Barry Gardiner
MP for Brent West · Labour · United Kingdom
“Sir Desmond, imagine that the top brains in the country’s security and intelligence community produced a report that told you how to save the world. You would want to see it, right? Well, the report we are discussing is not about how to save the world; it is about what happens if we do not.”
“The nuclear threat will rise as clashes between nuclear powers become more frequent. Those are the cold assessments of the Joint Intelligence Committee. The Government were right to think that those assessments might scare people—they scare me—but they were wrong to think that they could hide them from the public.”
“The Minister will know that the grant structure on which UKRI is based gives out grants for a maximum of three to five years. Very few are for five years—most are for three years or under—yet the sort of long-term scientific development that my hon.”
“My hon. Friend is making a superb case for the importance of funding for her deep earth facility. I had the privilege of going to the National Oceanography Centre’s deep oceans facility, and the innovative science there on carbon sequestration is superb.”
“The Prime Minister has spoken powerfully about the devolution of power and giving back control. Will he therefore ensure that the proposals for commonhold and leasehold reform, for which 5 million leaseholders in this country are waiting with bated breath, do give that power and control back to those people, through the right to enfranchi…”
“We know how much land there is in the UK, and we know the extent of our inland waters and seas, so we can know how much we have to do to protect them, as we are required to do by target 3 of the global biodiversity framework.”
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“One official in Brussels is reported as saying: “The British are sacrificing an entire European industry to say thank you to China for signing up to the nuclear power project at Hinkley Point, and pretending it is about free trade.” It is right that we reach out to our international counterparts, but travelling around the world to hold “pre-negotiations” is no substitute for clear policy that sets out what our negotiating armoury is. An international trade White Paper should set out the Government’s principles—a clear plan of what the UK intends to achieve through future trade negotiations.”
“Friend the Member for Redcar (Anna Turley), expressed outrage at the Government’s leaked memo that suggested steel would not be a priority industry post Brexit, threatening to destroy the very livelihoods of communities across England and south Wales. Similar concerns were raised by my hon. Friend the Member for Stoke-on-Trent Central, as the ceramics industry in the Potteries faces increasing competition from Chinese dumping on world markets. The British Government have for the past number of years been blocking efforts by the EU to introduce the sort of anti-dumping measures employed by the US by repeatedly exercising a veto and actively encouraging a blocking group of other nations.”
“If they do not plan to introduce trade defence measures, they need to set out whether and how they will protect and support sensitive sectors such as the steel industry and the solar panel industry from cheap imports. The Government must also weigh whether they can afford to take a tough stance with countries like China and India with which they will be looking to conclude trade deals—or will they sell out our steel sector and others? The UK steel sector is in an existential crisis. My hon. Friend the Member for Middlesbrough South and East Cleveland, who chaired the all-party parliamentary group on steel, and my hon. Friend the Member for Aberavon (Stephen Kinnock), who launched the “Steel 2020” report earlier this year alongside my hon.”
“That makes Labour Members fearful that the Government have not done the proper assessment of the danger that future trade arrangements could pose for job losses and wage depression. The Government have put the cart before the horse. A trade White Paper should set out what the UK’s future policy on trade defence instruments will be. The EU currently has in place a series of trade defence measures, such as anti-dumping measures against China—and, to a lesser degree, India and Malaysia—on steel, other metals, and solar panels. The UK has famously opposed such measures at the EU. Now that we will be able to set our own trade policy, the Government must tell us whether they will stick to that line.”
“When the Prime Minister first announced the start of preliminary talks with the USA, the American Farm Bureau Federation wasted no time in confirming that it would seek food hygiene changes in any UK-US deal, namely to end restrictions on US exports of chlorine-washed chicken and hormone-grown beef. Will the Secretary of State confirm to us that, in any talks about future trade deals, the sovereignty of our food safety and environmental protection standards will be not be sacrificed in the name of regulatory harmonisation? An industrial strategy and international trade White Paper should have come together precisely because of the interdependence of trade, job creation, and economic growth.”
