Budget Resolutions

Debate between Peter Grant and Andrew Bowie

Monday 1st November 2021 Commons Chamber

[Peter Grant]

During the previous time that there was a pro-independence majority in the Scottish Parliament, that majority Government did in fact open their door to discussions with the other parties, and the hon. Gentleman’s party was quite happy to take advantage of that. He may remember, in fact, that it was an initial suggestion from his party that led to the Scottish Government introducing and maintaining to this day a record of 1,000 additional police officers compared with the maximum number that ever existed in Scotland under the previous Lib Dem-Labour coalition.

This will be seen as the year the Tories finally ditched any pretext that Budget day has anything to do with the public finances, helping the economic recovery or sustainable growth. Budget day has become purely and simply a propaganda exercise for the Government, and particularly for the Chancellor. That is what the days and days of utterly inexcusable leaks were about—leaks that until 10 years ago would have meant automatic dismissal or resignation for the Chancellor. The Chancellor seems to measure its success not by how effectively it closes the gap between rich and poor, because it does not, or by whether it delivers on any of his party’s manifesto promises—that is on the off chance that anybody can find any that havenae been broken—but on how many favourable headlines he gets in the right-wing press. It is almost as if the Chancellor has worked out how important the right-wing press is going to be in choosing the next Tory leader in a year or two’s time when the present incumbent gets fed up with being Prime Minister and goes off to do something different.

This Government have a track record of spending millions of pounds on pushing soundbite slogans that are utterly meaningless. [Interruption.] I will give way to the hon. Member for Stoke-on-Trent North (Jonathan Gullis) if he has got—[Interruption.] Okay, if he does not want to intervene he can keep his mouth shut. In 2015, George Osborne gave us a “long-term economic plan” that changed, on average, every three months until he resigned. In 2017, we had “strong and stable”, leaving Britain weaker and less stable than it has ever been in peacetime. In 2019, we had “get Brexit done”, which meant we all got done over by Brexit, and in 2019 also we had an “oven-ready deal” that left most of us feeling that we had been stuffed like Christmas turkeys. This month’s catchphrase is “levelling up”. Looking at the detail of this “levelling up” Budget, it is like claiming that you have levelled out the potholes on the road by digging a massive great hole somewhere else in the road to supply the rubble to fill in the original potholes. It is about filling in holes left behind elsewhere in our economy and in our public services by 11-and-a-half years of a failed Tory Government trying unsuccessfully to maintain a failed British state.

The Government want us to believe that they are making things better for some people without making them worse for anybody else. Some people will get a bigger piece of pie, but nobody will have to make do with a wee-er piece of pie. You cannae do that unless the pie is getting bigger, but the fact is that the pie is still much, much smaller than it was when the Tories came to power.

The Institute for Fiscal Studies said in response to the Budget:

“For most departments, the budget increases announced today will be welcome, but not enough to reverse the cuts of the 2010s.”

If the best the Tories can say about this Budget is that, with a following wind and a wee bit of luck, they might just be about be able to remediate most of the damaging cuts they have inflicted on us during their term of office, that does not strike me as a cause for celebration. That is why they will not see a great deal of positive responses to the Budget from those on this side of the House.

[Andrew Bowie]

rose—

[Peter Grant]

I give way with pleasure.

[Andrew Bowie]

I understand and respect that we have political differences on our respective sides of the House, but surely the hon. Gentleman can join us in welcoming the fact that this Budget delivers the largest ever block grant to the Scottish Government in history since the Scottish Parliament was created. Perhaps he can expand on how he will be pressing the Scottish Government to spend that extra funding that we have delivered from the UK Government to Edinburgh.

[Peter Grant]

The sad thing is that no matter how much anyone in this House presses the Scottish Government on their decisions, a record amount of that money coming back to Scotland has already been decided not by the elected Members of the Scottish Parliament, but by Members of the UK Parliament who could not get elected in Scotland. Record amounts of that money come with strings attached and conditions attached that tell the Scottish Government how they have to spend our money.

In response to the hon. Gentleman’s specific question about the amount, if he looks carefully, he will see that, yes, there are welcome increases for capital spend, but the day-to-day service provision budgets of the Scottish Government will continue to be under intense pressure. While we welcome the increase in capital spend, the Departments of the Scottish Government—just like the Departments of this Government and the departments of local authorities the length and breadth of England and Wales—will find that the resources to meet the ever-growing demand on their day-to-day services will be as tightly pressed as ever.

While the Government will try to pull the wool over our eyes and say, “It is all covid’s fault”, we cannot and will not let them forget that the British Government’s management of the economy during covid has been among the worst of the world’s major economies. The International Monetary Fund has predicted that the long-term economic damage from covid in the UK will be worse than in the other G7 economies. Even that does not tell the whole story, because while the Secretary of State rejoiced in the fact that we hope the long-term economic damage of covid will be restricted to 2%, he forgot to tell us that Brexit is twice as bad as that. I wonder why he forgot to mention that the long-term, self-inflicted damage of Brexit is likely to be twice as bad as the long-term damage of covid.

