Scotland Bill

Amendments 16, 17 and 18 are essentially probing amendments, authored by the Law Society of Scotl...

Does the right hon. Gentleman recall that the former Member for Monklands East and leader of the ...

I have long held that view. I cannot remember a time in my conscious political being that I have ...

I hear what the right hon. Gentleman says about amendment 58, and he is correct that Parliament c...

Indeed, and it is for that reason that I said that I saw some merit in the proposal. The hon. Gen...

Does the right hon. Gentleman share my hope that English Members here will approach this change w...

I actually agree with the right hon. Gentleman on that point. Indeed, I see the Bill as the start...

While the right hon. Gentleman opposes those doubts, does he not accept that, given that we are n...

I am heartened by the right hon. Gentleman’s optimism in that regard; I always think that achievi...

I congratulate the right hon. Gentleman on the case he is making in his usual eloquent and persua...

I will take support anywhere I can find it, but I am not entirely sure that the hon. Gentleman’s ...

New clause 3, which stands in my name, would deliver full fiscal autonomy, real home rule and a S...

When the hon. Gentleman uses the term black hole, does he mean a deficit? When people talk about ...

It can be referred to as a deficit. We have listened to the Institute for Fiscal Studies and the ...

Will the hon. Gentleman concede that Scotland has contributed more than the rest of the UK in tax...

The hon. Gentleman can vote for my new clause, if that is what he believes. That scenario is on o...

Those of us who have a Eurosceptic point of view, as my hon. Friend does, have always been very c...

As my hon. Friend made that point last week, I was waiting for it. If he will be patient for a mo...

Does my hon. Friend agree that there will not now be the automatic application of the Barnett for...

Absolutely; we are a united kingdom. For instance, Lincolnshire gets more money in its educationa...

Is not the hon. Gentleman being very clever with his amendment because he is ultimately talking a...

My personal view, for what it is worth, is that if we are to create a sustainable Union we must, ...

The hon. Gentleman mentions the Barnett figures. He will of course point out, for completeness, t...

I do not want to get into a sterile debate about whether London subsidises Scotland or vice versa...

Might not the hon. Gentleman be entering into this debate a note of unpleasantness that need not ...

I am grateful to the right hon. Gentleman, who has been a good personal friend of mine over many ...

May I thank the hon. Gentleman for the spirit in which he is presenting his argument? I also hear...

I hear what the hon. Gentleman says and nobody is suggesting that, even if my new clause 3 were p...

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The hon. Gentleman is now going to tell the House that he supports my new clause.

We seem to be very happy with the hon. Gentleman’s new clause at the moment, but he talks about s...

I am afraid we are getting into the historic arguments of who is to blame: is it the UK Governmen...

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I will make a bit more progress, because I want to get to my hon. Friend the Member for North Eas...

Universal credit has been reserved because if Scotland decided to make it more generous, the issu...

Full fiscal autonomy results in full responsibility. That is what real Parliaments do.

Resp...

I agree with all the wonderful things my hon. Friend has been saying about Scotland, which are so...

That is a very fair point. I agree that that is a matter for debate. I have already made the poin...

I can feel the sap rising at various points in the hon. Gentleman’s speech. When he said that Sco...

That is an amusing point, but the right hon. Gentleman knows exactly what I am trying to say. Thi...

The hon. Gentleman is highlighting many wrongs. Does he think that Irish independence was wrong?<...

If we had granted home rule in the 1880s or implemented the home rule Act in August 1914, it is v...

I am a little puzzled. Just for the record, will my hon. Friend confirm that he is not equating t...

I am absolutely not. I do not want to overplay the analogy. As a fervent, almost romantic Unionis...

Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

I must finish soon, because I am going to weary the Committee, but I do give way.

An important point has been made about opportunity. It is a real sadness that Scotland has lost a...

Most of them seem to come down here and run us, but there we go. They have done very well and we ...

As one of the only Irish or Northern Irish people here, I am glad to hear the hon. Gentleman conf...

Again, that is a very fair point. I do not mind having conventions, but we, as politicians, have ...

There is one part of the hon. Gentleman’s amendment, which he may well be coming on to, that did ...

