Scotland Bill

Lord Austin of Dudley Excerpts

Monday 9th November 2015 Commons Chamber

[Mr Allen]

I hope—[Interruption.] I hope that even those who are heckling and shouting would say that I always try to engage people from the SNP in debate on these issues. Sometimes things get a bit interesting and a bit heated, but that is because we all care passionately about these views. I am trying to put my point of view over now. Perhaps there are shades of opinion in what appears to be a robotic, monolithic Scottish National party. Perhaps some SNP Members acknowledge that others have a different view. It might be the case that that has some resonance, and that not all of them simply wait to be told what to do at their regular Monday meeting.

[Ian Austin (Dudley North) (Lab)]

I take a different view from that of my hon. Friend the Member for City of Chester (Christian Matheson). I agree with my hon. Friend the Member for Nottingham North (Mr Allen) that, now that the SNP is the establishment in Scotland, its members are desperate to avoid any scrutiny of the way in which it runs the Scottish Government. That is because they want to be able to blame everybody else—namely, the wicked people down south—for everything that goes wrong in their country.

[Mr Allen]

I am sure that the Chair would call me to order if I answered my hon. Friend’s very pertinent question, but I know that he will make that point and many others when he is called to speak.

New clause 8 is about defining. It is all very well to sit in Holyrood handing out little bits of largesse here and there, but that is exactly what Whitehall and Westminster do to everyone else. The Scottish people have suffered from that as much as the English people have. One way to get round that is to define the competences of local government and national Government in such a way that no one will be able to unpick the idea, whenever it suits them, that power should be devolved beyond Holyrood or Westminster. Unless that principle is clearly entrenched, the lure of power from the centre—be it Holyrood or Westminster—and the temptation to tell people what to do will be too strong.

New clause 8 proposes that people who want to engage in this debate should sit down and discuss with their local government—wherever it might be—what it is appropriate for local government to do. I do not believe that Scotland, England, Wales or Northern Ireland should be immune from that idea, because otherwise they will find that power gets sucked back up. Some of my friends in Scotland are telling me that power there is becoming ever more centralised. No doubt that will be a matter of debate, but that is what people are saying. Perhaps the easiest way round that is not to say, “Oh yes, but we are very nice to people. We are benign and we give them a little bit more money here and there”, but to allow the people, the drivers who produced devolution in Scotland, to produce devolution lower down than Holyrood.

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[Ian Austin]

Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

[Angus Robertson]

The hon. Gentleman will have time to make a speech later. There is very little time, and I am the first parliamentarian from the SNP to be called in these proceedings more than an hour after the beginning of this debate.

The sole purpose of the Scotland Bill is to implement the Smith commission in full. The UK Government’s amendments are a welcome admission that the Scotland Bill, as published, did not deliver Smith. However, the Government’s amendments tabled on Report still fail to deliver Smith and still fail Scotland. SNP Members have tabled a range of amendments that will give the people of Scotland the powers they were promised and the powers that they will need. We have tabled amendments on tax credits, which would devolve control over all aspects of working and child tax credits, and on employment rights, which would devolve control over employment rights and industrial relations to the Scottish Parliament. We will debate those in the next group of amendments, when they will be addressed by my hon. Friend the Member for Banff and Buchan (Dr Whiteford).

We have also tabled new clause 36 to devolve the power to hold a referendum on Scottish independence to the Scottish Parliament. There should only be another referendum on Scottish independence when the people of Scotland indicate that they want one, but it is right that the Scottish Parliament—the people of Scotland’s Parliament—should hold the power to react to the wishes of the people of Scotland.

We should not lose sight of the fiscal framework. That is the financial underpinning that will allow the transfer of powers to operate without detriment to the people of Scotland.

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[Tommy Sheppard]

I am grateful to the shadow Secretary of State for his support on this matter. The principle is clear: you do not keep a dog and bark yourself. Once power has been devolved to organisations, they must be allowed to get on with it.

