 Dwi'n edrych wrth gwrs o'r ffmerd, mae'r gwaith o Ffrensloes Cymru yn Wasun 16107, yn y cyddiad Nicola Sturgeon, gyda eu llach yn gyffinio.えてil eu cyfuddgo, gan gael iawn dddirri, i ddod agnowysg gwrs oell y ffrensloes cyddiad, i gael gwladau ers i ddibredig i ddibredig ei ddibredig, ac rwy'n i gael iawn i ddibredig i ddibredig eich mewn ffrensloes cyddiad. Y Llywodraeth Cymru, Jeremy Miles, the Welsh Brexit Minister, will open a debate on essentially the same motion as the one that we are debating here this afternoon. The Welsh First Minister will close the debate in the Welsh Assembly. It is, I think, worth emphasising that this is the first occasion in 20 years of devolution that the Scottish Parliament and the Welsh Assembly have acted in unison in this way. We have been brought together by our dismay, bordering now on despair at the UK Government's approach to and handling of Brexit. That despair is, it's fair to say, echoed across our countries. As recently as last summer, the Prime Minister confidently told me that by the autumn of last year not only would we know the terms of exit but we would also know a significant detail about the UK's future relationship with the European Union. Yet here we are just 24 days until the UK is due to leave the EU and still we do not know if there will be any agreed terms of exit. We do not know if there will be any transition phase. The terms of the future relationship are not much more than a blank sheet of paper. The potential consequences of all that for businesses, communities, individuals and public services, the length and breadth of the UK, grow more stark by the day. In the face of all of this chaos, the Prime Minister is showing no decisive leadership whatsoever. Instead of doing the right thing and ruling out a no-deal exit at any stage, she insists on freewheeling the car ever closer to the Brexit cliff edge. She is trying to run down the clock, making on an almost daily basis undeliverable promises to hardline Brexiteers and, more recently, offering toadry half-baked bribes to Labour MPs. Perhaps her one and only note of consistency in all of this over the past two and a half years has been contempt for Scotland and the position of the Scottish Parliament. Seemingly, Scotland is not even worthy of her bribes, though I think that we should probably take that as a compliment. The domestic and international standing of the Westminster system of government has surely never been lower in any of our lifetimes. This fiasco should not be allowed to continue for even one day more. That is why the Scottish and Welsh parliaments are today making three demands of the UK Government. The first is that the prospect of leaving the EU with no deal is ruled out, and ruled out not just at the end of March, but ruled out at any time. The second is that MPs must not allow themselves to be bullied into choosing between the catastrophe of no deal and the disaster of the Government's deal. The third is that an extension of article 50 is essential and now urgent, and it must be requested now. The demand to rule out a no deal scenario is, I hope, supported right across this chamber. Let me be very clear about this point, as Mike Russell has already been in recent weeks. The Scottish Government is right now doing everything we possibly can to plan for and mitigate the impact of a no deal Brexit. I am personally chairing our weekly resilience meetings, looking at medicine and food supplies, economic and community impacts and transport links. However, every single aspect of that planning reinforces this overwhelming reality. No rational Government acting responsibly in the interests of those it serves would countenance leaving the European Union without a deal. The UK Government's own forecast predicts that a no deal scenario could reduce GDP by 9 per cent over a 15-year period. That is bad enough, but you only need to look at the nature of the preparations that are under way to know that the impact would be much, much more immediate. The UK Government has been buying fridges to stockpile medicine. It has been testing motorways and airfields and kent for use as lorry parks. It has been awarding and then, of course, cancelling ferry contracts to businesses that do not even own ships. It has been taking steps that should be utterly inconceivable in a prosperous, developed economy in conditions of peacetime. All of that is to plan for an avoidable outcome, which, if it happens, will be an outcome that happens by the choice of the UK Government. It is unforgivably reckless. I am grateful to the First Minister for giving way. I do not want a no deal Brexit, but will the First Minister heed the calls of Scottish Business, of NFU Scotland, of the Scottish Chamber of Commerce and of the Scottish Whiskey Association and many others in the business community here in Scotland, and back the Prime Minister's deal so that we can avoid a no deal Brexit? I think that the member mischaracterises many of those perhaps that he quotes, but I will come on in a moment, and I said at the outset that I would come on to this point why I do not think that it is acceptable and I think that it is utterly incredible that the Scottish Tories are suggesting that it is, that our country should be in the position of having to choose between catastrophe and disaster. So a direct answer to the question, no, we will not choose disaster in order to avert catastrophe. The approach of the UK Government is unforgivably reckless. No deal should be definitively ruled out, not just at the end of March but period, and today, from Edinburgh and from Cardiff, we demand that it is. However, and this does bring me to Adam Tomkins' point and indeed to the second purpose of today's motion, the UK Government must not use and they must not be aided and abetted in this by the Scottish Tories, use the threat of no deal to blackmail the UK Parliament into voting for its current bad deal. The response to the rejection of the Prime Minister's deal has so far been characterised by delays, denials, dissembling and, most recently, desperate attempts at bribery. Ministers have wasted months now pretending that significant changes to the Northern Ireland backstop are possible, despite all of the evidence to the contrary. Much better, surely, to face up to the fact that the Prime Minister's deal is unpopular because it is a thoroughly bad deal. It is a bad deal for the whole of the UK and it is certainly a bad deal for Scotland. Let me just spell out why for the benefit of the Scottish Tories. It would take us out of the European Union against our democratic wishes, it would take us out of the single market and out of the customs union against all of our economic interests, but it provides no clarity whatsoever on our long-term future relationship with the European Union. It tells us nothing about what