Financial Statement
Deidre Brock Excerpts(2 years, 1 month ago)
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Rishi Sunak
The hon. Gentleman is simply wrong. Those in work, particularly on low incomes, will benefit disproportionately from the policies that have been announced today. I have given plenty of examples already, but a single mother with two children who is renting, on universal credit, and working full time, earning the national living wage, will be £1,600 better off as a result of all the policies we have announced on taxes and welfare. We are supporting exactly the people the hon. Gentleman talks about.
Deidre Brock (Edinburgh North and Leith) (SNP)
The Climate Change Committee’s estimates suggest that the overall price tag for retrofitting the UK’s homes—considered some of the most leaky and energy-inefficient in Europe—is £27 billion a year over the next 25 years. Will the Chancellor recognise that this issue needs real commitment and investment, not just tinkering around the edges?
Rishi Sunak
No. In the spending review, we announced the largest investment in upgrading home energy efficiency that this country has ever seen—billions and billions of pounds across a range of different schemes, helping hundreds of thousands of households with the costs of upgrading their energy.
Cost of Living Increases
Deidre Brock Excerpts(2 years, 2 months ago)
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Deidre Brock (Edinburgh North and Leith) (SNP)
Many of the issues around the cost of living that we have heard about in the debate are underpinned by food security, which is what I will focus on. Before I expand on that, however, I reiterate that the people of Ukraine are at the forefront of our thoughts and discussions at this time. Their lives have been devastated by the horrors of war and they must remain uppermost in our minds as we reflect on any potential impact of the conflict on daily life here.
Hon. Members have previously touched on the anticipated consequences of the war on the global economy, including on food prices. Russia and Ukraine are the world’s largest and fifth largest wheat exporters respectively, and the two countries are major suppliers of critical fertiliser components. We must realise that the consequences of that hit to the supply chain are likely to be felt severely in sub-Saharan Africa and places already struggling with hunger such as Afghanistan, Syria and Yemen. We must be ready to help those regions of the world most affected by a potential global food emergency.
Those global shortages will lead to rising food prices in the UK too. The EU is moving quickly on measures to support farming and businesses, and there is concern in agriculture that the UK will not replicate or work in parallel with that. Of course, millions of households across the UK were already seeing their food bills escalate long before the crisis in Ukraine. Shop price inflation leapt between January and February this year to the highest inflation rate recorded since November 2011.
The Resolution Foundation has warned that rising food and energy prices could cause a “second peak” in inflation of above 8% in the autumn. It is our most vulnerable constituents who will be hardest hit, experiencing an inflation rate of as much as 10% due to their spending a higher proportion of their household budget on food and fuel.
The agricultural industry forecasts difficult conditions in the global fertiliser market, where the UK is a much smaller player with less leverage after Brexit. If, as looks almost certain, the resultant higher costs mean that yields are reduced, that too will have an impact on food security and take a further toll on the cost of living. Farmers are facing a perfect storm, with prices for fertiliser, fuel, energy and feed rocketing. The sector in Scotland has raised the alarm about the far-reaching implications for markets, processors and abattoirs, and ultimately rising prices in supermarkets for consumers. A post-Brexit shortage of both permanent and seasonal workers, combined with a lack of haulage drivers and processing staff, has put serious strain on agriculture and food and drink businesses across Scotland. Meanwhile, the UK Government have reneged on promises to replace fully our former EU funding.
On top of all that, the Scottish and UK farming sector is being exposed to real, lasting harm by the UK Government’s hurried and poorly conceived trade deals. The Department for International Trade’s own analysis of the deal with New Zealand euphemistically described an expected loss of £150 million to fishing, agriculture and food-related sectors as just a “process of economic adjustment”. Organisations such as the National Farmers Union of Scotland have consistently warned about food security issues in relation to that—indeed, it issued a press release on that very subject today—but have been repeatedly ignored or dismissed by the UK Government.
At Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs questions last week, the Secretary of State and the Minister for Farming, Fisheries and Food claimed that the UK is largely self-sufficient in its food production. However, the Government’s own analysis of food security shows that, by economic value, the UK produces only about 60% of food consumed domestically, and actual consumption of UK-produced food is closer to 54%, as a part of it is exported. In terms of historical, long-term trends, there is a concerning drop in the domestic supply ratio of fresh vegetables, from 76% in 1990 to 54% in 2020.
We need to ramp up domestic food production, but the planting window to do that is narrowing. The UK can do more to service the domestic market in cereals and spring barley, for example, but there is a risk of missing out if the EU acts faster and much of that services Europe instead. If offers come in from France or Germany to service spring cropping, businesses will take them.
We must keep things in perspective and do everything possible to assist with the humanitarian crisis in Ukraine, where there are reports of farmers being unable to go out into their fields for fear of bombardment, but the UK Government clearly need to take food security here much more seriously and take action now to address the immediate risks to domestic food production. We remain vulnerable if we are too reliant on imports, and it is people on the lowest incomes who will suffer the most.
Some of the people I am angriest with are the Brexiteers. The snake oil salespeople blithely assured all of us who warned them about the problems of over-dependence on imported foods—we said this Government were making it impossible for many farmers and others in our food industries—that all would be well in the golden land of Brexitania. They are now truly reaping what they have sown, are they not? The trouble is that all the other countries around the world who have also been relying on Ukraine—that golden breadbasket of the world—and Russia to supply their needs are out there alongside us, hunting on the trade markets for deals on the rice, wheat, maize, nuts, fruits and oils that we have all been receiving up to now. When goods are in short supply, prices go up. We must recognise and face with clear eyes the food security problems that there will be for the most vulnerable among us on these isles.
Working People’s Finances: Government Policy
Deidre Brock Excerpts(2 years, 7 months ago)
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Miriam Cates (Penistone and Stocksbridge) (Con)
It is a pleasure to follow my constituency neighbour, the hon. Member for Sheffield, Brightside and Hillsborough (Gill Furniss), and it was a delight to hear the maiden speech by my hon. Friend the Member for Hartlepool (Jill Mortimer) earlier. As a fellow MP in a post-industrial area, I absolutely recognise what my hon. Friend said about the importance of levelling up being about not only materially restoring to northern areas the opportunities that have been given to the south, but honouring those areas for their contribution to the wealth of this nation over hundreds of years.
Throughout my whole adult life, inflation rates and interest rates have been remarkably stable. That is not normal historically, and when I speak to constituents or more senior Members and hear about what life was like in the ’70s and for many decades before, I realise that the inflation that is a threat now is very different from the stability we have enjoyed in previous years. It is a concern.
My constituents are worried: they are worried about energy prices, and we have heard much about that over recent days; they are worried about commodity and construction prices; and they are worried about shortages. I have just heard from a major importer in my constituency who is concerned about the cost of shipping. The cost of a shipping container from China has risen from around $2,000 a container last November to getting on for $20,000 now. That will have a huge inflationary pressure, given how much we import.
It is also the case, though, that wages are rising and our job market is buoyant. Our plan for jobs is working. We have heard much about the furlough scheme, which has rescued our economy from the fate of mass unemployment. We have a record number of job vacancies—more than 1 million—and businesses in my constituency of Penistone and Stockbridge are hiring people of all ages for all different types of jobs.
We have heard Brexit being blamed for the situation that we find ourselves in, and there is no doubt that Brexit has caused changes in our economy. I draw the attention of hon. Members to an article by Matthew Lynn in this week’s Spectator entitled “Who’s afraid of rising wages?” It starts:
“During the Brexit referendum, Stuart Rose, the former boss of Marks & Spencer, and chair of the Remain campaign claimed that if Britain left the EU, wages ‘will go up’. This was, he added, in a rare moment of candour, ‘not necessarily a good thing’. But the idea that salaries might rise was exactly the reason that a great many people voted for Brexit.”