I was disappointed that the hon. Member for Nottingham North (Mr Allen) took almost 20% of the time available for this debate not to discuss constitutional principles about the governance of Scotland, but to pursue his concerns about the decentralisation of services. What we are discussing is a change in the constitutional arrangements between Scotland and England within the Union. We are talking about giving more authority and competences to the Scottish Government, and that is not the same thing as the decentralisation and better administration of public services in England. The hon. Gentleman was wrong to do that and is unlikely to have made friends to support his argument as a result.

My final point is on full fiscal autonomy. I think that some of our opponents thought that when we did not get that through the last time, we would forget about it. Believe me, we have not forgotten about it. We want the Scottish Government to have control over the economy in Scotland. We want the ability to grow our economy and for our priorities to be set in line with the aspirations of the people who live in Scotland. I heard some interesting arguments from the hon. Member for Gainsborough and others in favour of full fiscal autonomy, but I have yet to hear a principled argument against it. The hon. Member for Edinburgh South (Ian Murray) often talks of a black hole, but that is not an argument in principle against full fiscal autonomy—against giving the Scottish Government control over economic affairs. It is an argument for saying that we should prepare for that devolution of powers and make sure that we get it right. I hope that the hon. Gentleman will come round to that way of thinking. We will object to the proposal to give a Conservative Secretary of State the power to set up a commission to look into whether full fiscal autonomy could happen, because he has already made his intentions in that regard clear.

We will come back to this issue, and it will be the subject of future debate in Scotland. The grandest commission of all on this debate will be the electorate of Scotland, who will get another opportunity in six or seven months’ time to decide whether they want better economic powers for their Government. We will get another mandate and come back to make that argument again.

My right hon. Friend the Member for Moray referred to the fiscal framework. It is not for us today to get involved, or even seek to influence, the discussions between Scottish and UK Ministers on the fiscal framework, but we have to be clear about what is at stake. The Smith commission was clear: it said that whatever powers are devolved to Scotland in this or any other settlement, it should be at no detriment. In other words, at the point of transfer of the power, the Scottish budget should not suffer as a consequence. I want to hear from the Secretary of State whether he believes in that principle. Is it guiding his discussions with Scottish Ministers? If it is used simply as a device to cut the Scottish budget and not provide adequate funding for the delivery of the new powers, he will do his cause a great disservice and hasten the day that we come back with a new Bill that will be a considerable improvement on this one.

[Ian Austin]

In September 1997, I travelled from Dudley to Glasgow and Edinburgh to support the late Donald Dewar and Scottish Labour’s campaign for a yes-yes vote in the devolution referendum—[Interruption.]

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Natascha Engel)]

Order. There is an awful lot of noise in the Chamber while the hon. Gentleman is on his feet.

[Ian Austin]

Thank you, Madam Deputy Speaker.

I remember helping to organise events at which Donald Dewar, the right hon. Member for Gordon (Alex Salmond), who has just left his place, and Sean Connery spoke at the Old Royal High School building, overlooking what would become the site of the new Scottish Parliament. SNP Members did not object so much then to people from England taking an interest in Scottish politics. That referendum led to the establishment of the Scottish Parliament, and the amendments to the Scotland Bill that Labour has tabled, which I wish to support today, will make it a permanent part of the UK’s constitution.

I promise that my speech will be the shortest we have heard today, but I want to set out some practical arguments in support of the case made for greater decentralisation by my hon. Friend the Member for Nottingham North (Mr Allen). As we have heard, these proposals constitute the biggest transfer of power since the Scotland Act 1998. The Bill will make the Scottish Parliament the most powerful devolved parliament in the world. It will raise 50% of its own expenditure, with power over most of the revenue from income tax and much of social security.

[Stephen Gethins (North East Fife) (SNP)]

Does the hon. Gentleman think that these proposals are—to quote a Scotsman—

“as close to a federal state as you can be”?

A simple yes or no answer will do.

