Dr Scott Arthur

It is, as always, a pleasure to see you in the Chair, Sir Edward. I want to thank my hon. and learned Friend the Member for Folkestone and Hythe (Tony Vaughan) for how he introduced the debate. It is customary for the mover of the motion to present a balanced argument, but in this case it is so difficult to find any benefits of leaving the EU. He had a really difficult job and I am only glad that he did not mention bendy bananas. This debate is timely because the Prime Minister has just this afternoon outlined his vision for a closer relationship with the EU. The important point to remember in all of this, and absolutely fundamental, is the need to work with other political parties to make that happen, because it is in the national interest and we find ourselves in a difficult time. That requires honesty. If all political parties are going into this debate, they have to be honest about the impact of Brexit. We must also be honest that rejoining the EU is not an easy proposition. I say gently to the hon. Member for Perth and Kinross-shire (Pete Wishart) that it would take years to re-enter. It is right that we look for benefits in the interim; I would be surprised if there was a referendum on rejoining within a decade. [Paula Barker in the Chair] I want to make four or five observations. People in my constituency are finding life difficult now because of five things: the financial crash, Brexit, covid, the Ukraine war and Iran. Some of that damage can be undone if we look again at Brexit. It is right that people have been asking who benefits from Brexit. Certainly, no business in my constituency has said that they have, and no student or academic says that they feel the benefit from Brexit—I cannot even think of a resident who would say that. We have heard that the Russians may have benefited; perhaps politicians who take bribes from Russia have as well, but I think that that person is in jail so we cannot speak to him. What infuriates me most is how immigration was weaponised by the right during the Brexit debate: they told us that we would get control of immigration again. In fact, we lost control of immigration. Now the same right-wing politicians are back, trying to weaponise immigration when perhaps they should be apologising for what happened. As the world moves towards becoming more isolationist through Trump’s tariffs and the European “Made in Europe” agenda, the UK is exposed more than ever as an island in the middle of the Atlantic without being part of that bigger trade bloc to negotiate with other nations. I say gently to my Scottish nationalist colleagues who talk about the impact of Brexit that it would have been so different if the SNP had not blocked a customs union for the UK when it had the chance. It chose to abstain, and that abstention swung the vote. They should own that and apologise. I have got that off my chest—[Interruption.] Feel free to intervene. We have to think carefully about what any future realignment might look like. We must acknowledge that the toxicity and fake news during the Brexit referendum mean that many people will feel uncertain about reopening the debate. Many will feel very uncertain about the prospect of a referendum as well, if one is to come. That is why incrementally getting closer to the EU makes sense—we have to win the argument one step at a time. We should start with trade, defence, security and student mobility. But we cannot talk about those as abstract concepts; we need to talk about what they will mean for people in our constituencies, particularly young people.