Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership

Angus Brendan MacNeil Excerpts

Thursday 24th June 2021 Commons Chamber

[Angus Brendan MacNeil (Na h-Eileanan an Iar) (SNP)]

Tapadh leibh, Madam Deputy Speaker.

I also thank the Secretary of State for the debate. It is good to see the right hon. Member for North Somerset (Dr Fox), the former Secretary of State, in his place. The International Trade Committee had many interactions with him in his old role.

Dominic Cummings was right, or at least partially right, in some of his utterances this week. In particular, he was correct when he said that politicians have been obsessed with trade deals that are not that significant when it comes to economic growth and drawing lines on maps. I am not sure what other howitzers he will be sending the way of the UK Government, but I do not think that will be the last.

When we come to trade deals, trade, the issue of Brexit and the comprehensive and progressive agreement for trans-Pacific partnership, the important things are numbers. When we look beyond the flowery language, we see that even the Government’s own figures show we are talking about 0.08% of GDP—that is £1.8 billion. We have to take that in the context of Brexit, which is a 4.9% damage event to the UK economy. It is like saying, “I had £4.90 and I threw it over my shoulder, and now I’m scrabbling around on the other side of the world for 8p”. That is the ratio difference we are talking about. The Australian deal is worth 2p, and an American deal would be worth 20p. A New Zealand deal might give us another penny and the Canadian deal is worth about 3p, so all in all, we have thrown away about £4.90 and are hoping to get back, with what I have talked about there, 30-odd pence.

[Emily Thornberry]

The points that the hon. Gentleman is making are very important, and Government Members ought to listen to them carefully. Quite a lot has been made of the statistic of a 65% increase in trade projected for this region by 2030, but on close examination of the document, is it not right that that projected increase in trade is one that Government figures show would happen irrespective of whether the UK joins the CPTPP?

[Angus Brendan MacNeil]

The right hon. Lady makes that point in her own way, and I do not want to go into it too much given that the clock is still ticking.

The comprehensive and progressive agreement for trans-Pacific partnership is not actually as comprehensive as it seems. Only seven out of the 11 countries have actually ratified it. Malaysia, Chile, Peru and Brunei have not. When we take out their GDP contributions, the figure goes down to 0.5% of GDP, or 5p that is available from the CPTPP to recover the £4.90 that has been lost by Brexit.

That is as far as we can go with the good news. I am now going to have to give the House some bad news. This morning, Neale Richmond, the Irish TD, who is never off our screens and is a fantastic representative of Ireland, brought to my attention in a tweet that the Republic of Ireland now has, for the first time ever, a trade surplus with the UK, as UK exports to the Republic of Ireland are down 47.6%. That is £2 billion of trade gone. Remember that the UK was talking about a £1.8 billion increase from the CPTPP. With Ireland alone, the damage of Brexit has wiped out what could be gained from the CPTPP.

There may be some good news in Ireland, depending on people’s constitutional stance. North-south exports are certainly up and are making for a far more integrated economy, with a 22.4% increase in exports to Northern Ireland from the Republic and a 44.2% increase in imports to the Republic from the north. That is against the background that my hon. Friend the Member for Inverness, Nairn, Badenoch and Strathspey (Drew Hendry) pointed out of the 33% fall in trade that has been truly damaging the economy. The Secretary of State said earlier that we were putting our eggs in one trade basket. It looks as though we do not have any eggs in any trade basket, the way it is going at the moment. Certainly, from my talks with the British Egg Industry Council and the British Poultry Council, it is very much a real-life chicken-and-egg situation as to which way this is going.

I also want to point out some privacy issues. I have had correspondence from constituents that I want to bring to the Government’s attention, and I am sure that they know what I am talking about—making sure that people’s data is actually safe and is not traded around to second, third and fourth parties in a global context.

I also want to raise the issue of patent attorneys. UK patent attorneys are a fifth of the number of patent attorneys in the European patent convention, and they do a third of the work at a value of about £746 million. Let us take that away from what is left of the CPTPP—the 0.5%, or £1.1 billion. If this damages the UK patent attorneys’ relationship with the European patent convention, it would just about negate everything from the CPTPP, and there is a very real possibility that this could happen. UK patent attorneys are flagging this up constantly. The Government should be well aware that we are now talking about not a 0.8% or a 0.5% gain from GDP, but perhaps only a 0.2% gain. So we are down to 2p after throwing away the £4.90 that I referred to earlier.

