Contributions
1,320 recent contributions in Hansard
HANSARDTrade Bill (Eighth sitting)Thanks to the Opposition’s amendments.25 Jun 2020HANSARDTrade Bill (Sixth sitting)I will come on to that shortly, but in brief, the proof has been in the pudding. For each of those 20 agreements, we have published the report. The reports have been available for…23 Jun 2020HANSARDTrade Bill (Sixth sitting)I was being very generous in saying that my door was open, but it is not open to discuss the content of the current negotiations with the US. That, of course, is a matter—in the…23 Jun 2020HANSARDTrade Bill (Sixth sitting)I thank the hon. Gentleman for that intervention and I am glad that he made it, because I will take him back five years to a very interesting negotiation that I had with his…23 Jun 2020HANSARDTrade Bill (Sixth sitting)Sir Graham, I think a comparison of how the UK and European Union do international treaties is a debate for another day. I do not think the two political systems are comparable.…23 Jun 2020HANSARDTrade Bill (Sixth sitting)I was going to return to the Command Paper, because the hon. Member for Sefton Central asked me a direct question about it. If the hon. Gentlemen will bear with me, I will return…23 Jun 2020HANSARDTrade Bill (Sixth sitting)It is simply not correct to say that all international treaties are subject to EU competence. Many international treaties are, of course, subject to a UK competence, and CRAG has…23 Jun 2020HANSARDTrade Bill (Sixth sitting)Again, we are talking about continuity agreements that have already gone through a process of scrutiny in the House. I was a member of the European Scrutiny Committee pretty much…23 Jun 2020HANSARDTrade Bill (Sixth sitting)I am not saying that; I am clearly saying that the witnesses we heard from were, I think, unanimous in saying that the continuity agreements were important for the UK economy and…23 Jun 2020HANSARDTrade Bill (Sixth sitting)We are going slightly around in circles, conflating the continuity arrangements and future free trade agreements. I will happily debate with the hon. Gentleman the merits of our…23 Jun 2020HANSARDTrade Bill (Sixth sitting)My hon. Friend is absolutely correct. I was going to come on to describe the Opposition’s panoply of amendments taken in their entirety; at the moment, I am still going through…23 Jun 2020HANSARDTrade Bill (Sixth sitting)I should be clear that the Command Paper was published by a previous Government in a different parliamentary context. However, we have in our approach so far followed what was set…23 Jun 2020HANSARDTrade Bill (Sixth sitting)Nothing has been axed; all I am saying is that the Command Paper was produced at a different time. What we have done is to follow the Command Paper in publishing, for example, the…23 Jun 2020HANSARDTrade Bill (Sixth sitting)I will make a bit more progress. As with new clause 5, new clause 8 contains a number of practical flaws in the proposed system. Those flaws would undermine negotiations and…23 Jun 2020HANSARDTrade Bill (Sixth sitting)I was intrigued by the amendment, but let us pause for a moment on what it would do. Amendment 9 would stipulate that agreements are in scope of the clause 2 power only if the…23 Jun 2020HANSARDTrade Bill (Sixth sitting)No, I am not going to give way. I think that a Member with quite a big Caribbean community in his constituency has quite a lot of explaining to do about why he is now opposed to…23 Jun 2020HANSARDTrade Bill (Sixth sitting)Sir Graham—23 Jun 2020HANSARDTrade Bill (Sixth sitting)The point of the amendment is to rule out of scope agreements that have yet to be fully ratified, which includes not only the Canada agreement but the CARIFORUM agreement and…23 Jun 2020HANSARDTrade Bill (Sixth sitting)Truth be told, I was going to allow an intervention when I had fully laid out the case, and mentioned the number of people that the trade stance that the hon. Member for Harrow…23 Jun 2020HANSARDTrade Bill (Sixth sitting)I will allow the hon. Gentleman to intervene. Perhaps he can explain and apologise for his position in relation to those countries.23 Jun 2020