Stephen Doughty
MP for Cardiff South and Penarth · Labour (Co-op) · United Kingdom
“The hon. Gentleman is absolutely right to set out the situation, the threats and the impact on our economy. Across this House, we share a desire to get the strait reopened.”
“I thank my hon. Friend for his sustained and continued advocacy on behalf of his constituent, which is deeply powerful. I know it is of concern to many Members across this House. Despite some progress in Mr Johal’s legal proceedings, eight of the cases against him remain outstanding.”
“I share the hon. Gentleman’s horror at some of the things we have seen going on in those illegal settlements, and we have absolutely condemned the settler violence—the settler terrorism—that we have seen.”
“I pay tribute to our Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office consular teams, particularly for their current work on the Nepal-China flooding crisis. It is also important to pay tribute to the work they do to support the thousands of British nationals who are arrested or detained abroad each year.”
“If I may, Mr Speaker, I want to start by acknowledging the devastating floods in Nepal. I know many Members are supporting constituents who have been affected by this tragedy, and our intention remains to support British nationals and the people of Nepal.”
“The right hon. Gentleman raises important cases. I can assure him that we continue to support the clemency applications of Ryan Cornelius and Charles Ridley and to raise their case with the UAE authorities. In fact, I did so recently; the former Foreign Secretary did so as well and has met the families. As the right hon.”
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“I have travelled through them on a number of occasions in recent months, and there have been breakdowns and delays. It was actually quicker to walk through the manual checking service than go through the e-passport gate. Unless there is additional capacity and extra e-passport gates, not only to cope with the additional people coming through but to deal with redundancy in the case of any breakdowns or technical malfunctions, I genuinely fear that there is potentially a serious problem. People will understandably opt for e-passport gates. I think they are a fantastic innovation, and I totally agree with what the Minister said about the technology and the digitisation of these services. We all want to see that, because it makes them more secure.”
“I too want to get back to it, Chair. I appreciate the intervention and I am sure the Minister will want to disassociate herself from the other comments made. The Minister talked about reviewing capacity and also about potentially transferring up to 6.5 million people—I appreciate it will not be that many—into the e-passport gate system. However, I am not clear about how many additional e-passport gates will be installed at the key points of entry. It is all very well to have something under review as we look at capacity, but I have seen significant delays at e-passport gates. She talked about the arrangements on the other side of the channel in the Eurostar terminal in Gare du Nord and in Brussels. In Gare du Nord there are two sets of e-passport gates that someone has to go through and a series of other checks interspersed between.”
“In principle, I have no objection to the order’s being used. We all agree that e-passports are a good idea, but we need that capacity and security.”
“I know that the intention is there, and I have listened carefully to what the Minister and the Prime Minister have said, but we do not have a guarantee. Surely the Minister must agree that we must have the most accurate information to prevent paedophiles, terrorists, criminals, and individuals involved in organised crime from crossing our borders. Frankly, it does not matter what nationality people are or what the general risk profile is. There will always be individuals, including from the countries we have just mentioned and European countries, who will seek to evade our border and security protections and do harm in this country. Therefore, we must have the strongest relationship possible on security and information sharing. I hope that the Minister will be able to respond to those points.”
“What is the back-up plan for when those systems go down in order to avoid huge queues and problems? The last point I want to make is about the sharing of data that is inputted into these systems about whether somebody is or is not allowed in. Obviously, we have close data-sharing arrangements with some of the countries that the Minister mentioned through the “Five Eyes” arrangements and other things. It is absolutely crucial that we keep ourselves safe from terrorists, criminals and others coming to our borders. One hopes that that information is properly put into the relevant databases and used. On our ability to use the systems for European citizens in the future, there is no guarantee that we will have access to the Schengen information system or the European criminal records information system, which we have discussed multiple times.”
