European Council

Jacob Rees-Mogg Excerpts

Monday 21st March 2016 Commons Chamber

[The Prime Minister]

I am very grateful for the hon. Lady’s work on this, and I am glad to have helped. I think she will find that this will have an impact on other European countries, because there is now huge pressure on some of those countries to explain their own level of tax on sanitary products. The Irish are of course leading the way with a 0% rate. On the matter of the rest of the SNP manifesto, I have to say that if we implemented it in full and had an independent Scotland, we would basically be bankrupt and have to tax everything.

[Mr Jacob Rees-Mogg (North East Somerset) (Con)]

May I warmly welcome my right hon. Friend’s generous comments about my right hon. Friend the Member for Chingford and Woodford Green (Mr Duncan Smith), who is so widely respected on these Benches? Does the Prime Minister agree that two of the three greatest reforms of the Government he leads are restoring fiscal rectitude and welfare reform? May I therefore encourage him to continue with both equally?

[The Prime Minister]

I wholeheartedly agree with my hon. Friend. This goes to the point about the importance of the welfare cap. We have controlled departmental spending carefully for years in our country, but welfare spending has often run ahead. It was up by 60% under the last Labour Government. That money cannot then be spent on hospitals, schools and vital public services. My hon. Friend is absolutely right: fiscal rectitude, welfare reform and making sure we keep welfare spending under control are vital components of a one nation Government.

European Council

Jacob Rees-Mogg Excerpts

Monday 22nd February 2016 Commons Chamber

[The Prime Minister]

The problem with the hon. Gentleman’s statistics is this: obviously, 50% of our trade is with the EU, but if we take the EU as a whole only about 7% of its trade is with us. So were we to leave the EU and then contemplate the negotiation that would follow, clearly we would not be in the stronger position. I think that is important. The second point I would make—I made this point earlier—is that, yes, we have a trade deficit in goods, but we have a massive trade surplus in services and it is in the single market in services where the prospects for progress are greatest today. So there would be a danger if we were to leave that maybe we would get that deal on goods relatively quickly because of our deficit, but if they held up the deal on services where would all our service companies be? Where would those jobs be? What would we say to those companies about how long it could take to get a deal to safeguard the incomes and prospects of families across our country?

[Mr Jacob Rees-Mogg (North East Somerset) (Con)]

May I congratulate my right hon. Friend on spending 40 hours—apparently four clean shirts and a packet of Haribo—in implementing the Labour party manifesto in his conversations in Brussels? Does this not actually show the problem: that for so much labour he has achieved so little, and that the EU is a failing organisation—a failed common fisheries policy, a failed common agricultural policy, a single market that shackles us with regulation that makes us fundamentally uncompetitive, an immigration system that is betraying people who get to Europe, not to mention the eurozone which, thank heavens, we are not a member of? In this failed organisation, the Prime Minister has said in his statement that we are to make a final decision. It is the one sentence of his statement that I fundamentally agree with: a final decision to be made in June as to whether we stay with a failed body or whether we leave and make our own path. Is the Government’s policy basically,

“And always keep a-hold of Nurse

For fear of finding something worse.”?

[The Prime Minister]

Obviously, my hon. Friend and I have a profound disagreement about this issue. I very much respect his views because he has held them in good faith for many years, and I have held my view that we need reform, but reform within the EU, for many years. I am sure that we can respect each other in the months of debate ahead.

I do want to take issue a little with my hon. Friend on manifesto delivery. I will not run through the whole thing, but we said that we would legislate for a referendum —we’ve delivered it. We said that we will protect our economy from further integration of the eurozone—that is covered in the settlement. We said that we want powers to flow away from Brussels—that is covered in the settlement. We want national Parliaments to be able to work together to block unwanted European legislation —covered in the settlement. We want an end to our commitment to ever closer union—covered in the settlement. We will ensure that defence policy and national security remain firmly under British national control—covered in the new settlement. We will insist that EU migrants who want to claim tax credits must live here and contribute to our country for four years—covered in the settlement. It is there time and again.

