Devolution (Immigration) (Scotland) Bill

Debate between Pete Wishart and Andrew Bowie

2nd reading
Friday 25th April 2025 Commons Chamber

[Andrew Bowie]

Michael Gove, soon to be Lord Gove of Torry, is answerable for his own opinions on whether immigration powers should be devolved to Scotland. I would not be in any way surprised if his views on that issue have changed, as indeed have his views on certain other issues over the years.

First, we should not enable regional immigration policies within the United Kingdom. Secondly, there is absolutely no case for a special immigration policy for Scotland outwith the United Kingdom’s legislative framework. Thirdly, the Scottish Government under the SNP over the past 18 years have demonstrated an unparalleled and unprecedented level of incompetence, which ought to preclude consideration of granting greater powers over, frankly, anything. We all know that there is such a thing as Scottish exceptionalism. The only exceptionalism that the Scottish Government have demonstrated is an exceptional reverse Midas touch to almost every single area over which they have responsibility, whether it is education, health or transport infrastructure. I could go on.

[Pete Wishart]

Just before the shadow Secretary of State gets into his usual anti-Scottish Government stuff, he has told us what he does not like about this Bill moved by my hon. Friend the Member for Arbroath and Broughty Ferry (Stephen Gethins). How would the Scottish Conservatives resolve our population demography crisis and the fact that we have a shrinking working-age workforce in Scotland? What would they do?

United Kingdom Internal Market Bill

Debate between Pete Wishart and Andrew Bowie

Wednesday 16th September 2020 Commons Chamber

[Pete Wishart]

It is probably just as well I have eaten, because I would otherwise consume that with no problem at all. Can I just say to the hon. Gentleman that we would take the authority of the EU looking over Scotland any day, rather than rogue state UK. I say that very candidly and sincerely.

[Andrew Bowie]

Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

[Pete Wishart]

No, I won’t. [Interruption.] I might give way later, as the hon. Gentleman is a prize on the Government Benches, and we will of course want to hear from him in time, because I enjoy our little exchanges.

Strengthening the Union

Debate between Pete Wishart and Andrew Bowie

Monday 23rd July 2018 Commons Chamber

[Douglas Ross]

Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

[Andrew Bowie (West Aberdeenshire and Kincardine) (Con)]

Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

[Pete Wishart]

I do not have time to take any more interventions.

I ask the Scottish Conservative MPs—I may give way to one or two of them later—whether they are helping to strengthen or to weaken the Union in this Parliament. They came down here with 29% of the vote—the “Ruth Davidson opposes a second referendum” party did relatively well in Scotland—but they have lost five percentage points in the past year. Their constituents are watching them whine on about a Parliament and a Government 400 miles away, and they are sick and tired of being represented by people who could not care less about their duties and functions in the House, but everything about a Parliament that they can no longer question, and that is having an impact on what they are doing.

We could get on to English votes for English laws. Does that strengthen or weaken the Union? Well, there is a hard one. We could also get on to the £1 billion that Democratic Unionist party Members were able to secure, of which Scottish Conservatives have not been able to get a single penny. However, let us just sum up where we are in the wider debate. If we look across the range of defining constitutional issues, we find, when the people of Scotland are tested in opinion polls, that independence now stands at 47%, or two percentage points up from our very impressive gains in 2014. We are very much on a journey with all this. Independence remains more or less at the level we had in 2014, and we are not even campaigning for independence at the moment.

The defining feature in all this will be the Conservatives’ Brexit—their hard Brexit—and how the Scottish people start to assess the situation. Scotland is currently tethered to HMS Brexitannia, which is heading full speed for the biggest iceberg ever encountered in political history. Unlike the real Titanic, this HMS Brexitannia is hurtling towards an iceberg at full speed in the full knowledge that that will sink the ship and all the souls on board.

For Scotland, however, there are lifeboats attached to this doomed and stricken liner, and they are marked “Independence”. All we in Scotland need to do is clamber aboard, get them off the vessel as quickly as possible and row towards the shores of independence, security and sanity.

European Union (Withdrawal) Bill

Debate between Pete Wishart and Andrew Bowie

Committee: 4th sitting: House of Commons
Monday 4th December 2017 Commons Chamber

[Pete Wishart]

Is the hon. Gentleman actually saying that if, for whatever reason, clause 11 was not passed or was significantly amended, what he refers to as the UK’s single market would be done away with?

[Andrew Bowie]

I am not sure I actually understand the premise of the question. I will give way again if the hon. Gentleman would like to explain.

[Pete Wishart]

It is quite straightforward. The hon. Gentleman is alleging and suggesting that, for some reason, if clause 11 were significantly amended, his internal market would be at risk. Does he actually believe for one minute that, if clause 11 were rejected, his internal market would absolutely disappear?

[Andrew Bowie]

I am arguing that, if we agreed to the provisions set down by the Scottish National party and the other Opposition parties, it would be fatally undermined and at risk.

Just to prove my point, we all know that making a success of Brexit and protecting and strengthening our internal market are not in the interests of the Scottish National party, whose raison d’être remains the destruction of our United Kingdom. Conservative Members are committed to making these things work and to making a success of this exciting new chapter in our island’s story for business and for peoples from Inverbervie to Ipswich, and from Banchory to Bognor.

That is why the UK Government are working tirelessly with the devolved Administrations in Cardiff and Edinburgh, and with the various parties in Northern Ireland, to make sure that when we leave the European Union in 2019, the laws that protect the integrity of our market, and the common frameworks that ensure parity and access across Britain, remain the same as they are today. That will involve compromise, but surely even the greatest hardliner would agree that it makes no sense for each of the four nations of our United Kingdom to have different rules and regulations or different regulatory bodies for packaging, animal welfare or aircraft noise, for example.

If we get this right, little will change for most people and most businesses. For the fisherman, it will still be Marine Scotland responsible for implementing rules and regulations on the quayside. For the farmer, it will still be the Scottish Government making a mess of their support payments. But instead of Brussels being responsible for overarching frameworks or new laws, or for negotiating trade deals, fishing quotas and common agricultural payments, it will be the sovereign United Kingdom Parliament in London, which is directly responsible and accountable to the British people.