Oral Answers to Questions

Ruth Cadbury Excerpts

Wednesday 13th March 2019 Commons Chamber

[Brandon Lewis]

Obviously, as we leave the European Union, the civil servants who have been focused on those issues will continue to do the work they need to do that relates to the EU. Where that work ceases, they will be moved back into the relevant civil service areas, as is required, across Departments.

[Ruth Cadbury (Brentford and Isleworth) (Lab)]

At a meeting of the Cabinet Office in December, it was reportedly agreed that all non-essential Government business is to be suspended so that civil servants can concentrate on no-deal planning. Can the Minister confirm whether the Government consider the housing crisis, resourcing the Home Office to process settled status applicants, the failure of universal credit and the delays to HS2 to be essential or non-essential business?

[Brandon Lewis]

The best advice I can give the hon. Lady is not to get tempted to believe rumours of Cabinet leaks that she reads about in the newspapers. If she looks at the Government’s track record, she will see that we are delivering record employment levels and record low unemployment, that we are improving wage levels for people who work for the Government, and that we are delivering for people, with good and outstanding education continuing. I am sure she will look forward to hearing more about that in the spring statement later today.

Exiting the European Union

Ruth Cadbury Excerpts

Monday 11th March 2019 Commons Chamber

[Mr Lidington]

If the hon. Lady is referring to a letter that has been issued today, it is not one I have seen, so I cannot easily comment on that. People will pick their own tone to express what has been agreed. That is not unusual in international negotiations. We are clear that the changes that have been negotiated today are significant, and I have described a number of ways in which that is the case.

[Ruth Cadbury (Brentford and Isleworth) (Lab)]

Will the Minister confirm whether the Government have a legally binding agreement or merely a legally binding assurance?

Leaving the EU

Ruth Cadbury Excerpts

Tuesday 12th February 2019 Commons Chamber

[The Prime Minister]

The deal we have negotiated on security does provide. There are, as the right hon. Gentleman knows, two areas where it does not specify the particular instruments that will be used in relation to access, for example, to criminal records, but it does specify that that access will be enabled and the discussions will be on the form that that access takes. The deal we have agreed ensures that we are able to continue the security co-operation with the European Union that has helped to keep us safe.

[Ruth Cadbury (Brentford and Isleworth) (Lab)]

The Prime Minister just said that she thinks her deal is the best for the UK, so why will she not put her trust in the UK people and put it back to them for ratification?

Progress on EU Negotiations

Ruth Cadbury Excerpts

Thursday 22nd November 2018 Commons Chamber

[The Prime Minister]

I refer the hon. Lady to the answer I gave earlier.

[Ruth Cadbury (Brentford and Isleworth) (Lab)]

In answer to my hon. Friend the Member for Barrow and Furness (John Woodcock), in relation to Schengen, the Prime Minister admitted that it was incredibly difficult and took a long time to negotiate an agreement with the EU when already in the EU. If that is so, how on earth does she think it will be easy, straightforward or quick to negotiate all the hundreds, if not thousands, of agreements implied in this document?

[The Prime Minister]

First, it is in the interests of both sides to have that access. Secondly, the fact that we did negotiate membership of SIS II, despite our not being a member of Schengen, shows it is possible to negotiate such a thing when both sides see that it is in their interests.

EU Exit Negotiations

Ruth Cadbury Excerpts

Thursday 15th November 2018 Commons Chamber

[The Prime Minister]

Thank you, Mr Speaker. The hon. Gentleman was suggesting that Scotland was in the same position as Northern Ireland. Of course it is not; it does not have a land border with a country that is going to be within the European Union.

[Ruth Cadbury (Brentford and Isleworth) (Lab)]

This deal is far worse for our young people than the deal they currently have with our membership of the EU. This deal has no guarantees on Erasmus, funding for EU students, their travel and work rights in Europe and EU research funding worth €100 billion. When the future of millions of young people is at stake, does the Prime Minister not agree that it is time to let them vote for their future with a people’s vote, particularly for those young people who did not get a vote last time because they were not old enough?

[The Prime Minister]

There are references in what we have agreed in relation to some of the matters the hon. Lady raises, but the deal is about the future of this country. [Interruption.] She is holding up the withdrawal agreement. The withdrawal agreement is about our withdrawal from the European Union. It is not about our future relationship. The matters she referred to are about our future relationship.

UK/EU Future Economic Partnership

Ruth Cadbury Excerpts

Monday 5th March 2018 Commons Chamber

[The Prime Minister]

I set out very clearly in my speech on Friday why I separated goods trade from other areas of trade with the European Union. I have also set out how we can ensure that we maintain the integrated supply chains that are currently so important to industries such as the automotive industry.