We all stood under this manifesto, and I am proud of it and of the team who put it together and are implementing it. While I say, “Yes, let’s have this vigorous argument”, let us not pretend that we have not delivered the manifesto on which we stood in front of the British people.

UK-EU Renegotiation

Jacob Rees-Mogg Excerpts

Wednesday 3rd February 2016 Commons Chamber

[The Prime Minister]

Those are important questions. I think I am right in saying that the amendments to the European Referendum Bill—now the 2015 Act—that were agreed in the House of Lords and were then, I think, accepted here require the Government to produce a series of documents concerning the reform proposals, the alternatives to membership, and the obligations and rights that attach to membership of the European Union. I think that, through a process involving those documents, we should address a very important question that clearly affects one part of the United Kingdom quite intensely.

[Mr Jacob Rees-Mogg (North East Somerset) (Con)]

In 2014-15, 183,000 economic migrants came from the European Union, none of whom would have been deterred by anything we have heard so far. Ever closer union may be taken out of the preamble, but it remains in the essential text of all the treaties. On protecting the “euro-outs”, all that will happen is that there will be a discussion—and there are plenty of discussions in the European Union—and, on competitiveness, that has been part of the European Union’s own ambition since the Lisbon agenda of 1999.

The thin gruel has been further watered down. My right hon. Friend has a fortnight, I think, in which to salvage his reputation as a negotiator.

[The Prime Minister]

My hon. Friend is extremely articulate and always speaks very powerfully, but let me take two of the points that he has made and explain why I think that, actually, he has got this wrong.

First, the principles that will be legally binding in terms of how currencies other than the euro are treated constitute a real advance. They mean, for instance, that never again can the European Union suggest that the clearance of euros is possible only in eurozone countries, which would have been disastrous for our financial services industry. I have secured that. The European Union cannot even promote that again, which is extremely important, because if we were not in the European Union, we would not have that protection at all. The EU could change the rule just like that. I do not think my hon. Friend understands the power of the principles of no discrimination, no disadvantage, and no cost, which mean that we cannot be forced to bail out eurozone countries as we nearly were last summer. Those are powerful principles.

On ever closer union, I encourage my hon. Friend to look at page 9 of section C of one of the documents, which states that

“the references to an ever closer union…do not offer a basis for extending the scope of any provision of the Treaties”.

As I have said, as far as I can remember—I was advising a Minister at the time of the Maastricht debates, and I sat through Lisbon and Nice and Amsterdam and the rest—the principle has never been set out in that way. This means that ever closer union cannot be used to drive a process of integration. If we in the House have the protection that we must have a referendum if any Minister ever suggests that we sign up to another treaty that passes power—protection one—and we have this too, we are well on our way to saying that our different sort of membership of the EU is not only safeguarded but is being extended, because not only are we out of the euro and out of Schengen, but we are out of ever closer union too.

EU Council

Jacob Rees-Mogg Excerpts

Tuesday 5th January 2016 Commons Chamber

[The Prime Minister]

The hon. Gentleman makes an important argument, but I think there are forces going in both directions. On the good side, the widening of the European Union to include the Baltic states, the Nordic countries and the Balkan states has been a great advance for the British agenda, and the fact that we are focusing Europe on doing trade deals with the fastest growing parts of the world, rather than looking inwards, is a great advance in the agenda.

However, there are still proposals for more federalistic approaches and Britain has successively carved itself out of those things. If Europe wants a border force to help police its external borders, that is a matter for them and is not something we will take part in. If the eurozone wants to pass a series of laws to have a fiscal union or mutual debt obligations, that is a matter for it. It is fine, as long as we are not involved. What I aim to get through the renegotiation is the best of both worlds for Britain—in Europe where it is to our benefit, but not involved in those things that involve the wrong passage of sovereignty from this place to others.

[Mr Jacob Rees-Mogg (North East Somerset) (Con)]

The Prime Minister tells us that other EU Heads of Government say that the EU needs Great Britain and Northern Ireland. Does that not show the strength of our negotiating position? They need our money and our economic strength. Therefore, has not the time come for him to screw his courage to the sticking point and say to Chancellor Merkel—that great beadle of Berlin—when he next sees her, “Please, we want some more”?

