European Union (Withdrawal Agreement) Bill

Debate between Pete Wishart and Desmond Swayne

3rd reading & 3rd reading: House of Commons
Thursday 9th January 2020 Commons Chamber

[Pete Wishart]

There is a fascinating journal, account and book to be written about this, and I am looking forward to the hon. Member’s memoirs after all this.

I want to pay tribute to some of the other people who have won today, in the great victory of this Brexit. I know that the Conservatives will, uncharitably, not do this, but somebody has to congratulate Nigel Farage. It is his vision that has been realised today. Without Nigel Farage, there would be no Brexit. Without the pressure that was put on the Conservative party from whatever incarnation of his party existed at the time, there would not be the hard Brexit that they are all celebrating today. Come on, Conservatives—give the man a peerage, for goodness’ sake! He, more than anybody else, deserves it. And wouldn’t it be comedy gold for a man who rails against unelected politicians to be given an unelected place in the legislature? Please do it, just for the comedy value.

We are not just passing a piece of legislation today. We are actually entering into a new age, a new epoch: the age of hard Brexitism. Everything that this House does from this point on will be informed and directed by this new atmosphere, culture and direction of the United Kingdom. I am trying to think of a poster boy for the new hard Brexit age, and the only thing that comes to my mind is the right hon. Member for Rayleigh and Wickford (Mr Francois) in combat casuals flying a Spitfire to the sound of hope and glory heading straight to the ground because his aircraft has suffered engine failure. That is the image that comes to mind in the new Brexit age, and God help us as we go forward. It is viciously right-wing and isolationist, and takes no account of the views of anywhere else around the whole world today. It is this new age of hard Brexit that we are now entering into.

I am looking around for some of the other hon. Members on the Conservative Benches. Obviously the right hon. Member for North Shropshire is here, but I am looking for the newly knighted dark lord of Brexit austerity, the right hon. Member for Chingford and Woodford Green (Sir Iain Duncan Smith). He is not in his place, and neither is the right hon. Member for Wokingham (John Redwood), who so excited us with his tales of English nationalism. None of them is here, but all of them have to be congratulated. They are now the mainstream of the Conservative party. They effectively manipulated what was a moderate centrist party to become this party of Brexit extremists. They booted out all the moderates; none of them is here now. There is no debate or discussion, or any sort of contradiction of the views of hard Brexiteers any more, because they have booted all the moderates out. This is the new Conservative consensus, and I hope that the party today in the Bulldog Club is generous and full of largesse, and that they very much enjoy it.

[Sir Desmond Swayne]

My right hon. Friend the Member for North Shropshire (Mr Paterson) spoke of the gloom and doom on the other side of the Chamber, and I think that the hon. Gentleman put his finger on it in his complaint about the hardness of this particular Brexit. What was clear throughout the Committee stage was the harking back of Opposition Members to a previous Bill that did not make it through this House in December of last year. It did not make it through this House because those Members voted against the programme motion, and they now feel guilt for having delivered the very situation about which he complains, but which we rather regard as the intervention of providence.

[Pete Wishart]

I am grateful to the right hon. Gentleman. I know he is tempting me to speak about the Labour party, but that is just cruelty. I will resist the opportunity to say a few words to Labour Members, other than: for goodness’ sake get your act together, because you have to be an Opposition. Not one of their Back Benchers is standing to be called in this debate today, which shows how humble they have become in this whole debate. However, I say to the right hon. Gentleman that it is a bit rich blaming a useless Labour party for sinking that last Brexit deal, because it was the hard Brexiteers who brought it down. They were prepared to sink their own Prime Minister and reject a deal because of their ultimate vision, objective and all-consuming obsession with the hardest of hard Brexits, which is what is being delivered today.

Parliamentary Constituencies (Amendment) Bill: Committee Stage

Debate between Pete Wishart and Desmond Swayne

Tuesday 19th June 2018 Commons Chamber

[Pete Wishart]

That is a salutary lesson from the hon. Gentleman. He knows and respects his history, and knows exactly what is being debated here and the impact that that type of speech has.

[Sir Desmond Swayne (New Forest West) (Con)]

This is not an area where I have expertise, but my understanding was that the money resolution enabled money to be spent in preparation for the Bill becoming law. So there is a financial implication of passing a money resolution, even if the Bill has not proceeded to Third Reading and Royal Assent.

[Pete Wishart]

The right hon. Gentleman is right that he is not an expert on this particular issue; he has just demonstrated that by what he said. There is no obligation on the Government to commit money in a money resolution. A money resolution would allow the Committee stage of the Bill to be given the authority that the Leader of the House suggests this motion would not allow. I looked today at some of the proceedings of the Committee. It is like “Alice in Wonderland” meets “Groundhog Day”, without any progress. The Committee seems to come together and adjourn; as quickly as it sits to consider some of the issues, proceedings are abandoned because there is nothing for the Committee to do. What an absolute and utter waste of time.

The key point is not Parliament’s responsibilities and the distinction between Government’s and Parliament’s roles in the House. The key issue is that the private Member’s Bills system is broken. It may be broken beyond repair. This is the fifth Parliament I have been involved in, and I have never known a Parliament to obsess so constantly and continually about private Members’ Bills. Usually they go through without any real issue or difficulty. The Leader of the House mentioned a couple of Bills under the coalition Government for which money resolutions were withheld. In the periphery of my memory, I remember those Bills, but that was about the first time in my 17 years in this place that the Government withheld money resolutions. We are entering a new sort of territory with this Government weapon to stop the progress of Bills that they do not particularly like. The House should consider deeply the increasing use of this method as a blocking tactic for private Members’ Bills before we continue down such an avenue.

