European Union (Withdrawal) Act

Baroness Chapman of Darlington Excerpts

Monday 25th March 2019 Commons Chamber

[Jenny Chapman (Darlington) (Lab)]

It is an honour to close for Her Majesty’s Opposition in such an important debate on our nation’s future and to follow the brilliant speeches made by Members who have risen to the occasion, including my hon. Friends the Members for Pontypridd (Owen Smith) and for Reading East (Matt Rodda), the right hon. and learned Member for Beaconsfield (Mr Grieve), my hon. Friend the Member for Birmingham, Northfield (Richard Burden), who made a particularly thoughtful speech, and my good and hon. Friend the Member for Redcar (Anna Turley), who spoke with passion and conviction.

Tonight the House must make an important decision: to take the reins from the hands of the Prime Minister and find a way out of this Brexit impasse. I know that that is not an easy decision for many Members, particularly those on the Government Benches, but we have seen how the Prime Minister has responded to losing two meaningful votes by two historic margins. First she hoped to push through the same deal again without meaningful changes, no matter the rules of the House or the obvious hopelessness of her strategy. Next she tried to pitch the people against MPs, with all the consequences that that has for parliamentary democracy. Then she went to the European Council without a viable strategy and had to have a plan to extend article 50 and avert no deal written for her and for the United Kingdom. Finally, when she should have been seeking consensus across the House, she spent the weekend further trying to placate the very people manoeuvring against her. At every turn, she has made a crisis of her own making even worse.

Well, enough is enough. There is a void where coherent leadership ought to be, exemplified by the Prime Minister’s statement earlier today. Tonight Parliament must step into that void to find a consensus on the best way through. That is what amendment (a) from the right hon. Member for West Dorset (Sir Oliver Letwin) and amendment (d) from the Leader of the Opposition seek to achieve. As my right hon. Friend the Member for Leeds Central (Hilary Benn) said, if the Government were doing their job, those amendments would not be necessary. The European Council’s decision to grant the UK an extension to the article 50 process was a necessity—it was the only way to prevent leaving without a deal on Friday—but any extension must be for a purpose.

Parliament must rapidly decide how we wish to proceed if we are not going to face the cliff edge again on 12 April. Indicative votes are not ideal, but these are extraordinary circumstances, and indicative votes would allow MPs an opportunity to express their view on a way forward. Labour recognises that Members across the House have different views on how the process for indicative votes should be carried out. My hon. Friend the Member for Bishop Auckland (Helen Goodman) outlined her view based on her distinguished service on the Procedure Committee. Finding a consensus will not be easy. Different processes have different strengths and weaknesses, but as my hon. Friend the Member for Wigan (Lisa Nandy) said, a key merit of amendments (a) and (d) is that they do not close off options for how we conduct that process.

Labour will be supporting both amendments, and I encourage Government Members to stop giving the Prime Minister, who is so evidently out of control, the benefit of the doubt. This is a chance to put the country before party.

However any indicative process is conducted, this House must reach a decision on the substance of the matter. What future relationship with the EU do we want, and how do we want to get there? We must start by eliminating the bad options and the unicorns. Labour and the House are clear that we cannot accept the Prime Minister’s blind Brexit. Nor will we sign up to a distant and arm’s-length economic relationship along the lines of Canada. The Brady amendment, which proposed replacing the backstop with alternative arrangements, was an irresponsible, Government-sponsored unicorn. Neither we nor the House will countenance no deal, described by my right hon. Friend the Member for Derby South (Margaret Beckett) as the very definition of irresponsibility. How right she is.

As far as Labour can see, that leaves two credible options. The first is a close economic partnership based on a customs union and single market alignment, with dynamic alignment for rights and protections. The second is a public vote between remain and a credible leave option. The Leader of the Opposition and the shadow Brexit Secretary, my right hon. and learned Friend the Member for Holborn and St Pancras (Keir Starmer), have met colleagues to discuss those ideas. They are engaged in good-faith discussions to find where a majority lies in this House—a majority that I hope will be expressed through the indicative votes process.

Let me finish by saying this: today the Prime Minister said that even if a majority for a way forward is found through the indicative votes process, she cannot commit to implementing it. How characteristic and typical that is of a Prime Minister who confuses the vices of blinkeredness and intransigence with the virtue of steadfast determination, whose first instinct is to ignore and push away the views of others, and who seems incapable of accepting that in our parliamentary democracy the Prime Minister must bring a majority of the House of Commons with her. It is an approach that has brought about a national crisis and brought us to a point where Parliament must now step in and take control of this process.