[The Prime Minister]

I will bear that in mind when I see Chancellor Merkel in the snows of Bavaria on Wednesday evening. Of course we have negotiating capital. We have a strong position because we make such a huge contribution to the organisation, but I believe that what I have set out is the right approach for our country.

ISIL in Syria

Jacob Rees-Mogg Excerpts

Wednesday 2nd December 2015 Commons Chamber

[Jeremy Corbyn]

I thought I had made it clear, and that the Speaker had made it clear, that at the moment I am not giving way; I am really sorry, but I am not. Okay? The Government’s proposals for—

[Mr Jacob Rees-Mogg (North East Somerset) (Con)]

On a point of order, Mr Speaker. Though it is indeed customary that he who holds the Floor decides whether to give way, is it not also customary to answer questions when they are put in interventions? We are waiting for the right hon. Gentleman’s answer on Iraq.

[Mr Speaker]

The hon. Member for North East Somerset (Mr Rees-Mogg) is a sufficiently experienced parliamentarian to know that he has made his own point in his own way, and it is on the record.

Oral Answers to Questions

Jacob Rees-Mogg Excerpts

Wednesday 21st October 2015 Commons Chamber

[The Prime Minister]

The hon. Lady is right to raise that issue. The Government work closely with Peel Ports because of the enormous amount of key infrastructure and land that it owns. I will look carefully with the Secretary of State and the devolved authorities to see whether there is more that we can do in this instance.

[Mr Jacob Rees-Mogg (North East Somerset) (Con)]

Does my right hon. Friend share my concern that, if the other place were to vote against changes to working tax credits, that would be a serious challenge to the privilege of this House—a privilege that was codified as long ago as 1678? Does he further share my concern that such a move would entitle him to review the decisions of Grey and Asquith on creating more peers, to ensure that the Government get their financial business through?

[The Prime Minister]

My hon. Friend makes an important point—his knowledge of history is clearly better than mine, because I thought the key date was the Parliament Act 1911. Under that Act, issues of finance are supposed to be decided in this House. This House has now decided twice in favour of the measure on tax credits—once when voting on the statutory instrument and again last night in a vote scheduled by the Opposition. The House of Lords should listen to that carefully and recognise that it is for this House to make financial decisions, and for the other House to revise other legislation.

European Council

Jacob Rees-Mogg Excerpts

Monday 19th October 2015 Commons Chamber

[The Prime Minister]

If the hon. Gentleman is asking whether anybody at the European Council criticised the British approach, the answer is no, there was no criticism of our approach. It is understood that we are taking 20,000 refugees. We have always been clear about exercising our opt-out on the quota, and there is a lot of respect for us for the money that we have put into the refugee camps. One way that we can demonstrate that we want to help our European partners at this time of need for them—these are very difficult debates about having hotspots in countries where people are arriving, how we distribute people around the European Union, and the massive pressure that is currently on Germany, Austria and Sweden—is to offer our technical expertise at the border, and that is where we are giving support and where we can contribute more if necessary.

[Mr Jacob Rees-Mogg (North East Somerset) (Con)]

My right hon. Friend said that we have maintained our own border controls. I wonder how effective he thinks that is when we admitted 183,000 economic migrants from the European Union last year and how effective it will continue to be if he and the German Chancellor have their wish and Turkey becomes a full member.

[The Prime Minister]

On the issue of Turkey, one point I have made about our renegotiation is that we should treat accession countries in a totally different way in terms of unfettered rights to come to Britain. We made that very clear from the start of our renegotiation. We think that these transitional periods have been too short and that it was wrong when they were not properly used. It is important to note that we have borders and border controls in the way that Schengen countries do not. One question that we will have to ask ourselves as a country as we get towards the end of this renegotiation process is, can we guarantee that we will be able to have the excellent juxtaposed border controls in France that we have today if we do not have an adequate relationship with the European Union? That will be an important point.