What are we left with? We have thrown away £2 billion with Ireland, and might gain a few hundred million with the CPTPP. We are risking our farming and crofting trade with Australia and much else. We have walked away from our partners next door, as my hon. Friend pointed out. It might be strategic, but what do we say to people who are losing their jobs and to the businesses that do not grow because of this economic damage? I do not think the Government have an answer. This appears to be a Government wanting to come back waving bits of paper, much like Neville Chamberlain, and shouting “Trade deals in our time”. It is not good enough for anybody who is trying to make a living up and down the nations of the current UK.

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Dame Eleanor Laing)]

With a time limit of three minutes, I call Craig Williams.

[Craig Williams (Montgomeryshire) (Con)]

I shall speak ever quicker, Madam Deputy Speaker.

It is a great pleasure to follow the Chairman of the International Trade Committee, the hon. Member for Na h-Eileanan an Iar (Angus Brendan MacNeil). I serve on that Committee and I look forward to scrutinising the detail of this, both in private and in public sessions, with him. It is also a great pleasure to follow my right hon. Friend the Member for North Somerset (Dr Fox), who set out his vision and made some important points, which Members on both sides of this Chamber should reflect on, about the developing world and how we can help it through trade and liberalisation. His point struck home about how hollow the international aid debate is when we do not help our partners and fellow democracies around the world on the back of trade.

It is important again to look at the strategic context for this CPTPP. I am proud to have got that out in one go, as I have been practising—the International Trade Committee helps with that. The context is a £9 trillion market. In 2030, it will represent 65% of the middle-class consumers of the world, in places where meat consumption and meat imports are going up, which is important for a rural constituency such as mine. The demand for the fifth quarter—I will not go into details about that part of the carcass, which we do not consume and do not want in this country—is over there.

I am struck by the fact that this partnership will be good for the premium products that the farmers in my constituency produce—the dairy, Welsh lamb and beef. The demand and consumption is increasing in the part of the world we are talking about, not decreasing as it is in the European markets, and that is where we need this country to be. This is where I would like Ministers, including my right hon. Friend the Minister for Trade Policy, who will be responding to this debate, to be focusing for our agricultural communities. It is worth again stressing the strategic context of this deal; these are the growing markets where we want to be sat around the table. This is where I want Welsh lamb to be promoted very vigorously by Her Majesty’s Government. This is where we want Scottish whisky to be promoted and sold. This is the access we want.

[Angus Brendan MacNeil]

Scottish lamb.

[Craig Williams]

I will discuss that with the Chairman in many debates, no doubt. However, my last 30 seconds are coming to an end, so all I will do is wish the Front-Bench team well in progressing this partnership. My Welsh farmers want access to this market. I wish him well in scrutinising it as it goes forward.

--- Later in debate ---

[Aaron Bell (Newcastle-under-Lyme) (Con)]

It is a pleasure to follow the hon. Member for Upper Bann (Carla Lockhart). Five years ago yesterday, I voted to leave the European Union. Newcastle-under-Lyme voted to leave the European Union, and so did the whole of Britain, so eventually we did, no thanks to some Opposition Members. It was never about retreating into an island fortress, as some people like to suggest, and it was never about retreating from free trade. In fact, as the famous Spectator cover had it, for many of us it was about getting out and then into the world.

CPTPP is the sort of organisation that British people thought they were joining in 1973 and that they voted to join in 1975: the common market, as it was back then, where countries enforced their own laws, but there was not enforced harmonisation. Unlike the EU, by joining the CPTPP—I hope we will do, and I welcome what the Secretary of State said in her speech about the progress we are making—we will retain control of our borders, our money and our laws, and we will secure the growing opportunities, including: increased trade and investment opportunities; the opportunity to diversify our trading links and our supply chains to increase our domestic security, especially in the wake of what we have seen with the pandemic and other threats around the world; and, the opportunity to turn the UK into a global hub for free trade. That is a vision I hope we can all get behind.

[Angus Brendan MacNeil]

The hon. Gentleman is talking about free trade. I mentioned in my speech the damage to trade with neighbours in Ireland, for instance, but we used to trade very freely—with no paperwork, no hurdles and no hassle—with the 27 other member states of the European Union. How many countries across the world can we now trade with in the same way?

