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The Guardian - UK
The Guardian - UK
Politics
Andrew Sparrow

MPs pass non-binding motion saying UK should stay in customs union after Brexit – as it happened

Union and EU flags flying outside the Houses of Parliament.
Union and EU flags flying outside the Houses of Parliament. Photograph: Daniel Leal-Olivas/AFP/Getty Images

Afternoon summary

  • MPs approved a non-binding motion saying the UK should stay in the customs union after Brexit after a debate that suggests the Tory pro-Europeans have enough support to beat Theresa May on this issue in crucial votes later in this spring. The government ordered its MPs to abstain on the motion, and it was passed without a division. Most of the most prominent Brexiters in the Commons stayed away, with the result that the debate was one-sided; there was passionate speeches in favour of staying in the customs union (none more so than Dominic Grieve’s - see 4.27pm) and only relatively routine ones against. But what was significant was that Tory pro-Europeans mounted a show of force. There will be binding votes on the customs union when the trade bill and the customs bill (officially the taxation [cross-border trade] bill) come back to the Commons in the next few weeks. As Sky’s Faisal Islam points out, 10 Conservatives have already signed one of the pro customs unions amendments tabled to the trade bill.

The 10 on this list are: Anna Soubry, Nicky Morgan, Sarah Wollaston, Jonathan Djanogly, Stephen Hammond, Antoinette Sandbach, Heidi Allen, Jeremy Lefroy, Robert Neill and Ken Clarke. Grieve’s name is not on this amendment (NC5), but his name is on another pro customs union amendment (NC1). Many of these spoke in the debate. But at least four other Tories - Ed Vaizey and George Freeman (see 3.07pm), Luke Graham (see 3.39pm) and Kevin Hollinrake (see the Hansard here) - also made speeches or interventions that suggested that were very sympathetic to the case for remaining in the customs union. In addition to all these names, there are two other Tory MPs not already mentioned who voted against the government on the EU withdrawal bill in December last year - Sir Oliver Heald and John Stevenson. That gets you to 17 Tories who may be seen by the whips as potential rebels. By some estimates a rebellion involving just seven Tories would be enough to defeat the government. There were 12 rebels in the December vote (one of whom voted for and against the government.) A lot could change between now and the crucial votes, but on the basis of where we stand this afternoon, a defeat looks very possible.

That’s all from me for today.

I’ll be in writing a blog tomorrow.

Updated

This is from Michelle Kosinski, a CNN diplomatic correspondent.

The government has good grounds for thinking that Trump will be met by huge protests. We did some polling on this last summer, and found that 11% of respondents said they would either definitely (4%) or possibly take part in a protest if Trump visited the UK.

Here are the figures.

People were asked which response best described their reaction if Trump did visit.

Pleased: 13%

Accept the case for a visit, but not necessarily pleased: 26%

Upset, but would leave it at that: 20%

Upset, and would consider joining a protest march: 7%

Upset, and would definitely join a protest march: 4%

Not care one way or the other: 27%

MPs approve motion backing customs union with EU after Brexit without opposition

MPs have passed the customs union motion. (See 12.33pm.) It was passed by acclamation because no MP opposed it.

The government is opposed, but because the motion is non-binding it chose to abstain, as it has routinely been doing with backbench motions.

Mel Stride, the financial secretary to the Treasury, wound up the debate for the government. He said the government could not support the motion.

Yvette Cooper is winding up now. She says there is no evidence to back up the government’s position. She says the government should allow the Commons to have a vote on legislation.

Time is running out. The government should stop running away, and schedule a proper debate on the customs union.

Downing Street has put out this statement about President Trump’s visit.

The president of the United States will visit the UK on 13 July. He will hold bilateral talks with the prime minister during his visit. Further details will be set out in due course.

In the debate Peter Dowd, the shadow chief secretary to the Treasury, is winding up for Labour. He says Theresa May should act like a prime minister, challenge her critics and back the consensus for the UK staying in the customs union.

Trump to visit UK on 13 July

The White House has confirmed that President Trump will visit the UK in July.

What No 10 said about Rudd and the customs union

Downing Street issued a stark warning on the customs union after comments by the Home Secretary suggested it may still be up for discussion.

“The government is absolutely clear and without ambiguity that we are leaving the customs union and not joining a customs union,” Theresa May’s spokesman told reporters. He went on:

It’s the position of the prime minister, the cabinet and the entire government that we will be leaving the customs union and be free to sign our own trade deals around the world.

Number 10 said there was “a discussion around the issue of which two customs options the government opts for - but are we leaving the customs union? The answer is categorically yes.”

Rudd had issued a clarification on Twitter which still left some room for manoeuvre - ruling out remaining in the EU customs union but offering no comment on joining a new customs arrangement with the EU.

Downing Street said Rudd and May had not spoken since the lunch with journalists and insisted Rudd had not been told to clarify her remarks.

May’s spokesman also refused to rule out that the government re-using the phrase “hostile environment” which Rudd has said she felt uncomfortable with.

“I can’t predict the phrases individuals ministers will use,” he said.

However, Downing Street did back Rudd’s decision to drop the removals targets.

There have been targets in place for a number of decades in relation to immigration enforcement, it is the job of home secretaries to set priorities for tackling immigration. It remains a government priority to tackle illegal immigration to ensure the rules are properly enforced, but how you choose to achieve that is a matter for individual home secretaries.

Ruth Davidson announces she is pregnant

Congratulations are in order. The Scottish Conservative leader Ruth Davidson has announced she is pregnant.

Updated

Grieve accuses government of 'blundering around ignoring realities' on Brexit

Here are some extracts from the Dominic Grieve speech. (See 3.49pm.) It was the most rousing of the debate so far.

