Exiting the European Union

Alex Cunningham Excerpts

Tuesday 24th November 2020 Commons Chamber

[Lucy Powell]

Absolutely. My right hon. Friend makes an excellent point, and that is why this debate is so important. It coincides with worrying rumours—I hear that they are rumours, but rumours can cause a great deal of worry—about the future of the Nissan car plant in Sunderland.

[Alex Cunningham (Stockton North) (Lab)]

The shadow Minister took the words from my lips. Nissan is in the north-east, and although we are 30 miles away, businesses in my constituency and throughout Teesside rely on it to buy their products. Within the last few days we have heard Nissan say that if we do not get a good enough deal, it will be off. That must be a terrible blow to any region, but to the north-east, where unemployment is nearly double the national average, it simply does not wash.

[Lucy Powell]

My hon. Friend makes an excellent point, and those are the real risks that we currently face. There is real uncertainty around the deal. Many of the previous commitments made are now undermined, and that will have a devastating impact on particular sectors, such as the automotive industry and the aerospace industry—perhaps my hon. Friend the Member for City of Chester (Christian Matheson) wants to come in on that. Both those sectors are particularly powerful when it comes to the so-called levelling-up agenda, and I worry about that.

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[Lucy Powell]

Absolutely. This agenda could not come at a more critical time, because these same sectors and industries have been left on their knees as a result of covid-19. They just cannot cope with all these things coming at once.

[Alex Cunningham]

My hon. Friend will realise that businesses from Nissan to the chemicals industry on Teesside rely on a just-in-time supply chain. They need things to be crossing borders almost daily in order to complete the process of manufacturing goods. If there is any further delay in that process, some of these companies will say, “Well, we may as well manufacture in Spain.”

[Lucy Powell]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right. That is one of the reasons we wanted to support this statutory instrument today. Businesses have no resilience left anymore. Any money or time that they set aside for end-of-transition preparations and so on has all disappeared because of the coronavirus pandemic and the ensuing economic crisis.

It is important to remind the House of the things that the Prime Minister promised as the negotiations with Brussels enter their endgame, because I really am not sure that the results are going to match the initial promise that we were given at the election last year. A deal that fails to deliver on the commitments made in the political declaration and to the British people at the general election risks making life considerably harder for jobs, businesses and communities already grappling with the economic challenges of covid-19, as so many Members have already raised.

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[Lucy Powell]

Thank you very much, Madam Deputy Speaker. Of course, my hon. Friend the Member for Rhondda (Chris Bryant) is very good at writing books. He has one out—I think for Christmas, actually—at the moment, but the book that we are all waiting for is his diaries. I am not sure when they will be published, but maybe they will be a Christmas bumper when they do.

 As the Minister said briefly in her opening remarks, this statutory instrument will end the application in the UK of the rights derived from articles 34 to 36 of the treaty on the functioning of the European Union. The removal of these provisions will ensure that there is no barrier to divergence from EU rules should the Government choose to diverge. As the memorandum that accompanies the statutory instrument sets out, the Government plan for the UK to have its own regulatory regime for goods after the end of the implementation period.

[Alex Cunningham]

One of the things that will be covered by that regime is the movement of food, which does not just go from this country to Europe but comes in the opposite direction as well. Many businesses in this country are extremely worried that food for which there might be a lead time of three weeks could end up sitting on the docks for hours on end if we do not get the agreement that we need.

[Lucy Powell]

My hon. Friend makes an important point. I hope the Minister has taken note of that and that we can hear about it when she responds, because it is especially important at this time of year—not to keep on with the Christmas puns, Madam Deputy Speaker.

If the Minister is allowed to, will she update us on what the EU-UK trade regime will look like and what rights and protections will be in place at the end of the implementation period? When will we get the details? More importantly, will businesses have plenty of time to prepare for the regime’s implementation? Ministers have repeatedly said that in many policy areas the rights and protections that we have enjoyed inside the EU will be maintained and improved on when we are outside the EU. Will the Minister set out where she thinks we might diverge from EU standards and requirements in future? How will she ensure that divergence benefits British businesses, instead of putting in place new barriers to trade that could cost them dear?

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[Lucy Powell]

My hon. Friend makes a powerful point. Perhaps next time he goes on a delegation there he can see whether I want to join them, as the shadow business Minister. It sounds like a good trip, and I am partial to a bit of calamari, so I would enjoy that.

This statutory instrument relates not just to UK-EU trade, but to the requirement for a new framework for UK-wide trade, as we have been debating through the United Kingdom Internal Market Bill—now in the other place—because current treaty provisions also govern trade in goods across the UK. Will the Minister update us on where these issues are now up to, as we need to know before stripping away all the trade regulations that currently apply across the UK? As has been raised, any divergence needs to be agreed with the devolved Administrations, and that is why we are hoping that common standards for trading agreements will be agreed via the common frameworks put on a statutory basis. Ministers herald this approach yet refuse to put them on a statutory footing. There have been many long discussions on this in the Chamber and in the other place. The Government recently lost votes on this aspect of the internal market Bill, so we are hoping that the Government will accept these amendments when they return. Can the Minister confirm that?

[Alex Cunningham]

My hon. Friend posed the question of where there is likely to be divergence. We know already that there has been divergence on food standards, paving the way for importing chlorinated chicken, hormone-fed beef and all manner of things. Those goods are going to end up in the stomachs of the poor people—the people on low incomes—in my constituency and in my hon. Friend’s. Does she not agree that we need to tighten this up and make sure that all our people are protected with proper standards and proper regulations?

[Lucy Powell]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right. That is why it is such an important issue, and we really are hoping and expecting that the Minister will confirm today that the Government will accept the amendments on this that were passed in the other place, because it is about how we as a country are coming to an agreement about standards. I am sure that these issues will be raised later in the debate.