[Aaron Bell]

I thank the hon. Gentleman for making that point. I think he would accept the point that I have made that exiting the EU was not about wanting to retreat from free trade. I would rather we had been able to get a better deal with the European Union, but it was not interested. A lot of the time, it seemed that the EU wanted to punish us for Brexit to put other people off from doing the same. I am afraid it was aided and abetted by Opposition Members who met the EU when we were negotiating, so I will not take any lessons from the Opposition today about negotiating this agreement.

As the Secretary of State said, some of the richest opportunities will come from the Asia-Pacific area, with £9 trillion-worth of a growing middle class for our exporters. These include exporters in Staffordshire and Newcastle-under-Lyme such as global British icons like JCB, companies in my constituency like Doulton, which sells water filters to the growing markets in developing countries, and niche smaller start-up companies like the Staffordshire Gin Company. We have heard a lot about whisky today; let us talk about gin. The Staffordshire Gin Company is already exporting to Singapore. and this trade deal will reduce its tariffs. I invite the Minister and the Secretary of State to come up with me for some quality assurance of the Staffordshire Gin Company’s products. I am sure we could have a very good session there.

But I do not just want to talk about the benefits for our exporters and our producers, because, as my right hon. Friend the Member for North Somerset (Dr Fox) said so eloquently, free trade is a win-win, but the true benefit is to consumers. Companies and producers are not there for consumers to service; they are there to service the consumers. It should be up to people to make their own choices to have lower prices, whether the goods are supplied from Newcastle or New Zealand. That is the true prize of free trade—the true sense of comparison of markets and also the benefits for developing countries that he and my hon. Friend the Member for Montgomeryshire (Craig Williams) spoke about. We must not lose sight of the benefits to consumers. They may be more diffuse—perhaps a few pence off the weekly shop—but that adds up in a community like Newcastle-under-Lyme. That is the real, true benefit of this. We should obviously focus on the benefits for our exporters and the potential jobs that will be supported, but whenever we talk about free trade we must not lose sight of the real reason for it, and that is to make people’s lives better—consumers both at home and abroad.

Free Trade Agreement Negotiations: Australia

Angus Brendan MacNeil Excerpts

Thursday 17th June 2021 Commons Chamber

[Mr Speaker]

Let us go to the Chair of the Select Committee, Angus Brendan MacNeil.

[Angus Brendan MacNeil (Na h-Eileanan an Iar) (SNP) [V]]

Tapadh leat, Mr Speaker. Some are saying that Australia has never before had such good luck in a trade negotiation and are wondering how this would have been different had the UK not been at the table. They suspect that Canberra is running out of champagne.

The reality is that in year one of the deal, UK farmers face the arrival from Australia of more quantities of beef, sugar, lamb, cheese and other dairy products than ever arrived in any year from the EU. To make up for the Brexit damage, we would need 245 such deals, which are very risky to farming. There is a feeling of unseemly haste with this deal. Incidentally, the EU would not create such risks for its farmers. With all that in mind, and given the need for scrutiny, will the International Trade Secretary appear before our Select Committee in the next week to 10 days so that we can have a good to and fro and investigate the issues before she signs the deal and Australia has her in handcuffs?

[Elizabeth Truss]

It is interesting that the Chairman of the Select Committee accuses me of haste. It is true that the EU is in the fourth year of its negotiations with Australia, just as it takes a very long time to negotiate any deal with any party. Fundamentally, the EU’s instincts are not to open up its markets. That has cost British business over the years, because we have not had access to Australian and Pacific markets on the same terms as others.

I assure the hon. Gentleman that I will appear in front of his Committee to answer questions prior to the signing. I am very happy to give him any kind of briefing. As he knows, he will get a copy of the signed trade agreement before anyone else—[Interruption.] I am afraid I cannot understand the hon. Gentleman’s gesticulations, because there is no sound. I think he is very happy that I will appear before the Committee—that is the message I am receiving.

As I have already said to the right hon. Member for Islington South and Finsbury (Emily Thornberry), in none of the 15 years of the transition period for beef and lamb access is the amount higher than that we currently import from the EU. It is extraordinary that the Labour party is happy with a zero tariff, zero quota deal with a landmass that is much closer to the UK, but afraid of a country that is 9,000 miles away. It seems to be one rule for its friends in the EU, and another rule for everybody else.

Oral Answers to Questions

Angus Brendan MacNeil Excerpts

Thursday 10th June 2021 Commons Chamber

[Mr Speaker]

Let us go to the Chair of the International Development Committee.

[Angus Brendan MacNeil (Na h-Eileanan an Iar) (SNP) [V]]

Happy birthday from Na h-Eileanan an Iar, Mr Speaker.