I agree with some of the comments that have been made, that by being outside the EU we lose some of the influence we have in creating the customs union and managing it. That I’m afraid is the price we are paying for the folly of the decision in the referendum of 2016. But just because one has imposed one calamity on oneself doesn’t mean one goes to inflict greater calamities simply on the basis that one has to do it in order to prove the theory, the mistake theory, that one has espoused ...

Grieve said there was not a single economic analysis showing the advantages of free trade deals outside the EU outweighing the advantages of staying in the single market and the customs union.

Why is it that the deputy ambassador of Japan has us all in and says, ‘You do realise that every Japanese company will be gone in 10 years’ time if they cannot have frictionless trade into the European Union’? We are behaving in the most extraordinary and blinded fashion as we blunder around ignoring the realities.

And in any case free trade agreements come with strings attached, as I said earlier. [See 12.47pm.] If you have a free trade agreement, if you have multiple free trade agreements, they will very quickly start to look like customs unions. That’s what happens when people get together. So this ‘customs union bad, somehow free trade agreement good’ simply does not stack up. It is time for a reality check. In fact, we need more than a customs union, because as is also clearly obvious we are not going to be able to trade without regulatory alignment.

Dominic Grieve.
Dominic Grieve. Photograph: BBC Parliament

Updated

No 10 slaps down Amber Rudd over customs union

No 10 has slapped down Amber Rudd over his customs union comments. (See 3.44pm.) This is from BuzzFeed’s Emily Ashton, from the Downing Street lobby briefing.

It might be time to revise the 12pm UQ verdict. The foreseeable future lasted about four hours ...

Updated

Sarah Wollaston, the Conservative chair of the health committee, spoke in favour of the motion. She said she wanted to make the argument that staying in the customs union is necessary for patient safety. If the UK were to leave, patients could find it harder accessing drugs, she said.

Grieve says silencing Tory moderates increases chances of Corbyn becoming PM

Dominic Grieve, the Conservative former attorney general, is speaking in the customs union debate now. He is the Tory that led the rebellion that saw the government being defeated on the EU withdrawal bill before Christmans.

He starts by saying that whenever he wants to take part in debates like this, he is urged (by the whips, he implies) to keep quiet. They tell him that if he speaks out, and disagrees with the government, he will increase the chances of Jeremy Corbyn becoming prime minister. But he says what is most likely to to lead to Corbyn becoming prime minister is “if people of a moderate and sensible disposition stop debating important issues”.

The speech is a cracker - the best of the debate so far.

I will post highlights in a moment.

What Amber Rudd said about the customs union

While the customs union debate was taking place in the chamber, elsewhere in the palace of Westminster Amber Rudd, the home secretary, was speaking at a lunch for political journalists. Here are the customs union comments that she has now had to correct. (See 3.27pm.)

Asked if she would vote to keep Britain in a customs union if she was still a backbencher, Rudd said:

I am committed to the government’s position, which to some extent, we are still working on.

Then, after a later question, asked if she thought it was more or less likely that the UK would stay in the customs union, Rudd said:

I’m afraid I’m not going to be drawn on that; we still have a few discussions to have, in a really positive, consensual, easy way amongst all my cabinet colleagues, in order to arrive at a final position.

One of the features of the customs union debate is that we have seen Conservative MPs not previously identified as potential rebels on this issue sounding positive about staying in the customs union. One was Luke Graham, the MP for Ochil and South Perthshire. He ended his speech saying:

None of our constituents voted to be poorer. None of our constituents wanted to have more barriers between ourselves and our international trading partners. We don’t mind the labels, we don’t mind the mechanism, but I know from my constituents they want to be able to have a customs system that they can rely on, that respects the United Kingdom’s integrity, but also allows them to prosper and be better off than they are today.

Updated

Rudd clarifies her press gallery speech comment, saying UK will leave customs union

Amber Rudd has issued her second major correction of the day. Referring to her press gallery comments about the customs union (see 2.38pm and 3.17pm), she posted this on Twitter.

Sir Keir Starmer, the shadow Brexit secretary, has welcomed what Amber Rudd said at the press gallery lunch about the cabinet’s customs union policy being undecided. (See 2.38pm.) He said:

Amber Rudd appears to have let slip that discussions around the cabinet table about negotiating a customs union with the EU have not in fact concluded.

If that is so, then the prime minister should rethink her approach and listen to the growing chorus of voices in parliament and in business that believe she has got it wrong on a customs union.

It is worth pointing out that Downing Street has repeatedly said that this issue is settled, and that the UK definitely is leaving the customs union.

Either what Number 10 is saying in public is not an accurate guide to what May is planning in private (which has happened before - remember the general election they said would never happen?), or Rudd is giving a duff account of what is happening behind the scenes in government (for which there is also precedent, as we learnt this morning.)

While Ed Vaizey was speaking, his Conservative colleague George Freeman intervened. Echoing the argument used by Antoinette Sandbach earlier (see 2.29pm), Freeman said:

In Mid Norfolk, where my constituents voted to leave, the majority opinion I heard on the doorsteps was, ‘Mr Freeman, I wanted to be in the single market, not in a political union, it was Mrs Thatcher who took us into the single market, I want to be in the market, not in the union.’

Vaizey said that was “absolutely right”. He said if it was in the interests of the British economy to stay in the customs union, parliament should be able to take that decision without being accused of betraying the British people. But the Brexiters had “tipped over into an ideological fervour where anything that involves Europe in any shape or form seems to be wrong”.

Ed Vaizey, the Conservative former minister, used his speech in the customs union debate to say that the government needs to answer a series of questions about Brexit. For example, when is it going to sign its new trade deal? And how much are they going to be worth?