“We have received significant evidence from airport operators and others, and there are concerns about the capacity at places such as the St Pancras terminal. Any of us who has travelled through there will know that it is a relatively small space. The minute that there starts to be a back-up of queues or a fault in the technology, there is a problem. We only have to look at what happened in the drone incidents at Gatwick or Heathrow the other day. The potential for technology to go wrong is significant. We therefore need back-up systems, redundancy and additional capacity to cope if we are going to put new people through the system. This is a very reasonable point, and I hope the Minister will explain whether any additional e-passport gates will be introduced. If so, which terminals will they be at?”
“You make exactly the point that I was going to make in response to the right hon. Gentleman, Mr Robertson. This is not a debate about the net migration target. Visitors will come here, regardless of their immigration intentions. We want to encourage people to come to this country for tourism, business and other things, and we need to ensure that that is done in the safest, securest and most efficient way possible. My concerns are simply about the practicalities. The Minister mentioned the space constraints in the terminals, and so on. That is a real concern, and I have yet to see any evidence to the contrary, despite having had a number of discussions about it in the Home Affairs Committee.”
“The Minister has been very generous in taking interventions. I really want some clarity on this point: will any new e-passport gates be introduced as a result of this or any other change in Government policy? I understand she says she will keep it under review and she believes there is extra capacity, but will there be any new e-passport gates?”
“On a point of order, Mr Speaker. The Government have a track record on this: they have a track record of trying to prevent this House from having its say over all aspects of the Brexit process, and what the public cannot see is the Chief Whip sitting there at the end of the Treasury Bench feverishly briefing journalists and texting Members in a co-ordinated attempt to undermine your judgment, Mr Speaker. The hon. Member for Wellingborough (Mr Bone)— [Interruption.]”
“The hon. Member for Wellingborough made a reasonable point about going into the Table Office and being able to table an amendment. Is there not a problem here, Mr Speaker, as the fact is that the Government have had four weeks to get this right, but did not table the Business of the House motion until well gone 6 o’clock last night? Indeed, Members of this House were sitting in a meeting with the Prime Minister and Chief Whip and there was complete confusion about whether the Business of the House motion had gone down; there was a deliberate attempt to prevent amendments from being tabled and the House knowing what was going on. Do you agree that that is not acceptable, Mr Speaker?”
“I concur with my right hon. and learned Friend that nothing has changed. Does he therefore agree that the Prime Minister’s decision to delay was not only wrong, but irresponsible, because on every single day that has gone by during that time we have seen the Treasury spending more and more taxpayers’ money to prepare for a no deal that it says it does not want, businesses cancelling investment plans, and jobs being put at risk? All of that is deeply irresponsible, particularly when nothing has changed.”
“On a point of order, Mr Speaker. Thank you for the comments you have made and the action you have taken, and I certainly agree that your view is shared across the House by Members of all parties and all views—nobody wants to see this behaviour going on. May I just add that, of course, threats have also been directed at the police themselves? Earlier this morning, I spoke with some of the police officers protecting us all—they are doing a fantastic job. They, too, are being subjected to racist abuse and threats, and we all saw the tragic events here at the House, with the death of PC Keith Palmer. Nobody wants to see that situation again, so I hope that those conversations will be fruitful and that we can ensure that all of us can go about our business safely.”
“The problem is that the individual cases keep coming and coming because of the Government’s failures on universal credit. A constituent contacted me because of an issue about early payment from her employer before Christmas. She was forced to go to a food bank—over Christmas! Surely, the Minister does not think that that situation is acceptable.”
“Mr Speaker, before I ask my question I should like to draw your attention some further serious events going on outside Parliament today. They include intimidation, threats and potentially unlawful actions targeting Members of this House, members of the press, members of the public and peaceful activists. May I urge you to use your offices to communicate with the Metropolitan police at the highest level to ensure that proper action is taken, as this issue has been repeatedly raised? I would say to the Secretary of State that there has clearly been no progress in the negotiations or on the Government’s position. There has, however, been progress on spending taxpayers’ money. Will he tell us how much the delay has cost the taxpayer on a daily basis and in total since the Prime Minister decided to delay the meaningful vote?”