The Government must respect the devolution settlement and work collaboratively, in good faith, with the devolved Administrations to build that strong and thriving internal market with common standards underpinning it. Not doing so would threaten our precious Union by putting rocket boosters under the campaign for independence in Scotland. I know that the Prime Minister is very keen to talk about Christmas at the moment, but he seems to be giving the Scottish First Minister all her Christmases at once by his constant undermining of devolution recently. He seems to have made another blunder on that recently, propelling her campaign for Scottish independence by, as I said, putting rocket boosters under it.

On that point, I wonder whether the Minister would also explain to us the status of this statutory instrument. It is my understanding that her colleague, the Under-Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, the hon. Member for Stratford-on-Avon (Nadhim Zahawi), wrote to his counterparts in the devolved Administrations to seek their consent for him to lay this statutory instrument, which she is taking on his behalf, as some goods potentially affected by this instrument fall under devolved competence. I understand that consent has been received from the Welsh Government, but not yet from the Scottish Government—I do not know whether the hon. SNP spokesman wants to come in on this. I am not sure whether we can lay and agree to this statutory instrument today on that basis. What happens if the Scottish Government do not consent to it but Parliament already has? I do not know whether anyone knows the answer to that or if the Minister wants to rise to clarify that.

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[John Redwood]

Of course I hope we can do things to help the Falkland Islands, as we have over many years. They are clearly part of our family, and blood and treasure have been shed to ensure that they are part of our family, so I above all think that we should do all we can.

From 1 January, we in this House can do the things that are in the power of an independent country. We cannot instruct the EU when we are out of it any more than we could when we were in it. There have been a glittering array of failed issues that we put to the EU on which it did not sympathise with us. We had a series of Governments who were so broken backed that they only ever accepted things that the EU wanted to do and did not try to do anything that we wanted to do, which is why it got so frustrating as a member of that body.

It is about taking back control, and I urge everyone here to be more optimistic about the powers of this House. What is the point of someone being a Member of Parliament if they do not believe that they can improve on anything in the inherited corpus of EU law? Why do the Opposition, on the whole, say, “Everything EU perfect, everything generated in this country rubbish”? It is not plausible, and it is against the spirit of the Brexit majority in this country. They want us to get a grip and do better. If we do not do better, they will change us. That is the joy of Brexit—they, at last, will get back control over us. If the law went wrong in the European Union, it did not matter who was in the Government. Even if they threw the Government out, nothing changed, because the EU would not change the law, whereas if we get the laws wrong, the public will know what to do—they can throw Ministers out.

[Alex Cunningham]

Will the right hon. Member give way?

[John Redwood]

I am not giving way, because I have a couple of points to make, and I am conscious that many Members wish to make speeches.

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[Alan Brown]

I wholeheartedly agree. The shadow Minister used the phrase “rocket boosters” under the argument for independence, and I hope we do have these rocket boosters in place and getting fired up right now.

[Alex Cunningham]

Despite the fact that we share nationality, we do not share that particular ambition for separation. Some things about that worry me a lot if Scotland does eventually go independent. One is, do I get a passport? But more important than that, will I still get my supply? Will the divergences be in place for me to get my square sausage, my Scottish black pudding, my sliced sausage and, of course, my supply of Talisker?

[Alan Brown]

I will need to catch up with the hon. Gentleman in better surroundings, and we can share a sausage and Talisker, but of course he makes a serious point. In actual fact, the devolved nations want a common framework for agreeing how goods move about. To be honest, if we get our wish of independence, we are going to operate that way as well. We want to work with the other nations, and that is really important. But the way this UK Government are going about it, they want to impose their will on the different devolved nations, and it is like it or lump it. Hopefully, we can toast a wee dram to independence and we will discover we will still be friends after that as well, even though we do not share the same aims at the moment.

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[Alan Brown]

Yes, so we all share the same good taste in food then.

I agree with the point my hon. Friend made. Following up his earlier point about the contribution from the other Benches, I actually thought, “Oh my goodness, I’m going to have to listen to another 15 Conservative MPs tell me how great Brexit is going to be, how they are taking back control, how this is just another step in the way of taking back control and there’ll be wonderful trade deals.” So in one way there is a blessing: I do not have to listen to 15 speeches the same. But in another way, it is disappointing that they have not turned up here to actually do their job and actually say what they wanted to say. That is disappointing.

[Alex Cunningham]

The right hon. Member for Wokingham (John Redwood) actually talked about taking back control, but he talked about Parliament taking back control, yet we are seeing statutory instrument after statutory instrument giving more power to the Executive. Is that really Parliament taking back control?

[Alan Brown]

I agree absolutely 100%. Again, if Parliament was taking back control, we would expect parliamentarians in here doing their job debating it. But not only have the Executive taken more power, but we know there is more power invested in unelected bureaucrats who were advising the Prime Minister. I am sure nobody is shedding a tear that Dominic Cummings has actually left, but there is too much power in unelected bureaucrats behind the scene. It is double ironic when Brexiteers come here and talk about taking back control, and the Government were in hock to unelected officials.

We do have to wonder what divergences are planned by the UK Government, but also how these divergences are going to be managed. What is the process going to be? Will there be proper impact assessments undertaken, and will there be complete transparency on divergences that are proposed and what that means for businesses? How will we ensure that there are no unintended consequences by diverging in one area, which might affect more businesses adversely by stopping the export of their goods or preventing vital imports coming in? Those vital imports might prop up the supply chain of the key industries mentioned earlier, such as aerospace and automotive, because we rely on an EU-wide supply chain, with goods in the supply chain going backwards and forwards two or three times sometimes to create a finished product.