“Beyond Brexit, as the United Kingdom once again assumes competence for its own independent trade agreements, the Secretary of State must set out how he is pursuing agreements that share the benefits of globalisation more equitably. One can only wonder that this Government thought it sensible to embark upon a new industrial strategy without first publishing a White Paper on trade, so will he publish a trade White Paper? He has introduced a trade Bill in the Queen’s Speech but, as of this moment, he has not set out to Parliament or to business any policy on which to base it. The Secretary of State has been travelling around the world holding preliminary talks with his counterparts. In fact, he has recently returned from a visit to the USA.”
“My hon. Friend is absolutely right to point out that, were we to go on to WTO terms—from memory, the tariff rate for sheepmeat is about 44%—we would absolutely destroy the capacity of our hill farmers in particular to compete with foreign imports. The Government need to come clean and give clarity to the British food and farming industry on our future trade policy options and what that means for the industry. It is not good enough to tell farmers that the status quo will be maintained until 2020 and then leave an abyss as to what options are available for their future. These people need a comprehensive international trade policy, and they need to know what it is.”
“If not, it will reinforce the sense that the Government are blundering into this process without a clear endgame and lacking a strategic understanding of the issues at stake for the UK economy and for jobs in this country.”
“Will the Government be excluding devolved Administrations and local government agencies from trade agreement commitments on Government procurement? How will they ensure that British businesses maintain access both to European markets and the markets of other trading partners, especially where there is considerable regulatory divergence between these markets? Will the UK be adopting any non-conforming measures for investment and service commitments in its future trade agreements? By providing comprehensive answers to all these questions and publishing an international trade White Paper, the Government may be able to restore business confidence in the fact that they are holding current trade dialogues and working groups that are backed by a clear and strategic plan.”
“How do they propose to protect and enhance workers’ rights? How will they address human rights within the context of new trade agreements? How will sustainable development be a guiding principle for our trade policy? How will they ensure that current environmental protections are maintained and enhanced in future trade agreements? What investment dispute resolution model, or models, are the Government willing to adopt? The Department’s recruitment advertisements suggest that the priority trade sectors are healthcare, financial services, and education; clearly, food and farming do not feature among its priorities. How will trade policy address the sectors that do not appear to have been identified as a priority?”
“No, I am about to conclude. To that end, I ask the Minister to respond to the following questions about the Government’s international trade policy. What are their principal trade policy objectives? What will be their guiding principles for our future negotiations? How will they seek further liberalisation from our current tariff levels, and in which sectors? What transparency and parliamentary scrutiny will be given over our future trade negotiations? Will they commit to disclosing whether any obligations in trade agreements, both those in negotiation and finalised, are the motivation for legislative amendments before the House or regulatory changes by the Government? How will they ensure that our future trade agreements benefit British small and medium-sized enterprises as well as big business?”
“Mr Speaker, you and I have been in this House for 20 years, and after yesterday’s attack, I have never felt more proud or more grateful to be speaking in this Chamber. What assessment has the Secretary of State made of the need to deploy WTO trade remedies? We know that the Government opposed anti-dumping measures in Europe that would have protected British industries. Earlier, he spoke of a balance of interests between UK producers and UK consumers. If there is to be a balance, how many specialist staff has he recruited to deploy successful anti-dumping measures and protect vital UK jobs in the steel and ceramics industries from dumping by China?”
“Now that the Secretary of State has revealed to The Sun his plans for a trade Bill in the Queen’s Speech, will he do Parliament the courtesy of publishing a trade White Paper that sets out clearly what markets he wishes to liberalise and what measures he will take in future trade agreements to protect and enhance International Labour Organisation principles, sustainable development, human rights, environmental protection, intellectual property rights, food standards, future options on state-owned enterprises and the ability to nationalise particular sectors? If he develops an informed, consultative international trade policy, the Government may be able to restore confidence that they are holding trade dialogues that are backed by a clear and strategic plan.”
“Last week, the Budget failed to stop the 800% rise in business rates for companies that have installed solar panels. This week, research published in the journal Nature Energy states that to achieve our targets set out in the Paris agreement we need to set out longer-term plans beyond 2050, yet the Government have now dithered for five years and still refuse to publish their own implementation plan, even up to 2030. How does the Minister propose to increase our low-carbon exports when he cannot even set out how we will achieve our medium-term climate targets?”
