Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Deidre Brock and Dominic Raab

Tuesday 28th March 2023 Commons Chamber

[Dominic Raab]

I thank my right hon. Friend for bring that to my attention. It sounds very serious and capable of having a negative and pejorative influence on proceedings. If he writes to me or—even better—comes to see me, I will be happy to look into it further.

[Deidre Brock (Edinburgh North and Leith) (SNP)]

T6. The Joint Committee on Human Rights concluded that the UK Government should not proceed with the Secretary of State’s proposed British Bill of Rights, saying:“it weakens rights protections, it undermines the universality of rights, it shows disregard for our international legal obligations”. I realise that his Government show little regard for international legal obligations generally, but what is his response to the JCHR’s recommendations?

[Dominic Raab]

We showed only last week, when we brought together more than 40 countries to give effect to the International Criminal Court mandate to investigate and prosecute war crimes in Ukraine, how we are leading the charge and upholding the international rule of law. That is not helped, however, by abuses of the system, particularly, as suggested by her colleague the hon. Member for Kilmarnock and Loudoun (Alan Brown), foreign national offenders using elastic interpretations of human rights to frustrate a deportation order. That is the ill that we will cure in addition to strengthening quintessential UK rights, such as freedom of speech.

Bill of Rights

Debate between Deidre Brock and Dominic Raab

Wednesday 22nd June 2022 Commons Chamber

[The Deputy Prime Minister]

I share my hon. Friend’s restlessness to proceed with all due speed, because we have been talking about this for a long time. I wrote about it in a book in 2009, and it was in our 2010 manifesto. The consultation process is important, and we had a 12-week consultation on the consultation document, which included clauses. We are publishing it now, but there will be space for further scrutiny by the Joint Committee on Human Rights, the Justice Committee and others, including Lords Committees. It is important to garner cross-party support to ensure we have the scrutiny that will make our reform more robust when it enters into force.

[Deidre Brock (Edinburgh North and Leith) (SNP)]

The Justice Secretary wrote recently that all

“UK citizens should be able to enjoy the same essential protections.”

I return to the point raised by my hon. Friend the Member for Glasgow North East (Anne McLaughlin). Will all the human rights that the Justice Secretary wishes to cover in his Bill apply to all people in the UK or only to UK citizens? Should not human rights apply to everyone?

[The Deputy Prime Minister]

I will give the hon. Lady an illustration. We have an international obligation not to make people stateless, so I do not think UK citizens are in precisely the same legal position as a foreign national offender. I think most people think we should have freedom under the rule of law and that we should be consistent in applying the law, but that people who have been welcomed to this country should come here through lawful routes and that people who commit serious crimes in this country should be removed. That is common sense, and I think the people of Scotland will not understand how hon. Members who purport to represent them can stand in the way of such a common-sense measure.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Deidre Brock and Dominic Raab

Tuesday 8th February 2022 Commons Chamber

[Deidre Brock]

The Justice Secretary claims that his reforms will protect free speech—a right that already receives special protection in the Human Rights Act—yet simultaneously the Government want to criminalise exercise of the right to protest, through the Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Bill, and there are already plans to take away whistleblower protections in the Official Secrets Act. Is it all free speech the Justice Secretary aims to protect, or only the kind his Government want to hear?

[Dominic Raab]

I thank the hon. Lady, because she raises a good substantive point. We want to strengthen and reinforce the right of free speech, in particular given some of the judge-led privacy law we have, but also some of the encroachments on free speech we have seen in political debate. I think constituents of Members in all parts of the House would recognise the difference between free speech, lawful protest and, frankly, the downright sabotage that we have seen by groups such as Extinction Rebellion, where we are right to legislate to protect the freedoms of others.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Deidre Brock and Dominic Raab

Wednesday 22nd September 2021 Commons Chamber

[The Deputy Prime Minister]

My hon. Friend is a powerful champion for patients and his constituents. We have now received applications to be one of the next eight hospitals in our new hospitals programme and I understand that an expression of interest has been submitted proposing developments across Warrington and Halton hospitals. Notwithstanding the smart way in which he has gone about his intervention, he will understand that I cannot comment on particular applications, but there will be a decision by spring 2022.

[Deidre Brock (Edinburgh North and Leith) (SNP)]

Q2. As the Scottish National party’s Westminster COP26 spokesperson, I welcome today’s announcement by Ineos of £1 billion of investment into cutting greenhouse gas emissions at its Grangemouth plant and supporting the carbon capture, utilisation and storage Acorn cluster at St Fergus in Aberdeenshire. It is a big step in the right direction. I must ask the Deputy Prime Minister this. Can he outline exactly what his Government have against the Scottish Government requiring real living wages for Scottish workers and net zero obligations in their green ports?

[The Deputy Prime Minister]

Net zero is at the heart of everything that we do and we have raised the national living wage, which will save a full-time worker £400 every year.

