Lord Hain: ...government cuts are undermining the very ground on which we stand, walk and run. In a sane world, Tory leadership candidates would now be unveiling plans for reducing poverty and inequality, but Brexit fever has them in its grasp, so poverty and inequality have played no part. The Chancellor claims that the UK has started its journey out of austerity, but the fiscal squeeze that George...
Lord Hain: ...Minister. She does not really grip Northern Ireland in the way that other Prime Ministers have done, including Tony Blair and John Major. She does not give it priority. It is no excuse to say that Brexit overwhelms her as it is overwhelming our whole government system. I hope that the noble Lords, Lord Bourne and Lord Duncan, for whom I have a great respect, will take this message back:...
Lord Hain: ...to play a waiting game. Like a cricketing nightwatchman, he is intent only on staying at the crease by meeting every delivery with a dead bat. He is waiting for whatever dawn and the outcome of the Brexit votes might bring: perhaps a revival of business investment and consumer confidence as the fog of Brexit uncertainty lifts—if it ever lifts, given the Government’s latest Brexit...
Lord Hain: I was going to make exactly the point that the noble Lord, Lord Kerr, has just made with far more authority. The European Union negotiates as a bloc and the Brexiteers want to break free of that, for their own reasons.
Lord Hain: ...the EU’s responsibility under any circumstances. Only last week, the head of the Northern Ireland Civil Service, David Sterling, warned of potentially grave and profound consequences of a no-deal Brexit—including a sharp rise in unemployment, the collapse or flight of businesses and potential unrest—for Northern Ireland, which, lest we forget, voted by 56% to 44% to remain in the...
Lord Hain: I resigned. However, she is very welcome and I wish her all the best. What worries me about this—and I hope that the Minister can give us concrete assurances—is that, on the Brexit agenda, it seems to be in the DNA of Whitehall not to have regard for the devolved Governments. The only reference I can find in the Bill to the Welsh, Scottish and Northern Ireland devolved legislative bodies...
Lord Hain: ...withdraw the tone of some of my earlier remarks, which were made without knowing what she was going to say. I ask the Minister to bear in mind, in terms of advice to Whitehall officials working on Brexit legislation of this kind, that it is not an accident that these extra consultative arrangements she is now describing were not in the original Bill. This has been true all the way through...
Lord Hain: My Lords, I realise that the hour is late, but I rise to support Amendment 98, which would make it much more difficult for the Government to preside over a default no-deal Brexit, and to encourage the development of alternative strategies. Due to the failure of the Government to develop a credible Brexit strategy, there is now a grave danger of the UK crashing out of the European Union on 29...
Lord Hain: ...to overstate the link between that and recent dissident IRA activity, specifically the car bomb in Derry/Londonderry, it does demonstrate the willingness of paramilitaries to exploit the current Brexit uncertainty and devolved government limbo to undermine the fragile peace, as the noble Lord, Lord Empey, said last week in this House. The border is often described as the Irish border. It...
Lord Hain: ...I think he was rather uncharitable in pulling the leg of my noble friend Lady Hayter. I speak in strong support of my noble friend Lady Smith’s Motion. There are now just 60 days to go to Brexit, come what Theresa May. This is “make your mind up” time. As Michel Barnier has pointed out: “To stop no deal, a positive majority for another solution will need to emerge.” It is...
Lord Hain: ...impose a discipline on all the parties concerned to use that process to resolve any common issues that are outstanding. It is an established process, but it has not really been used. In the post-Brexit situation, which I think will be a nightmare, these procedures will be needed even more to ensure the constitutional stability, success and indeed viability, given what is going on in...
Lord Hain: ...Government and now, I hear from successive First Ministers of Wales and individual Ministers for Wales, with whom I am in direct and regular contact, that nothing has changed. Yet the issues over Brexit are even more serious and of even more constitutional and policy importance than prior to this whole sorry horror show unfolding. The Government need to consider putting in place,...
Lord Hain: ...to the Act of Union Bill and its parent, the Constitutional Reform Group, in my speech in your Lordships’ House on 13 December. But what is the case for the union now, which is under threat from Brexit in both Scotland and Northern Ireland? The former Labour Prime Minister Gordon Brown set out a compelling vision in rejecting Scottish independence, both in a speech on 10 March 2014 and...
Lord Hain: ...in support of my noble friend’s Motion, I refer to the paper by the European Research Group and Global Britain, entitled Fact—NOT Friction, which insists that all the warnings about a no-deal Brexit are mere myths. It claims that the European Union has promised us tariff-free trade, so we can have our cake and eat it, citing in support the President of the European Council, Donald...
Lord Hain: That is what I meant, my Lords. I believe that, without wide-ranging constitutional reform, the very future of the United Kingdom is imperilled, not least by the strong possibility of Brexit triggering Scottish secession, and even Northern Irish secession through a referendum provided for under the Good Friday agreement. One way to address this is through the new Act of Union Bill in the name...
Lord Hain: My Lords, I echo everything that the noble Baroness, Lady Humphreys, has said, especially speaking as she did so well about Wales. Last week, the Government finally admitted that any form of Brexit will make the nation poorer. The Prime Minister is therefore offering Parliament a false choice: vote for her flawed deal, which would deliver only less control, more uncertainty and a cliff edge...
Lord Hain: ...” the alleged solutions offered by Iain Duncan Smith and Owen Paterson—to which I could add David Davis. These senior figures are playing with fire on the island of Ireland. It is not only Brexiteers; Westminster politicians more generally have been reluctant to acknowledge the UK’s status as a highly successful and influential state within the EU. As a former Europe Minister, I can...
Lord Hain: ...as a former Secretary of State for Northern Ireland, I warmly welcome the noble Lord, Lord McCrea, to this Chamber. The Prime Minister’s deal is a bad one for Britain, primarily because the Tory Brexiteers imprisoned her in a negotiating straitjacket which meant it could not be otherwise. They never did have a plan of their own but merely a set of slogans. On the Irish border—always...
Lord Hain: ...economic policy has now opened. The balance of fiscal and monetary policy is shifting towards monetary restraint, even before the austerity-induced slowdown has ended and before the full effects of Brexit uncertainty have become clear. Premature rises in interest rates can only hinder rather than help Britain’s recovery. Yet the fact that the Bank of England has begun to raise interest...
Lord Hain: My Lords, continued Brexit negotiating crises cannot hide a blindingly obvious outcome facing this country. Even if the Prime Minister were to get absolutely everything she has demanded from the European Union under her Chequers plan—which, as Brussels has made clear, is highly unlikely—she would be abandoning the 80% of the economy in the services sector and lumbering taxpayers with a...