Why should we be afraid of rising wages? It is what the Opposition have been calling for. More competition for employees will lead to rising wages, and we are seeing that: Costa, for example, is paying over 5% more. On average, wages have risen 8% over the past three months, and, from April, this Government raised the national living wage to £8.91.
We must remember that we are still in economic shock. We are coming out of an extraordinary period of time, but things will settle. In fact, the International Monetary Fund has forecast that the UK will have the highest growth in the G7 this year, so while there are concerns around inflation and the cost of living, which must be addressed, there is also a good chance that we will have a fairer jobs market at the end of this.
Deidre Brock (Edinburgh North and Leith) (SNP)
Will the hon. Lady share with us the solution to the seasonal agricultural workers scheme, which is not adequate for farmers to be able to employ enough people to pick crops in the field and to avoid the situation that we are seeing in Scotland where many fields of crops are just being left to rot because of the lack of workers?
Miriam Cates
The hon. Lady makes an excellent point. While, overall, on a macro level, having more jobs available for British workers will push wages up, it is of course the case that certain sectors will need specific interventions to save them, and I would support any such measures.
While there are concerns like the one the hon. Lady has raised, and concerns in the wider economy, our plan for jobs is working and the future is optimistic. None the less, there are some long-term structural issues with the cost of living and threats to living standards that must be addressed, and this is the moment to do so. We must find a solution for the sake of future generations.
First, housing affordability is a key driver of problems with the cost of living. Solving the housing crisis will unlock many issues, such as generational inequality, and it will reduce the cost of living. I am delighted that the Secretary of State for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities, my right hon. Friend the Member for Surrey Heath (Michael Gove), has been appointed to look at this specific problem, because it is very important. Many of the serious issues that Members have raised in this House today would be much aided by a reduction in the cost of housing.
Secondly, we also need to look at fairer finance for families. Again, much has been said about the changes to universal credit, but I want to consider what we could do in our taxation system to make life fairer and cheaper for families. Unlike many countries, the UK has an individualistic tax system. We tax individuals rather than households, which means that we do not take into account the number of dependants in a particular house, and that can make life very expensive for families. Some families on low and middle incomes can end up paying around 30% more tax than individuals living on their own. When we couple that with the way that benefits are clawed back as people earn more, some families can effectively face a marginal tax rate of 75%, making it very difficult for them to get out of poverty. We must recognise the importance of raising children not just for the nuclear family, but for our whole society. We need to look at how we can make it less expensive for families to exist and to raise their children.
Leaving the EU: Impact on the UK
Deidre Brock Excerpts(3 years, 1 month ago)
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Deidre Brock (Edinburgh North and Leith) (SNP)
I am old enough to remember the days when we were told that, post-Brexit, the UK would hold all the cards and the trade deal would be the easiest in human history; that the EU needed the UK more than the UK needed the EU and there was no downside to Brexit, only a considerable upside; and that trade would boom immediately after we left.
The Office for National Statistics told us what actually happened immediately after we left. Exports to the EU were down by more than 40%, the largest monthly fall since records began. Imports were down as well, by just under 29%, mainly in transport equipment and chemicals. The transport equipment is mainly cars; the chemicals are mainly medical and pharmaceutical products, which some of us might think are pretty important. Also included, of course, are agricultural products such as fertiliser, which we might also think are important. Food imports from the EU dropped by a quarter in January, falling below £2 billion in a month for the first time since 2014.
Far worse from our point of view in Scotland are the figures for exports of food to the EU, which dropped by two thirds: fish and shellfish down by 83%, an industry wiped out; meat exports down by 59%; dairy down by half. Lord Frost, that wisest of Brexiters, suggested that the drop in exports was down to stockpiling ahead of the end of transition; I am not sure whether he has thought through the stockpiling of fresh fish—perhaps happy British fish do not rot.