[Ian Austin]

As I have said, the proposals will make the Scottish Parliament the most powerful devolved parliament in the world. Labour has been the driving force behind this Bill. We have pushed to ensure that Scotland has all the extra powers, including powers over welfare, to allow the Scottish Parliament to design a new social security system for Scotland and to ensure the Scottish Parliament will have the opportunity to mitigate the impact of Tory cuts to tax credits. Despite their desperation to be disappointed and their determination to stoke grievance and fuel resentment, SNP Members have said that this will give the Scottish Parliament the powers it needs to create a new social security system in Scotland. When asked whether the Bill gives Holyrood the power to make up any reduction in tax credits, Alex Neil, the SNP welfare spokesperson, said:

“The amendments...should give the Scottish Parliament those powers.”

Despite that, the nats have tabled a series of amendments, including 10 new clauses on national insurance, the living wage, employment legislation, industrial relations, benefits, full fiscal autonomy and the power to decide whether and when to hold another referendum.

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[Dr Whitford]

Our junior doctors in Scotland are not out on the streets marching and balloting for strike action. The hon. Gentleman might wish to make a direct comparison of performance before he attacks our NHS.

[Ian Austin]

I will come on to the SNP’s record on running the health service shortly, but before I do—[Interruption.]

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Natascha Engel)]

Order. No shouting out, please. A Member is speaking and it is quite difficult to hear what he is saying. It is not appropriate to shout things out. If people want to speak they can intervene or stand up and take part in the debate. Let us have no shouting.

[Ian Austin]

I am afraid they are behaving like nationalist bullies the world over. They try to silence anybody who has a different view. They want to pretend that whether or not you are allowed to take part in a debate in this Chamber depends on where you represent and the accent you have. It is a complete and utter disgrace.

[Alberto Costa]

Is it not a disgrace that the people of Scotland, including Labour supporters and Conservatives who voted decisively to reject separatism, are being completely ignored by SNP Members today?

[Ian Austin]

I completely agree with the hon. Gentleman. It is an absolute disgrace.

An even bigger disgrace is the state of education in Scotland, which is run by the SNP. The gap between the richest and the rest has persisted, meaning that the poorest children in Scotland are not getting the opportunities they should. Young people from deprived backgrounds who get to university are facing grants and bursaries that have been cut, making them the lowest in the UK. Every year, more than 6,000 children in Scotland leave primary school unable to read properly, and pupils from a wealthier background are twice as likely to get a higher A than pupils from deprived backgrounds. Pupils from wealthy backgrounds are twice as likely to go on to higher education as those from deprived backgrounds. In further education, 140,000 fewer students are going to college in Scotland, and funding for Scotland’s colleges has been cut by £53 million. Scotland has the lowest percentage of university entrants from the poorest backgrounds and the lowest proportion of entrants from state schools in the UK. As I said, grants and bursaries for poor students have been cut by 35%.

A moment ago, the hon. Member for Central Ayrshire (Dr Whitford) asked me about the health service in Scotland. The truth is that under the SNP standards have been slipping. Waiting time targets have been missed and pressure is increasing on nurses and doctors. Analysis from the impartial Scottish Parliament Information Centre shows that the SNP has not increased investment in the NHS as much as in England, despite rising demand. The accident and emergency waiting time target has not been met for six years. More than 400,000 people have had to wait more than four hours in A and E since 2011. The new flagship Queen Elizabeth University hospital in Glasgow posted the lowest waiting time targets since its opening: only 77% of patients were seen within four hours.

The hon. Lady asked what Scottish doctors are saying. Only one third of NHS Scotland staff say there are enough staff for them to do their job properly. Despite promising less private involvement in the NHS, spending on private health services is at its highest since devolution.