Covid-19

Debate between Deidre Brock and Dominic Raab

Tuesday 17th March 2020 Commons Chamber

[Dominic Raab]

I thank the hon. Lady for the emphasis she puts on international co-ordination. There are multilateral efforts to make sure we deal with everything from research and development of vaccines to capacity building for the most vulnerable countries. I am certainly happy to look at the details of any proposals if she wants to write to me. The challenge has been with different approaches, driven partly by different assessments of the risk, but also the pace at which coronavirus has spread and geography.

[Deidre Brock (Edinburgh North and Leith) (SNP)]

The Secretary of State mentioned the Irish Government’s announcement of a mandatory 14-day self-quarantine period. The Australian Prime Minister recently announced the same thing for passengers arriving in Australia from abroad. Is that an option the UK Government are actively considering?

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Deidre Brock and Dominic Raab

Tuesday 4th February 2020 Commons Chamber

[Dominic Raab]

My hon. Friend is right to tirelessly champion freedom across the world. I met interim President Guaidó. We continue to want a peaceful resolution of the situation in Venezuela and a transition to free elections which are credible for the people of Venezuela.

[Deidre Brock (Edinburgh North and Leith) (SNP)]

This morning, the now-sacked President of COP26 said that the Prime Minister has shown,

“a huge lack of leadership and engagement”

and “doesn’t really understand” climate change, which has led to the UK being “miles off” globally from where we need to be. Now rumours are flying around suggesting that the Government are planning to shift COP26 from Glasgow to an English location. What on earth are the public supposed to make of this shambles?

[Dominic Raab]

The hon. Lady will not need to wait long, because today, with Sir Richard Attenborough, the Prime Minister is launching and setting out the detail of our approach to COP26, where we will lead in bringing the world together to tackle one of the global challenges of our age.

EU: Future Relationship White Paper

Debate between Deidre Brock and Dominic Raab

Thursday 12th July 2018 Commons Chamber

[Dominic Raab]

I thank my right hon. Friend. Let me give him some assurance: free movement will end; it is not up for negotiation. Equally, when countries right around the world engage in free trade negotiations, the issue of visas is often considered alongside them, and that is the approach we will take.

[Deidre Brock (Edinburgh North and Leith) (SNP)]

I, too, must wish the Secretary of State the very best of British luck in his new role.

Brexit was of course a disastrous outcome of Tory infighting, and it now looks as though the Tory compromise last week is also falling victim to Tory infighting. It is an embarrassment and massively damaging. In January last year, the Prime Minister laid out 12 principles to underpin her Brexit process. The first was certainty and clarity, but we have had neither. The take-home from this latest Brexit White Paper seems to be that we are leaving the EU but we are putting in place regulations to comply with EU regulations on the movement of goods, so we will have no say in the decisions but we will abide by them. What mechanism will check the UK’s regulatory compliance with EU rules to allow access to the market? Will the UK use EU standards in negotiations on other trade agreements, or will there be a whole different set of standards for each agreement? Even more importantly, services make up 80% of the UK’s economy, and paragraph 48 of the White Paper says that

“the UK and the EU will not have current levels of access to each other’s markets.”

That is the Government limiting the sector’s access to the world’s biggest market, which is massively damaging. What measures will the Government bring in to compensate for that bizarre and unhelpful move?

Scotland is right in the firing line of this Brexit dither and indecision—damaged yet again by Tory infighting and intransigence. Is it not time that the Government accepted that this is a wrong-headed scheme and kept us in the single market and the customs union? They would be well advised to take the measured and sensible approach recommended by the Scottish Government ahead of last week’s Joint Ministerial Committee. Will that be considered? The Government’s own analysis has shown that Brexit is massively damaging, no matter what protections are offered. Will the Government now listen to wiser heads, reverse course for everyone’s good, and stay in the single market and customs union?

Lastly, what on earth is happening in this place? Not only did the Opposition parties receive copies of the White Paper appallingly late, but it is customary for party spokespeople to have sight of statements before Ministers rise to their feet, not during the statement, as happened today. This Government’s contemptuous treatment of this Parliament has once again been laid bare for all to see.

[Dominic Raab]

First, the decision to leave the EU was not a decision by any political party; it was a decision by the UK in a referendum—free and fair—of which every party in this House, when the legislation providing for it was passed, agreed to respect the outcome.

In relation to goods and services, we will be taking the decision to agree to a common rulebook, because we want to mitigate any risk of friction at the border. However, this House and the Government—the UK—will have the chance to feed in to any potential changes that may occur over time through consultation. Ultimately, there is a parliamentary lock to make sure that elected Members of this House have the last word. The reality in relation to goods is that the corpus or body of law remains relatively stable. Unlike goods, services are not affected by friction at the border—they are not subject to tariffs or customs—and unlike the vast majority of manufactured goods and agri-food products, most services are not subject to specific standards. The hon. Lady complained about rule taking in relation to goods and then she complained about our not being subject in relation to services. That made no sense at all.