Oral Answers to Questions
Deidre Brock Excerpts(8 years, 1 month ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
Deidre Brock (Edinburgh North and Leith) (SNP)
8. What discussions he has had with the Chancellor of the Exchequer on the effect on Scotland of measures announced in the Budget.
The Financial Secretary to the Treasury (Mr David Gauke)
The Chancellor has delivered a budget that delivers for Scotland. This will be the last Budget where a UK Chancellor sets out income tax rates and thresholds for Scottish earners. The changes to the income tax personal allowance will benefit 2.6 million taxpayers in Scotland. The Budget delivers on our plans to build a stronger Scottish economy as part of the UK and put the next generation first.
Deidre Brock
I congratulate the Minister on finding the Chancellor to have those discussions—earlier this week, we thought he had gone walkabout! The Budget had £1 billion-worth of cuts to the Scottish budget and £650 million-worth of cuts to the English NHS. Given the volte-face on social security cuts, does he think he could persuade the Chancellor to reverse Scotland’s cuts and put in a good word for the English NHS as well?
ISIL in Syria
Deidre Brock Excerpts(8 years, 5 months ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
Chloe Smith (Norwich North) (Con)
It is a pleasure to follow the hon. Member for Strangford (Jim Shannon).
Courageous Tornado crews based at RAF Marham in my county have been flying to Iraq already in the last year. The question today is whether we should ask them to do more, and my answer is yes. We have a clear, present and extreme threat and we have the ability to help defeat it.
I vote today in favour of diplomacy, of united resolve through the UN, of continued humanitarian leadership, of planning for stabilisation, reconstruction and peace in Syria, of cutting off the sources of finance, fighters and weapons, and of extending our advanced military capabilities in a fight that is already going on, in which we are already involved, and in which our enemies want us dead—a fight that we must win to keep British people safe both at home and abroad, and in which our allies need our help.
It is also right that the Government take domestic action, which is not necessarily named in this motion, but which goes with that coherent military, humanitarian and diplomatic action.
Chloe Smith
I will not give way; I want to proceed and there are a few other Members who have been waiting patiently and want to come in.
We all know we are under threat. No action is not an option. We all know there is history behind and there is risk ahead. People are naturally concerned that we may make things worse, and that being part of airstrikes may make us more of a target here in Britain. Those concerns are valid, but we can only hope to have a safer world for British children, and Syrian children too, by having the courage to defeat the evil that we face. Indeed, Syrians are already fleeing it, and desperately. We must act; the UN is asking us to act.
I am prepared to back UK action with all its risks because I want to protect civilians there, here and anywhere in the world from the greater and more certain threat they face from IS: the threat of death, repression and torture.
People rightly argue that it is not possible to bomb an ideology out of existence. That is true, which is why we need the breadth of the motion. We also need to ask what the alternative is. Is it to allow an ideology that recruits from its own military success so far to continue to do so, with a headquarters, and to invoke our silence in its cause? No, it is not. We must back the motion. My morals, my conscience and my heart and head say that it is Parliament’s duty to support the Government in the actions they must take to keep British citizens safe against that active ideological evil. It would be foolhardy to fail to take an action that may allow us to do our part.
Oral Answers to Questions
Deidre Brock Excerpts(8 years, 6 months ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
David Mundell
Absolutely, and I commend the hon. Lady for the extent to which, during her short time as a Member of Parliament, she has already engaged with that important Jewish community in Scotland. I also commend the work of the Scottish Government in that regard. As I said earlier, this is a matter on which we are all united, supporting Jewish communities and not accepting anti-Semitism.
Deidre Brock (Edinburgh North and Leith) (SNP)
8. What steps he is taking to ensure that the new devolution arrangement which would result from the provisions of the Scotland Bill is financially neutral.
The Financial Secretary to the Treasury (Mr David Gauke)
The UK Government are delivering the cross-party Smith agreement in full, giving the Scottish Government substantial new powers over tax and spending. The Smith agreement stated that the devolution of powers
“should be accompanied by an updated fiscal framework”.
The UK and Scottish Governments are discussing that.
Deidre Brock
Let me offer the Secretary of State a sixth opportunity to disassociate himself from the subsidy claims that have been made by his own party in the Chamber. Will he do so now? Does he agree that the Treasury’s statements of funding policy over the devolution years have been a creaking and unstable mess, creating unnecessary friction, and will he recommit himself to a more open and transparent process—as he refused to do previously—for the calculation of the block grant to underpin the new fiscal framework?