According this story by Adam Payne for Business Insider, the answer to the first question is - not any time soon. Payne says the European commission is “deeply concerned” about the lack of preparation the international trade secretary Liam Fox has made towards carrying over Britain’s existing free trade deals after Brexit. Here’s an excerpt from the story, which is worth reading in full.

One of the tasks facing Britain is to ensure the free trade deals it already has with other non-EU countries, as part of its EU membership, continue to apply after it has left the bloc.

However, the commission — led by President Jean-Claude Juncker — has told the EU’s other institutions it is “deeply concerned about the UK’s incompetent handling of trade deal rollovers,” and Fox’s “failure to grasp basic concepts and trade-offs,” a source who received the internal EU briefing told Business Insider.

Fox has previously said that all trade deals will be preserved in time for exit day.

“We’re going to replicate the 40 EU free trade agreements that exist before we leave the European Union so we’ve got no disruption of trade,” the government minister said at the most recent Conservative party conference.

However, the commission is concerned that Britain is nowhere near ready, citing “indecision” within the Department for International Trade (DIT) in verbal briefings to officials from the EU’s other institutions.

Meg Hillier, the Labour chair of the Commons public accounts committee, told MPs that the UK should stay in the customs union and that the alternative was “chaos, cost, confusion and huge cost to the British economy”.

She also stressed that her committee, and others, have done a lot of work that has exposed the disadvantages of leaving the EU.

On the Commons order paper the Commons authorities list documents relevant to a particular debate. Today’s order paper lists 16. They are all committee reports, or transcripts of evidence sessions. If you want some Brexit reading, you can find them listed here (pdf), on page 7, complete with relevant links.

In the Commons Sir Hugo Swire, a Conservative, is speaking now. He says he voted remain. But he accepts the result, and he does not believe that people were voting to stay in the customs union. He also says he does not see why people would want to remain tied to the EU when its share of global trade is falling.

Amber Rudd, the home secretary, was speaking at a press gallery lunch today. As the Sun’s Tom Newton Dunn reports, she refused to say the UK would definitely leave the customs union.

The Conservative Matt Warman is speaking now. He is opposing the motion, arguing that to stay in the customs union would amount to ignore the result of the EU referendum.

His Tory colleague Antoinette Sandbach intervenes. She says many people in her constituency argued during the referendum that they voted to join the common market, but that the EU had turned into something different. Leaving the EU, but staying in the customs union, would be consistent with that these people were asking for, he says. The UK would no longer be in the political union, but it would be in the common market.

As the row between the Westminster and Holyrood governments over the sharing of EU powers after Brexit continues, Thursday’s FMQs saw Nicola Sturgeon dismissing as “nonsense” Ruth Davidson’s accusation that her government was acting unreasonably.

The Welsh government left Sturgeon unexpectedly isolated on Monday when it signed a deal with Westminster, splitting up the highly effective coalition between the two devolved governments and leading to speculation that Sturgeon herself had stepped in at the last minute to veto a similar deal for Scotland.

But others argue there is far more cause for optimism than the FMQs rhetoric might suggest. Lord Hope, the retired Scottish judge and one of the key cross-bench members to champion the Scottish government’s cause in the Lords, has told the Guardian that he believes his amendment to the controversial clause 11, which he will publish next Monday, will offer much-needed clarity. He said:

What I’m concerned about is that the wording respects devolution, which it is doing, but there’s the little extra bit which we hope to put in that might make it a bit clearer as the where the boundaries do lie.

A devolution veteran, who was involved in the drafting of the Scotland Act of 1998 which brought about the Holyrood parliament, Hope said:

Michael Russell [the Scottish government negotiator] says that he wants to make it clear the Scottish parliament has the absolute right to decide yes or no, and I think we’ve achieved that for the areas that are matters for Scotland alone. The tricky area is how you deal with it when there are interests of other parts of the UK involved as well as Scotland. It’s quite difficult for the UK government to say ‘alright Scotland can have the last say in those areas’.

Paying tribute to Russell for his negotiating skill, Hope added “I do hope his views will carry weight with the Scottish government of which he is a part but not the controlling part as I understand it” - a reference to the rumours that Sturgeon herself had prevented him from reaching a deal earlier in the week.

Nicola Sturgeon speaking during First Minister’s Questions in the Scottish Parliament today.
Nicola Sturgeon speaking during First Minister’s Questions in the Scottish Parliament today. Photograph: Ken Jack - Corbis/Corbis via Getty Images

Rachel Reeves, the Labour chair of the business committee, told MPs that she was clear that the UK needed to stay in the customs union to maintain frictionless trade with the EU.

Labour on course for best council result in London for 40 years, poll suggests

Turning away from the debate for a moment, Labour is set for the best performance in London local elections of any party for more than 40 years, according to a poll. The Press Association has the details. It says:

Jeremy Corbyn’s party enjoyed the support of 51% of the capital’s voters, a massive 22 points ahead of Conservatives on 29%, with 11% backing Liberal Democrats, in the YouGov survey for Queen Mary University of London’s Mile End Institute ahead of next week’s elections.

But politics professor Philip Cowley said a one-point drop in Labour support since a similar poll in February suggested Tories would hold on to the flagship boroughs of Westminster and Wandsworth on May 3.

The poll suggests a 5.35% swing to Labour since the same seats were fought in 2014, down from 7.35% in February.

“Despite the small increase in support for the Conservatives, the Labour party is predicted to do better than any political party has managed in London for over 40 years,” said Prof Cowley.

“Nothing in this poll indicates that next week will be anything other than a good night for Labour in London.”