“The permanent secretary of his Department told us on the Home Affairs Committee just a few weeks ago: “It is not part of our contingency planning to deploy the armed forces.” I pressed him on this, and he said again: “It is not part of our no-deal planning that we would deploy the armed forces, for example, at the border.” Was the permanent secretary misleading the Committee, or was it a surprise to the Department this morning when it was told that the Army could be deployed at the border for immigration enforcement and other purposes?”
“I will look very closely at what the Home Secretary has set out in the Immigration White Paper. We have heard many different stories about what it will include, but I am not sure we can entirely believe all of them, given the disputes we have seen between him and the Prime Minister. I want to ask the Home Secretary a very specific question about immigration enforcement at our border in relation to no-deal planning.”
“Does my right hon. and learned Friend agree that it is deeply dangerous to use the sort of scare tactics we saw being briefed out from No. 10 this morning, when it was said that somehow 3,500 troops were going to be put on the street? I asked the Home Secretary repeatedly about that after his own permanent secretary had told me that there were no such plans for troops to be used at our borders. Somebody is not telling the truth here—it is either the briefings coming out of No. 10 or somebody else.”
“Is it not the truth that, while the Prime Minister talks about democracy, she prevented the Cabinet from having a vote, she is preventing Parliament from having a vote and she does not want the public to have a vote on this deal? If she wants to talk about democracy, she should think very carefully about that. Will she not admit that she is acting in a completely reckless fashion with jobs, with business, with investment and with our constituents’ futures, because on 2 January, when the vast majority of people in this country will go back to work, this Parliament will not be sitting, the Government will still be stalling for time and trying to come up with a magic solution and people will simply be asking, “What is going on?””
“I am sure that there is consensus across the House about protecting young people under the age of 18 from illegal or inappropriate material. What steps are being taken to ensure that, in any of the regulations or any of the wider efforts the Government are taking, we do not accidentally prevent young people from accessing age-appropriate material about sex and relationships education? I am aware of material for young lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender people on YouTube and other platforms that has been erroneously caught up in age filters and other restrictions. That prevents young people from finding out in a healthy and age-appropriate way about their sexuality and the key things they need to understand as they are growing up.”
“Some of it is self-generated content where people are doing revenge porn, sexting and sharing types of images that not only constitute committing an offence because they are creating child pornography, but are well outside the scope of what one would find on a commercial site. Will she reassure us that serious work will be undertaken to look at that area?”
“Further to the comments by my colleague on the Home Affairs Committee, the hon. Member for East Worthing and Shoreham (Tim Loughton), we have raised a series of concerns with social media companies and other technology companies about access to inappropriate, violent or extreme content, as well as the content that we are discussing today. Will the Minister and the Government look much more closely at peer-to-peer sharing sites like Snapchat and closed messaging groups on Instagram, Kik and other messaging sites? It is my understanding, from speaking to a lot of young people in my constituency, that that is where a lot of this content is. No age verification goes on, and it is simply done in encrypted sharing.”
“The Leader of the House obviously does not expect the Prime Minister to get a meaningful concession in Brussels, because otherwise we would have a meaningful vote next week. While the chaos has been happening on the Government’s side of the House, will she join me in paying tribute to the outgoing First Minister in Wales, Carwyn Jones, and the new Welsh Labour First Minister, Mark Drakeford? Does she perhaps concede that we need to take some lessons in strong and stable Government from the Welsh Labour Government, who have delivered real changes for my constituents, including new schools, new hospitals, new further education colleges and real differences in public services? That is what happens when we have a Government focused on what matters to people, rather than one who are focused on the chaos on the other side.”
“The police Minister knows that I have seen for myself the pressures facing South Wales police, particularly in Cardiff, not just from the increasing demand from everything from county lines to spice to missing persons, but from the specific demands on it as a capital city hosting major events and as a seat of Government. The Minister met me, the chief constable and the PCC, and we made a very reasonable request to him; I wonder if he has had a chance to consider it further and has anything hopeful to say to us. On the police pensions gap, I appreciate what he said about next year, but beyond that the gap is projected to be £417 million a year, £10 million of which would fall as a burden on South Wales police. Where is that money going to come from in the future?”