I took advice from the Clerks. All right, I’ll surrender treason if they want, particularly to th...

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Hoyle. I welcome you back to your role. I w...

It is important to get it on the record that Alex Johnstone MSP has made it perfectly clear that ...

It will no doubt be a relief to you, Mr Hoyle, that I will confine myself to the words agreed by ...

Does the hon. Gentleman genuinely believe that there are circumstances in which the permanency of...

I congratulate the hon. Gentleman on his election. I gently encourage him to remind himself of th...

If there is absolutely no threat whatever to the Scottish Parliament, why not put that fully on t...

The hon. Gentleman makes an excellent point. Hopefully, the Committee does not need to divide. If...

I have no objection to what the hon. Gentleman is trying to achieve, but can he clarify the amend...

The hon. Gentleman knows that the UK does not have such a constitution—we are strong supporters o...

I am just trying to be helpful. The hon. Gentleman might have the wording “United Kingdom’s const...

I am making the point that it would be very difficult for people to go back on legislation with t...

Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

I want to make some progress, if the hon. Gentleman will forgive me. I have given way to Members ...

I have always been a Unionist, but my idea of my country, the United Kingdom, is that it must be ...

Is the right hon. Gentleman seriously suggesting that Germany is not an independent nation?

That is exactly the problem: Germany is not an independent nation. No member of the eurozone is a...

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If SNP Members will allow me a little time, I will say things that they will like. I am not tryin...

Would not an easier solution be for Scotland to collect its own tax, as Catalonia does, and then ...

But if Scotland wisely decides to have lower tax rates to make itself more popular, the Union wil...

The right hon. Gentleman should realise that it is not lower taxes that have made the SNP more po...

If Scotland wishes to impose higher taxes, the Union has less of a problem with that—unless it ch...

I find myself in the unusual position of agreeing with much of what the right hon. Gentleman is s...

No, I do not think that we need a constitutional convention, because that would create endless de...

The right hon. Gentleman talks about getting good deals for the various parts of the UK, but let ...

I start from the point of view of democracy. A democratic state has to have the full range of pow...

The right hon. Gentleman is being very kind in enabling our dialogue to continue. I am sure he wo...

Well, it functioned after a fashion, but I would not have wanted to live through that time. The n...

I do not want to divert from the subject, but was not the reason for the Scots’ enthusiasm in goi...

Yes, it was a kind of early version of the banking crash, which also reminds us that Scottish ban...

May I return the discussion to the here and now? I should like to clarify something that the righ...

I am making an even more urgent point than that. I am saying that that discussion is going on in ...

Does the right hon. Gentleman not agree that successive Westminster Governments could learn much ...

That is because all the time that it is a subsidiary Parliament of the Union, and part of our pub...

I thank the right hon. Gentleman for his most gracious speech and his thoughtful remarks about th...

Then I think we need to have another debate, on another day, which looks at what is going on in t...

For the second time in five and a bit years, I agree with the right hon. Gentleman. On the compli...

We are where we are. Promises were made, I thought in good faith, by the three Front-Bench teams....

Sir David, it is a great pleasure to see you in the Chair this afternoon. Like many colleagues, I...

As usual, the hon. Gentleman is making a thoughtful contribution. He said that the Scotland Bill ...

I am probably one of the worst in this House for blaming Westminster. Westminster and, above all,...

The hon. Gentleman mentions Donald Dewar and I pay tribute to what Donald Dewar did. In the estab...

The problem with Smith, with 2012 and with Donald Dewar’s devolution is that none of them were pe...

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If I may just make this point while I am thinking about it, I will then give way. If we continue ...

Does the hon. Gentleman agree that the only real separatists in this House are those on the Gover...

We all have a stronger common interest than we sometimes dare admit, and we certainly all have an...

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I give way to the hon. Member for Na h-Eileanan an Iar (Mr MacNeil), who has been waiting a littl...

I see that my patience has paid off and I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman. Is not one of the pr...

It is always good to knock off a quick anti-Westminster point, so I will join the hon. Gentleman ...

I commend the work that my hon. Friend and his Select Committee did in the previous parliamentary...

If we have now breached the principle and the wonderful idea of devolution—giving power away, not...