Holding on to Westminster and Wandsworth would not be a sign of success for the Conservatives, but “merely the avoidance of utter disaster”, he said.

Corbyn’s party led the poll not only in the more deprived inner city, but also in the traditionally Conservative-leaning suburbs. In inner London, 59% intended to vote Labour and 22% Tory, while in outer London, Labour led by 46% to 34%.

Council elections are taking place on May 3 in all parts of London, as well as more than 100 local authorities in the rest of England.

YouGov questioned 1,099 London adults for QMUL from April 14 to 20.

Anna Soubry, another Conservative pro-European, is speaking now. She says a business from her constituency came to see her to discuss their Brexit worries, but asked her not to name them because they are worried about repercussions. She says they make medicine and export 60% of their goods to the EU. They are worried about the costs of exporting if the UK leaves the customs union, and are planning to open laboratories in the Netherlands.

Nicky Morgan says Tories will 'not be forgiven for generation' if Brexit undermines economy

At the end of her speech Nicky Morgan said the Treasury committee and the international trade committee this week. They took evidence from Prof Patrick Minford, the academic economist who is a strong supporter of Brexit. Morgan went on:

[Minford] said very clearly, when asked about the free trade agreements and free trade policy we are currently going to pursue, ‘we don’t have any precedents for this’. This country is being asked to experiment at other people’s pleasure with a free trade policy when we do not know what the costs will be for constituents and businesses in this country. And I say to my party; if we undermine and ignore the evidence of peace in Northern Ireland, and we undermine the financial security of people in this country, we will not be forgiven for a generation.

Nicky Morgan, the Conservative pro-European and chair of the Treasury committee, is speaking now. She is one of the select committee chairs who tabled the motion (see 12.33pm) and she says select committee have spent hours taking evidence on this issue. It is important for parliament to test the evidence. She says today that can do so in relative calm, because they are not discussing amendments to legislation.

She says she wants to address those in the Conservative party unhappy about her stance. They argue that people like her are going against government policy. But Morgan points out that Theresa May herself implied she favoured some flexibility over the customs union in her Lancaster House speech. She quotes this passage from the speech. May said:

I do want us to have a customs agreement with the EU. Whether that means we must reach a completely new customs agreement, become an associate member of the customs union in some way, or remain a signatory to some elements of it, I hold no preconceived position.

Nicky Morgan
Nicky Morgan Photograph: Parliament TV

John Bercow, the speaker, has now introduced a five-minute limit on speeches.

Hoey is now talking about Northern Ireland. She says it is “almost as if we are being blackmailed by Sinn Fein”. If terrorism does revive in Northern Ireland, people should be put in jail.

Ken Clarke intervenes. He says Germany exports four or five times as much to China as the UK. They are not being held back by the single market. So why is Hoey saying the UK is being held back?

Hoey says the UK needs to change. She says leaving the EU will be a “catalyst” for change.

Kate Hoey, the Labour Brexiter, is speaking now. She says staying in the customs union would be seen as a move towards going back into the EU.

She quotes from two Labour opponents of Britain’s entry into what was then called the common market, Joan Lestor and Clement Attlee. She says she does not see why progressives support the EU. She says it obstructs free trade.

Since the Irish border issue is featuring in this debate, it is worth flagging up these tweets from Darren McCaffrey, Sky’s Ireland correspondent

In the debate the Labour MP Stephen Doughty makes a point of order. He refers to this Tweet from the BBC’s political editor, Laura Kuenssberg, and asks if Amber Rudd is planning to come to the Commons to make another statement.

John Bercow, the Commons speaker, says there are no plans for a statement, but he says that Doughty can “look forward to Monday” implying that he might consider granting another UQ on this next week (although it is not clear that the BBC lines goes much beyond what Rudd was saying in the Commons earlier. See 11am.)

Clarke says he does not understand why Brexiters object to the UK being part of EU trade deals. He says he cannot think of any EU trade deal that people in the UK have found objectionable.

And the Brexiters say the UK can trade on WTO terms. But, with President Trump in the White House, there is less and less support for the WTO regime, he says. He says Trump will not even appoint judges to the WTO court. He does not want it to adjudicate on disputes.

Clarke also dismisses the idea that the UK on its own will get a good trade deal from the US. Even with Obama as president, the Americans refused to open their procurement markets to Europe. All the Americans want is to be able to sell beef in the UK. They are offering nothing in return, he says.

He says the best thing to do would be to stay in the customs union and the single market. If that is not possible, the UK needs something looking remarkably similar to the customs union. Not replicating it would cause huge damage, he says.

Ken Clarke, the Conservative former chancellor and leading pro-European, is speaking now.

He says the cabinet is trying to agree its negotiating position. But, meanwhile, events are moving on. The Commons should have more chance to express its views.

He says he agrees with everything Yvette Cooper said, apart from her claim that a trade deal with the US could open the way to privatisation of the NHS.

And what Cooper said was entirely consistent with what the Conservative party used to think for the first 50 years of its his membership of it, he says. Since then there has been a conversion. “But the light did not strike me.”

Labour’s Chuka Umunna says the government knows that leaving the EU will make the country poorer. Clarke has been an MP for 48 years. Can he think of any government enacting a policy to make the country poorer.

“Not deliberately,”, says Clarke, to laughter.

Ken Clarke
Ken Clarke Photograph: BBC/BBC Parliament

Cooper says opponents of the customs union say that would not be compatible with the EU referendum, which was a vote for sovereignty and taking back control.

But, as Dominic Grieve pointed out (see 12.47pm), any trade deal would involve giving up an element of control, she says.

She says she wants to live in a country that supports manufacturing, and trade deals and the Good Friday agreement. That is why she is backing the customs union, she says.