Syria: Refugees and Counter-terrorism

Jacob Rees-Mogg Excerpts

Monday 7th September 2015 Commons Chamber

[The Prime Minister]

I can certainly give the hon. Lady that assurance. The Gateway programme, which she talks about, and other schemes effectively resettle about 1,000 people in Britain every year. In addition there are successful asylum applications—I think there were 11,000 last year—and we will now be taking 20,000 Syrian refugees. I think that is a generous, compassionate country in action, and we look forward to working with Hull City Council on that basis.

[Mr Jacob Rees-Mogg (North East Somerset) (Con)]

There is widespread support for the Prime Minister’s generous decision to take 20,000 refugees, but last year alone we took 183,000 economic migrants from the European Union. I wonder whether that is proportionate, or whether we could not be more generous to refugees if we were less obsessed with the free movement of people.

[The Prime Minister]

The ability to move in Europe and take a job is something that many of our own citizens enjoy by going to live in another country. What we should be addressing is the additional pull factor of our welfare system, which can give people some €12,000 or €13,000 in their first year after coming to Britain. That would ensure that free movement works, which is important, but is not artificially inflated by our own welfare system.

Debate on the Address

Jacob Rees-Mogg Excerpts

Wednesday 27th May 2015 Commons Chamber

[Mr Speaker]

I am grateful to the right hon. Gentleman for putting that on the record.

[Mr Jacob Rees-Mogg (North East Somerset) (Con)]

Further to that point of order, Mr Speaker. If we go back to the Bradlaugh case, it is well established that this House is entitled to limit the voting rights of individual Members. The House refused to let Bradlaugh take the Oath, and it was upheld by the courts that that could not be interfered with outside this Chamber, and that is in our Bill of Rights.

[Mr Speaker]

I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman, on whom we can always depend for his historical exegesis, but I think that does rather underline why it would be imprudent of me to say anything beyond what I have said today. I note what has been said by other Members, and I think it sensible and wise to leave it there for today.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr David Davis (Haltemprice and Howden) (Con)]

Thank you, Mr Deputy Speaker; I will try to be disciplined in my taking of interventions. It is a pleasure to follow the hon. Member for Carmarthen East and Dinefwr (Jonathan Edwards). I shall not follow him down the route of devolution for Wales, despite the fact that my name is Davis.

The House will be unsurprised that I find a great deal to approve of in this Queen’s Speech; it is, after all, the first to be delivered by a solely Conservative Government for nearly 20 years. I particularly welcome the European Union referendum Bill. Contrary to what has been said, it is asking the people’s permission to do something—stay in or leave. It is not anything else beyond that and it is long overdue.

I also welcome the education and adoption Bill, which involves two sets of moves in the right direction. I would do more myself, but the moves are, at least, beneficial. I welcome the enterprise Bill, which will build on the economic success of the past few years. It will create jobs so it will probably do more to reduce poverty in this country than any other social measure. I welcome the childcare Bill, which doubles free childcare to 30 hours a week—indeed, I would again go further and reduce some of the restrictions on that childcare provision. That would help underpin the lives of ordinary people in a beneficial way.

I also welcome the right-to-buy Bill. It is controversial, but done properly—that point matters—it will improve ordinary working people’s ability to get on to the property ladder. The failure to do that has been decried on both sides of the House. At the same time, it will release money to allow new social housing, which every Government in the past 20 years have failed to provide on a sufficient scale. Indeed, the last Labour Government failed in 13 years to provide as much social housing as was built in one year under Margaret Thatcher. We all have to face that fact.

I want to talk about three areas of concern, many of which have been mentioned, especially by my right hon. and learned Friend the erstwhile Attorney General. The first is the Scotland Bill. I am sorry that the right hon. Member for Gordon (Alex Salmond) is not here, because he would have some views on this. Despite my being a firm Unionist, I have long been an advocate—since 1998, in fact—of more fiscal autonomy for the Scottish Parliament. When I was the Public Accounts Committee Chairman in 1998-99, I went to see Gordon Brown to tell him that the mechanism that he had chosen, of having Holyrood dependent on an opaque, virtually incomprehensible subvention formula, was a grievance machine: it would create grievances in Scotland and England. As such it was a destabilising measure, not a stabilising one.

