Sewel Convention — House of Commons, 2018-06-18
Topic: International Affairs
Lesley Margaret Langan Laird (Labour, Centre-left): Let me begin by echoing some of the sentiments that have been expressed tonight about the fire at the Glasgow School of Art. Let me also thank my colleague the junior shadow Minister for the efforts that he has made to raise the profile of this issue, appearing on Canadian television tonight. That demonstrates that it really is a global issue I remind the people in this Chamber, and the people we represent, that the debate is of the utmost importance. I also acknowledge that several Scottish Members are unable to attend today, as they are otherwise engaged with the Scottish Affairs Committee At the heart of the debate are concerns about the future of the Scottish devolution settlement, and about the future of the United Kingdom itself. In that context, it is unbelievable that the Minister responsible for these matters has chosen to absent himself. Let us be clear: responsibility for the position in which we find ourselves today sits squarely in the lap of the Conservative party. This Tory shambles is epitomised by the Secretary of State, the invisible man in the Cabinet, who is now missing in action rather than being at the Dispatch Box. This is not a personal attack, but it is a critique of a performance. The Secretary of State has been AWOL on many fronts. He is not at the Brexit negotiating table; he is not able to keep his commitments to the House; he is not able to deliver for the Scottish Parliament; and he is not able to deliver on the commitments that he made to his colleagues on clause 11 Today’s debate, and the Tory shambles, were totally avoidable. The Tories’ approach involves playing fast and loose with devolution, and with the future of the United Kingdom. The current approach of a party that claims to want to protect the Union serves only one purpose, and that is to play into the hands of the Scottish National party, which—let us all be clear about this—does not want to protect devolution, and which never wanted it in the first place In contrast, let me set out the grown-up approach taken by the Scottish Labour party. As the party of devolution, we want to protect devolution and protect the future of the UK at the same time. That is why Labour in the Scottish Parliament voted along with the SNP, the Liberal Democrats and the Greens to withhold consent for the EU withdrawal Bill, particularly due to the provisions in clause 11. At that point the Tory Government must surely have understood the depth of concern about the way they were proposing to utilise the new powers, but, alas, they did not. Instead, they carried on regardless, ignoring the Scottish Parliament and playing into the hands of the SNP. In acting in this way, it has become abundantly clear that the Tories are as much a threat to the UK as the nationalists Let me outline how and why this shambles came about. We are here because the Secretary of State for Scotland and his UK Government decided when they drafted the EU withdrawal Bill that all powers coming back from the EU would come to Westminster and be devolved to the devolved Administrations at a time of their choosing, something that is entirely incompatible with the devolution settlement, a fact that their own Scottish MPs acknowledge The Secretary of State for Scotland then promised on four different occasions that he would fix this flawed course, but he did not. Last Tuesday he managed to do something that I do not think anyone in this House could have envisaged: be complicit in a situation where no Scottish MPs or the Secretary of State for Scotland were able to speak about devolution, truly taking this process to a new level of farce A number of hon. Members have suggested that it was Labour that somehow disrupted this debate—that Labour somehow stopped democracy happening—but it was the Conservatives who set the timetable. In fact, they wished to set the debate for only one day, and only on our pressing did they set it for two. But that was still not enough to debate what are some of the biggest constitutional issues this country is facing Labour throughout this process has tried to play a constructive role. We have tabled amendments and made suggestions to both Governments. These could have helped break the deadlock; but instead what we have seen is two competing nationalisms entrenched and intent on cancelling each other out Throughout this process only Labour has genuinely sought an agreement that protects devolution and breaks the impasse. The leader of Scottish Labour and I wrote to the First Secretary of State asking for cross-party talks; so far he has refused.