Yvette Cooper is still speaking, and she is explaining why she thinks the government’s proposals for customs after Brexit will not work.

One of the two proposals, for a new “customs partnerships”, has been dismissed as unworkable by both the European commission and David Davis, the Brexit secretary, she says. (Davis has reportedly dismissed it in private, but has not said publicly it will not work.) Cooper says it is quite something to get the commission and Davis to agree.

The two options were explained in this government paper (pdf) published last year. It summarised the “customs partnership” plan by saying: “One potential approach would involve the UK mirroring the EU’s requirements for imports from the rest of the world where their final destination is the EU.”

Cooper is right to say this idea has been widely dismissed. In his column in this week’s Spectator, the (pro-Brexit) James Forsyth writes:

The idea is to keep trade flowing freely by having the UK collect tariffs on the EU’s behalf. The problem with this proposal is it is not seen as credible even within the UK government. One cabinet minister tells me: ‘Sounds mad and unworkable? Yes it is.’

According to Politico Europe’s Charlie Cooper, the government paid consultants almost £700,000 to help develop this widely-discredited plan. Here is an extract from his story.

The UK government paid private sector consultants hundreds of thousands of pounds to help design a Brexit customs arrangement — only for the EU to dismiss it almost as soon as it landed in Brussels.

Government records show the U.K. tax authority, Her Majesty’s Revenue and Customs (HMRC), spent £680,000 on a contract with consultancy firm McKinsey & Company to, among other things, assess the “commercial feasibility” of the “new customs partnership model.” That is one of two customs proposals put forward by UK Brexit negotiators last week in talks aimed at avoiding a hard border between Ireland and Northern Ireland.

Sylvia Hermon, the independent MP for North Down in Northern Ireland, intervenes. She says she was very worried to hear Theresa May say during PMQs yesterday that a no deal Brexit would be acceptable. A no deal Brexit would lead to the return of violence in Northern Ireland, she says.

Dominic Grieve, the Conservative pro-European and former attorney general, intervenes on Cooper. He says any free trade agreement will come with strings attached. And he says if the UK wants a free trade agreement with the EU, it is going to start looking like a customs union.

Cooper says she is looking to see where a consensus can be found in the Commons. She thinks that a consensus can be found around support for the UK staying in a customs union.

If the UK were to stay in a customs union, the UK would still be bound by the common external tariff. That would mean British goods and parts being able to go back and forward to the continent without suppliers having to fill in rules of origin forms.

MPs debate keeping UK in customs union after Brexit

The two (rather pointless) ministerial statements have wrapped up much more quickly than expected (see 9.50am) and so MPs have now just started the debate on the customs union. John Bercow, the speaker, started by saying the backbench debate on plastics has been postponed, which means this debate will run until 5pm.

Yvette Cooper, the Labour MP who chairs the Commons home affairs committee, is opening. She says she and other select committee chairs called for this debate because they think the customs union issue needs to be debated.

Here is the full text of the motion. The key point is highlighted (by me) in bold.

That this House notes that the EU is the UK’s largest export market for goods, accounting for a total of £145bn of exports and £241bn of imports in 2016; further notes the government’s expressed aim to secure the freest and most frictionless possible trade in goods between the UK and the EU after 29 March 2019; notes the importance of frictionless trade without tariffs, customs or border checks for manufacturers and businesses across the country who trade with the EU; further notes that the free circulation of goods on the island of Ireland is a consequence of the UK’s and Republic of Ireland’s membership of the EU customs union; in addition notes the government’s commitment to (i), in the UK-EU joint report on progress during phase 1 of the article 50 negotiations, the maintenance of North-South cooperation and the all-island economy on the island of Ireland, (ii) the Belfast Agreement implemented in the Northern Ireland Act 1998 remaining a fundamental principle of public policy and (iii) the continuation of unfettered access for Northern Ireland’s businesses to the whole of the UK internal market; and therefore calls on the government to include as an objective in negotiations on the future relationship between the UK and the EU the establishment of an effective customs union between the two territories.


The centrist grouping inside Scottish Labour, those close to former leader Kezia Dugdale and her putative successor Anas Sarwar, is being urged allow the party’s interim deputy leader to stand unopposed because a contest for the post could repeat last year’s bruising factional disputes.

Senior figures close to Jeremy Corbyn and Scottish leader Richard Leonard, who defeated Sarwar decisively last November after an at times bitter election campaign, are putting pressure on the party’s centrists not to stand a candidate against Lesley Laird, who has been acting deputy since late last year.

They also fear the pro-Europe lobby within Labour at Holyrood could use this as a proxy war over Brexit. Dugdale is leading a very active grouping inside the party pressuring Corbyn to remain in the single market and customs union after Brexit.

The only candidate so far, Laird is also shadow Scottish secretary in the Commons. Her backers point to endorsements which they say establish her as a unifying candidate, including from Gordon Brown himself and from Brian Wilson, an energy and foreign minister under Tony Blair, as well as the party’s most senior council leaders. They claim that kind of backing makes Laird clear favourite.

The recently-launched Scottish Corbynista blog Red Robin quotes Wilson saying Laird should stand unopposed:

The last thing Scottish Labour needs at present is another internal election.

Confirming Lesley Laird in the post would strengthen the ties between Labour at Holyrood and Westminster while enhancing her position in the House of Commons. All Labour’s efforts and resources need to be concentrated on campaigning and presenting attractive alternatives in Scotland and the UK.

Laird, who unexpectedly regained Gordon Brown’s old Westminster seat of Kirkcaldy and Cowdenbeath from the Scottish National party in last June’s snap election, became temporary deputy after Alex Rowley resigned from that post following serious allegations about his private life and a blundering intervention in the leadership contest.