We need to grip this issue. We need to enable the Scottish Parliament to pay its own way from funding that it raises and controls, both in policy and Executive terms, and to ensure that subventions provided from the rest of the United Kingdom, in the form of pensions and other welfare costs, are properly costed, as are all the other taxes raised in Scotland that do not go to the Scottish Parliament. We should make our judgments in future on the basis of knowledge, not of assertion and counter-assertion from the two sides of Hadrian’s Wall. That is one issue, and we will come back to it in detail no doubt during the debate on the various measures relating to both Scotland and England.

Like my right hon. and learned Friend the Member for Beaconsfield (Mr Grieve), the aspect of this Queen’s Speech that worries me most is the whole question of Human Rights Act repeal, and, with that, the introduction of the counter-terrorism Bill and the communications data Bill—the so-called snoopers charter. I am very pleased that the Government have decided to step back from an immediate rush into repealing the Human Rights Act. That seems very sensible. With only 19 days to go until the 800th anniversary of Magna Carta, it at least shows some sensitivity to the history of our country and what we stand for—something to which my right hon. and learned Friend referred. We should remember that the biggest lesson of Magna Carta is that the acquisition of liberty and loss of liberty in our history has often happened by accident as much as by plan. We must think about the unintended consequences of what we do when we set about changing these major constitutional issues.

Before this debate I spent a little time looking through the list of adverse judgments against the United Kingdom by the European Court of Human Rights since we joined, but mainly since 2001, when the HRA came into effect. Bearing in mind that I was the person, along with Jack Straw, who brought to this House the motion that stopped the imposition of prisoner votes on this country, I have a very sceptical view of the ECHR, yet I found that I agreed with some 90% of the judgments, on such diverse things as taking away from the Government the right to keep the DNA of innocent people for years, through to preserving the right of British citizens to wear a crucifix while at work. That is the level of diversity that we are talking about. The number of things I did not like was quite small, and that came about largely as a result of the nature of the Court as a body without any feeling for the history and tradition of Britain, with a lot of people from different countries who have no reason to know about our history.

Ideally, therefore, I would like us to keep the main thrust of the HRA but bring the Court judgments back to our own Supreme Court. Unfortunately this produces for us a serious conundrum to which I have not yet heard any Government Minister give an answer. As it stands, the European convention on human rights, in the hands of Strasbourg, is entrenched; no British Government could change it. If we bring its provisions back to the United Kingdom, then it is no longer entrenched. Looking at the history of the past 20 years, I ask myself how Governments would have responded when, let us say, 90 days’ detention without charge went across this set of tramlines, or control orders, or DNA, or anything else. What the Government would do, of course, is change the constitutional measure that was put in place to uphold the Court.

[Mr Rees-Mogg]

On the point about entrenchment, my right hon. Friend referred to Magna Carta. Three clauses of Magna Carta still remain the law today, 800 years later. Entrenchment is not needed for the law to survive if it is good law.

[Mr Davis]

That was my view 20 years ago. Since then, I have lived through three sets of Governments, none of whom I would trust with the protection of liberty in this country. Three clauses are left out of how many? I have forgotten; a very large number have disappeared. The harsh truth is that in the modern world Governments are very quick to modify things that are inconvenient to them. When the Blair Government were in power, they were very happy to do things that were just procedural issues that the public did not pay any attention to, even though their effects were enormous.

The only way to deal with this is to undertake a written constitution for the United Kingdom. That could not be done on a partisan basis—it would have to be bipartisan— and it would take years, more than a single Parliament. I am afraid that at the moment, as it stands, I am unwilling to support Human Rights Act abolition unless I hear an answer to that conundrum, as well as the others put to the House by my right hon. and learned Friend the Member for Beaconsfield.

I have concerns about the counter-terrorism Bill, which intends to move us from stopping people making speeches that incite violence to stopping ones that incite hatred. I suspect that many people in this House have made speeches that incite hatred, sometimes deliberately, sometimes not. How on earth we are going to make the judgment as to what crosses this line and what does not without massively impeding our freedom of speech, I do not know. Let us remember that Voltaire’s comment, accurately, was this: “I despise what you say but I will fight to the death for your right to say it.” I repeat: “despise what you say”. We must remember that freedom of speech is the right of people to say things we do not like and are not comfortable with.