Small businesses offering mail order have been hit hard. Macbeth’s Butcher in Moray and the Ethical Dairy in Castle Douglas both announced in January that they had to stop sending consignments to Northern Ireland. The Cheshire Cheese Company cannot send its products to EU customers. It, like other businesses, was advised by the UK Government to set up shop in the EU to get around the problems caused by the Government’s own failure adequately to negotiate that easiest deal in human history.
It is not just about trade barriers, either. The world’s largest daffodil grower is Varfell Farms at Longrock in Penzance, but its crop is rotting in the fields because it cannot get the workforce in from the EU. Scottish fruit and vegetable growers face the same problem. The loss of freedom of movement means the loss of seasonal workforces as well as the loss of our rights across the other 27 nations.
Brexit has been and continues to be an utter galloping disaster. Scotland is ill-served once again by this den of inadequacy, and so are Wales and great chunks of England. Northern Ireland has a category of pain all of its own.
In the midst of that, we have Tory Ministers who struggle to understand the EU rules that were laid out in simple language and that many, many voices warned about in advance. Scotland will see the back of this nonsense soon enough. Independence is coming for us, and we can then start to repair the harm that these witless Brexiters have thrust upon us.
Future Relationship with the EU
Deidre Brock Excerpts(3 years, 5 months ago)
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Penny Mordaunt
I can give my hon. Friend greater assurance than that, because there is a very firm deadline, which is that at the end of this year, we and others have to legislate. Time is running out. We will carry on negotiating until there is no hope left, and the statement made yesterday would indicate that, unless progress is made, Sunday may well be that deadline.
Deidre Brock (Edinburgh North and Leith) (SNP) [V]
On Tuesday, the chief executive of the Food and Drink Federation said that his members could not agree export sales for next year with any certainty as they cannot be sure what tariffs may apply, what delays they may face or how much they will get paid for their goods. He also said that there is a shortage of general ambient warehousing space and cold chain storage. Businesses are trying to stockpile against the shocks and offset increased costs, but how can they do that if there is not facility for that stockpiling? What are the Government going to do about that, and why on earth have they not thought this through sooner than just three weeks before exit day?
Covid-19: Economy Update
Deidre Brock Excerpts(3 years, 6 months ago)
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Rishi Sunak
My hon. Friend is absolutely right. When I talk to both businesses and employees, they say that what they want is to be able to go to the jobs they love. They want to be able to do that. They want to be able to serve customers and they want to be able to welcome us all back to their restaurants, pubs, cafés and so on. She is right that we have to strike that balance. I think the approach that the Government have taken does that—it strikes that balance. The support we have put in place today will enable as many of those people to remain in their job working hard and hopefully have a fulfilling future to come.
Deidre Brock (Edinburgh North and Leith) (SNP) [V]
It is good to see the Chancellor has found the magic money tree of Tory myth and given it another shake, but the money needs to go to the self-employed, the smallest businesses and the poorest households. He will have total control of VAT soon. Will he look at cutting tax on household essentials? Will he target the support for job retention schemes at the smallest businesses, so they can continue to employ people, rather than offsetting the wage bill of some supermarkets? Tesco, Sainsbury’s and Waitrose are not feeling the pinch the way that small enterprises are feeling it. Will he send the cash where it will do the most good?
Rishi Sunak
The hon. Lady is right in saying that support should now be targeted at where it can make the most difference. That is why our approach has evolved through this crisis, and what was universal at the beginning and at the peak of the crisis has now evolved into a more targeted approach. To give one example, a difference between the job support scheme and the old furlough scheme is that now large businesses—precisely the kinds of businesses she mentioned—will not be able to access the job support scheme, especially with its new, more generous terms, unless that business is seeing revenue decline. That sensible change means that support is rightly targeted at smaller and medium-sized businesses that need our help at this difficult time, and not at the large businesses that are not seeing any change to their business model.