National Security and Investment Bill (Fourth sitting)

Debate between Peter Grant and Andrew Bowie

Committee stage & Committee Debate: 4th sitting: House of Commons
Thursday 26th November 2020 Public Bill Committees

[Peter Grant]

Q You were suggesting earlier that the definition of the national security interest needs to be widened to include other national interests such as the strategic economic interest. Are you suggesting that there are some businesses or some assets in the United Kingdom that, although they do not have any national security implications, should not be allowed to be bought over by a company whose ultimate controlling partner remains anonymous?

David Offenbach: Well, I remember there was an outcry years ago when Michael Portillo was a Defence Minister and they were going to sell the Ministry of Defence. There was an outcry and it was withdrawn. Should Admiralty Arch become a hotel or is that an asset? These are the sort of issues which, if they come up, will be dealt with at the time. I like to think that certain things are fairly sacrosanct. We would not sell Buckingham Palace or Windsor Castle to a foreign buyer if we did not know who they were—or at all, in fact.

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

Q Mr Offenbach, thank you very much. I have a very quick question. You ran through a long list of acquisitions at the beginning of your evidence, most of which I think you would suggest were not in the national interest, although people may disagree. Given the Bill as it stands, which, if any, of those acquisitions would have been thwarted or prevented by it? Which, if any, of those acquisitions would have fallen foul of running the risk of being a threat to national security?

David Offenbach: The answer is that one is not quite sure. That is why I want to widen the definition. The reason why there are 17 different areas and categories in the Bill is that it is hard to know what national security is at any particular time and how it is reflected in the business that is actually being considered. The only way to make sure that something does not slip through the net is to have a slightly wider definition. There is no definition of national security itself in the Bill, which is perhaps why strategic, research and development, innovation or other issues should be brought in. Then one can be quite sure one has not accidentally lost an asset where there are national security issues.

National Security and Investment Bill (Third sitting)

Debate between Peter Grant and Andrew Bowie

Committee stage & Committee Debate: 3rd sitting: House of Commons
Thursday 26th November 2020 Public Bill Committees

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

Q Professor Martin, I have been listening with interest—it has been fascinating—especially when you were talking about the need to balance national security, the national interest and economic security. I have been reading the very good briefing by the Law Society of England and Wales, which suggests that the Bill could be improved by the insertion of a definition of national security. Do you agree?

Professor Martin: I do not vehemently disagree with that suggestion, but I am not persuaded by it. It is not a new issue. I remember cases—they have nothing to do with this—going back to the aftermath of the so-called global war on terror, with demands during inquiries for definitions of national security. I am not sure what that would achieve other than it would be heavily litigated. In terms of both definitions of national security and the categories of technology, a better answer is a drumbeat of reviewable activity, which is by definition transparent, about how the Government interpret the scope of the Bill, if it becomes an Act, and the sort of cases it applies to so that, over time, you build up a broadly accepted framework—of course, not everyone will accept it—that is seen to be fair and rational.

[Peter Grant]

Q I understand the reluctance to have an explicit legal definition of national security, but would there be a benefit in having an “except for” clause that makes it clear that certain activities do not come under the category of a threat to national security? Would that help to allay fears about infringements of rights of democratic participation—the right to protest and so on?

Professor Martin: I certainly would not be against things like that, if it could be done in a way that did not compromise the wider use of the Bill, because I do not think there is intent to interfere in the democratic process. I think the intelligence services take that pretty seriously. I remember in other contexts, when asked to co-operate on cyber-security with other countries, given that some cyber-security capabilities—by no means all—can be intrusive, that a lot of due diligence is always done on whether they could be turned by more authoritarian regimes against their own people. I would not object to that in principle. I do not know whether you have a case in mind when you say that might be necessary, but I have an open mind on that.

National Security and Investment Bill (First sitting)

Debate between Peter Grant and Andrew Bowie

Committee stage & Committee Debate: 1st sitting: House of Commons
Tuesday 24th November 2020 Public Bill Committees

[Peter Grant]

Q In your experience, is that a technique that either the Chinese Communist party or other potential hostile players either have used or are likely to use if it is in their interests? Do you have knowledge, for example, of China using non-disclosure territories to set up companies in order to try to invest in the UK or elsewhere? Are you aware of them using the influence of the technology, for example, to try to exert influence on companies that do not, at first glance, appear to be directly owned from China?

Charles Parton: I have to say that that is outside my expertise, but I do think it is an extremely good and important question that could be researched relatively easily. Forgive me if I am pushing RUSI here, but I suspect that RUSI has the capability in one of its teams to do some data mining on that, and come up with an answer. It is a very important question, but I am not aware of any research, though there may be some, that goes deeply into that question. It is certainly one that should be followed up.

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

Q It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Twigg. Good morning, Mr Parton. The Bill obviously aims to protect national security while promoting investment in the United Kingdom and not dissuading any inward investment into the country. With your experience, and given everything that you have said this morning, do you think the Bill will succeed in its aims?

Charles Parton: Again, I am not a legal expert, but it seems to set out the legal framework. It all very much depends on the structures and mechanisms, and the resourcing of them, that are set up to ensure whether the judgments about a particular company or a piece of academic research and the technology from them should be blocked or allowed through. I put it back to the Committee: if its detailed research, and the measures that go into the Bill, show that whatever organisation is set up is sufficient unto the job, and that the channels are there to ensure that all these small and sometimes obscure technologies are at least passed by it, that is a really important piece of work.