[Ruth Cadbury (Brentford and Isleworth) (Lab)]

We read in the Financial Times today that the United States

“is offering Britain a worse ‘Open Skies’ deal”

than the one we currently have as an EU member. Is that not a precursor to the hundreds of deals that the UK will have to negotiate once we leave the EU?

[The Prime Minister]

No. We are discussing with a number of countries around the world how we can improve our trade arrangements with them even before we have left the EU and how we can get into the position of having a free trade agreement with those countries.

Oral Answers to Questions

Ruth Cadbury Excerpts

Wednesday 21st February 2018 Commons Chamber

The Prime Minister was asked—

[Ruth Cadbury (Brentford and Isleworth) (Lab)]

Q1. If she will list her official engagements for Wednesday 21 February.

[The Prime Minister (Mrs Theresa May)]

This morning I had meetings with ministerial colleagues and others. In addition to my duties in this House, I shall have further such meetings later today.

[Ruth Cadbury]

On Monday, children and parents at St Mary’s Catholic Primary School in Chiswick told me of their concerns about air pollution affecting children’s health. This morning, the High Court ruled that the Government’s air quality plan is unlawful. What does the Prime Minister feel is worse: losing for the third time in the High Court, or 40,000 unnecessary deaths and the impact on children’s health of the UK’s unsustainable air quality?

[The Prime Minister]

The issue the hon. Lady has raised about air quality is important, and that is why we have been taking action to improve air quality. I say to her that I do not think that the way she has described the Court’s decision this morning properly reflects the Court’s decision. Let me just explain to the House that we welcome the fact that the Court dismissed the complaint relating to five cities with major air quality problems and found that we are taking appropriate action. It agreed that the modelling we used to support the 2017 air quality plan is sound. It has asked us to go further in areas with less severe air quality problems where we thought a pragmatic approach was appropriate; we will now formalise that. But actually, on two of the three counts, the Court found in the Government’s favour.

--- Later in debate ---

[The Prime Minister]

My position remains exactly as it has always been. We are going to negotiate a new economic partnership with the European Union. I assure the hon. Lady that the interests of agriculture will be one of the considerations we take into account when we make sure that we are still able to have a good trade arrangement with the European Union, as well as improved trade arrangements with the rest of the world.

[Ruth Cadbury]

On a point of order, Mr Speaker. It relates to Prime Minister’s questions.

[Mr Speaker]

I will give the hon. Lady the benefit of the doubt. Points of order are supposed to come after statements. She says it appertains to the exchanges we have just had. I hope it does and that it is not just a prolongation of the argument. Let us hear it.

[Ruth Cadbury]

Thank you so much, Mr Speaker. My question to the Prime Minister referred to the ruling of the High Court today. In the ruling handed down in the High Court this morning, Mr Justice Garnham declared the Government’s failure to require action from 45 local authorities with illegal levels of air pollution in their area to be unlawful. In her response, the Prime Minister—

[Mr Speaker]

Order. Forgive me, but the words that immediately spring to mind in this context are “second bite of the cherry”. I am afraid a Member is entitled only to one bite of the cherry. If the hon. Lady feels very aggrieved, she can always write to me about the matter. I am not sure I should exhort her to do so—doubtless a missive will be winging its way to me ere long—but I do not think we can detain the Chamber now. The hon. Lady had a good bash earlier and we will leave it there for the moment.

Oral Answers to Questions

Ruth Cadbury Excerpts

Wednesday 17th January 2018 Commons Chamber

[Penny Mordaunt]

I do agree with my hon. Friend. The rules that we are constrained by have not prevented us from coming up with the funds needed to help those areas hit by Hurricanes Irma and Maria. This is also a lesson that we should continue to invest in our defence capabilities, because we were very reliant on our armed forces to get into those places.

[Ruth Cadbury (Brentford and Isleworth) (Lab)]

T3. Yesterday, officials from Myanmar and Bangladesh agreed details for the repatriation of the Rohingya, but reports suggest that the Rohingya will have no guarantee of citizenship on their return, that they could be forced to return against their will, and that they will be vetted individually as potential terrorists. Before giving the UK Government’s support, what will the Minister do, beyond taking the two Governments at their word, to verify that repatriation for the Rohingya will be safe, voluntary and—

[Mr Speaker]

Order. We have got the gist of it.

European Council

Ruth Cadbury Excerpts

Monday 18th December 2017 Commons Chamber

[The Prime Minister]

My hon. Friend is right. We have to prepare for all contingencies and continue to include among them the possibility of no deal, but what has been shown by the phase 1 negotiations is that, with perseverance and commitment on both sides, we can reach agreement.