I also agree with my hon. Friend the Member for Nottingham North on the case for greater decentralisation from Holyrood to local authorities, because that might enable local authorities in Scotland to tackle the housing crisis across the country. Scotland is facing its biggest housing crisis since the second world war, with nearly 180,000 people in Scotland on social housing waiting lists. Audit Scotland estimates that Scotland will need more than 500,000 new homes in the next 25 years. In 2007, the year Labour left office in Scotland, there were 25,741 housing completions. In 2014, there were just 15,000—a 40% reduction.

When I visited Edinburgh for a weekend last month, I was absolutely stunned—[Interruption.] The hon. Member for Na h-Eileanan an Iar (Mr MacNeil) thinks it is funny. The level of rough sleeping on the streets of Edinburgh is an absolute disgrace. His colleagues in the SNP should be thoroughly ashamed. Everyone knows that under the Conservatives rough sleeping is increasing right across the country, but I have to say that I saw many more rough sleepers on the streets of Edinburgh than I have ever seen on the streets of Birmingham, which is a much, much bigger city.

On full fiscal autonomy, I agree with new clause 1 and the case for a commission. The Institute for Fiscal Studies has said that the SNP’s plans would leave a £7.6 billion black hole in Scotland’s finances that the separatists have absolutely no idea how to fill. The nats might deny that, so let us have the full independent review that Labour is calling for and get the facts.

Having listened to the debate, you, Madam Deputy Speaker, would be forgiven for thinking that SNP Members would much rather invent rows with the rest of the UK than improve life for people across Scotland. Their whole approach is designed to drive up resentment and blame everyone else for their failings. Instead of being held to account for their record, they want to blame the nasty people down south for everything that goes wrong: everything that goes right in Scotland is down to the SNP; everything that goes wrong is down to the rest of us. The truth is that SNP Members are not interested in policy. They are obsessed with breaking up the country, but having been rejected in the referendum they are trying to engineer a separation by fuelling grievance in Scotland, winding up the English and undermining Labour, because they know they have more chance of a successful vote in a referendum with a Tory Government in place in Westminster.

They are more interested in breaking up Britain than they are in improving the health service, improving education and providing housing for the poorest people in Scotland. It is much easier to blame everything on a supposedly wicked Westminster than it is to try to use the powers they have to improve things in Scotland. In fact, the last thing they want to do is solve the problems in education, health or housing, because then they would not be able to stoke resentment, fuel grievance and blame the nasty English for causing them. It is, I am afraid, the perpetual nat whinge: blame everyone else for your failings and pretend that everything would be solved if only the country was broken up.

[Joanna Cherry (Edinburgh South West) (SNP)]

In contrast with the previous speech, which was an ill-informed diatribe criticising the Scottish Government, I rise to address the Bill before us today. I am going to use what precious time I have to speak in favour of amendment 204.

Amendment 204 would introduce a subsection to clause 11 that would remove the Human Rights Act 1998 from the list of protected provisions in schedule 4 to the Scotland Act 1998. This would have the effect of removing the Human Rights Act from the list of enactments that cannot be modified by the Scottish Parliament. If the Scottish Parliament was able to modify the Human Rights Act, that would allow the Scottish Government and the Scottish Parliament fully to establish a human rights regime in Scotland regardless of whether the Act was repealed by the UK Parliament in London.

The UK Government, which have no mandate in Scotland, have repeatedly made clear their intention to repeal the Human Rights Act and to replace it with a Bill of Rights. They have made it clear that they scorn European and international norms on human rights and the jurisdiction of the European Court of Human Rights. They have made it clear that they want to replace the Human Rights Act with a watered-down version of the rights and protections that everybody in the UK currently enjoys. We saw that very much trailed in The Sunday Times yesterday.

We in Scotland do not wish to have the terms of the debate on human rights in Scotland dictated by the UK Parliament, because in Scotland we have a very different agenda. There is no mandate in Scotland for repeal of the Human Rights Act. Preserving the Human Rights Act was an issue during the campaigns in both the independence referendum and the general election. The SNP has consistently opposed repeal, and as my right hon. Friend the Member for Moray (Angus Robertson) said, we won the general election in Scotland. Indeed, including Labour’s and the Liberal Democrats’ sole representatives in Scotland, 58 out of 59 Scottish MPs oppose repeal.