The point of trade deals is economic growth, but as the Secretary of State well knows, the trade deals with the US, Canada and New Zealand will make up only about 4% of the Brexit damage. However, signing a Swiss-style sanitary and phytosanitary agreement could achieve greater economic growth, would not threaten farming as the Australian trade deal does, would sort out the Northern Ireland protocol sausage situation and would prevent the Prime Minister from getting spoken to like a naughty schoolboy by the President of the United States. Given those four advantages, has she considered lifting her pen and signing a Swiss-style SPS agreement to make things a whole lot better on a number of fronts?

[Elizabeth Truss]

My colleague Lord Frost is clear that we need to see pragmatism from the EU to resolve this issue. The hon. Gentleman does not seem to acknowledge that the parts of the world where we are striking deals, whether Asia-Pacific with the comprehensive and progressive agreement for trans-Pacific partnership or countries such as India and those in the Gulf, are the fast-growing parts of the world. He is living in a static past; we are living in a dynamic future.

CPTPP

Angus Brendan MacNeil Excerpts

Wednesday 21st April 2021 Westminster Hall

[Angus Brendan MacNeil (Na h-Eileanan an Iar) (SNP)[V]]

It is a great pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Hollobone. As I listened to you I was promising myself I would most definitely be finished by 10.22, but now I can see that I will have to finish four and a half minutes from now. I take on board your strictures, indeed.

I congratulate the hon. Member for Wycombe (Mr Baker) on obtaining the debate, which is timely. The International Trade Committee, which I chair, is looking at the CPTPP in the international trade arena. I do not know whether there are interventions in Westminster Hall, but if anyone is willing to give it a go we can show the powers that be in the main Chamber that it can be done. I do not think that we are bold enough to do that virtually yet, but it is a possibility that I mention in passing. I will not speak for long at all, Mr Hollobone, so you can relax.

If the debate is about the economy, we have yet to see assessments being done in relation to GDP. Much is made, in prose and flowery language, of trade deals for the UK in the light of the damage of Brexit, but very little is done in numbers. Numbers inform debates that should be about business and the economy. We know that Brexit means forgoing about 4.9% of GDP—these are the Government’s own figures—yet we have had no deals to make up for this damage being done to the economy. None of the trade deals that have been signed have been new; they have all been roll-over deals. The best, probably newest-ish, deal is the Japanese deal, but of course this comprehensive economic partnership agreement has only replaced the EU’s economic partnership agreement with Japan. That will grow GDP by 0.07%, according to the Government—about a 70th of the Brexit damage that is coming—but it is actually not that because it is a replacement deal, so the GDP gain is effectively zero. That should be borne in mind.

It should also be understood what trade deals do. The best of the trade deals that the UK can get, with the United States of America, will grow GDP by about 0.2%. That is 24.5 times smaller than the Brexit damage, so we would need about 24 such trade deals to make up for that damage. Unfortunately, with the USA accounting for a quarter of the world’s GDP, to get 24 of those kind of deals we would need to go and strike trade agreements on about six and a half planets populated with Americans and to which we can drive lorries. That is not really possible.

We have to understand the numbers behind this. There is no assessment of CPTPP. When an assessment is done, it should not include Japan, because a deal with Japan has already been landed; we cannot land the same fish several times. It is with a lot of other, smaller economies—Brunei, Canada, Chile, Malaysia, Mexico, New Zealand, Peru, Singapore and Vietnam. Excluding Japan, that deal is probably approaching the level of about half the America deal, or about 0.1% of GDP; it may be a little more. If I say that the 4.9% GDP loss of the Brexit deal is £4.90, for ease of understanding, the America deal, which is worth 0.2% of GDP, would be worth 20p, the Australian deal would be worth 2p and the New Zealand deal would be worth 1p. There are very little gains to be made. That must be understood.

Distance is an important factor as well. With Ireland, the UK imports £12.4 billion of goods and exports £17.8 billion, roughly. It has a trade surplus with Ireland. With China—I use this for illustrative purposes—we import £49 billion of goods and export £30 billion. The numbers are sort of in the same ballpark, give or take £10 billion. China is 300 times larger than Ireland, but it is further away, and distance is important, as we know. The Pacific ocean, while being greatly big, is not really that close to our doorstep. Trade for people who sell, say, shellfish on lorries to the European continent is not eased with the Pacific being so far away; it does not allow for a weekly rotation of lorries.