Covid-19: Future UK-EU Relationship
Deidre Brock Excerpts(3 years, 10 months ago)
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Douglas Ross
I am always happy to agree with my hon. Friend. Let me add that Scottish Conservatives in the Chamber today would outnumber, if he were here, the one Scottish Labour Member by five or six to one. We continue to be a strong force in Scotland and in this Chamber.
Let me return to the title of this debate and what we are discussing generally this afternoon, because there have been a number of omissions in the SNP speeches we have heard so far—I am sure this will be rectified later. We have not heard the F-word at all during this debate. I represent Moray and the Minister on the Front Bench represents Banff and Buchan. In a debate about the EU, I expect to hear about fishing, particularly from the SNP. So why, would we surmise, would SNP Members and their leader here, who represents a constituency that has many fishing interests, not mention fishing once during this debate? Is it perhaps that they are ashamed of their policy towards Scottish fishermen?
During this debate, we are speaking about an extension, but what the SNP have not spoken about is what they would do at the end of that extension, because of course they just want to prolong this period of instability for our businesses, communities and individuals. At the end of it, they do not want another extension or a deal with the EU to be granted by the UK Government; they want to stop us leaving the EU. That is a perfectly acceptable policy for them to hold, but they therefore have to explain to fishing communities in Moray, in Banff and Buchan, and around Scotland, including those that they currently represent here and at Holyrood, what their plans are for the fishing industry in Scotland. It is very clear: they would say to the 1 million people in Scotland who voted to leave the European Union, many of them in fishing communities: “We don’t need you, we don’t trust you, we think you were wrong, and we’re going to take you straight back into the European Union and straight back into the common fisheries policy, which you have campaigned against throughout your lives and has been damaging to your business, because we don’t trust the result you gave in 2016.” That is a shameful position for Scottish National party Members to hold. Maybe it is not surprising, then, that they have not once mentioned the word “fishing” in this debate.
Deidre Brock (Edinburgh North and Leith) (SNP)
I would very much appreciate it if just one Conservative Member could explain to me why Conservative Members suggest that there would be total control of the seas around the UK in the event of Brexit when UNCLOS—the United Nations convention on the law of the sea—makes it very clear that that would not be case, and, based on historical fishing rights, the other countries in the EU will be challenging this in court? I never hear Conservative Members talk about that—all they say is that UK waters will be completely controlled by the UK, and it simply is not true.
Douglas Ross
I would say to the hon. Lady that I am her one Conservative Member, because I can explain it to her. When we finally leave the transition period on 31 December, we will become an independent coastal state controlling who fishes what, where and when in our waters—a proud independent state. There are examples of others that are able to do that, and we will follow suit.
Something that is not often considered in this debate is how big a difference a short extension to the transition period would make. Fishing leaders in Scotland have said that a one-day increase in the transition period beyond 31 December this year would be a one-year increase for their industry, because we would go into a whole new round of talks. When the right hon. Member for Ross, Skye and Lochaber suggests that we as a Government and a country should have two years of extra negotiating during the transition period, we should ask what that would mean for our fishing industries, which I am not willing to accept.
I represent the constituency in Scotland that came closer than any other to voting leave in 2016: just 122 votes separated leave and remain. So while I know it is very convenient for Scottish National party Members, the Scottish Government and others to say that Scotland voted to remain, not everyone in Scotland did. One in two people in Moray voted to leave and one in two people in Moray voted to remain. This argument does foster great passion, understandably, but it is not as black and white as the SNP would often like to make it.
I also want to focus on the points about leadership that we have heard during this debate. I tried to intervene on the right hon. Member for Ross, Skye and Lochaber when he highlighted poll ratings that suggest that Nicola Sturgeon’s leadership has been positive during this pandemic. I was going to ask him: was it leadership when Nicola Sturgeon chose not to inform the Scottish people of the first case of covid-19 being identified at the Nike conference? [Interruption.] I am sorry if the hon. Member for Perth and North Perthshire (Pete Wishart) thinks it is funny that the Scottish Government, the First Minister and Scottish Government Ministers withheld information from the Scottish people about the first case of covid-19 in our country, but I do not believe it is a laughing matter. I hope that he will reconsider his actions when I am discussing an important matter about people who have lost their lives.