that looks like. The UK Parliament is effectively being asked to approve a blindfold Brexit. I think that that is completely and utterly unacceptable. Adam Tomkins is saying that 500 and odd pages, for his benefits, are the withdrawal agreement. The political declaration is what five or seven pages. That is what is meant to set out the future relationship. To the extent that any direction of travel can be discerned from those few pages at all, it points to a long-term social and economic disaster for Scotland. The red lines that the Prime Minister has drawn means that we are heading towards a Canada-style deal at best. Let us focus on what that means. The Scottish Government's estimates say that this could lead to a fallen national income of £1,600 per person by 2030 compared with EU membership. Our services sector, three quarters of our total economy, will be particularly badly hit. Being taken out of the customs union, pursuing an independent trade policy, will also make the UK vulnerable to the trade priorities of Donald Trump. When the US Government's negotiating priorities were published just at the end of last week, it was absolutely no surprise to hear fears that Scottish and UK markets could be open to chlorine washed chicken and hormone fed beef. Of course, part and parcel of the approach taken in the Prime Minister's deal is the end of freedom of movement. When he combined that with the Tory's despicable hostile environment policy, that could lead to a fall in the number of people working in Scotland and paying tax here. The NHS and social care will pay a particularly heavy price if EU nationals are deterred from working here. In short, this is the deal that the Scottish Tories think we should accept—the disaster that we should accept—a vert catastrophe. The deal on the table guarantees us more years of uncertainty during which Scotland's interests will be at the mercy of a vicious and seemingly never-ending Tory civil war on Europe, one where I am afraid to say that the extreme brexitiers currently appear to be in the ascendancy. It could open up our markets to US products, which for very good reasons are currently banned, and it will damage our economy, our living standards and our national health service. For all of those reasons, and many more reasons, the Prime Minister's deal would be disastrous and must be rejected by the House of Commons. What should happen instead? There is an onus on those of us who think that deal should be rejected and that no deal should be rejected to say what should happen instead. The Scottish Government has made clear that we see continued EU membership as the best outcome for Scotland and for the UK. If that cannot be secured for the UK as a whole, we believe that that option should be open to Scotland as an independent country. We have also put forward compromise proposals for more than two years, which would see the UK as a whole to stay in the customs union and single market. The Welsh Government has also put forward plans for a closer relationship with the EU. The UK Government has shamefully ignored us at all stages of the process. What the Welsh and Scottish Governments are proposing now—this is the third point raised by today's motion—is that there must now be an extension of article 50. Nobody, I am sure, not even the Scottish Conservatives, now believes that Brexit can be delivered on 29 March. Quite apart from anything else, there is no time left to properly scrutinise and pass the legislation required. We should not simply seek a short extension, as the Prime Minister seems to envisage. We need an extension long enough to enable a better path to be taken. Of course, that could open the way again to the possibility of a single market customs union compromise. However, the preferable alternative option, in my view, is now a second EU referendum. There is a strong democratic case for that. After all, those voting to leave the EU didn't know precisely what they were voting for. The leave campaign was deliberately vague—some may say deceitful—about the form Brexit would take. Where it was specific, it was less than honest, for example, about the prospect of Turkey joining the EU and, of course, the NHS getting more money. We also know now that the leave campaign broke the law when it came to spending. I understand that the prospect of a second vote does not appeal to everyone. We cannot and should not take for granted that there would be a majority for remain across the UK. That would have to be worked for. However, simply pressing ahead with Brexit, knowing that we are heading for disaster makes no sense at all. After all, whatever most people voted for, it certainly was not where we find ourselves now. The second referendum provides everyone with a second opportunity. Although Scotland, of course, has the option of independence, for the UK as a whole, another referendum is now the best of the options available. Last month, I opened the new Scottish Government hub in Paris. In a city like that, where evidence of Scotland's ties with Europe extends back more than seven centuries, it is impossible not to feel a deep and profound sense of loss about what Brexit means for Scotland. Our country has benefited immeasurably from the hundreds of thousands of EU citizens who have made this country their home. Many Scots have had their horizons widened and their lives enriched by the ability to study, travel and work in Europe. At the EU, while far from perfect, we would all agree on that, has also encouraged stronger trading ties, a cleaner environment and better conditions for workers. Perhaps most of all, it has exemplified the benefits that we all gain when independent countries co-operate for the greater good. That is not something that we should choose to give up lightly. For more than two years now, since the result of the EU referendum, the Scottish Government has proposed ways of mitigating the damage that Brexit will cause. We have been joined in our efforts by the Welsh Government, however we have, shamefully, been ignored at almost every turn by the UK Government. So this motion today is a further attempt to propose a way forward that provides the basis even at this late hour for a more sensible and a less damaging approach. By doing so, it will allow us to act in the interests not just of our own constituents but of the UK as a whole, indeed of Europe as a whole. I commend this motion to Parliament and I hope that members of the Scottish Parliament, together with our friends in the Welsh Assembly, will vote for it this evening. Thank you very much. I call on Jackson Carlaw to speak to and move the amendment in his name. Thank you. I move the amendment in my name. Scottish Conservatives will be opposing the First Minister's motion today, but may I begin this afternoon by thanking her for at least bringing this