“I am told that some of those protestors, particularly those from SODEM—the Stand of Defiance European Movement—including Steven Bray, are being harassed by people holding potentially defamatory placards targeting individuals and by the activities of the far right. This is a relatively recent development and, as I think you will be aware, these good-natured protests have been going on quite peacefully for a long time. Could you use your offices to speak to the parliamentary security authorities to ensure that protestors are kept safe, that their right to protest is respected and that contact is made with the Metropolitan Police to ensure that those protests are able to continue in a safe and secure way?”
“On a point of order, Madam Deputy Speaker. I apologise for not being able to raise this matter with you in advance—the Policing Minister may be interested to hear this—but I am aware of concerns about harassment targeted at some of the peaceful demonstrators who have been outside Parliament for many weeks, months or years protesting about issues around Brexit. I am always unclear about the boundaries of the parliamentary estate, but I am sure that you would agree, along with many Members, that people should be able to express themselves and protest freely and peacefully outside Parliament’s buildings.”
“It sends out a very bad message if, for whatever untoward reasons, young people coming to express their democratic rights are prevented from accessing Central Lobby and speaking to their Members.”
“On a point of order, Mr Speaker. I have raised this matter with you and the Clerks, and I understand that measures are being taken to address this issue, but I want to raise with you the concern that there are hundreds of young people here today campaigning for a people’s vote from the For Our Future’s Sake organisation and Our Future Our Choice. They have been in the House to meet MPs over the past few weeks and have had very constructive discussions. They are not protesters. They are not here to cause disruption; they are here to speak to their elected representatives. Can you ensure that they are being allowed in to meet MPs and to use the Committee Rooms that they have booked with Members and that this does not happen in the future?”
“That has been a hallmark of some Conservative policy over the last few years, which is deeply disappointing. While we have, on the face of it, a commitment to the Department and to the 0.7% spending target, a series of measures have undermined the Department and its core objectives. I am not sure that some of the things the hon. Gentleman suggested would be compatible with the International Development Acts. Those Acts were clear that poverty eradication had to be the foremost agenda of UK aid and development policy. He said that the Department feels “pressure” to focus on countries with the most poverty. I think that it should. That should be the primary purpose of our aid and development spending—those most in poverty.”
“Many of us are members of the fair trade group in Parliament, and many of us have argued for support for trade with developing countries—trade that will lift people out of poverty. The hon. Member for Braintree (James Cleverly) mentioned the Make Poverty History campaign, in which I was closely involved in 2005. One of its three pillars was trade justice, alongside more and better aid and dropping the debt. All those things go together. While I agree with some of the principles put forward by the hon. Gentleman, his speech belied a wider agenda. This is essentially part of an agenda about Brexit and an attempt by some Government Members to undermine and take apart the Department for International Development by other means than a straight-out abolition.”
“I rise to speak in opposition to the Bill. Let me start by making it clear that trade, development and ending poverty very much go together. That has always been at the heart of the Department for International Development’s agenda, having been put at its heart when the Department was established by the Labour Government in 1997. I sat in that Department as an adviser and worked with many organisations, particularly on trade and development issues, for many years. I worked alongside my hon. Friend the Member for Harrow West (Gareth Thomas), who served as a joint Trade and DFID Minister, on how we properly put those issues together. I am a Labour and a Co-operative MP. Fair trade and trade justice are at the heart of what Co-operative MPs stand for.”
“They should not be used as some sort of Brexit sweeteners for us to try and grab magical trade deals that, frankly, we already have, but are also not going to replace our excellent trading relations with our EU neighbours or, indeed, the trading relations that exist between us as an integral part of the European Union and many of the world’s developing countries. We have to have a relationship of mutual respect: not simply one of self-interest, but one of common interest. We will truly make poverty history by supporting and working alongside developing countries, not by acting in an instrumental way in which we are putting our own interests before those of others. I therefore oppose the Bill, and I hope the House will divide on this. Question put (Standing Order No. 23).”