[Ruth Cadbury (Brentford and Isleworth) (Lab)]

The majority of UK citizens would now prefer us to remain in the EU, because they are realising what many of us knew for a long time, which is that leaving the EU means greater costs to the economy and to UK taxpayers than staying in and that we will no longer have a voice at the table in Europe. Will the Prime Minister start leading the country, or will she continue to be led by the hard Brexiteers in her own party?

[The Prime Minister]

The hon. Lady seems to have forgotten one thing: this Parliament voted overwhelmingly for a vote to take place in a referendum on our membership of the European Union. That vote took place, and it was a close vote, but the majority voted to leave the European Union. I think—and I have always felt this—that in other circumstances when other countries in the EU held a referendum on new treaties and came out against them but the EU basically told them to go back and think again is not the right way. If the British people have voted to leave, we should leave.

Proportional Representation

Ruth Cadbury Excerpts

Monday 30th October 2017 Westminster Hall

[Ruth Cadbury (Brentford and Isleworth) (Lab)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Sir Roger, and also to follow such excellent speeches by Members from all parts of the House. I also thank my constituents who have written to me on this very important subject.

First past the post neither reflects voters’ wishes nor is any more likely to provide strong government than proportional representation. I will also quote the late Robin Cook, who said in 2005:

“Democracy is not just a means to an end. Democracy is a value in itself. And if we treasure that value, we need to provide a more democratic system for the centrepiece of our own political structure.”

I agree with the Electoral Reform Society that, under first past the post, people feel more like observers than participants in the democratic process. I have never been particularly wedded to first past the post, although I have been elected, first to Hounslow Council and then to the House, in more than nine elections through that system. I can beat the number of years the hon. Member for Glasgow Central (Alison Thewliss) has been involved with PR. Some 35 years ago, I was elected to the National Union of Students national executive—so I share a political history with at least four Members here—for which the PR elections to that body were felt to be representative and fair.

Since the last Labour Government created the London Assembly, I have been involved in campaigning for elections in which the geographical link is maintained, contrary to the points repeatedly made by Members here who oppose a change. Furthermore, the London Assembly reflects the voting intentions of Londoners, as do all the new elected legislative bodies created by the last Labour Government in the years after 1997.

The hon. Member for North East Derbyshire (Lee Rowley), who is no longer in the Chamber mentioned the recent New Zealand general election, of which I have personal experience. When I visited my son in New Zealand in September, I played a small part on election day. They have multi-Member PR there. Notwithstanding the unorthodox way in which the leader of New Zealand First announced his choice of partners in the Green and Labour parties, in order to form a Labour-led Government, there is no groundswell of opinion in New Zealand to move away from the multi-Member system. I spent the day reminding voters in a strongly Labour voting area in South Auckland to go out to vote. Because of the PR system, those people were more likely to come out to vote than they might have been under first past the post, which would have made it a safe seat. No doubt because of those conversations they had on their doorstep with a middle-aged English MP, they now have a Labour-led Government. In New Zealand, the voter has two votes: one for the electoral district and one for the national list, thereby representing their geographical concerns and their national political perspective.

In the UK, because of first past the post, too many people in safe seats say on the doorstep, “What’s the point of voting?” In highly marginal seats such as my own—it was highly marginal until June 2017, but seems to be a safe seat for the time being—people often vote not for their first party of choice, but for the candidate most likely to defeat the candidate they least want. One person in five votes tactically, according to the Electoral Reform Society. The lack of representation in Parliament of small parties is abysmal, but as the co-leader of the Green party, the hon. Member for Brighton, Pavilion (Caroline Lucas), said, those parties often represent millions of votes.

Going into the election in June this year, I had a majority of 465 in my seat of Brentford and Isleworth. The Green party—some of its members are here today—withdrew its candidate because it felt that I was more likely to further its priorities in Parliament than my Conservative opponent. I met many people on the doorstep who normally vote Green and said they would vote for me, but would have liked an influence on getting a Green MP elected to Parliament. I met many Liberal Democrats who were voting for me, but would have preferred the chance to vote Lib Dem. That is not democracy—it is not good democracy.

[Rachael Maskell (York Central) (Lab/Co-op)]

My hon. Friend is making an excellent speech. We come to Westminster because we want to advance the politics that we care passionately about. Is it not right that our constituents also have the opportunity to advance the politics they are most passionate about by voting from the choices before them to have a more representative voice in this place?

[Ruth Cadbury]

In my view, PR is a way to have a more representative voice.

While no system is perfect, all systems have elements of complexity. All can bring instability, hung Parliaments and coalitions. PR brings proportionality, as people know that their vote will help towards the weighting of the party they want to see sitting in that legislature, and reflects the complex diversity of the UK now.