Scotland Bill

Debate between Angus Robertson and Bernard Jenkin

Monday 8th June 2015 Commons Chamber

[Angus Robertson]

No. I have given way very generously, both to Labour and to Tory Members, and I will now make some progress.

In addition to the points that have been raised thus far, the Smith recommendation for a power to create new benefits in devolved areas has not been adequately reflected in the Bill. Similarly, the ability to top up reserve benefits has been watered down. The Scottish Parliament would also be prevented from creating additional benefits to mitigate the impact of welfare sanctions and conditionality, which, as Members will know, are among the main causes of poverty. Their use has seen tens of thousands of people forced to rely on food banks, a scandal that should make Government Members hang their heads in shame. As the Devolution (Further Powers) Committee pointed out, the Bill contains unwarranted restrictions on the payment of carers’ benefits.

Secondly, on the constitution, the Bill as it stands fails adequately to guarantee the permanence of the Scottish Parliament. As the Devolution (Further Powers) Committee made clear, this Parliament should not be able to abolish Scotland’s Parliament against the wishes of the people. The consent of the Scottish Parliament and the Scottish people is a necessary addition to fulfil the Smith agreement’s promise of permanence.

Equally, as the Bill stands, the Sewel convention will not be translated effectively into law. It is not given full statutory footing in the Bill, as the Smith commission proposed. It is not good enough, as the Bill currently stands, simply to recognise the existence of the Sewel convention. The Bill’s clauses are vague and, as drafted, do not in fact require Scottish Parliament consent for UK Government legislation in devolved areas. That is not acceptable.

In the Committee stage, we will explore the gaps in the Bill more fully, but I will provide the House with one final example of its shortcomings in the area of employment. The Bill does not include the full range of employment support services currently delivered by the Department for Work and Pensions, contrary to both the letter and the spirit of paragraph 57 of the Smith agreement. That, too, needs to change.

[Mr Jenkin]

Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

[Angus Robertson]

I am still making progress.

These are matters of substance: shortcomings identified and agreed by all parties in the Scottish Parliament. The Scottish Government have helpfully provided new clauses to the Devolution (Further Powers) Committee on those and other gaps in the Bill—amendments that would deliver on the Smith agreement in full. Will the Secretary of State agree now to introduce them as Government amendments? If he cannot offer that guarantee, I am happy to confirm that the Scottish National party will do so, so that the Bill can be given these most basic and essential improvements during its Committee stage.

In that respect, I want to remind the Secretary of State of the Government’s stated policy with regard to England, as set out in the Queen’s Speech, and to replace the word “England” with “Scotland” to create what I hope can be a new principle for the passage of this Bill—perhaps we can call it the Mundell principle— as follows: “That decisions affecting Scotland can be taken only with the consent of the majority of Members of Parliament representing constituencies in that part of our United Kingdom”. That means that if the majority of Scottish Members of this House, representing the views of the Scottish Parliament, desire a change to the Bill that affects only Scotland, his Government must not and should not stand in our path.

The Scottish Parliament and Government have set out the steps that must be taken to ensure that this legislation delivers on the Smith agreement. The Bill is a response to the referendum, but we now need an adequate response to the general election and the clear mandate for more powers that was delivered. I agree with the words of the Scottish Council for Voluntary Organisations in its briefing to Members on the Scotland Bill:

“As it stands, the Scotland Bill fails to recognise the sea change of opinion in Scotland and the wish for further devolution.”

That failure must now be remedied. If the Government are unwilling to give the people of Scotland what they want, the SNP will table the necessary amendments.

The manifesto on which I and my colleagues were elected was one that secured the support of more votes in Scotland than the Conservatives, the Labour party and the Liberal Democrats combined. We have been clear on our priorities for more powers, stating that

“we will prioritise devolution of powers over employment policy, including the minimum wage, welfare, business taxes, national insurance and equality policy—the powers we need to create jobs, grow revenues and lift people out of poverty.”

Those priorities will be the focus of our amendments in Committee and on Report. I hope that the Government will accept such changes as reflecting the clearly expressed will of a majority of Scottish Members on issues that affect Scotland only.

With meaningful powers over working-age benefits, we can protect Scottish society from the ideological attacks on our welfare state being undertaken by this Government. With responsibility for a full range of economic levers, we can work to support the job creators in Scotland. We can do more to create the wealth and share it more fairly. We can make more of our natural competitive and comparative advantages, boost exports and encourage innovation as we work to make Scotland’s economy more competitive and more productive. These are more powers for a very clear purpose: to deliver policy that works better for the people of Scotland—policy for the many, not just for the few. As our manifesto made clear, we will seek to amend the Bill so that the Scottish Parliament can become responsible for all revenues raised in Scotland as part of a wider financial arrangement that includes borrowing powers. That is also part of our mandate.