The hon. Member for Wycombe mentioned visas. That could be changed now by the UK Government. Many a time have I pleaded with various Immigration Ministers to allow fishermen to come to help our economy, but for reasons of headlines in tawdry newpapers, they have resisted. We have seen a loss to our economy as a result.

We need to see what CPTPP can do and which supply chains will benefit from the loss of tariffs. We must also remember that CPTPP will be similar to the new deal with the European Union. It is only free trade. As with each and every other trade deal, there will be paperwork and hassle for anybody trading under the deal. In north America, some people just pay the tariff rather than trade under a deal, because things can be so difficult.

My final words, because I am aware of your strictures, Mr Hollobone, are that we need to see the assessment of CPTPP. It is nice to have the flowery language and the prose and the good intentions and whatever in the world, but it is numbers that talk. We need the bottom line. When we have just decided to burn 4.9% of GDP and have recovered none of it in return, the numbers for CPTPP—unfortunately; I would love to be a bit more positive about this—just do not stack up very far. Given that the Government have not produced assessments of that yet, I am betting that these are in the tenths of a per cent—about a fraction of the damage of Brexit unfortunately. We must be honest and frank with ourselves. I hope I did not take too much of the time and it is a great pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Hollobone.

Oral Answers to Questions

Angus Brendan MacNeil Excerpts

Thursday 15th April 2021 Commons Chamber

[Elizabeth Truss]

We are extremely committed to the Good Friday agreement and have had frequent discussions with the Biden Administration. I am having very positive discussions with my counterpart Katherine Tai about resolving the Airbus-Boeing dispute—which has been going on for 16 years—to the benefit of the Scotch whisky industry, other industries throughout the UK and industries such as aerospace, in which we need Airbus to be able to compete.

[Angus Brendan MacNeil (Na h-Eileanan an Iar) (SNP) [V]]

Madainn mhath, Mr Speaker.

The digital-service-tax threats from the USA show that the Biden Administration value their special relationship with big tech more than the one with the UK. The threat to the tax sovereignty of the UK and a number of other countries indicates that there is not really a relationship of equals. Is not the prospect of a trade deal with the USA pretty dead? In any case, the 0.2% of GDP that such a deal was going to recover was only a fraction of the damage done by Brexit. Has the Secretary of State accepted that fact yet?

[Elizabeth Truss]

We are urging the United States to desist from any more tit-for-tat tariffs disputes, including in respect of a digital services tax. We think that the best way to resolve the issue is through the process that the Chancellor is leading at the OECD. We are in further discussions with the United States not just to end the Airbus tariff dispute but to work with the United States at the G7 to challenge unfair practices in the global trading system by countries such as China.

Oral Answers to Questions

Angus Brendan MacNeil Excerpts

Thursday 25th February 2021 Commons Chamber

[Angus Brendan MacNeil (Na h-Eileanan an Iar) (SNP) [V]]

Mòran taing fawr, Mr Speaker. The UK Government have removed direct access to the EU market, damaging GDP for the UK by about 4.9%, and that is the area that 47% of UK exports go to. The Minister has not replaced that with any new markets at all; all the new deals have been merely rollovers of EU deals. So, forgetting all the flowery adjectives about trade deals, and she did talk about GDP, what do the numbers say about the gains to GDP from ASEAN trade deals? Also, does she have any numbers for CPTPP yet?

[Elizabeth Truss]

The Chairman of the Select Committee understands that a lot of the economies we are talking about are fast-growing. We want to be in a position, in 2030 to 2040, to make sure that the UK has deep relationships with some of the fastest-growing parts of the world, like CPTPP, the United States and places where our exports are currently growing faster than they are for the EU. I would also point out to him that it is Lord Frost and the Cabinet Office who are responsible for negotiating and working with the EU.

Trade Bill

Angus Brendan MacNeil Excerpts

Consideration of Lords amendments
Tuesday 9th February 2021 Commons Chamber

My second concern is with the reference in Lords amendment 1B to the consent of devolved Administrations to trade deals developed in a reserved area of policy, as opposed to the full consultation that is clearly appropriate. Other than that, I support that amendment and would have voted for it this afternoon, and I hope that the Government will move in its direction.

[Angus Brendan MacNeil (Na h-Eileanan an Iar) (SNP) [V]]

It is good to have this debate, although I am afraid it is a bit too short, as I think most Members would accept.