“He said: “For India mobility is key” and went on to point out that a recent study suggested that a free trade agreement could increase UK-India trade by 25%—I use that figure, but the hon. Member for Rossendale and Darwen said 26%. That would boost UK exports by only 0.4% of total exports. The hon. Gentleman spoke of the “huge prize” that that would be, but let us be clear and do the maths: none of the UK’s top 10 export partners is a Commonwealth country. Indeed, in respect of those Commonwealth countries for which the Government have announced trade working groups and dialogues, the volume of exports from the UK is extremely low. India accounts for 1.7% of our exports, Australia 1.7%, Canada 1.2% and New Zealand approximately 0.2%. Let us add Singapore, given the Secretary of State’s recent visit—that accounts for an additional 1.2%.”
“In that regard, I pay tribute to the work of the right hon. Member for East Devon (Sir Hugo Swire). [Albert Owen in the Chair ] It would be foolish, however, to think that we in the UK may simply pick up where we left off before we joined the EU. The world has changed, the power balance has changed and the nature of global trade has been transformed beyond recognition. Yesterday, His Excellency Y. K. Sinha, the new high commissioner for India in London, made that absolutely clear at a conference in East Anglia. He said that the key to a post-Brexit free trade agreement would be to resolve the issue of workers’ mobility—how familiar does that sound from our Brexit debate? He made it clear that, for India, it is essential to ensure that its financial services and IT professionals could come to and go from the UK freely.”
“At a time when we are loosening the bonds with our nearest friends after a 40-year partnership in the EU, we have come to realise the value of those old friends. We seek to strengthen our ties with India, Canada, New Zealand, Jamaica, Australia, Pakistan, Bangladesh, South Africa, Kenya, Nigeria and all 52 Commonwealth members. Trade is one of the most effective means of creating shared prosperity and decent jobs. Opposition Members understand the power of fair and open trade. We share the dream of the vast majority of people around the world who want to see closer ties between countries. We want to build trade links, not protectionist walls. We are therefore emphatic in our support for promoting trade with the Commonwealth and in welcoming the Commonwealth Trade Ministers conference to London next month.”
“Your firm guidance and chairmanship, Mr Davies, are always much appreciated by Members. This has been an excellent debate. I pay tribute to my hon. Friend the Member for City of Durham (Dr Blackman-Woods) and to the hon. Member for North West Norfolk (Sir Henry Bellingham), both of whom spoke very powerfully about the importance of education and visas connected with education. I especially want to draw out the remarks of the hon. Member for Mole Valley (Sir Paul Beresford), who spoke with great knowledge and understanding of the dangers that exist for our farmers. I pay tribute, too, to the hon. Member for Rossendale and Darwen (Jake Berry) for initiating the debate. I thought it could have been subtitled “The importance of old friends”, because long before the Common Market became a twinkle in Edward Heath’s eye we had the Commonwealth.”
“Will he give us a strong reassurance that, when the UK leaves the EU, those very poorest countries, many of which are Commonwealth countries, will not see their exports to the UK effectively fall off a cliff edge? Will he assure us that the Government will continue the generalised system of preferences arrangements after the UK leaves the EU?”
“By withdrawing from the European Union, we will leave the EU’s generalised system of preferences, which allows developing countries favourable market access through generous tariff reductions, which essentially remove tariffs on approximately two thirds of imports from those countries. I want to ask the Minister about the GSP-plus enhanced preference scheme for countries that have ratified and implemented core international conventions relating to human and labour rights, the environment and good governance, and the “Everything but Arms” arrangement for least developed countries, which grants duty-free and quota-free access to all products from those countries except arms and ammunition.”
“We must consider that, although the United Kingdom has determined that it will withdraw from the EU, many Commonwealth countries seek precisely to strengthen their own participation in such regional agreements, and not to recreate the Commonwealth’s old links with the UK. Two Commonwealth countries—Malta and Cyprus—remain members of the EU and will find themselves similarly restricted from pursuing the trade agreements that the UK now seeks. I will try to move to a close in the next couple of minutes, Mr Owen, as I was asked to. That means leaving out a great deal, but let me pick up one essential thing.”