But centrist sources say a coronation isn’t necessarily healthy. There are concerns that Laird performs badly with the media, said one. Laird has also refused to resign her council seat in Fife, despite being an MP, leading to SNP attacks on her poor attendance record.

“It’s clear she is the establishment’s pick,” said one critic. “But she doesn’t have any name recognition widely in the party and getting parliamentarian support doesn’t necessarily mean anything. So, I wouldn’t rule out a challenger at this stage.”

They say the left may worry that the long-standing members more likely to vote in a less significant contest like this may prefer a centrist as a balancing influence. Leonard won in part because the Corbynite and trade union machines swung behind him, and he is yet to have any great impact with voters.

Lesley Laird MP with Jeremy Corbyn in St Bryce Church, Kirkcaldy, where former Prime Minister Gordon Brown’s father was once the minister, during a visit in August 2017.
Lesley Laird MP with Jeremy Corbyn in St Bryce Church, Kirkcaldy, where former Prime Minister Gordon Brown’s father was once the minister, during a visit in August 2017. Photograph: Ken Jack - Corbis/Corbis via Getty Images,

Amber Rudd's deportation targets UQ - Summary and verdict

Government resignations are an arbitrary business. Often ministers are forced to quit for little apparent reasons, while in other circumstances they survive despite glaring evidence of egregious incompetence, or worse. The Windrush scandal has been a disgrace, and Rudd’s response has been slow and cack-handed. But it is not entirely her fault. As Jack Blanchard said in his Politico Europe briefing yesterday, “her own best defence is one she simply cannot deploy — that this is basically all the fault of her predecessor at the Home Office, one Theresa May.” She could not say this, but Tory MPs know it, and that helps to explain why they were out in force to support her this morning. (Michael Gove, the environment secretary, and Sajid Javid, the housing secretary, were on the front bench beside her.) Ministers normally got forced out when they have lost the confidence of their own backbenchers. On the basis of what we saw this morning, Rudd is secure for the foreseeable future.

Here are the main points.

  • She dismissed calls from Labour and the SNP for her resignation, arguing that she was the person best place to fix the Home Office’s problems. In response to one call for her resignation, she said:

I do take seriously my responsibility but I do think I am the person who can put it right. I understand the House will want to hold me to account for that, but I am confident the changes I am committed to putting in place and the transparency that will go with that will deliver the changes that are expected.

  • Conservative MPs strongly backed Rudd. None of them suggested she should resign, or criticised her handling of the Windrush scandal in any significant way, and several went out of their way to praise her. Sir Nicholas Soames, the Tory former minister, said Rudd had the “total support of this side of the House in trying to resolve a very difficult legacy issue” and another backbencher, Julian Knight, praised Rudd for her “real steadfastness”.
  • Rudd gave a hint that the government is considering dropping its annual net migration target. Privately many cabinet ministers want to abandon the commitment to get annual net migration below 100,000, which in recent years the government has come nowhere near hitting, but Theresa May has been a strong supporter of the policy. Labour’s Peter Kyle said the government should rethink it. In reply, Rudd said:

The targets that were apparently being looked at were for illegal migrants, so I do think that it is wholly different. There may be a time for a discussion on legal migration, but at the moment I think it is right our focus is on illegal migration to make sure that it is done in a fair, compassionate and transparent way.

Last month, in evidence to the Commons home affairs committee, Rudd refused to say that the government remained committed to this target. But she did not say it had been abandoned either.

Amber Rudd, the home secretary, responding to the urgent question about deportation targets.
Amber Rudd, the home secretary, responding to the urgent question about deportation targets. Photograph: HANDOUT/Reuters

Updated

Here is David Lammy’s question to Amber Rudd in full. (See 10.46am.)

I asked the minister at the last urgent question how many people had been deported, she said she didn’t know. I asked her how many people have been imprisoned in her own country, she said she didn’t know. There are impact statements that have been ignored, there are letters from MPs and she said she wasn’t aware of a pattern. We now understand people have been removed because of targets and she said she didn’t know. I say with all conscience is she really the right person to lead this office of state?

Updated

This is from Sky’s Faisal Islam, with the latest from the Number 10 lobby briefing.

Mike Schroepfer, Facebook’s chief technical officer, is giving evidence to the Commons culture committee now. My colleague Alex Hern is covering it on a separate live blog.

Rudd's perfomance at the UQ - Verdict from the Twitter commentariat

This is what journalists are saying on Twitter about Amber Rudd’s performance.

From the Guardian’s Amelia Gentleman, who broke the Windrush story and has led the reporting on this issue.

From the BBC’s home affairs correspondent Danny Shaw

From Sky’s Beth Rigby

From PoliticsHome’s Kevin Schofield

From the Guardian’s Jamie Grierson

From the Times’s Sam Coates

From the Independent’s Tom Peck

The SNP’s Peter Grant says, even if people are not deported, being detained is a humiliating experience. How many people have been wrongly detained?

Rudd says he does not accept the premise of Grant’s question, because Grant is conflating legal with illegal immigration, she says.

And that’s it. The UQ is over. I will post a summary soon.

Rudd says the changes she has been making to Home Office policy have been intended to assist families and children.

How Rudd admitted Home Office has been using deportation targets

Here is the key quote from Amber Rudd’s opening statement.

I have never agreed that there should be specific removal targets and I would never support a policy that puts targets ahead of people.

The immigration arm of the Home Office has been using local targets for internal performance management. These were not published targets against which performance was assessed, but if they were used inappropriately then I am clear that this will have to change.