debate to Parliament? It is almost three years since all the Holyrood party leaders stood here to argue for a remain vote, and there is little doubt that the decisions made in the next few weeks will be among the most critical that our country has had to face in recent times. Therefore, it is timely that we have the opportunity to bait our withdrawal from the European Union, from which the UK has voted to leave after 40 years and to do so at this key juncture. I wish to outline this afternoon why I believe that the right decision at Westminster is to support the withdrawal agreement, to leave the EU on March 29 and to move to the next phase of our negotiations with the European Union. The Brexit referendum in June 2016 was one of the largest exercises in democracy this country has ever witnessed. The number of people who voted to leave was the largest number of people to vote for anything in our history. While they have been largely forgotten in this place, let us not forget that they included 1 million people in Scotland, more than the number who voted for the SNP in the most recent Westminster election. This without the same effort underpinning the leave campaign in Scotland as elsewhere in the UK, led by former Labour MP Tom Harris, opposed by all the Scottish party leaders, opposed by all our MPs, opposed by all but a handful of MSPs. The leave campaign nonetheless attracted over 1 million Scottish supporters. A 38 per cent vote to leave, a reality upon which this Parliament has never properly reflected. Too often, those 1 million Scots have been casually dismissed as either deluded, deranged or both, or worse still, and their anger is very real in a little while. That was not a vote that carried any caveats. It was a UK-wide referendum that meant that we were all going to go or all going to stay. Something recognised by the First Minister during the campaign when she took part in UK-wide TV debates, rightly in my view, as we both campaigned to convince people from across the whole of the UK to remain. As I have said and was quoted by no lower source than the then First Minister, had I lost the independence referendum of 2014, I would have been among the first to join Team Scotland in seeking a good deal for us outside of the UK. That would have been my duty. Likewise, after the Brexit vote, it is vital in my view that the losers, however hard that is, provide their consent to the result and seek to make our withdrawal work. I now hear an argument from the SNP and others that the 2016 vote is somehow invalid because, somehow, leave voters did not realise what it was that they were voting for in the referendum. We are asked to accept, with only self-serving anecdotal evidence to credit the assertion, that 17 million people were so foolish when they voted to leave that they had obviously been hoodwinked. Such an argument only illustrates in the eyes of those who did vote to leave the arrogance of those who make it, the very elitism that they voted in part against. Almost every study into the 2016 vote has shown that leave voters knew exactly what they were voting for, to remove the UK from EU supranational institutions and to get greater control of their community and our borders. Secondly, let me set out why I believe that the withdrawal agreement and the political declaration that goes with it are worthy of our support. As time passes and as the pressure of a deadline intensifies, it is all too easy to lose track of how far we have come. Cast your mind back to mid-2016. At that point, the discussion was often nervously considering the possibility of no deal being reached with our European partners at all, of a complete breakdown in talks with the EU, of mutual intransigence, of the EU 27 rejecting the deal and no deal becoming a certainty. We were told that we would never be able to agree financial terms to leave and that the price of the EU would demand would be between £80 billion and £100 billion. That was the view that we repeatedly heard expressed to the Culture, Tourism, Europe and External Affairs Committee. Even a year or 80 months ago, a deal was far from inevitable, but we now have it in our grasp. The agreement offers us a chance to deliver Brexit in a smooth and workable manner, and that is the view of our 27 EU partners. Every bit is as much the view of the UK Government, and it is now the only way we leave the EU on the basis of an organised exit. It delivers on the decision that the country made, handing back control of our money, laws and borders to the British people. It returns control over our waters, offering us the chance to revitalise our fishing sector. While we will be able to strike new deals around the world, that deal will also ensure that we maintain a strong and abiding friendship with our allies across the continent. Can I ask if this is such a roaring success? Why was it rejected by such a massive vote in the House of Commons? Jackson Carlaw It was rejected by such a massive vote in the House of Commons for a variety of reasons, but not least because the deal as it was presented then was not acceptable. That is why, since that date, work has progressed to achieve a different outcome. We will see next week what that is. Let me state again and unequivocally, because I believe that this is fundamentally important particularly today. Scotland does not just value those who have made their home here for the economic benefit that brings as important as this is. Those who have settled here contribute immeasurably to the fabric and culture of our country and our whole national life experience. Let me say directly that I do not think that anyone could have come away from watching the interview with Mrs MacDonald broadcast earlier today without feeling deeply saddened by it. It is a reminder to us all that major events such as Brexit are not really about graphs or charts, but about their impact on people. I will say that I am sorry for any distress that has caused her and that I hope very much that she gets the support over the coming weeks. If we are a more tolerant and inclusive nation, it is because of the presence of new Scots, not in spite of them. In a UK with a rapidly changing demographic, we all need to work together to ensure that this is the perspective of the whole of the UK and not just politicians in this chamber. We do not envisage a United Kingdom pulling up the drawbridge in the world, we want a United Kingdom to remain the same outward-looking country it has been. Indeed, this deal secures many of the asks that the SNP once demanded. It asks for an implementation period to smooth our exit from the EU, that is being delivered. It called rightly for guarantees for EU citizens living here, that too is being delivered. It has insisted that, on the need to prevent a hard border in Ireland, again exactly what this deal will ensure. At