“It is estimated that the so-called Commonwealth effect reduces overhead costs for businesses trading between markets by up to 15%. However, there has been a move to greater regional co-operation through formalised partnerships and institutions very like the European Union, and the increased regulatory harmonisation that goes with that, which has unlocked similar benefits for those Commonwealth countries. It can be no coincidence that the countries mentioned by the hon. Member for Rossendale and Darwen are all members of the Trans-Pacific Partnership agreement. That drive to regional partnerships is significant.”
“Because of the time, I will not. The Conservative Free Enterprise Group think-tank identified those countries as the priority target for trade agreements. It also recognised that the 10 largest Commonwealth export markets for the UK account for no more than 8% of our total exports but almost three quarters of our exports to the Commonwealth. Clearly, any shift away from the EU would require a substantial uplift in our export growth to make up for the potential loss from the European Union. It has properly been said that trade between Commonwealth countries is enhanced and facilitated by the context of shared languages, cultural familiarity and particularly common legal and regulatory frameworks. The various communities in the UK from Commonwealth countries, including those in my borough, Brent, are our very best trade advantage.”
“The Secretary of State will know that New Zealand is a land of 30 million sheep—there are six or seven sheep for every person—so has he discussed the impact of a trade deal with the leader of the National Farmers Union? It regards the combination of a 43% World Trade Organisation tariff on sheepmeat and increased market access for New Zealand as potentially fatal to our sheep farmers. How will he protect them?”
“When I wrote to the Secretary of State in November to ask for an investigation into his Department’s support for any British businesses engaged in corrupt practices, he replied that his Department had no power to conduct such an investigation. Last week, after the publicity surrounding Roll-Royce’s deferred prosecution, he announced precisely such an investigation. When did the powers of his Department change, when will the inquiry report back, and will he explain why he has refused to comply with the open government principles of the OECD anti-bribery convention?”
“First, I would like the Minister to clarify a point. He said that nothing stops us protecting the NHS. Of course, he will be aware that, uniquely, CETA adopts a negative list approach. The German Government have incorporated their health service in that negative list to protect it, but the UK Government did not see fit to do the same. They reserved that for private ambulance services, but not for the NHS. Will the Minister explain why that was the case?”
“The Minister will know that although the joint interpretative instrument has legal force, it does not supersede the agreement. He talked about taking back into public ownership any aspect that had been privatised; will he explain further how the ratchet mechanism works? That seems to be in place precisely to stop any country doing exactly what he has just said.”
“Many, Sir Edward. Further to my question on the NHS, will the Minister explain why the German Government and other Governments saw fit to protect their health services in their entirety, while the British Government felt the need to protect private ambulance services by listing them in the annexe, but not the health service as a whole? That is the key question. What was the rationale for that? If he believes that health services are protected under the generality of the agreement, why did he bother specifying private ambulance services?”
“I have to say that I am not satisfied with the Minister’s explanation, and nor indeed with what he said about the ratchet mechanism. I trust that we will have a chance to debate those issues. Will he provide more information on how the Government intend to transition CETA to apply to the UK once we have left the EU? He was right that the mixed investment part of the agreement would not apply in the provisional application, but he did not explain what transitional arrangements he is looking at to apply the agreement in the UK after we have left the EU.”
“I am grateful to the Minister for that reply. Does he accept that because CETA was negotiated as an EU-Canada agreement, there will be areas in which what would be most beneficial to the UK has been sacrificed for the benefit of the rest of the EU, because that was the basis of the negotiation? Therefore, given that we will shortly be coming out of the EU, would it not actually be better for us to have a separate bilateral treaty? No doubt CETA could provide the basis of much of what would be contained in that. To sign ourselves up now to elements negotiated to our detriment and for the betterment of other countries in Europe would seem rather comical.”
“He seems to think that once we have left the European Union we will be able simply to renegotiate the treaties we had, but that would be to an investor’s detriment; it would be to the detriment of Canada, which had already negotiated a better deal with us when we were part of the EU. It is very unlikely that it would concede to that. Indeed, the ratchet mechanism is there precisely to stop that.”
“Of course, Sir Edward. To pick up on what the Minister has said, I think he accepts the basic premise that CETA was an EU-negotiated treaty and therefore some aspects of it will have been negotiated for other countries’ benefit and to our detriment. He then said that we are firm supporters of free trade—I totally agree with him that we want fair and open trade, because that is to all our benefit—but he has failed to articulate how we will be in a position to renegotiate the basis of the agreement we will have entered into under the European Union. The ratchet mechanism will still apply.”