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[Ian Blackford]

I am grateful to my hon. Friend.

This is also about our ethos, the kind of society we are and what we will strive to do, because in Scotland we believe not in welfare, but in social security—we believe in offering protection to people—but we also believe in the principle that society is as strong as its weakest link. That is a very different concept from what we have in this Parliament, with the cuts that are coming through and those we know will come in the autumn statement.

[Ian Austin]

Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

[Ian Blackford]

No, I am going to make some progress, if the hon. Gentleman does not mind.

So I say to those in this House: will they respect the sovereignty of the Scottish people, who sent us to this House, or will they ignore the express wishes of the Scottish people? Let me say to Government Members that they have been rejected wholesale at the ballot box in Scotland. They should think very carefully before exercising a veto, which to all intents and purposes will be an English veto against Scotland. Perhaps in that regard the question we should put to the Secretary of State is: is he Scotland’s man in the Cabinet or is he the Cabinet’s man in Scotland? The Secretary of State should do the honourable thing—accept our amendment and stand up for the people of Scotland. What is it to be?

And what about the Labour party, a party that once dominated the political landscape of Scotland? It is perhaps not yet extinct like the dodo, but more like a beached whale. Labour Members should show us that they want to protect Scotland. If they want to make a difference for Scotland, they should support our amendments tonight—or will they be siding with their colleagues in Better Together?

[Ian Austin]

rose—

[Ian Blackford]

I want to make some progress.

Labour Members need to start learning the lesson that Scotland rejected them for a reason. They had better start to get on side with us and the people of Scotland. Tonight is a chance for the House to understand that Scotland expects powers for the Scottish Parliament to be delivered so that Scotland’s destiny can be put in Scotland’s hands. That will not happen by voting for a Bill that leaves us with a hand tied behind our backs while a Tory Government do their worst to the poor and disadvantaged in our society.

Our amendments allow us to deliver on the interests of our people. We need a Parliament that will allow us to stand up for the people of Scotland and recognise that the people are sovereign. Let me finish by quoting Charles Stewart Parnell:

“No man has the right to fix the boundary to a march of a nation. No man has the right to say thus far shalt thou go and no further.”

It is in that context that we need powers to determine in Scotland when and if we want to have a referendum. It is in that context that the House should listen to the elected Members of the people of Scotland.

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[Ian Austin]

Does my hon. Friend agree that this obsession with organising another referendum proves the central point made by me and others in this afternoon’s debate—that the SNP is much more interested in breaking up Britain than in getting on and delivering for the people of Scotland by improving the health service, improving education and providing the homes that the people of Scotland need?

[Wayne David]

I could not agree more. In my book, devolution is not about divorce, separation or schism. It is not about balkanising Britain. It is about establishing a new partnership, so that the people of Britain can work together in a constructive and harmonious way.

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[Wayne David]

One of the key reasons why we are broadly in support of what the Government are belatedly proposing is that we believe it will give new responsibilities to the Scottish Parliament to try to achieve substantial things on behalf of the Scottish people. I think there is a case to say that responsibility and power go together, and that is why these measures are a step forward.

[Ian Austin]

A moment ago my hon. Friend expressed surprise that the SNP and the Tory right were voting together on full fiscal autonomy, but I am bemused about why he is surprised given that it was the SNP who brought down the Labour Government in the 1970s and ushered in 18 years of—[Interruption.] I do not know what the hon. Member for Ochil and South Perthshire (Ms Ahmed-Sheikh) is shouting for, given that she was until very recently a Tory herself. They ushered in 18 years of Thatcherism and all the problems about which they are now whingeing. [Interruption.]

[Wayne David]

All I would say is that it is quite clear that the truth hurts sometimes, does it not? They have been rumbled absolutely.