“Many parts of that work are excellent—the funds are doing excellent work—and we cannot have a purist development policy in which we do not work with other agencies. However, I certainly have some serious questions about the way in which other Departments have been spending money through the prosperity fund without reference to our development objectives and without reference to poverty eradication as the first point. Quite frankly, there has been very lax scrutiny from other Departments—including, I am sorry to say, the Foreign Office—about where that is going and how it is being spent. I do not think that the fate of the world’s poorest people and the relationships of common interest that we should be building together, as I have said, should somehow be used instrumentally in the Brexit process.”
“We have seen attempts by this Government to rebadge aid and development spending and redraw the definitions used at an international and UK level—“Let’s say we’re keeping the 0.7% target, but we’ll undermine it in every way we can by sticking everything else under it and claiming that it’s development spending.” We have seen the repeated diversion of our aid funding to private contractors, many of whom have actually been seriously criticised for some of the work they have been doing. As I have said, we have had the huge increases to the CDC. I am not opposed to an increase to the CDC, but I have had some serious concerns about its level. We have also seen this with the Government’s two cross-Government funds—the conflict, stability and security fund and the prosperity fund.”
“Mr Speaker, you will know, because I have spoken on this at great length before, that I have been a critical friend of the CDC. The CDC has got things wrong in the past. The huge extra funding given to it was premature and too much to absorb quickly, but I know that the CDC is working to look at all those issues. It is important that we stick with what we have. It works perfectly well. It has poverty eradication at the heart of it. We have excellent people working on it. We do not need to create something else. As I said, this Bill unfortunately sits alongside a series of other agendas.”
“There is also the crucial issue of the extra bureaucracy and cost of setting up such an agency. Why do we need it? We already have a Department. We already have UK aid. We already have the multilateral agencies that have these relationships. We already have many experts working in trade facilitation and trade and international development. Why would we create another costly agency and reorganise and shunt civil servants back and forth yet again when we already have people doing excellent work in that area, in not only this country but many of the others with which we co-operate? I do not need to mention all the names, but there are many other agencies that we have worked with for many years, such as Crown Agents. Of course, we also have the Commonwealth Development Corporation.”
“One of the tragedies of Brexit is that we will potentially just chuck all that in the bin. The European development fund, the European Commission’s humanitarian office—ECHO—and many other programmes are some of the Department for International Development’s highest rated multilateral programmes. I previously served on the International Development Committee, and we saw evidence of that when looking at the funding of multilateral agencies. It seems absurd to suggest that we come out of all those programmes and create something else that is hugely bureaucratic and would, I fear—whatever the intentions of the hon. Member for Braintree—be used by other Government Members and those with agendas to simply undermine the work of the Department for International Development.”
“One of the greatest tragedies of Brexit is that we are potentially coming out of key European development agencies, the European development fund and the arrangements that exist for close co-operation with many countries, including many in the Commonwealth and African, Caribbean and Pacific countries. It has been far from perfect. I have campaigned when I think the EU has got things wrong in its relationships. In fact, my hon. Friend the Member for Harrow West will remember he and I having lively discussions about policy in a previous life and where that went. The reality is that, on the whole, the EU has had development and poverty eradication at the heart of its policies and its relationships with the ACP countries. We already have trade agreements with many of those countries. We already have supportive policies in aid and development.”
“I would hate to see a day when we slip back to things like the Pergau Dam scandal, or where things are tied simply to self-interested trade policies and we attempt to get self-advantage rather than to focus on common interests between ourselves and some of the poorest countries in the world. There is a good way to go about this. It is the policy that we have practised in Government through the Department for International Development. It is the policy that has been pursued in much of our work through multilateral agencies, which do much to promote trade and development and provide trade capacity. The hon. Gentleman spoke about the EU.”
“The hon. Gentleman says that I was not listening. I was listening carefully. He is blurring objectives. The focus should be on poverty and on our common interest. There is a way of devising international development policy and trade policy that is in the common interest of both parties—of our country and of developing countries—and ensures that we move together in generating and spreading wealth and prosperity for all people in the world, including in those countries, rather than having a self-interested trade policy. Past Conservative Governments do not have a positive record on this.”