Is it leadership when the UK Government are carrying out more covid-19 tests in Scotland than the Scottish Government? I am happy that our broad shoulders of the United Kingdom can help the UK Government, but I would have thought that the Scottish Government would be ambitious enough to have the testing facilities in place to do more than the UK Government. I am extremely grateful that the UK Government are there to support the Scottish Government.
Is it really leadership when we have senior members of the Scottish National party, and indeed the First Minister, threatening to put up barriers at the border to stop people coming into our country? Given that the Scottish Tourism Alliance criticised those comments by saying that 70% of tourism in Scotland is from the rest of the United Kingdom, any signal from the First Minister, the Scottish Government or the SNP that we are closed for business is unacceptable. It is not a political issue—it is a financial issue for bed and breakfasts, hotels, restaurants and all those who rely on investment and money from people across the United Kingdom to support them. We need to send an unequivocally clear message that Scotland is open for business. I was grateful to hear that from the right hon. Member for Ross, Skye and Lochaber today. Sadly, I would say that the message has come too late.
Deidre Brock (Edinburgh North and Leith) (SNP)
I want to start by talking about the catalogue of demonstrated Brexit costs, which grows almost unceasingly. I continue to be told by constituents of how it will cause massive damage to their businesses, and I am going to highlight just one of the most recent examples.
Leith and Edinburgh have a long association with the European wine trade—back as far as the 13th century—and it continues today. Raeburn Fine Wines, with premises in Leith, Edinburgh and London, has been telling me about the effects of the Brexit proposal on the wine trade. Perhaps surprisingly, the UK accounts for a large share of the world trade in fine wines, but that is under threat. Import certificates for EU wines will add business costs and near impossible bureaucracy to the uphill challenge of surviving the covid recession.
Wine is not the only high-quality sector facing an uncertain future. The recent announcement of the membership of the Trade and Agriculture Commission showed that the Government intend to break their promise to farmers to protect food standards post Brexit. The financial services sector also features heavily in my constituency, and it faces being locked out of EU markets or migrating to EU nations to protect its access. Universities face losing research cash. The health service faces losing access to essential supplies, including any new vaccine for the virus causing the current pandemic. Our fishing industry is about to be sold out by this Government, who will be handing out quotas with abandon. The list goes on and on.
Brexit was already a damaging prospect. Add the global pandemic, the trade negotiations going worse than anyone predicted and the OBR forecast of one in eight soon being out of work, and it is not clear to me and many others why anyone other than the blindest zealot would plough on unthinkingly. Now those zealots want to tie an unwilling Scotland to the handcart on the road to hell, with an internal market that once again renders the wellbeing of the people of Scotland secondary to the financial considerations of the south-east of England. No room for nuance or subtlety in the brave, new Brexit; no room for devolution in the sunny uplands of broken Britain.
The Government are so frightened of debate that the Minister for the Cabinet Office is in hiding and they have sent expendable cannon fodder instead. That points to the fact that Government Ministers do not seem to understand the four nations. Some of them famously think that there is no border. They think that wisdom rests in Whitehall and all must comply. They have lost even the limited vision that once embraced England’s northern powerhouse—that, too, will be ground down in the new Tory version of Mao’s long march. No dissent will be tolerated, no differentiation accepted. At a time when the best economic solutions for Scotland, Wales and for huge parts of England diverge hugely from the solutions offered in Parliament, uniformity will be enforced. Four legs shall be good and two legs shall be bad.