When it comes to trade deals, Parliament really needs to debate beforehand. One of the things we know from the little interaction we have had with negotiators is that it is much better for them to know what Parliament is thinking; it strengthens their hand in negotiations to understand what they might get through Parliament at the end of the day. That is hugely important. It is also important for them to hear the concerns of 650 people who represent the geographical area that the trade deal will be a huge, integral part of and will affect. I would caution that what happened before Christmas, with the rush of the European trade deal, is a lesson that Parliament should think and not rush.

There is, of course, within any Executive—any Government—a feeling that they do not want scrutiny, they do not want to discuss, and they do not want to pause, reflect and think again, but for the good of everyone concerned, they should do that. Parliament treats itself as a sausage factory; it gets things done and through, and that is the end of it. However, at the end of the day, as the shellfish exporters, the poultry exporters and many others in the UK know, once Parliament has washed its hands of it and walked away, other people have to deal with the text at hand. They cannot deal with that text very well if it has not been thought about, reflected upon or given due scrutiny.

In Parliament, we talk a lot about trade deals, but do we realise the GDP size we are talking about? That is something we can lay out beforehand. Leaving the European Union will cost the UK about 4.9% of GDP. The best of the upcoming trade deals that we are looking at will make only a fraction of that back—with New Zealand and Australia, probably about a fiftieth of it. Are people aware of that?

During the negotiations on the Japan trade deal, the International Trade Committee could not get access to the right level of negotiators. It was only at the end that we understood the pass we were sold on tariff rate quotas, where the UK accepted playing second fiddle to the European Union; after the European Union had dined with Japan, the UK could then perhaps go to the table for the crumbs. We were not aware of that at all during the negotiations. Parliament has to look a bit better. We have to trust our Select Committees, improve access, and have debate beforehand and afterwards. As for the point that Parliament has much power with the CRaG process, frankly, that is just not true.

The best the Government could do at this stage would be to adopt Lord Lansley’s amendment 1B. That would be a huge help from the point of view of the Select Committee and Parliament, and the Government should have the humility to do that.

[Dr Liam Fox (North Somerset) (Con)]

I wish to make only three brief points. First, the House of Commons is the appropriate place to scrutinise the elected Government’s independent trade policy. That is why I am against Lords amendment 1B, because it actually gives powers away from the House of Commons. The amendment requires the House of Lords to give its permission for the elected Government to even have discussions on our future trade policy. I cannot believe that the Labour party’s position is to give the House of Lords a veto on what an elected Government in the House of Commons should or should not be able to do. I wonder sometimes whether this House is having some sort of collective democratic nervous breakdown, because it seems always to want to give its powers away to someone else.

As I said last time, I do not believe that the courts should have a say on the elected Government’s trade policy, either—whether prospectively or retrospectively—or on what we debate in Parliament. When it comes to the issue of genocide, what matters is what we do about credible accusations of genocide. We should not be waiting for judicial confirmation through the Trade Bill. We can assess evidence, assess intelligence and listen to eyewitnesses ourselves. Frankly, if we want to take action in response to the Chinese Communist party’s treatment of the Uyghur people, we should do so. We have given ourselves new powers. But the Trade Bill is not the appropriate place to deal with that issue.

On the impact, we are talking not about stopping trade with China or stopping companies doing trade deals with suppliers in China—the use of sloppy language that fails to differentiate between trade deals and free trade agreements, which are a different legal entity entirely, does not help the quality of the debate—but we do have a perfect right to take into account any state’s behaviour when it comes to a future free trade agreement, and our ability to do so is limited. I campaigned to leave the European Union because I wanted powers brought back from Brussels, but I wanted them brought back to this place, not given straight back to the Executive to exercise them on our behalf. When I was Secretary of State, I wanted to see Parliament given a vote on new trade agreements, as the previous Speaker would have attested. I still believe that that is most appropriate at the beginning, at the setting of the mandate, because if Parliament can agree then on the direction of travel, we are less likely to have the sort of misinformation that we had on the transatlantic trade and investment partnership and the ridiculous scare stories that we heard from the SNP spokesman today. If we do not have the ability to vote at the beginning of the mandate, it makes the CRaG process less credible.

The Government are making a rod for their own back. Today we have an opportunity to give power back to the House of Commons—not the House of Lords, not the courts, not the Executive. We should show a little bit of courage and faith in our own institution.