no stage has the SNP acknowledged any of this, they have a campaign to run to use Brexit to stir the independence pod, this in their own words transcends everything. It is also the core reason why the SNP has lost support, not gained support since the Brexit referendum took place, because they have rightly been seen to be using Brexit for their own political ends. Let's remember that, at the last election in 2017, the SNP led by Nicola Sturgeon lost half a million votes, the largest loss of votes in a single election by any party in modern Scottish political history. There are just 25 days until we leave the EU. No amount of talking, no amount of debating, no amount of arguing gets around the cold and movable fact that, and if there is no agreed deal, then we leave with no deal. That's not a political statement, that's not an opinion, it's a fact. It's the automatic operation of the law, it is the default, and no amount of bluster gets away from it. The EU has made clear that any request to extend that deadline, were one made, would be agreed only to facilitate an agreement reached, not to vacillate further. It's not enough for the SNP or any other party to simply say they want to avoid no deal. If they want to avoid no deal, they have to back a deal, and there is only one deal on the table. A deal that, until the final vote, is still capable of clarification to meet genuine concerns, many MPs and others still have. Progress continues to be made, even as we speak, to resolve those concerns, to give a majority of MPs the reassurance that they need, so that they are able and good conscious to give the deal their support. If he has such faith that changes can be made to things like the backstop to bring a majority of MPs on board, surely he has the faith in the British people that they too will have the judgment necessary to make the final decision on that deal. I say so, Mr Cole-Hamilton. I voted no in the independence referendum, I voted remain in the EU referendum, and I hope very much that I will never have to vote another referendum again in my lifetime, and I intend to make sure that I don't. The SNP Government motion today argues that MPs should oppose the Prime Minister's deal and instead demand an extension to article 50. Of course, that is an option now available to them, but I would strongly urge MPs not to go down this route. Crucially, a decision to delay will not solve any of the issues that we face before us today. After any extension, the choice will still be no deal, this deal or one close to it. Indeed, for us in the UK, it may only make things worse by extending the damaging uncertainty that firms face for weeks, possibly months or even years longer. As Alec Neill said, Brexit will happen whether we like it or not. The democratic wishes of the people have to be respected. To do otherwise would be to risk a huge backlash and undermine the principles of our democracy. I can see why a nationalist party, which wants to create and exploit these divisions and to perpetuate chaos and uncertainty, might see the upsides to that outcome. A nationalist party that argues that leaving a 40-year-old union is bad, while arguing that leaving a 300-year-old union, many times more important economically, culturally and in so many other ways, is good. I urge other parties to delay a decision on Brexit. It is not a solution, it is simply a way to prolong the indecision and by doing so to keep the divisions that the country faces open for longer and to allow even deeper divisions in Scotland to be exploited all over again by the SNP. I back a deal, I back Brexit being delivered. Ahead of us lie challenges and opportunities. We need a Government in Scotland, one that is not looking backwards, bitter and riddled with grievance, but rather a Government in Scotland focused on creating a dynamic entrepreneurial Scotland, a Scotland that succeeds in this new international environment. The SNP Government is no longer acting in good faith for the people of Scotland. Scotland needs fresh, clean leadership, and in just two years we will have the chance to elect a Government that gives it just that. Richard Leonard will open for the Labour Party. I rise to open for Scottish Labour in support of the motion in the name of the First Minister of this Parliament and in unity with the Labour First Minister of the Assembly of Wales. Today, we will demonstrate that the clear majority in this Parliament opposes Theresa May's damaging European Union exit deal, and we will demonstrate that the clear majority in this Parliament wishes to see an end once and for all to the no-deal Brexit option. Let's be clear. Theresa May's Brexit deal isn't within our grasp. It's dead. It was rejected by MPs on a scale without precedent. So I say to the Scottish Tories that this motion today, this political action today, is absolutely necessary, not despite the political crisis that Theresa May has brought us to, but precisely because of the political crisis that Theresa May has brought us to. The reality is that there needs to be a new approach. Labour has been saying this for months and months. Instead of this Tory race to the bottom, we need a deal that is not bad for the people of Scotland, bad for the people of the UK, bad for the people of Wales, as this one is. We need a deal that protects jobs, that best defends workers' rights, which safeguards environmental standards and consumer interests, which is underpinned by a permanent customs union and so critically prevents a hard border in Ireland. Labour's proposals are the basis for reuniting the country. They form the basis of building blocks for a realistic alternative, an alternative that European Union president Donald Tusk said, offered and I quote, a promising way out, an alternative which I believe would also win support among unions, among businesses and win the consent of the people as well. It's an alternative that could break the deadlock and prevent us catastrophically crashing out of Europe without a deal. Theresa May, by contrast, has been playing fast and loose, fast and loose with people's livelihoods, having played fast and loose with people's citizenship rights as well. Trying to run down the clock so that the only options appear to be either her bad deal or a no deal, neither of those is acceptable. Both would be damaging to our economy, to our social fabric and we will do everything in our power in this Parliament working with the Welsh Assembly to prevent them. That is why Labour fully agrees with the clause in today's motion that a no deal outcome to the current negotiations on EU withdrawal would be completely unacceptable not just on 29 March 2019, but at any time. Before I was elected to this Parliament, I spent 20 years as a trade union organiser and one of the enduring trade union principles that guided me then and guides me