I have asked officials to provide me with a full picture of performance measurement tools which are used at all levels, and will update the House and the home affairs select committee as soon as possible.

Updated

Labour’s Rachael Maskell asks, given that Rudd does not know what her department is doing, who is running the Home Office?

Rudd says she accepts the criticism she has received. That is why she is here. She hopes to have the chance to come back to MPs to explain the changes she will be making.

Rudd says she has had nothing but praise for the MPs’ immigration hotline (the one they can use to raise the problems of constituents with immigration problems). As some MPs jeers, Rudd says clearly there are exceptions.

Anna Soubry, a Conservative, asks Rudd if she agrees “part of Labour’s dreadful legacy was an obsession with targets” and that the Home Office should focus on individuals.

Rudd agrees. She wants to put the individual at the heart of policy, she says.

Asked if the government should drop the net migration targets, Rudd says this is an issue about illegal immigration. But she says there may be a time to address the legal migration targets.

  • Rudd hints that government may reconsider its annual net migration target.

Rudd says she won’t resign because she's best person to fix Home Office problems

Labour’s Paula Sherriff asks if Rudd agrees with what Theresa May said about being sick and tired of ministers not taking responsibility. Will she do the decent thing and resign?

Rudd says she does take responsibility. But she thinks she is the best person to put these problems right.

  • Rudd says she won’t resign because she thinks she is the best person to put these problems right.

Updated

Labour’s John Woodcock says people will accept Rudd did not deliberately mislead the home affairs committee, not least because what she said was so easily disproved. But it it is worrying that she and her lead official did not know what was going on.

Rudd says she is not authorising targets. She wants a compassionate approach to immigration, she says.

Labour’s Diana Johnson asks Rudd if she was asleep when she did not know there were targets.

Rudd says immigration is an important part of her job, although not the only one. She says the changes she is making will flag up problems more quickly.

Labour’s Stephen Doughty says this goes well beyond the Windrush generation. How many people have been wrongfully deported or wrongfully detained? He has met people in both categories.

Rudd says she is looking into this, going back to 2002. She says she will get back to the home affairs committee.

Yvette Cooper, the Labour chair of the Commons home affairs committee, said it was “deeply disappointing that the home secretary did not know the facts” when she spoke to the committee yesterday. She said that in April 2016, after talks with Caribbean diplomats, Foreign Office ministers were made aware of concerns about Windrush migrants being deported. Cooper asked what action was taken.

Rudd said Cooper raised this in the committee hearing yesterday. She said she would look into it.

The Labour MP David Lammy said he had asked Rudd various questions about Windrush migrants, including how many were deported, and she could not reply. He asked Rudd to consider if he was really the right person “to lead this office of state”.

I asked the minister at the last urgent question how many people had been deported, she said she didn’t know. I asked her how many people have been imprisoned in her own country, she said she didn’t know. There are impact statements that have been ignored, there are letters from MPs and she said she wasn’t aware of a pattern. We now understand people have been removed because of targets and she said she didn’t know. I say with all conscience is she really the right person to leave this office of state?

Rudd said she has been investigating if any Windrush migrants were wrongly deported, and so far there is no evidence of that happening.

Updated

The SNP’s Alison Thewliss also said that Rudd should resign.

But Rudd is getting the support of Conservative MPs. Sir Nicholas Soames said all Tory MPs were supporting Rudd, and Philip Davies, another Conservative backbencher, said people wanted tougher action against illegal immigrants.

In her response to Rudd, Abbott says Rudd should resign.

When Lord Carrington resigned over the Falklands, he said it was a matter of honour. Isn’t it time that the home secretary considered her honour and resigned?

Rudd responds by saying that illegal immigration is not the same as legal immigration. She says she was not aware of the internal targets.

Updated

Rudd admits Home Office has used internal targets for deportations

Diane Abbott asks for a statement about removal targets (that’s the question).

Amber Rudd says she gave evidence to the committee yesterday.

Windrush migrants are here legally and should not be subject to removal action, she says.

She says all MPs agree that the Windrush generation are here legally, but that the government should tackle illegal immigration. She says she has seen the exploitation and abuse that comes with that.

Her department has been working

The immigration arm of the Home Office has been using local targets for internal perfomance management.

She says, if they have affected policy, that will change.

  • Rudd admits Home Office has used internal targets for deportations.

UPDATE: Here is the key quote from Rudd.

I have never agreed that there should be specific removal targets and I would never support a policy that puts targets ahead of people.

The immigration arm of the Home Office has been using local targets for internal performance management. These were not published targets against which performance was assessed, but if they were used inappropriately then I am clear that this will have to change.

I have asked officials to provide me with a full picture of performance measurement tools which are used at all levels, and will update the House and the home affairs select committee as soon as possible.

Updated

Amber Rudd responds to Commons urgent questions on Home Office removal targets

Amber Rudd, the home secretary, is about to face Labour’s urgent question on the Home Office’s deportation removal targets.

This is what Rudd said about it at the Commons home affairs committee yesterday.

Recorded knife crime in England and Wales up 22%, says ONS

Police-recorded offences involving knives or other sharp instruments increased
by 22% year-on-year in England and Wales in 2017, the Press Association reports. The PA report goes on:

Police recorded 39,598 offences involving a knife or sharp instrument in the latest year ending December 2017, a 22% increase compared with the previous year (32,468), and the highest number registered since comparable records started in 2010.

The Office for National Statistics said: “The past three years have seen a rise in the number of recorded offences involving a knife or sharp instrument, following a general downward trend in this series since the year ending March 2011.”

Offences involving firearms were also up, by 11% to 6,604 recorded crimes.