Trade Bill

Angus Brendan MacNeil Excerpts

Consideration of Lords amendments & Ping Pong & Ping Pong: House of Commons
Tuesday 19th January 2021 Commons Chamber

We recently voted to take back control of our laws, our borders and our money. This is about taking back control of our laws and, indeed, our conscience. It is about reminding ourselves that when a people is under oppression so that their very existence is threatened, we have a duty and a responsibility to stand up. So I will be standing with the Muslim community around the world—Ummah Islamiyyah—and the Jewish community around the world, as well as with many, many people across the United Kingdom and across the world who are seeing the abuses that we are seeing, sadly, in western China and reminding ourselves that that crime does not just fall on the heads of the victims, but threatens us all. It is therefore genuinely a crime against humanity that cries out for justice in any court, but particularly, in a British court.

[Angus Brendan MacNeil (Na h-Eileanan an Iar) (SNP) [V]]

Feasgar math, Mr Deputy Speaker, and thank you very much for calling me at this stage of the Bill. I am speaking from the island of Barra in Scotland, which has just been included in tier 4 with the mainland. That is one of the reasons why I have not been travelling and why this is the first time I will speak in any stage of the Trade Bill. I am grateful that we are back to a virtual Parliament, which should have been happening long ago.

I would like to mention a couple of things before I get to the meat of this. A lot of constituents, and people who are not constituents, have been getting in touch about the NHS. I did hear the Minister say that the NHS would not be on the table and I hope that that includes the back door and every other side angle into the NHS. Food standards concern an awful lot of people. Over a quarter of a million emails were sent to MPs in the last year on food standards, so we should be very aware of that, as indeed we should be of standards in agriculture and general trade. The role of Parliament in scrutinising deals comes up a lot in correspondence, so I will raise that, too. ActionAid has pointed out, very valuably, that the fallout from covid-19 has shone a new light on the disproportionate impact of trade policies on women and girls, who comprise the majority of unpaid carers. It has had a particular impact on women and girls in the global south and has affected the work of women in trade. When trade is considered, we should think of all of humanity, and particularly the half of us who are of a different gender.

Scrutiny is indeed a very good thing. Let us think about this. With a lack of scrutiny, which Brexiteer thought that they were making the EU bureaucrat king over the UK’s export trade? But that is what has happened, as the shellfish guys and girls, and other exporters, will tell us. Much to the frustration of many in the shellfish sector, we have the EU bureaucrat with the clipboard, demanding five or six more bits of paper before things can move, where once they moved freely. And it is not just them, but exporters in general. From July, they will met by not just the EU bureaucrat, but another set of bureaucrats coming in as quasi-monarchs—the bureaucrats of the UK—and importers will be hit as well. The lack of scrutiny was probably one of the reasons that it came as a late dawn for many that the UK trade bloc is now smaller than the UK—quite an achievement for Brexit.

We move towards scrutiny in a bit more depth in amendment 5. My Committee had difficulty with the Japan agreement because of the time we had at the end for scrutiny and the experts we could share it with. I would have raised this concern earlier in Parliament had I been able to, but of course then there was no virtual Parliament. The access we had to negotiators was very interesting. We usually got the debonair, bland kind of guys at the top when we wanted the guys at the coalface who were negotiating during the trade deal—but that did not happen. Information we got during the briefings did not bear much relation to the matters that came up at the end, such as UK negotiators setting the principle of playing second fiddle to the EU when it came to tariff rate quotas in relation to Japan.

The UK boasts that it is doing 63 more trade deals. What it is doing is rolling over trade deals, and it is not actually getting any GDP increase from that. It is worth considering the numbers, because in the flowery language that is often thrown around on this, the numbers talk most. The cost of Brexit at the moment is 4.9% of UK GDP; it is costly. No trade deal that the UK has made or signed so far is recovering this 4.9% damage. The Japan trade deal was touted as being a 0.07% gain. To put this in context so that people understand, let us call that £4.90. The Japan trade deal was reported as giving us back 7p of that damage, but in fact it was not, because the UK was already trading under the trade deal that the EU had with Japan, so the net gain was, in effect, zero. The UK Government had not done the numbers comparison between the two, which was disappointing. Again, the need for scrutiny is large.

When it comes to the best trade deal we can get—the American trade deal—that is only going to give the UK about a 20p increase on the £4.90, comparatively, that is lost. We need 24-and-a-half times such trade agreements to make up the damage. As America has a quarter of the world’s GDP, that effectively means finding seven or eight planets we can drive lorries to, or ship containers on boats to, to counteract the GDP damage that Brexit has done, so clearly it ain’t going to happen. The trade deals that we are doing need to be looked at responsibly and carefully. Incidentally, on the American side, the GDP gain for them is only 0.02%, or 2p. I am sure that the new Biden Administration will have bits of paper showing other priorities for greater economic growth, before a trade deal with the United Kingdom. Again, that scrutiny could have stopped us misleading ourselves.