now is that you don't go back to your membership with the same deal that they have already voted on. If you do, they will let you know in known certain terms that we have already told you an answer. Talk of a second referendum last summer looked like that was what we were being urged to do, to ask people to vote again once more on the exact same proposition that they had voted on in 2016. However, now we have reached a different place, we are coming towards the end of the parliamentary road. We hope that there is still an opportunity to fundamentally revise the deal around Brexit. We hope, frankly, that the Conservative Government falls and that there is a general election. However, what we are saying is that if we cannot secure that, we think that there is no choice, no alternative, but to go to the people in a public vote with a credible leave option as well as the remain option on the ballot paper. We have to accept that none of those routes will be straightforward, but it is now inevitable, given the state of the Prime Minister's intransigence and incompetence, that the UK Government will have to seek an extension to the article 50 process to extend talks with the European Union. That motion is therefore right in calling on the UK Government to take immediate steps to prevent the UK leaving the EU without a deal, but it is a matter of fact nonetheless. I speak as somebody who voted to remain that over a million people did vote to leave in Scotland, and if you live in Fraserborough and voted leave listening to politicians in Edinburgh telling you that we all voted remain, will seem odd. So while there can be no respect for the Tory shambolic handling of Brexit, it is important to respect how people voted in the referendum. It is important in a democracy to respect the ballot box, yes. Willie Rennie. He is saying—we did give us a clear indication—does he support his leader at a UK level when he says that he is now in favour of a people's vote? The answer to that question is yes, I am in favour of a people's vote, but what I am also saying is that if there is still an opportunity for a general election, we should take it, and what I am also saying is that there is still an opportunity to revise the deal next week, we should take that as well. It is important to recognise where the real division in society lies, and it is not between the people in Aberdeen who voted to remain or those in Abergavenny who voted to leave. It is not between working-class families in Scotland and working-class families in London or working-class families in Wales. Those are false divisions propagated by those whose sole purpose is to divide communities and to wield power for its own sake. Our purpose is not to divide people, it is to bring people together, and on an understanding that and on the basis that Scotland's economy can no longer be just left to the market, that we need a more radical approach that extends democracy into our workplaces, into our communities to bring about real change and to give people hope, tackling inequality, giving people dignity and retirement, ending the attacks that deliberately hit the poorest, the hardest, building the homes that we need, investing in our industries, investing in our public services and investing in our people again. We have to find a way forward, a way forward that brings all our communities together, however they voted in the EU referendum and whatever their views are now, because if we don't do that, we risk division and instability for years to come. We have to strive for popular consent, we have to unite and not divide. That is the decisive battle that we face, and it is a battle that we must wage in the name of democracy according to the principles of consent, inside our parliaments and inside our assemblies, but out there in our communities as well. Thank you very much. I call Patrick Harvie to open for the Green Party. Once upon a time, not so very long ago, we might have thought that the implausible claims of the Brexiteers just sounded like the nonsense spouted by desperate campaigners who didn't think they had a hope of winning. Promises they were confident they'd never be held to. So, when Liam Fox said, believe me, we'll have up to 40 trade agreements ready for one second after midnight in March 2019, we might have thought it was just laughable. Now it's contemptible. When David Davis said, within minutes of a vote for Brexit, CEOs would be knocking down Chancellor Merkel's door demanding access to the British market, or when Dan Hannon said, absolutely nobody is threatening our place in the single market, we might have thought that some people were threatening our place in that single market, but it's clear now that those who are arguing for leaving the European Union were keen at the time to emphasise the benefits of a soft Brexit, maintaining a close connection with the single market, while secretly planning the very opposite. Then we saw the result, a knife edge result across the UK as a whole, and two of the four nations of the UK voting remain. We might have thought when we saw that result that our 52-48 vote must mean a compromise, it must mean reaching out across those divided lines and achieving a soft Brexit. We might have thought, as Ruth Davidson did, that maintaining our position in that single market and maintaining freedom of movement was the right course to take. If that course had been taken, I suspect that the most committed remainers among us would probably have had to accept that compromise. Yet so long after this process has been under way, Theresa May has refused repeatedly to face down her extremist wing. We might have thought that the Prime Minister must eventually decide which wing of her party she is on. She cannot keep pretending to be on both, yet month after month after month she has continued to put her own efforts at party unity ahead of the national interest, apparently deluding herself that everyone from Jacob Rees-Mogg to Dominic Grieve could be held to the same policy. Then we heard Brexit means Brexit. It was a funny line the first time it was used, but we might have thought that she cannot be serious. That cannot really be all she has got. Nearly three years on, all we have seen is a display of incompetence on an historic scale, and as the days tick down to the self-imposed deadline, still no one in this country knows what our fundamental relationship will be with our nearest neighbours in just a few weeks' time. Brexit means Brexit. It is still all they have. Leaders of both the main UK parties deny that they are just letting the clock run down, yet time after time they have delayed the decisions that we all know must be taken. This chaos must be stopped. I welcome the fact that Jeremy Corbyn and Richard Leonard, as we have heard, are now backing a people's vote, because the choices