On the communications data Bill, I differ dramatically from the previous Attorney General, my right hon. and learned Friend the Member for Beaconsfield. I have watched over many years the operation of our agencies and the foreign agencies. Most of them, pretty much all the time, behave honourably in collecting data, but they take the view that collecting data is not wrong; only looking at it is wrong. I am afraid that is semantic nonsense. If one holds the data, one has the power of the Stasi even if one does not behave like the Stasi—the power of a totalitarian state even if one does not behave like a totalitarian state. All those of us who have been here for many years have seen Governments, from time to time, misuse the data they have in front of them. I would be very unwilling for us to move further down that route, particularly because the Americans, as we speak, have passed the USA Freedom Bill—Act, as it will be—by some 330 votes to 88 votes in Congress. That will reverse exactly the sort of mass collection of data that is being proposed here. It is implausible to argue that the Americans do not need it but somehow we do.

I welcome the main parts of the Queen’s Speech, but some are incredibly difficult in terms of liberty and justice in this country. We are in a small-majority Parliament. I do not want a return to the trials and tribulations of the ’92-’97 Parliament, but I do want a Government who do not just try to solve everything in Whitehall or in a specially selected Committee with specially selected Members. I want these problems to be solved on the Floor of this House, and I hope that they give us the time to do it.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Jacob Rees-Mogg (North East Somerset) (Con)]

May I welcome you to the Chair, Mr Deputy Speaker? It is a real pleasure to see such a distinguished member of the Procedure Committee looking after our affairs this evening.

I really want to congratulate the hon. Member for Argyll and Bute (Brendan O’Hara) on his superb maiden speech. It was the ideal maiden speech, containing everything that a good maiden speech should have. It was serious minded, enormously respectful of the House of Commons, generous to his predecessor—against whom I imagine the hon. Gentleman had quite a good campaign to have won so successfully—while also having a little bit of steel that good maiden speeches need so that we know that he means business in this House. I congratulate him most sincerely on a brilliant speech, supported by so many of his compatriots and fellow members of the Scottish National party. Looking at my own Benches, I fear it rather puts us to shame.

Speaking as a parliamentarian, the Scottish Nationalists have shown us how to behave today. They have come here more smartly dressed than the Conservatives; they have sat through the debate in greater numbers than those of my own party; and they have even let the hon. Member for Bolsover (Mr Skinner) have his usual seat. Their good manners and respect for the House of Commons is something that those on the Government Benches will look forward to taking very seriously over the next five years, because those of us who are Unionists recognise that their right to be here is just as great as those of us from England, Wales or Northern Ireland. That will be an important part of how this Parliament develops.

Let me turn to the Queen’s Speech. The Gracious Speech divides, I think, into two parts. There is the natural business of government—the important and urgent business of government, starting, of course, with the economy. What the coalition managed is beginning to yield considerable fruit. The latest monthly deficit figure was much ahead of forecasts, with a significant increase in tax revenues coming through. That is what it would have been reasonable to expect.

Tax revenues are a lagging indicator of economic performance, and the fact that they are now coming through more quickly probably means that the deficit will decline faster than it is currently forecast to do. That will give us a strong background ensuring that we can live within our means, and that the legislation to prohibit an increase in national insurance, income tax or value-added tax will be a type of legislation to which we can commit ourselves very easily. Nothing particularly difficult will be involved, because, in my view, the revenues have now been boosted, but also because any increase in VAT would probably reduce the tax take for the Government. It is already clear that businesses reaching the VAT threshold are deciding not to grow and not to take on extra customers, because as soon as they do, their costs will become 20% higher. I think that 20% is as high as VAT can reasonably be.

We saw that the 50p income tax rate raised less money than the 45p rate is raising now, and we all know the lesson of the Laffer curve: higher rates do not produce more income for the Exchequer. When we consider national insurance and income tax together, we see that the Government are, among other things, taking lower earners out of tax. If those people were put back into tax, they would merely have to be paid more in benefits, thus increasing the deficit.