Government Policy on the Proceedings of the House

Debate between Pete Wishart and Desmond Swayne

Tuesday 10th October 2017 Commons Chamber

[Pete Wishart]

I will tell the hon. and learned Lady what I think about the will of the people. I was elected just a couple of months ago—I won an election. The gentleman I beat in that election is now in the House of Lords as an unelected Scottish Office peer. That is how to reject democracy; that is how to play fast and loose with the will of people—rejected one minute and ennobled the next. So I will take no lectures from the hon. and learned Lady.

[Sir Desmond Swayne (New Forest West) (Con)]

I am one of the people as well, and I will conduct my voting in this Chamber entirely on the basis of my own opinion and my own conscience. I decide when and how I vote, not the Government, and on the occasion in question, I chose to deploy my vote accordingly. I was in agreement with the first motion, because the lead I tend to take from my Front Bench was in agreement with it. Why would I therefore choose to oppose it? On the second motion, although I was against the sentiments being expressed, it was clear to me that, in accordance with the statute, however I expressed my opinion, it would make no difference. That is the matter in a nutshell.

[Mr Speaker]

Order. I exercised some latitude for the right hon. Member for New Forest West (Sir Desmond Swayne), not least in light of his starring performance this morning, when he asked the most succinct question, but that was a mini-speech rather than an intervention. I simply take this opportunity to remind the House that the debate can last until three minutes past 6. The hon. Member for Perth and North Perthshire (Pete Wishart) has not taken up a great deal of time so far, so this is not directed specifically at him, but I simply make the point that if Members want to speak, they should try to help each other, and that means refraining from, dare I say it, lengthy or self-indulgent interventions.

Scheduling of Parliamentary Business

Debate between Pete Wishart and Desmond Swayne

Monday 17th July 2017 Commons Chamber

[Pete Wishart]

The hon. Lady is absolutely right. She probably shares my concern about what would happen if that came to pass, and the inadequacy of Report stage. We would have everything baled into one, with Report, Third Reading and, probably, statements and other business on the same day. Intricate, important pieces of legislation require proper scrutiny in the proper Committees of this House, and it is incumbent on the Government to put that process in place. Any attempt to subvert the normal arrangements for Bills to go to Committee is clearly unacceptable, and I hope that the House will reject any such attempt.

We have heard quite a lot about how things are normally set up. I am almost disappointed that the hon. Member for—Chris Bryant, whatever his constituency is. [Interruption.] For Rhondda. I am almost disappointed that he is no longer here, because he is a keen student of the subject, and I think he actually gave us some figures. The Leader of the House said that we were in an unusual situation because we had had a June election. I was elected in 2001—I think you were elected before me, Mr Speaker—and I remember that in 2001 we had a June election, but all the Standing Committees and all the Select Committees were in place by the summer recess. The election in 2001 took place on 7 June, the Queen’s Speech was held on 20 June and all the Select Committees were in place and functioning by 19 July.

[Sir Desmond Swayne]

The reason for that is that in those days it was a stitch-up by the Whips. Now we elect the members of Select Committees, and that is the key difference.

[Pete Wishart]

I am grateful to the right hon. Gentleman, because he reminds me of something that happened during the establishment of the Select Committees in 2001. He is right; it was a stitch-up by the Blair Whips, and he will remember when they tried to remove Gwyneth Dunwoody and Donald Anderson from the chairmanship of two Select Committees. That held up the creation of the Select Committees, but we still managed to get them in place. There is absolutely no reason why the same cannot happen now. The example of the year of 2001 is a good one.

I very much agree with the hon. Member for Walsall South (Valerie Vaz) when it comes to Opposition days and the setting aside of time for Back-Bench business. It looks as though Back-Bench business and private Members’ Bills will be about the most interesting features of this parliamentary Session.

House of Lords Reform and Size of the House of Commons

Debate between Pete Wishart and Desmond Swayne

Wednesday 19th October 2016 Commons Chamber

[Mr David Hanson (Delyn) (Lab)]

Following the right hon. Gentleman’s point on gender balance, may I help the hon. Gentleman by saying that, among the hereditary peers, there are currently 91 men and one woman?

[Sir Desmond Swayne (New Forest West) (Con)]

rose—

[Pete Wishart]

I give way to the right hon. Gentleman.

[Sir Desmond Swayne]

I disagree with the hon. Gentleman. The new creations are exactly the savvy sort of people that we should have in the House of Lords. However, the reason why we are in this position of an unreformed House of Lords is that there was insufficient consensus in this place on how to replace it. Is he going to set out his plan for the other place?

[Pete Wishart]

If anything, that sounds like a manifesto from the right hon. Gentleman to get himself a good place in the House of Lords, and I wish him all the best in that ambition.

I am grateful to the right hon. Member for Delyn (Mr Hanson) for mentioning the hereditaries, because that brings me on to my next point. Although the new appointees are bad enough, there are some other cracking undemocratic horrors skulking in the corridors down the road. They are the aristocrats, the 91 Members of Parliament who have the opportunity to design, fashion, shape, issue and supervise our laws because of birthright—because they are the first son of a family that won a decisive battle in the middle ages. The one thing I do like about the hereditaries is that they bring an element of democracy to the House of Lords—did Members know that? It is the surreal and bizarre contest that they have when one of their number dies. The earls, the counts, the barons, the lords and the ladies of the land get together to replenish their numbers. It is the weirdest electorate in the world. It may be the poshest and most exclusive electorate that can be found anywhere, but at least there is that element of democracy in the House of Lords.