are simple. The withdrawal agreement, the cliff edge or seeking the consent of the people to stop the mess and stay in the European Union. The withdrawal agreement has already been rejected, and it is increasingly clear that the changes that the Brexit ultras want to see to abandon the people of the island of Ireland will not happen. The PM cannot get this through with the support of Conservatives, the ERG and the DUP alone. It is also clear that a meager bung to Labour MPs in leave voting seats will only alienate opposition even more strongly. The no-deal cliff edge also cannot be tolerated. Today, the Scottish Parliament and the Welsh Assembly will say so clearly, and we know that a majority of MPs will say so as well. The UK Government must abandon its strategy of threatening every part of the UK with that self-destructive path. We must now choose between delaying or revoking article 15. Many people rightly ask what use of delay would be unless it opens up a fundamentally new path. The answer to that question is obvious. A people's vote to allow the public the choice to cancel this crisis. I am sorry to Jackson Carlaw, but I do not think that his discomfort with the prospect of fighting another referendum campaign amounts to any kind of principled reason to say that democracy ended in June 2016. I have heard many people say that if a people's vote takes place, if Brexit is cancelled, there will be those who feel betrayed that it will hand an opportunity to the far right to seek a culture of betrayal and grievance. There is that danger. That same danger exists if Brexit is completed, because those far-right forces, which have been so consciously cultivated and unleashed by the leave campaign, will still be there if Brexit is completed. They will use a sense of triumphalism just as much as they would use a sense of betrayal. That threat exists in our society. Those who have campaigned for leave are culpable for creating that threat. We will have to face it down whatever happens with Brexit. In the meantime, we should all unite in supporting today's motion so that the Scottish Parliament and the Welsh Assembly speak with a clear voice. Extend, revoke, give the choice back to the people. Thank you, and I call on Willie Rennie to open for the Scottish Liberal Democrats. Thanks, Presiding Officer. Liberal Democrats support the motion today. It is obvious that we must avoid a no-deal Brexit. Business has spoken out. Cabinet ministers have spoken out. Even some Brexiteers use no-deal as a threat to get a supposed better deal from the EU, but it is still a real possibility. It is therefore helpful that the National Assembly for Wales and the Scottish Parliament speak out together against this deeply damaging option. However, that is not enough. We need a route out of this. Now that the Labour Party and Richard Leonard are on side, we need to unite for a people's vote too. There is an opportunity for all leaders to stand together at the people's vote march on 23 March in London. Vince Cable will be there, I hope that Nicola Sturgeon will be there, and it will be no better opportunity than for Jeremy Corbyn to make his support absolutely clear to attend that march as well. He should stand before them to make clear his support for a people's vote. Liz Smith, I thank Mr Rennie for giving way. Could Mr Rennie clarify if it was to be another people's vote exactly what the question would be? It is clear that it needs to be the deal that is agreed in Parliament versus remaining in the European Union. I make it clear—I am absolutely clear—that I want to remain in the European Union, because any other option is going to be damaging to our economy and our way of life. It has been suggested that everyone knew what Brexit meant back in 2016, but those who ran the leave campaign still cannot agree what Brexit means today. Jacob Rees-Mogg disagrees with Liam Fox, who disagrees with Boris Johnson and Michael Gove. If those in charge of leave campaign cannot agree what Brexit means today, how in earth was everybody supposed to know back in 2016, three years ago? That is a good reason in my mind to have the British people having the final say on Brexit. Parliament, as a whole, cannot agree a way forward, either. If it cannot, the only option is to hand the decision back to the people—another good reason to give the British people the final say. I respect those who sincerely voted to leave, which is why I do not want to rerun the referendum. I do not wish to pose the same question. My play is simple. If those in favour of Theresa May's deal, or any deal for that matter, believes in it and as confidence that it is the will of the British people, then put it back to the British people. If it is not so good, you will have nothing to fear. That is one of the biggest decisions that this country has ever faced, and it is wrong to deprive the people of that final say. That is another good reason to give the British people the final say. People are fed up with the debate, and I am fed up with it. They want an end to it, and I want an end to it, but what Theresa May will not tell you is that this is not going to end any time soon. I do not want to press the chamber, but even if she somehow cobbles together a majority in Parliament for the withdrawal agreement, it will only mark the end of the very beginning. It will not be over on 29 March. We will have the transition phase, then the endless negotiation over the free trade agreement with the EU. We will be replaying those arguments over and over again. CETA, the EU-Canadian Free Trade Agreement, was discussed for 22 years and negotiated for seven years. T-Tip has not even been agreed yet that transatlantic trade and investment partnership with the United States. It was talked about back in the 1990s and still has not been agreed or been anywhere near implemented. The whole reason for the backstop is because everyone knows that the transition period is an inadequate period of time in which to negotiate a comprehensive free trade agreement, so that agony will go on and on and on. The best way to bring that pain to an end is to put it back to the British people. Let them decide if they want more of that pain and division and anger or if they want to stop it now and any kind of Brexit. In fact, all Brexit options will damage our economy compared with what we have now. That is what the UK Government's own analysis admits. The UK will be poorer economically under any form of Brexit compared with staying in the EU. Official figures say that the UK economy could be up to 3.9 per cent smaller after 15 years under the Prime Minister's plan compared with staying in the EU. A no-deal Brexit is even worse—a 9.3 per cent hit—another good reason to give the British people the final say. However, let me give you one more reason to back a people's vote. For me, that