Meeting of the Parliament 07 February 2017
Referendums always deliver a result, but they often do not result in clarity or in a concrete course of action. That is why we are having such a heated debate, and that is what we are wrestling with today.
As MSPs and as representatives, we always have to balance a number of different considerations, but perhaps with the vote and the motion today there are more considerations than usual. We have to balance our personal values with those of our constituents, and we have to look at the wider public interest, but also be mindful of our political party values and of the policies on which we were voted into Parliament. Many members will be conflicted. Those who voted to leave might find their party pursuing a more European stance than they are comfortable with, and those who voted to remain might find themselves bound by the constitutional conveyor belt. We do not have to accept blindly the version of Brexit that has been put before us by the UK Government. It is incumbent on us to interpret the interests of our constituents and the wider interests of this country, and to make our case as the UK Government considers Brexit.
For me, those considerations are easy, as I have always believed in politics that reach beyond our borders—not those that are defined by our borders. I have a clear mandate from my constituents, who voted overwhelmingly for remain, and although I accept the vote, I cannot accept the UK Government’s course of action and I do not believe that it is justified by the result.
Let me tell members about my constituency. In my first speech in Parliament, I said that my constituents had an overwhelming reason to vote remain. That is what 86 per cent or so of them did, because the benefits of being in Europe are clear and apparent to them. In my constituency, there are two major campuses of two major universities: the people who work in higher education, the students and the academics from all over Europe see the benefits of European research money. Thousands—if not tens of thousands—of people in my constituency work in financial and professional services. The benefits of Europe are not hypothetical or theoretical to them. They see those benefits daily and, for them, the imperative to maintain our bonds with Europe, regardless of whether we come out of the EU, are all too important. Their livelihoods depend on it.
For me, as a Labour MSP and as someone who was elected because I believe in work, having access to work and having opportunities through work, it is clear: I will not vote for something that will destroy or undermine work and opportunity. In this globalised world, it is Europe collectively that guarantees our ability to benefit from globalisation and not to suffer from it. I have that mandate from my constituents and it is certainly what my personal values dictate.
The UK Government has distorted the result. Time and again through the referendum campaign, we heard leave campaigners say various things. The Conservative MEP Daniel Hannan said that the single market was not under threat. We heard from Nigel Farage that Norway and Switzerland were examples that we could follow, and we even heard that EFTA was an opportunity. I am afraid that it was Jim Sillars who said that. The reality is that there was no clarity from the vote about exiting the single market, or about leaving the customs union and resorting to World Trade Organization rules, and I am absolutely certain that no one voted to impoverish themselves. It was a narrow vote and it was evenly split. Only 600,000 people made the difference between the result that we had and a different one.
The reality is that the result revealed division, so it was incumbent on the UK Government to reach out and to rebuild. Instead, there has been distortion of the vote and the UK Government has pushed for a hard Brexit, citing a Singapore model with a low tax economy. The UK Government needed to provide insight, transparency and a democratic process so that we could all have confidence that we would have a say in how matters would proceed and in the final result. Above all, the UK Government needed to build consensus, because that is what the divided result required it to do.
I say gently to my colleagues in the SNP and the Green Party that consensus is not the preserve of the UK Government; the imperative for consensus lies with us all. I understand that for those who have long pursued independence the situation might feel like another reason to pursue it again, but it cannot be. Brexit issues and the risks that we face are there because of uncertainty; independence would not mitigate those risks or decrease the uncertainties—it would increase them. For those reasons, we must reject the idea that independence would mitigate the issues, so I urge members to support our amendment.