The legislation was changed from Scottish Executive to Scottish Government. It is not a briefcase...

I am sorry for once that I gave way to an hon. Member because this is a serious debate. There is ...

I declare an interest as an adjunct associate professor of British politics. I pay tribute to the...

We might not yet be a federal Parliament officially, and we might not yet have the right words fo...

My hon. Friend will remember that in the early 1990s there was a word that was in vogue in what w...

I think that devolution is so good that it should apply to everybody in the Union. I welcome the ...

An important part of our Union is that it has been a transfer as well as a fiscal Union, so the r...

As far as I am concerned, the idea of income tax assignment was applied in the Scotland Act 2012....

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I will give way to the hon. Member for Angus (Mike Weir), because the hon. Member for Glasgow Sou...

I have listened carefully to what the hon. Gentleman has been saying, particularly about local go...

We need to think carefully about whether the rights that we would like to enjoy in our constituti...

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I will give way to the hon. Member for West Dunbartonshire. I am sure, since his Front-Bench coll...

I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for participating in this resolute debate about the future of...

That was before even my time. I will allow the hon. Gentleman to educate me about that in the Tea...

On a point of order, Mr Amess. May we have a ruling that there is no such thing as the British Pa...

Order. I listened carefully to what the hon. Member for North Antrim (Ian Paisley) said, and it w...

The hon. Member for Nottingham North (Mr Allen) seems to be advocating a written constitution, bu...

I am sure that I would be called to order if I went into too much detail on the pros and cons of ...

Further to the point of order made by the hon. Member for North Antrim (Ian Paisley), France know...

Order. Again I say to the House that that is a point of argument, not a point of order.

Perhaps I can turn to a subject that will help the hon. Member for Na h-Eileanan an Iar, who has ...

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I think the hon. Gentleman has made more than his fair share of interventions. There may of cours...

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Sir David, and to speak to amendment 89, table...

Does the hon. Gentleman desire air passenger duty to be included in the remit of the amendment? D...

Air passenger duty is to be devolved to Scotland, as it has been to Northern Ireland, albeit in a...

It is interesting to hear the hon. Gentleman setting out some of the economic and fiscal prioriti...

Yes, a future SNP Government would increase it, decrease it, keep it the same and use the amount ...

The hon. Gentleman said that Government Members are not in favour of tax competition, but I am th...

The Laffer curve is something about which our friends in the Labour party have criticised us for ...

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I will give way in a moment, if the hon. Gentleman keeps calm.

Finally, as I have said, the...

How many times in the past eight years have the SNP Scottish Government exercised their powers to...

I welcome the hon. Gentleman to Parliament, but he does not need to jab his finger and point. The...

Was that not an extraordinary intervention from the hon. Member for South Leicestershire (Alberto...

I fear that my hon. Friend was intervening less on me than on Conservative Members, but he is abs...

I have tremendous respect for the hon. Gentleman, but he is letting himself down by how he is con...

The chief of the snapshot analyses I have just described is the one from the IFS that our opponen...

The hon. Gentleman’s desire for independence of taxation seems to be to lower taxation, while he ...

We were very clear in our manifesto that there would be increased tax yield, perhaps from a 50p r...

Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

In a moment.

If all the IFS and Treasury analyses do is project forward “Government Expendi...

Does my hon. Friend agree that the key reason the UK deficit is sitting at close to £1.5 trillion...

That is absolutely right. Trend growth in the UK over decades has not been sufficient, and privat...

Will the hon. Gentleman enlighten the Committee about what level of economic growth he thinks Sco...

We need to get trend growth up and we need to operate within a framework that will see the defici...

I am listening carefully to the hon. Gentleman’s argument. It is clear that amendment 89, which i...

I would like the Scottish Government to be in a position to draw down the powers as quickly as po...

Subsidies.

I will come back to that in a moment.

It would require the tax system to be fully functioni...

The hon. Gentleman is being incredibly generous with his time. Will he tell the House why, if ful...

I want maximum power for Scotland. I want it as quickly as possible. I am not like the British La...

I thank the hon. Gentleman for his generosity in giving way to me a second time. In the lead-up t...

The hon. Gentleman is right about one thing: we did not win the referendum. There was, however, a...