On that side of things—the fiscal, or tax, side of things—the Queen’s Speech is admirable. Given that it is a continuation of the work done by the coalition, I suppose that it would be mean-minded not to pay tribute to the Liberal Democrats, who, although now reduced in number, played an important part in that work. I think that the nation should be grateful for the big decision that they made in 2010, at considerable cost to their party’s fortunes, to ensure that the country could get out of the mess that had been left.

Beyond that, however, there are the constitutional matters, which, to my mind, are of a piece, whether they concern English votes for English issues, more devolution, the European referendum or human rights. I say that because, between 1997 and 2010, the Government started a whole process of constitutional reform which they did not complete or round off. One example is devolution. It began in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland, but nothing was done for England. That is because it is very complicated to come up with a solution for England that meets the requirements of constitutional propriety, while also recognising that England contains 85% of the population. If England demands exact parity with Scotland, we shall probably have broken up the United Kingdom anyway. If the English want the Union, the onus is on them to recognise that, and to be generous to the other constituent parts of the United Kingdom.

That is why I support—although I note that there is opposition to it—the use of Standing Orders at some point during the progress of a Bill to allow English votes. Standing Orders are easy to suspend. A Standing Order could be suspended if, for example, a future Government were dependent on Scottish votes for their continuation. There might be a political cost, but the Government of the country could continue, and Members of Parliament from Scotland would remain exactly the same Members of Parliament. It would be like an extension of a Grand Committee. There would be an issue in which some Members of Parliament were not involved, but ultimately it would once more be in the power of the whole House to decide on it.

That is a much more flexible system than a legislative system that would create a Parliament within a Parliament. A legislative system would mean that the franchise would change, and the ability of MPs from other countries in the Union to vote on issues would be permanently reduced, whereas a Standing Order is essentially a self-denying ordinance that could be overturned for a single vote. Standing Orders are suspended fairly routinely when it suits the Government for business to run a bit late, or when they want Second and Third Readings to take place on the same day. That cannot be done with legislation. Standing Orders are not a means of playing some wretched trick on Scottish MPs, but a way of ensuring that the system in the House of Commons can work and can be fluid. However, I should prefer that to be a fairly limited aspect of our law-making, involving issues that are so clearly and unequivocally English—or English and Welsh—that no reasonable person would think otherwise. I do not want the standing of individual Members to be determined by the nation from which they come.

The other issues that we face—the European issues—stem, in a way, from the same source. They involve a loss of power from the House of Commons to the continent and to continental courts, or even to judges in our own country. I worry about that, not because I think that out of nowhere has come a common sovereignty that we must fight to the death to protect, but because we hold that sovereignty in trust for our electors, and we must and ought to have returned it to them every five years. Instead, we have given it away to judges in Strasbourg, and to some of our own judges across the road in the Middlesex Guildhall. That has made it easy for legislation to be overturned, and hard for it to be reinstated by the House of Commons.

I do not deny that there are some very clever judges. My right hon. and learned Friend the Member for Harborough (Sir Edward Garnier), the former Solicitor General, said that there were judges who understood the law better than us mere politicians, and that may well be true. Nevertheless, we make the law, on behalf of our constituents, for the judges to interpret, and if we do not like the judges’ interpretation, it is for us to change the law. If we give away that power so that the judges become the final arbiter, we shall have given away something that does not actually belong to us, but belongs to our electors and to the British people.

The reform that I want is a reform that reasserts the principle of the sovereignty of Parliament, not as an end in itself, but because it supports democracy. That is where I think all the constitutional issues become involved. They are about respecting the will of the people, including the will of Scottish people to have more devolution, which I cannot deny, however much I want to. I stood in Scotland once; I got 9% of the vote. I did at least hold my deposit in Glenrothes, which is a fine town, and I very much enjoyed the experience. It is that level of democracy that we need to retain, be it in respect of devolution, Europe, or human rights.

Election of Speaker

Jacob Rees-Mogg Excerpts

Monday 18th May 2015 Commons Chamber

[Jacob Rees-Mogg (North East Somerset) (Con)]

I beg to move, That the right hon. John Simon Bercow do take the Chair of this House as Speaker.