The people have spoken, and the UK Government should respect their choice. We know that the UK Government blocked the devolution of many new powers during the very last hours of the Smith negotiations. They were wrong to do so, as the election result has made very clear. Press reports have revealed that very late drafts of the agreement, as negotiated between the Scottish parties, included

“proposals to devolve income tax personal allowances, employers’ National Insurance contributions, inheritance tax, and the power to create new taxes without Treasury approval.”

We are also told that Labour representatives on the Smith commission blocked plans to devolve additional powers on employment law, including the national minimum wage. I hope that the Labour party, in particular, will now shift its stance so that we can ensure that minimum wage levels are set by the Scottish Parliament, not by this Tory Government. I look forward to the Scottish Labour party adding its voice and vote in Committee to SNP amendments to devolve the minimum wage.

The delivery of substantial new powers for our Parliament has become the settled will of the Scottish people, as expressed in elections and opinion surveys. People want the devo-max that was promised in the final days of the referendum. Scotland deserves nothing less.

Trident Renewal

Debate between Angus Robertson and Bernard Jenkin

Tuesday 20th January 2015 Commons Chamber

[Mr Bernard Jenkin (Harwich and North Essex) (Con)]

What evidence is there that if we got rid of our nuclear weapons, anybody else would get rid of theirs? Would the French give up their nuclear weapons? Would the Russians?

[Angus Robertson]

If common sense were to prevail, it would have a positive impact on other countries. In the first instance, we have to be responsible for the decisions we make in this country, but I remember that when President Nelson Mandela announced he was changing the South African Government’s position on nuclear weapons, he was lauded for it by Members on both sides of the House. I think the UK would be lauded for making a similar decision.

Trident Alternatives Review

Debate between Angus Robertson and Bernard Jenkin

Wednesday 17th July 2013 Commons Chamber

[Angus Robertson (Moray) (SNP)]

I am pleased to be able to take part in a debate on the alternatives review, which many people with different views on deterrence theory believe to be fundamentally flawed because it did not consider all the alternatives. That is more relevant to Scotland than it is to many other places because Scotland probably has the highest megatonnage of weapons of mass destruction of any nation in the world.

The Liberal Democrats must be living in a parallel universe if they think that people in Scotland do not think it important to consider all the options, not least because the majority of our public representatives have voted against Trident renewal. In the Scottish Parliament on 14 June 2007, 71 Members of the Scottish Parliament voted against Trident renewal; only 16 voted in favour. In this place, on 14 March 2007, 33 Scottish MPs voted against the Trident renewal proposals, with only 22 voting for them.

This is the view not only of parliamentarians; it is consistently the view of the majority of people in Scotland. In October 2012, a YouGov poll showed that 57% of people in Scotland thought that the Scottish Parliament should have more powers to bring about the removal of Trident from Scotland. In September 2011, an Angus Reid poll for the Sunday Express showed that 57% of people in Scotland did not agree that Trident should be based on the Clyde. In 2010, a YouGov poll showed that 56% of people in Scotland believed that we should not buy a replacement for Trident. It goes on and on.

[Mr Jenkin]

Let me draw the hon. Gentleman’s attention to the report produced by the Public Administration Committee, which experimented with deliberative polling to find out how to inform national strategy at the heart of government by engaging with the public. What did the poll conducted on our behalf show? The final question asked whether the United Kingdom should order four new submarines or give up nuclear weapons altogether. In Scotland, 49% were in favour and 43% were against.

[Angus Robertson]

As the hon. Gentleman knows, there are always outliers in polling—[Interruption.] I reflect on the fact that the Scottish National party is the only majority Government in the United Kingdom, receiving more votes than all of the three UK parties combined on the second vote. The hon. Member for Harwich and North Essex (Mr Jenkin) can laugh, but he represents a party that is the worst-performing centre-right party in the industrialised world. That is how badly it performs in Scotland. Even when his friend Lord Ashcroft polled in Scotland, he found that in principle 48% of Scottish respondents oppose the UK having nuclear weapons.

The Liberal Democrat review would have been worthy, as the former Defence Secretary the right hon. Member for Coventry North East (Mr Ainsworth) suggested, if it had taken evidence and spoken with other people—people outside the Ministry of Defence, people outside government. The Lib Dem spokesman could have met the Scottish Trades Union Congress and spoken to its general secretary, Grahame Smith, who said that renewing Trident “will cost Scotland jobs”. We might not all agree with those views, but they are views of important people, and if we are going to have a review that looks into alternatives, surely the relevant people should be spoken to.

Did the right hon. Member for Inverness, Nairn, Badenoch and Strathspey (Danny Alexander) meet the Scottish Trades Union Congress? No, he did not. Did he meet Unison, whose Scottish general secretary condemned the Government’s decision to replace Britain’s Trident nuclear fleet?