The proposed UK internal market is an infernal insult to nations that need different frameworks and support; to the people who will suffer the aftermath of the pandemic; and to those who aspire to something better than the fag end of British imperialism and exceptionalism. What has become breathtakingly clear during the coronavirus pandemic is that the UK Government are dysfunctional and incompetent. I shall give a few examples. Ministers and Spads who went roaming around England in flagrant abuse of the rules remain in post; confusing and inconsistent messages are sent out; financial help for those affected was provided at first, then withdrawn; figures on testing capacity have been massaged until they are meaningless.
It is a shambolic mess, much like the Government’s Brexit negotiations and trade talks. Failure mounts upon failure’s shoulders until the combined weight is too much to bear. The bluster and bravado is no substitute for clear thinking and proper action. The confusion and dither, the stumbling up cul-de-sacs and falling over kerbstones are not statesmanship—they are just bluster and bombast. It is a sad and embarrassing caricature of a Government who talk populism and serve elitism.
Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Nigel Evans)
Order. I think we have to move on—sorry. I call Lee Anderson.
Coronavirus: Employment Support
Deidre Brock Excerpts(4 years, 1 month ago)
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Deidre Brock (Edinburgh North and Leith) (SNP)
Our farmers, crofters and fishers are crucially producing our food, but the situation has rocked those sectors to their foundations. Will the Minister outline what specific considerations are being given to supporting those sectors, so that they can continue their vital work?
Oral Answers to Questions
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Robert Jenrick
My hon. Friend is absolutely right. Last month, in the spring statement, my right hon. Friend the Chancellor was able to add to those policies by announcing a scheme to help small and medium-sized enterprises to reduce their carbon footprint; a new marine zone around Ascension Island; support for the renewables sector; the new future homes standard, to ensure that from 2025 homes are built with low-carbon heating and high levels of energy efficiency; and many other policies.
Deidre Brock (Edinburgh North and Leith) (SNP)
Tidal energy projects are powering ahead in Scotland and show substantial export potential. The Scottish Government recently announced support funding of up to £10 million to assist in commercialising its use. What support will the UK Government give the industry?
Robert Jenrick
The UK Government are supporting tidal energy. We have looked at any schemes that have become available to us. We have to balance the interests of the ratepayer, the taxpayer, to ensure that the schemes that we do support are the right strategic technology and the right value for money for the UK.
Draft Food and Farming (Amendment) (EU Exit) Regulations 2019
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Deidre Brock (Edinburgh North and Leith) (SNP)
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Gray. I have concerns about the geographical indications for spirits. To be honest, I have concerns about the Government’s generally cavalier attitude to protected products and about the adverse effects that it may have as we plunge down the Brexit cliff towards the waiting rocks.
Specifically, I have concerns about the explanation offered in the explanatory memorandum that spirit drink geographical indications for products from the EU27 nations will be gone after Brexit and that we will retain only the UK ones. Why would that be considered a good thing? It is better for consumers here to know that the drinks they are consuming—especially alcoholic drinks—are the genuine article. If someone in Leith fancies a Calvados after dinner, they should be confident that it is Calvados, just as they would be confident in a good Scotch.
That decision is especially strange alongside the decision to recognise spirits from the US and the stated intention to recognise two Mexican spirits when negotiations are complete. That seems so strange that there must be some intent behind it. Is there something that has not been made clear to us that would necessitate such a specific diminution of the relationship with EU spirits producers and such a specific improvement in the relationship with US producers?
The curiosity of that anomaly is not lessened by the notes on engagement at the end of the explanatory memorandum. Under the GMO bit, there is a fair deal of engagement with companies interested in developing GMOs, with “establishments”—a strange word to use—interested in researching them, with NGOs and with environmental campaign groups. On wine, the devolved Administrations were involved in the detailed drafting and the provisions in the regulations, and industry and producer stakeholders were kept informed. On direct payments, stakeholders in England were consulted. On spirit drinks, though, the full text says:
“Defra has engaged with industry throughout the development of the new replacement regulation for 110/2008, and although no formal consultation has taken place with industry or the Devolved Administrations, stakeholders have been kept informed of progress.”