These offences tend to be disproportionately concentrated in London and other metropolitan areas, the ONS said, but it added that the majority of police force areas saw rises in these types of violent crime.

The full ONS bulletin with the crime figures for England and Wales for 2017 is here.

David Lammy claims Rudd lied to parliament

The Labour MP David Lammy, one of the leading campaigners for the rights of the Windrush migrants, has accused Amber Rudd of lying to parliament. He has posted these on Twitter.

Unfortunately for those of us who enjoy a good row, Lammy will not be allowed to accuse Rudd in quite these terms when the UQ comes up later. Accusing a fellow MP in the chamber of lying is deemed unparliamentary and unacceptable (even if the culprit has lied), and if an MP tries to use that language, the speaker forces him or her to withdraw or face being removed from the chamber.

The government is keen to downplay the importance of the backbench debate on the customs union later. That may explain why it has decided to schedule two ministerial statements today. Taking into account the urgent question on Home Office deportation targets too, that means the debate will not start until after 1pm. It is likely to run for less than three hours.

Starmer accuses McCluskey of playing down Labour's antisemitism problem

Yesterday the New Statesman published an article by Len McCluskey, the pro-Corbyn Unite general secretary and the most powerful union leader in the Labour movement, criticising Labour MPs who have complained about antisemitism in the party, saying they should be “held to account”.

Sir Keir Starmer, the shadow Brexit secretary, said this morning he thought McCluskey’s arguments were wrong. He implied that McCluskey was denying that antisemitism was a problem in the party, telling Today:

I disagree with Len McCluskey. Jeremy Corbyn has made it clear, and it is obvious, that we have got a problem with antisemitism. We have got to deal with it robustly and effectively.

Part of that is the disciplinary procedure, which needs to be much quicker and much more effective, but there is also a cultural question.

Part of that cultural question is to stop those denying that there is even a problem. That is part of the problem. So I am afraid I disagree with Len on this.

In his article McCluskey explicitly said that he accepted that a “small number” of Labour members were guilty of antisemitism and that they should be expelled. But he also said the issue was being deliberately exploited by Corbyn’s critics and most of his article focused on them.

Sir Keir Starmer
Sir Keir Starmer Photograph: Andy Hall for the Observer

The UQ will start at 10.30am. Full coverage here, obviously ...

Amber Rudd summoned to Commons to explain why she denied deportation targets exist

Amber Rudd, the home secretary, will be responding to the UQ, the Home Office says.

Updated

Speaker grants urgent question on Home Office deportation targets

The speaker, John Bercow, has granted an urgent question on the Home Office’s removal targets. It has been tabled by Diane Abbott, the shadow home secretary.

Labour says Amber Rudd must face MPs to explain why she denied deportation targets exist

Amber Rudd, the home secretary, is in trouble. Yesterday, when she gave evidence to the Commons home affairs committee, she rejects claims that the Home Office set targets for the removal of illegal immigrants. She told the MPs:

We don’t have targets for removals ... If you ask me, ‘are there numbers of people we expect to be removed?’, that’s not how we operate.

But overnight it has emerged that the Home Office did have targets for the removal of illegal immigrants as recently as three years ago. My colleague Pippa Crerar has the story.

The reference to targets is in this report (pdf), published in December 2015 by the chief inspector of borders and immigration. Here is an excerpt.

Excerpt from report on removals by independent chief inspector of borders and immigration
Excerpt from report on removals by independent chief inspector of borders and immigration Photograph: Home Office

Overnight the government has revised its line on this from the one taken by Rudd in her hapless select committee outing yesterday. Matt Hancock, the culture secretary, set it out when he appeared on the Today programme to discuss a separate issue. He told the programme.

As far as I understand it, it has never been Home Office policy to take decisions arbitrarily to meet the target. There are rules around immigration. Immigration needs to be controlled but the rules also need to be fair.

Alert readers will spot that this formula, which Hancock repeated more than once, does not deny the existence of a target.

On Sky News Sir Keir Starmer, the shadow Brexit secretary, said the government was “dancing on the head of a pin”. He said Rudd should come to the Commons this morning to clear up what is going on. He told Sky:

The key question at the moment is, ‘Did you have a target for the number that were to removed?’ And that’s got to be answered. Amber Rudd appeared yesterday to say no. It looks as though she may have been contradicted in reports today. That’s got to be cleared up. The right thing to do would be to come to the House of Commons as the home secretary and make a statement setting out what the full position is and then face questions.

Obviously I will be following all the latest developments closely.

Here is the agenda for the day.

9.30am: Michael Gove, the environment secretary, takes questions in the Commons.

9.30am: Crime figures for England and Wales are published.

10am: The pro-European MPs Chuka Umunna and Anna Soubry hold a briefing ahead of the customs union debate.

10.30am: Mike Schroepfer, Facebook’s chief technical officer, gives evidence to the Commons culture committee.

After 11.30am: MPs debate a backbench motion saying the UK should stay in the customs union after Brexit. If there is a division, it will take place mid-afternoon.

As usual, I will be covering breaking political news as it happens, as well as bringing you the best reaction, comment and analysis from the web. I plan to post a summary at lunchtime and another at the end of the day.

You can read all today’s Guardian politics stories here.

Here is the Politico Europe round-up of this morning’s political news from Jack Blanchard. And here is the PoliticsHome list of today’ top 10 must reads.

If you want to follow me or contact me on Twitter, I’m on @AndrewSparrow.

I try to monitor the comments BTL but normally I find it impossible to read them all. If you have a direct question, do include “Andrew” in it somewhere and I’m more likely to find it. I do try to answer direct questions, although sometimes I miss them or don’t have time.

If you want to attract my attention quickly, it is probably better to use Twitter.

Updated

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