“The problem is that nobody believes the Government anymore. That is exactly why the Attorney General should, as my right hon. Friend the Member for Normanton, Pontefract and Castleford (Yvette Cooper) said, be forced to come to the House and to put in writing the assurances that the Minister has given. Today the Minister has simply been put up as chaff for other Ministers above his pay grade who, quite frankly, are willing to resort to any level of trickery and contempt for this House. That is the reality. Speaking of trickery, will the Minister be very clear about whether any EU member states or European Commission officials were informed of the plan to pull the vote before the Cabinet discussed it and before this House was told?”
“It is not just BuzzFeed that reported that, but the Daily Mirror . I myself have been told that the Prime Minister spoke to a number of EU member states and officials before she spoke to the Cabinet and the House to say that the vote would be cancelled. Does my right hon. Friend agree that what I have been told is shocking: that apparently the addendum the Prime Minister is now seeking was drafted weeks ago, before we even started the debate in this House?”
“I thank the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster for giving way. As he knows, I have a lot of respect for him, and he has a tough gig today. The reason for this postponement and delay is, of course, so that the Prime Minister can go away and negotiate some magic piece of paper. Can the right hon. Gentleman tell me whether any member of the Cabinet had seen or discussed a draft of the addendum or codicil that the Prime Minister is seeking at any point in the last few weeks before she decided to postpone the debate?”
“They are looking at this and they are saying to me that they want a chance to have a say on what is before them: Brexit reality, not Brexit fantasy. That is why we need a people’s vote.”
“The Prime Minister talks about faith in democracy, but I think a lot of people looking at this shambles today, whether they voted leave or remain, will see a Prime Minister who has tried to keep economic advice from this House and from the public, has tried to keep legal advice from this House and the public, and a Government who have been found in contempt. She is trying to prevent us having a vote on her own deal and she is trying to prevent us having a vote on whether or not she should be able to have a vote on that deal or not. People will be looking at this aghast. I have spoken to many leave voters in my constituency. I deeply respect and understand the reasons why they voted leave in 2016, but many of them have changed their minds.”
“So why do the Government not just accept the reality, put this question before this House, and if this House does not agree, put the question back to the people?”
“Is the Leader of the House not a little ashamed to be here today, running away from the Government’s own major policy? It is a Government who are showing complete contempt for this House—for all views in this House. There are many Members who do not agree with me on Brexit, but they are going to be stifled as well by not being able to speak and not being able to vote on this, and we are not able to represent our constituents properly. Let us be clear about what is really going on here: the Prime Minister is playing for time—a few more days into next week—to go away and get some sort of exchange of letters. She cannot renegotiate the withdrawal agreement; Donald Tusk has made that very clear—it is a legally binding document.”
“On a point of order, Mr Speaker. It may interest the House to know that while Ministers are fleeing the Front Bench, the Prime Minister has apparently left the country in the last few minutes; apparently she has gone to Berlin, Brussels and The Hague. Is this not rather strange when this House has not yet actually taken a decision as to whether to continue with the debate? Have you had any notice that the Prime Minister intends to return to this House after these visits in order to explain what she has been doing and what she has been seeking? I am told that she is seeking a political statement that the backstop is not enforceable—extraordinary.”
“It is not a coincidence that Russia has chosen this opportunity to take further military action against Ukraine and to continue to stir up trouble. Why does the Foreign Secretary think that so many former diplomats and others are totally opposed to the deal that the Government are putting forward on Brexit? Is it because it will undermine our diplomatic capacity in the world and our ability to stand up to those who would seek to divide and undermine Europe and this country’s national interests?”
“The Prime Minister spoke of security co-operation, yet when I asked the Home Secretary the other day whether we would be left more safe or less safe as a result of this deal, he could not answer the question, because he could not guarantee that we would have access to the crucial SIS II database that ensures that we have information on terrorists, paedophiles and other criminals trying to cross our border. That is the reality of the deal that she has put before us.”
“The progress that has been made over the past 15 years is remarkable, but we must not have a slipping back in that progress.”