I will make a little progress in a slightly more sedate manner, if I may. Reference has been made to our new clause 1, which would establish an independent commission on full fiscal autonomy to scrutinise the potential impact on Scotland’s economy and public finances. It would require the Secretary of State for Scotland to establish an independent commission of external experts, appointed in consultation with the Treasury Committee and Scottish Affairs Committee, to publish a report by 31 March 2016 setting out an analysis, objectively and fairly, of the impact of the policy of full fiscal autonomy.

VAT is another important issue. Our amendments 27 to 29 would place an additional £5 billion of reserves under the direct control of the Scottish Parliament by assigning 100% of Scottish revenues from the standard and reduced rate of VAT to the Scottish Parliament, as opposed to 50%, for which the Bill currently allows. Of course, under EU regulations, which do not allow for differential rates of VAT in the same state, the actual setting of VAT would have to remain reserved. However, this is not an argument against assigning the revenues generated in Scotland to the Scottish Consolidated Fund. As was said on Report, given that the Scottish Government would have

“no control over VAT, why assign only half of it? Why not assign it all? The Scottish Government could then quite rightly benefit, if there was a benefit, from the entire rise in VAT in Scotland rather than just half of it and could take responsibility if there was a shortfall, not just for half the shortfall.”—[Official Report, 29 June 2015; Vol. 597, c. 1256.]

It was said that that would be a good thing. Those were not my comments, or indeed the comments of another Member of the Opposition; they were the comments of the hon. Member for Dundee East (Stewart Hosie), who also happens to be the SNP’s spokesperson on the economy. Oddly, given his full-blooded support for devolving 100% of VAT, the SNP has not actually got round to tabling an amendment that would produce this effect, and when the Labour party tabled an amendment proposing that, did the hon. Gentleman and his colleagues welcome it? No, they did not. Instead, they issued a press release in which the hon. Gentleman himself denounced it as a “gimmick”. Well, I do not think it is a gimmick and I am sure the people of Scotland do not think so either.

New clause 4 would review the impact of the new income tax powers on the operation of gift aid in Scotland to guard against unintended and negative consequences for charities. Gift aid is worth over £1 billion a year to charities and over £100 million in Scotland. Any threat to its smooth operation must, therefore, be closely guarded against. The problem that Labour’s new clauses seek to address is that gift aid is UK-wide, linked to tax paid, and predicated on a single tax structure. I would welcome in the Secretary of State’s response any assurances he can provide to charities in Scotland on the issue of gift aid.

New clause 11 would require the Secretary of State to lay before the House of Commons a full record, including minutes of meetings and correspondence at ministerial level, of discussions between the Secretary of State, the Treasury and Scottish Ministers relating to the non-budget expenditure to be voted by Parliament authorising the payment of grants to the Scottish Consolidated Fund for that financial year. We would of course be happy to work in partnership with the Scottish Parliament on such a report, although it is similarly in the gift of the Scottish Government to produce their own report, and I hope that they would share it with us as well. We would thereby have regular updates on the health of these negotiations, which currently take place to a large extent behind closed doors. The purpose of this new clause is to ensure transparency and accountability in the process leading to the annual settlement between the Treasury and Scottish Ministers of the block grant to the Scottish Consolidated Fund.

It is worth noting that the Scottish Parliament’s Finance Committee produced a report on intergovernmental relations in late June. It makes for interesting and important reading. It is generally critical of the state of intergovernmental relations, which are described as taking place “below the radar.” It is said that relations should be made

“more formal and more transparent.”

The Committee also recommended that consideration should be given to establishing an independent body to advise on the calculation of the block grant and an independent arbiter to resolve disputes on issues such as the block grant adjustment. The Labour party would certainly support any such moves to that effect, and it is in the interests of introducing greater accountability, transparency and formality to these negotiations that our new clause 11 has been tabled.

I am grateful for being allowed to speak in some detail about some of the amendments, but they are important; these are important issues. I hope that the House will give sympathetic consideration to the points I have made this evening.