May I add my congratulations to you, Sir Gerald, on becoming Father of the House in succession to the much loved and highly regarded Sir Peter Tapsell? It is indeed a tribute to your long service to this nation that you now take the Chair of our proceedings.

It has been the habit of this House to continue with a Speaker who wishes to continue to serve, and that is for very important constitutional reasons. The Speaker is the champion of the House of Commons against all-comers—the champion of the Commons against the Lords and sometimes against the judges, but perhaps most particularly against the Executive. The historians here will know that some seven Speakers lost their heads for championing the Commons against the Executive—something that we hope is no longer necessary.

The connection between the Speaker and the Commons protects us and the rights of this House. If we were to be light in changing our Speaker, we would find that the Speaker spent the whole time paying regard to what the Front Bench on one side or the other were thinking as to how he should rule, lest he should not continue in office after a general election. The last time that happened was in 1835, when Charles Manners-Sutton was booted out by the Whigs for being too much of a Tory. I am glad to say that there are not very many Whigs left to behave in that way.

I want to move on from the general constitutional principle to the right hon. Member for Buckingham and why I think he is so well suited to continue as Speaker. A Speaker has to have a good knowledge of “Erskine May”. Some new, show-off Back Benchers may think that they know a bit about “Erskine May”. I occasionally thought that in the previous Parliament and went to the Speaker with some clever procedural strategy. He, with the wise advice of the Clerks, always knew it better, and that is essential to keeping order in this place.

A good Speaker must also be prompt with business. Who has not heard him say, “Short questions and short answers.”? That is the mantra of Question Time—[Interruption.] And speeches, though I quite like long speeches. [Laughter.] That has got our business through at Question Time and on statements, but the Speaker has also ensured that the Commons debated what it wanted to debate. The rise in the number of urgent questions has been hugely important in holding the Government to account, as has the selection of amendments on Report.

The Speaker also has the most phenomenal knowledge of Members, and the new Members will soon find that Mr Speaker knows not only their names but their date of birth and probably their weight when they were born—and will reveal all this when they rise to speak, for the entertainment of the rest of the House.

My right hon. Friend the Member for Buckingham has a reputation as a moderniser—a word that I use with some caution. In spite of my prejudices, it is important that this House looks beyond its own confines to the country at large. What he has done in terms of education has been very important—bringing school- children into this place and making it more available. But there is some hope—I hope that I am not being indiscreet in telling the House—because his son Oliver took one look at a portrait of the Speaker that was being unveiled and asked, “Daddy, why aren’t you wearing a wig?” Mr Speaker gave an answer that had it come from a Minister would not have been deemed satisfactory, so young Oliver said, “I think you should wear a wig, Daddy.” I am with Mr Speaker’s son on this issue, but I think my chances of success are limited.

The key virtue of the right hon. Gentleman is that he is impartial in this House, but he is a partisan for the House of Commons. In here, we are all equal and judged by him equally and fairly, but outside he defends our rights, our traditions and our liberties, and that is how it should be.

Question put forthwith (Standing Order No. 1A), That John Bercow do take the Chair of this House as Speaker.

Question agreed to.

Sir Gerald Kaufman left the Chair, and John Bercow was conducted to the Chair by Sir Peter Bottomley and Valerie Vaz.

Mr Speaker-Elect (standing on the upper step) : May I begin by thanking the Father of the House for the supremely efficient manner in which he conducted our opening proceedings, and express the hope that new hon. Members, especially, will enjoy the company and benefit from the wisdom of Sir Gerald in the course of their first Parliament?

I thank the House for again bestowing upon me the greatest honour that it can confer upon any Member. I am intensely conscious of the responsibilities into which I again enter, and I shall do my best to discharge those responsibilities efficiently, effectively and fairly. Above all, I am conscious of the rights of Back Benchers and the need to facilitate Members in championing the causes dear to them and, from whichever side of the House they come, holding the Government of the day properly to account. Thank you.

The Speaker-Elect sat down in the Chair and the Mace was placed upon the Table.