“The email actually reads: “What advice would you give would it be better to have an actual date or do you think we can just tell the chair we are in the process of scheduling a debate.””
“In reality, as a freedom of information request submitted by my office revealed, the Government had not been delayed by a scheduling problem in the parliamentary calendar; in fact, the first time that the Department for International Trade had even approached the business managers to discuss a potential debate on CETA was on 25 October, precisely one day before the Secretary of State was due to appear before the Committee and account for his failure to schedule that debate. Worse still, the email trail shows departmental officials asking whether they actually needed to set a date for a CETA debate at all, or whether it might be enough just to tell the Chairman of the European Scrutiny Committee that “they were in the process of scheduling a debate”.”
“I want to pick up on the idea that the Secretary of State has done everything that could be reasonably required of him. He appeared before the European Scrutiny Committee on 26 October, which was after he had given the commitments on 7 September. He stated that he was “very happy” to have the debate on the Floor of the House. He claimed that the failure to set a date for the debate had been owing to a scheduling problem in the parliamentary calendar.”
“I do want to address all the issues of substance. The joint interpretive instrument was prayed in aid by the Minister but, of course, that says that the right to regulate applies only to procurement conditions that do not represent unnecessary barriers to trade. Does the Minister consider that that is a proper restriction of the right to regulate, given that the trade dispute panels, as he well knows, have interpreted that word “necessity”—the necessity test—very narrowly in the past? Therefore, to pray it in aid as showing there will be no restriction is fine-tuning the interpretation in a way that experience would belie.”
“Thank you, Sir Edward. Perhaps the Minister could provide information on whether any comparison has been made between the risk from the investor-state dispute mechanism under our pre-existing bilateral investment treaties and the risk from the ICS established under CETA? Of course, 98.5% of our bilateral investment treaties in force are with non-OECD countries, and 61.45% of those treaties are so old that they predate the World Trade Organisation. There needs to have been an impact assessment of the risk from the ICS. Can the Minister assure us that that has been done? Which criteria were used in assessing the risks from the ICS? How did they compare with the risks under pre-existing bilateral treaties?”
“I am listening carefully to my hon. Friend’s points and I agree with a great deal of what he says. Does he consider that there is an irony in the fact that we are leaving the European Union in order to come out from supranational institutions that can override national Parliaments and courts, yet at the very same moment we appear to be signing up to an agreement that will give us a supranational court that sits over us?”
“We understand the power of fair and open trade today. We share the dream of the vast majority of people around the world who want closer ties between countries. We want to build trade links, not protectionist walls. Trade is one of the most important mechanisms for binding peoples together, but we want trade agreements that respect—”
“Thank you, Sir Edward. I welcome the opportunity, under your chairmanship, to address the Committee in this important and long overdue debate. My hon. Friend the Member for Swansea West speaks here for the European Scrutiny Committee. I speak for the official Opposition, and I am delighted to support the cross-party amendment tabled by me, my hon. Friend and the hon. Member for Glenrothes. For the avoidance of any doubt—there was doubt, because the Minister tried to sow it—the Labour party believes in an open, fair system of trade. Trade is one of the most effective means of creating shared prosperity and decent jobs. From the very first, when free trade was a radical cause in British politics, my party argued for open markets in the crisis years of the 1920s and ’30s, as mounting calls for protectionism led the world towards disaster.”
“That does not sound like a Secretary of State committed to full parliamentary scrutiny and to keeping his promise. The Government confirmed in their subsequent letter of 30 November that they recognised a debate on the Floor of the House of Commons to be “of the utmost importance”.”
“He said that that he was “very happy” to have that debate on the Floor of the House and claimed that the failure to do so had been the result of scheduling problems in the parliamentary calendar. In reality, as the freedom of information request I referred to earlier showed, the Government had not been delayed by a scheduling problem in the parliamentary calendar at all. In fact, the first time the Secretary of State’s Department even approached the business managers to discuss a potential debate on CETA was 25 October—one day before the Secretary of State was due to appear before the European Scrutiny Committee to account for his failure to do so. “What advice would you give”— the Department asked— “would it be better to have an actual date or do you think we can just tell the chair we are in the process of scheduling a debate”.”