On Amendment 3, I think everybody considers that to be the right thing. It is just that if the FTAs are suspended, do we then go back to trading on WTO rules, and when does that happen? Surely something stronger needs to be in place on that.

The best of all trade deals available is the one we have just walked away from. If the UK wants to increase GDP by 4.9%, there is the single market and the customs union, and that will help our shellfish guys as well. Tapadh leibh, Mr Deputy Speaker.

Oral Answers to Questions

Angus Brendan MacNeil Excerpts

Thursday 14th January 2021 Commons Chamber

[Mr Jayawardena]

The hon. Lady is right: there is, of course, more that can be done, which is why the United Kingdom has already committed £259 million to Brazil through its international climate finance programme to tackle deforestation. For example, the early movers programme rewards pioneers in forest conservation, and another programme led by the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs has protected the clearance of something like 430,000 acres in Brazil.

[Angus Brendan MacNeil (Na h-Eileanan an Iar) (SNP) [V]]

As we all know, Scotland opposed leaving the European Union, and leaving the European Union is going to cost the UK about 4.9% of GDP. Many are concerned that a trade deal with Brazil will be a threat to UK poultry and meat production. Will the Minister ensure that lower meat production standards do not get on the table in any way, shape or form? What is the GDP gain of a deal with Brazil? Do the Government have that figure, or is it similar to the Australia trade deal, which is projected to be 245 times smaller than the Brexit damage that the Tory Government have foisted upon the UK?

[Mr Jayawardena]

I thank the Chairman of the International Trade Committee for his question. I can be clear that we are firmly committed to upholding our high environmental, food safety and animal welfare standards now that we are outside the EU. Indeed, we have the agility and flexibility to enhance them where we believe that that is right. We can also go further on trade. That includes recently opening new opportunities for fish by securing approval from Brazil for seven new British fisheries facilities, which means that companies can now sell high-quality British fish to an import market that was worth almost £1 billion in 2019.

Oral Answers to Questions

Angus Brendan MacNeil Excerpts

Thursday 19th November 2020 Commons Chamber

[Mr Speaker]

Let us head to the Chair of the International Trade Committee up in Scotland, Angus Brendan MacNeil.

[Angus Brendan MacNeil (Na h-Eileanan an Iar) (SNP) [V]]

A very good morning to you, Mr Speaker, on the day you have been waiting for: the day of the first report on the UK-Japan comprehensive economic partnership agreement from my Committee. I am sure that you are looking forward to reading it. Indeed, we are hoping to have a debate in your Chamber, Sir, before the end of the Constitutional Reform and Governance Act process—just to let you know.

On food and farm standards, yesterday we heard from Tony Abbott, the former Australian Prime Minister and now adviser to the Board of Trade, who said that when he had an important deal to do with China, he took the state premiers of Australia with him. I wonder whether the Ministers at the Department for International Trade will consider doing the same for important trade agreements, taking the Welsh Minister, Jeremy Miles, the Northern Irish Minister, Diane Dodds, and the high-flying Scottish Minister, Ivan McKee, who might indeed be leader of the Scottish National party and First Minister one day. We need that to happen given that the UK Government are ready to burn particular sheep farming in Wales and Scotland by being outside the 45% tariffs. It is not just our standards, but the standards of our neighbours that are really going to matter for farming.

[Greg Hands]

I thank the Chairman of the Select Committee for that, and I look forward to reading his report. When it comes to the devolved Administrations, we all need to respect the devolution settlement, which is that trade policy is a reserved matter and the UK Government carry out their negotiations on behalf of the whole United Kingdom. It is also right, however, that we consult the devolved Administrations, which is why, since May, when I took over the role of interaction with the devolved Administrations in this Department, I have had six meetings with Minister Ivan McKee. We have the quarterly ministerial forum for trade. I have already described how NFU Scotland, two farming unions of Wales and the Ulster Farmers Union are on the Trade and Agriculture Commission. We also make sure that our trade advisory groups include representatives from the devolved Administrations. Our commitment is clear to negotiating the best possible deals for the whole United Kingdom, while making sure that voices from Scotland and the other devolved Administrations are very much included.