Why was there no formal consultation? Why was there no involvement of the devolved Administrations in the detailed drafting? Scotland, after all, has the bulk of the distilling industry, including 70% of the gin distilled in the UK. I very much hope the Minister will offer us an explanation for this strangeness and some greater insight into why such an asymmetrical decision has been taken.
I also wonder what effect this approach will have on our own spirits that are sold in the EU27 after we leave. Is whisky’s protection going to be diminished? Will Plymouth gin lose its protection in the EU? There is also a huge list of spirits drinks—nine full pages of the list in the EU regulation—that will no longer be protected in the UK. Will we now be open to poor-quality imitations?
Much of this SI seems fairly straightforward, but this issue needs some serious explanation before we are asked to approve the regulations. What is the rationale behind what appears to be a very strange idea?
David Rutley
I thank hon. Members for their contributions. We have discussed some of these issues in similar Committees before.
In response to the hon. Member for Stroud, who made points about the view of the House of Lords sifting committee on this particular SI, it is worth noting that this SI was laid, as I said, under the negative procedure, and it was then recommended that it be laid under the affirmative procedure. That is what we have done and, clearly, we are debating it today.
Again, I just want to point out that the suite of legislation on geographical indications under the EU withdrawal Act confers new duties on the Secretary of State; that is in consequence of the Secretary of State taking on functions from the European Commission as a result of withdrawal. However, it is not the instrument that we are considering today that confers new legislative duties. For spirit drinks, for example, that was the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Amendment) (EU Exit) Regulations 2019, which we debated earlier this month. This instrument confers only administrative functions on the Secretary of State from the EU Commission.
The hon. Gentleman asked about costs. As I said in my opening remarks, there are no legislative duties being imposed on the Secretary of State by this instrument. In terms of the administrative duties that result from this instrument, there are no costs associated with those duties.
The hon. Gentleman asked about scientific advice particularly around GMOs. At the moment, decisions on things such as commercial cultivation of GM crops and the marketing of GM products are taken at EU level, with each member state having a vote, and the European Food Safety Authority issues an opinion on the application. For the UK, that EFSA opinion is considered by the Advisory Committee on Releases to the Environment, a statutory body of experts that provides Ministers with independent scientific advice that informs UK votes. If we are to leave, EFSA opinions are publicly available, so we will continue to have access to them. ACRE will continue to have a role in advising the UK Government on applications made to, for example, grow a GM crop in the UK. The final decision will be taken away from the EU and made in the UK.
The hon. Member for Edinburgh North and Leith made some important points, particularly on spirit drinks, and we have discussed some of them before. She asked about the consultation that has been going on. I assure her we have a very strong relationship with the industry, through the Scotch Whisky Association. I was fortunate to meet the SWA in Edinburgh last November. That visit was one of the first things I did when I was able to get time away from the estate. We have a close dialogue with the Scotch whisky industry.
We recognise the geographic indication of Scotch whisky is pivotal to the industry and vital for the UK economy and the Scottish economy as well. We have not yet announced a decision on how EU GIs will be treated if the UK leaves the EU without a withdrawal agreement in place. The UK is not obliged to protect EU GIs after exit. The Government look forward to negotiations on the UK’s future economic partnership with the EU, during which we will be able to discuss the relationship between the UK’s new GI schemes and the EU schemes. In addition, we will warmly welcome any application from member states of the EU27, as we would from producers in the UK or from other countries around the world.
Deidre Brock
Is the Minister saying that current protections for those spirit drinks from Europe, which we have recognised up to this point, are no longer guaranteed to continue, and that it is very much dependent on negotiations?
David Rutley
I will reiterate what I said, because these are important matters: the UK Government have not announced how EU GIs will be treated if the UK leaves the EU without a withdrawal agreement in place. I also said that we look forward to further negotiations on the UK’s future economic partnership with the EU. All these things will be considered in that round.