“I welcome the fact that we have finally today been given the opportunity to discuss this issue, but I cannot help but record that at its meeting on 7 September last year the European Scrutiny Committee recommended CETA for an early debate on the Floor of the House. It did so in view of the unprecedented public interest shown in this new generation of international trade agreements and the complex legal and policy issues raised for the UK. The Committee granted the Government a waiver to allow them to sign CETA at the EU Council of Ministers, but that waiver was conditional upon the promised debate being scheduled urgently to take place on the Floor of the House and at the very latest, it said, before the provisional application of CETA. As I said, the Secretary of State appeared before the Committee on 26 October.”
“The failure to bring consideration of CETA to a full debate on the Floor of the House should be a matter of not only regret by the Government, but deep disquiet for hon. Members from all parties. The job in front of the Committee today is very clear. It is not to decide whether CETA should proceed or not. It is to decide whether it is appropriate, given all the concerns there are about CETA, that the Secretary of State should honour the promise and commitment he gave to the House in his written statement and to the European Scrutiny Committee and that we should debate this on the Floor of the House.”
“I am not interested in university debating points ad hominem. Free trade has become narrowed in its interpretation. The right hon. Gentleman will have noticed that I have focused on the benefits that an open and fair trading system can bring, and that is what we want, but we want trade agreements that respect sovereignty and that benefit little companies, not just major corporations. We want trade agreements that make our society a more, not less, equal place. That is why I am delighted to support the amendment tabled by my hon. Friend the Member for Swansea West. I want to deal with the process first. I will try to be brief because we talked a great deal about this issue during the questions.”
“The hon. Gentleman is right that all Members of the House have the right to attend the Committee, but he will have noticed that this one and only opportunity for them to do so was deliberately timetabled at the same time that the European Union (Notification of Withdrawal) Bill is being considered in Committee on the Floor of the House. I do not believe that is a coincidence. I do not believe that is a mistake. I believe that it is part of a deliberate attempt to stop proper scrutiny. The hon. Gentleman talks about scrutiny and about moving this debate on to substantive issues within CETA, but the debate on the motion and amendment is precisely about whether this matter should go to the Floor of the House. That is why the process is important. We need to see that proper process has been kept, and sadly it has not.”
“The very threat of a legal challenge and the scale of both costs and potential damages can make Governments back away from regulation that would be in the public interest, and can exert its own regulatory chill on Government plans for new legislation. It was a legal technicality that prevented Philip Morris from obtaining billions of dollars of compensation that it sought in its case against Australia’s law on plain packaging for cigarettes. That did not stop other countries backing away from introducing similar measures for fear of being hit with their own claims.”
“As noted in the charter for progressive trade deals that we adopted last year, we uphold the basic principle of equality before the law, which requires foreign investors to abide by the same rules as everyone else, in the same judicial system as everyone else. Foreign investors can have full confidence in the British legal systems to obtain redress where their interests have been unfairly harmed, and the British people can have confidence that the courts will then balance the competing interests of foreign companies and the public good when making their judgments. A company, however, does not even have to win its case in the investor court system to undermine UK sovereignty.”
“Along with the CETA Joint Committee, which will have binding powers over sovereign Parliaments in future, CETA includes the investment court system, the latest form of the ISDS mechanism, to allow foreign investors to sue host Governments over public policy measures that undermine their profits. Under CETA, a foreign company will have the right to bypass the domestic courts and avail itself of its own privileged commercial judicial system to challenge any regulatory reforms that run counter to its “legitimate expectations” as a profit-making enterprise, claiming vast sums in compensation even when Parliament has approved the reforms. We in the Labour party are opposed to any system that grants foreign investors private justice in their own private courts.”
“The Prime Minister has declared that leaving the EU will allow Britain to be a fully independent, sovereign country once again, no longer subject to “supranational institutions that can override national parliaments and courts.” Likewise, the Secretary of State for International Trade has given us his vision of “Britain as an independent sovereign nation, with a parliament beholden to no one”. Yet, if we look at last week’s White Paper, it spelled things out very clearly. It has an annex about CETA—it creates a framework of supranational institutions that are precisely designed to override national Parliaments and courts.”