is the most important reason. I respect those who voted to leave the European Union. They tell me that they want our country to be stronger and that they believe that they can do that by standing alone. They believe that Europe is holding us back. I politely tell them that this country has never stood alone. It is why we are leading members of NATO and the United Nations. It is why we have the second biggest international aid budget in the world, one of the best armed forces in the world and one of the best diplomatic services in the world. We play our part and we do so by working together with others. Our country stands for something good and we do good things with the European Union. Do not let anybody else tell you otherwise. Our economy is bigger than the basket case of the 1970s because we trade freely with each other. We are safer because we share intelligence and security with each other. We carry even more influence in the world because we stand together with each other. We are a country that people respect. That is not because we are on our own but because we work together. For the sake of our country, we must work together for the greater good. We must never walk away. I am delighted to contribute to the historic debate today in which Scotland and Wales are seeking simultaneously and in solidarity to stop the madness of a no-deal Brexit. We are hurtling towards the precipice of a no-deal, which only last week the UK Government itself said would inflict greater damage on both Scotland and Wales than the UK as a whole, and goodness knows that as damaging enough. Scotland's economy would suffer an 8 per cent shrinkage according to the UK, matched by a loss to Wales of 8.1 per cent, and the UK as a whole faces a 6.3 per cent reduction, accompanied by stark warnings of a disruption to cross-channel trade, leading to delays in food supply, a third of which comes from the EU. Here in Scotland we have reached a pretty pass when the Scottish Government's economic adviser Professor Gary Gillespie predicts a slightly less disaster of a projected GDP fall of 7 per cent. Professor Gillespie's paper is a detailed piece of work extrapolating the effects of different Brexit scenarios, all of them in variant shades of gloomy grey and drilling down into sectors and regions of our country. The paper sets out two potential no-deal scenarios. The impacts of both mean that Scotland's trade with the EU would be significantly impaired, with a potential drop in exports of between 10 per cent and 20 per cent. He predicts heightened uncertainty, which could reduce business investment in Scotland by £1 billion this year alone. International net migration into Scotland, currently at 13,000 a year, will fall. Indeed, it could potentially turn negative, given the predicted 30 per cent fall in the value of sterling and the hostile environment that is sending such a chilling message to EU citizens. It means that many workers are likely to leave for both financial and personal reasons. Professor Gillespie says that the economic slowdown resulting from these multiple whammies would result in unemployment rising by 100,000. That is 100,000 more Scots out of work. That is why we need to put the brakes on Brexit. Of course, the Conservatives tell us that this can be avoided by backing the Prime Minister, but that does not hold much water given that the Prime Minister just a few weeks ago voted against her own deal when she backed the Brady amendment to ditch the Irish backstop. Anyone who speaks to anyone in Brussels knows that the Irish backstop and the withdrawal agreement are indivisible. I realise that the anti-Europe faction in Mrs May's party, which she uses up so much of her time and energy appeasing, probably does not speak to Brussels, but she does and she must know that the EU will not ditch Dublin. It is a difficult lesson for those in her party who are still cling to a post-colonial delusion about British imperial power and influence, but it was Ireland that held all the cards in this negotiation. There must be a lesson there for Scotland, and who knows, perhaps Wales too. I support the motion today reiterating Parliament's opposition to an no deal, by all supporting the motion's contention that we must not and cannot support the EU withdrawal agreement that Mrs May tried and failed to win parliamentary support for. I said in an earlier speech in this subject that the deal would only continue the uncertainty and that has played our country since 2016. The end of any so-called implementation period we could still be staring at a cliff edge. I want to use just one example of that uncertainty around our future deal. Services are not mentioned at all in the withdrawal agreement, but the UK enjoys a huge surplus with Europe on services. I want to quote Sir Ivan Rodgers, the UK's former ambassador to the EU. In January, when we get into talks, we will discover at a granular level just how bad it is to start from a tabular as a third-country baseline on services. We shall spend a great deal of negotiating capital just to lever up our level of market access into something near the single market that we have now. That is just one example of the pain that the withdrawal agreement will cause, because it is built out around a rigid framework that comprises Mrs May's red lines. Those are leaving the single market, leaving the customs union and abandoning freedom of movement. Those red lines have boxed the UK into its own prison. The deal fails to guarantee key human rights, environmental rights and employment rights. Of course, it ignores the devolved settlement and rises roughshod over the powers of this Parliament, which rejected the draft deal in early December last year. In fact, the withdrawal agreement does not even mention Scotland. Of course, the withdrawal agreement was not just rejected by Scotland. It was responsible for the worst defeat of a UK Prime Minister in decades. I agree that the article 50 process should be extended so that agreement can be reached on the best way forward to protect the interests of Scotland Wales and the UK as a whole. However, the EU needs to agree, and it will agree if an extension is intended to deliver real change, either dropping those red lines or another vote, a people's vote. Having spoken to many senior politicians and officials in Brussels, they will not agree to what has been called a rolling cliff edge, which allows Mrs May more in procrastination time without delivering any material change or more time to blackmailers with no-deal threats. It is worrying that Jacob Rees-Mogg, the leader of the anti-Europeans in the House of Commons, has hinted that he could agree to a short extension in order to achieve what he calls a managed no-deal. That is a terrifying prospect, and that is not why we want an extension. The EU is wise to the possibility of