Why then did the SNP not table the new clause in the name of my hon. Friend the Member for Gainsb...

I can almost hear Professor Adam Tomkins, the Tory adviser to this Tory Minister, coming up with ...

The hon. Gentleman mentioned that tax receipts in Scotland are on average 3% higher per head than...

It is extraordinary! UK debt is £1.5 trillion and the Government are borrowing £75 billion more t...

This is an important point. The hon. Gentleman says he is in favour of moving towards fiscal auto...

I support moving to full fiscal autonomy because, as the N-56 think-tank said, it produces an opp...

The hon. Gentleman said that he will increase the deficit to spend to invest—where have I heard t...

First things first: the central bank does not guarantee debt. It sets the base rate, but the gilt...

Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

No. I have been very generous. I think I will stop being generous now.

In order to deliver ...

It is a privilege to serve under your chairmanship, Sir David.

We have seen a remarkable ev...

We await the granting, in 2016, of the powers that were recommended by the Calman commission in 2...

What the hon. Lady has said is not unusual. It is part of the blame culture. Apparently, if thing...

I suspect that my hon. Friend is right in his analysis of where amendment 89 would lead us. To be...

I entirely agree. If we are to give the Scottish Government more powers over entire areas of taxa...

The SNP won the majority of the vote on 7 May on the basis of a clear commitment to go beyond the...

I am not, actually. I agree with the hon. Gentleman. I doubt that most people were thinking about...

My hon. Friend is making an important point. We must focus on the nature of the transitional arra...

I agree with my hon. Friend that the position is not clear, but I think that the SNP wants to mov...

Order. A mobile phone is going off. I hope the hon. Member responsible will adjust it. I call Mr ...

I would not want to insult my hon. Friend the Member for Nottingham North in that way.

Ther...

We are here today primarily to debate the Scotland Bill, which we support, but my hon. Friend is ...

I agree, and we need to get away from the cynical approach of this Government who talk about devo...

Getting back to the Scotland Bill, I agree with the thrust of what the hon. Gentleman is saying i...

The hon. Gentleman raises an interesting point, which illustrates why the later amendment seeking...

Does the hon. Gentleman agree that the best time to raise any concerns and questions about costs ...

I am not sure what the point of that intervention was. I am talking about an amendment proposed b...

Will my hon. Friend give way?

No, as I am about to finish.

My hon. Friend made the point about the rest of the United Kin...

The last two and a half hours have been fascinating, and show what this Chamber should be about. ...

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Hear, hear!

I thank you, Sir David, for calling me to speak, and I thank my Back-Bench colleagues. Have not w...

My hon. Friend mentions the vow plus and the promises made to the Scottish people. In reality, th...

My hon. Friend always gets right to the heart of the matter. We know that everything in this Bill...

Does the hon. Gentleman accept, however, that by doing this through primary legislation any solut...

There is very little I would disagree with the right hon. Gentleman about on about these things, ...

One phrase used earlier by a Labour Member was that this Bill is the property of the Union. Is no...

My hon. Friend is, again, spot on. We always seem to get here in Scotland Bills: there is a debat...

I have some sympathy with what the hon. Gentleman is saying but surely he accepts that this is a ...

I am not disagreeing with the hon. Gentleman; he probably heard me say that these issues are impo...

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I am not going to give way again, because I know a lot of people want to get in and I want to mak...

I am not saying that.

Sorry, I was expecting a bit more of a substantial contribution from the hon. Gentleman, and I am...

That despondency and disbelief among the Scottish people becomes even stronger when we look at th...

I am grateful to my hon. Friend for his intervention. He is a great champion and passionate advoc...

We are talking here about the government of Scotland, so I hope it is not contentious to say that...

I thank the hon. Gentleman for giving way. Indeed, he is my hon. Friend, as he is both a canny Ul...

I am a Derry man as it happens. If the hon. Gentleman wants to make a point of such substance, pe...

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May I deal with this point, and then take an intervention? I have not been in this job long, but ...

I am completely sincere. I believe that the case for full fiscal autonomy is unanswerable in logi...

I am pleased to hear it. I therefore expect the hon. Gentleman to vote for our amendment later.