such shenanigans, and so an extension of article 50 would only be granted if there was significant material change. That has to be a second referendum. More people than ever have educated themselves about the benefits of EU membership. The lies and, indeed, the cheating of the anti-European campaign have been exposed. It is clear that our referendum could bring us back from the cliff edge and back from the attivistic direction that Brexit has taken us. That is why I want to stand with Wales tonight and support this motion. I have a little time in hand, so I do not need to cut people off exactly six minutes, but do not abuse it. I call Donald Cameron to be followed by Keith Brown. The last time I took part in a debate in this chamber on Brexit, we were less than four months away from the point at which the UK will formally lead the EU. We are now less than four weeks away. In that intervening period, despite the volatility in Westminster, one simple fat remains. The Prime Minister's deal represents the best way to implement the momentous decision that was taken by the electorate of the UK on 23 June 2016 to end our membership of the European Union. As I said in December... John Mason. I thank the member for giving way. He talks about the momentous decision that was made by the UK electorate. He and I can change our minds as individuals. Is a country allowed to change its mind? Donald Cameron. In reply to the member, as I said in December, not to respect that vote would render us guilty of forgetting that we serve the electorate, and that service includes respecting their decisions. Their decisions freely expressed in a referendum on a question posed to the United Kingdom about the United Kingdom's membership and answered by the United Kingdom. Alec Neill has already been quoted by Jackson Carlaw, but he said in December 2016 that the democratic wishes of the people have to be respected, and I agree. A few months ago, the cabinet secretary, Mike Russell, spoke about Edmund Burke during the debate and about the difference between representatives and delegates. If his quote is that a representative should not sacrifice his unbiased opinion, his mature judgment, his enlightened conscience, but instead owes you, not his industry only but his judgment, and he betrays instead of serving you if he sacrifices it to your opinion. It was implied that anyone wanting to give effect to the referendum result was repudiating their role as a representative. They were meekly sacrificing their judgment in favour of the electorate's opinion. Let me tell the members this. I voted to remain in the EU. I regret that we are leaving, but leave we must, because otherwise we would be betraying the wishes of this country as expressed by the voters of this country. The Prime Minister's deal is simply the best way of achieving that outcome. I would like to make some progress, I am afraid. It is currently the only deal on the table. We must support it and, in supporting it, we give effect to a democratic vote taken by the UK, including not least, the million or so Scots who voted leave and whose voices in particular have been drowned out since that vote. That is what my conscience dictates. That is how I exercise my judgment as a representative. I believe that the vast majority of people we represent want that outcome. They want a deal that protects their jobs and their livelihoods. They want an orderly exit. They want to move forward. They want to move on. They want to get it done. They abhor the idea of departing without a deal and recognise that the best way to achieve that is to support the Prime Minister's deal. Clearly, no deal would be an awful outcome and it is right to prevent it happening by default, but the best way of ending the uncertainty and avoiding no deal is to leave with a deal by the agreed date. Let us just remind ourselves who has backed this deal. Scottish Business has backed it. The Scottish Chambers of Commerce has backed it. Scots Whiskey, one of the most important industries in my region and vital for the Scottish economy, has backed it. The Scottish Whiskey Association supports both the withdrawal agreement and the political declaration. It says that if the deal is rejected, this will create considerable uncertainty for the industry. Scottish Farming has backed it. The NFUS has said of the deal that it will ensure that there are no hard barriers on the day that we leave the European Union and will allow trade and agricultural goods and UK food and drink to continue throughout the transition period, largely as before. Ross Greer. I am grateful for the member for taking the intervention. The list of organisations that he mentioned, almost if not every single one of them, endorsed a remain vote in the referendum. They have advocated the deal in comparison to the cataclysm of no deal. If we give the public the opportunity to vote on this again, what option does he think those organisations would back in that referendum? Donald Cameron supported the deal because this is respecting the result of the referendum. The NFUS said that this opportunity needs to be taken. Taking the withdrawal agreement and the political declaration together is a deal that provides clarity on our status as an independent coastal nation by 2020. It ensures that the environment remains protected and that there is no dilution of our commitments. It aims to protect trade and goods, something crucial for our exporters. Above all, it ensures that EU citizens who live and work in the UK can continue to do so. The SNP refused to back the deal, which is extraordinary because it meets many of their demands. It includes a transition period. It prevents no hard border between Northern Ireland and the Republic. It offers a guarantee for EU citizen rights and the likelihood of a customs partnership going forward. It is instructive to scrutinise the SNP's various positions on Brexit over the past few years. The First Minister may have much play of consistency. Let us just see how much consistency she has shown. First, she advocates EU membership. Then, she advocates a differentiated deal for Scotland. Then, she advocates the single market and customs union membership for the UK. Then, we learned from Ian Blackford that that particular ship has sailed, and having rejected it for months, the SNP advocates a people's vote. Or do they? There was talk of a hierarchy of outcomes and preferences of any outcome that commanded the majority. Then, the advocate a much narrower focus on a people's vote alone. It is a case study in opportunism, Presiding Officer. We shouldn't be surprised because, over the last 50 years— The First Minister lined there have been the SNP's efforts in the Scottish Government to find compromise. Does it ever occur to him that, had any of those efforts that compromise been accepted by the Prime Minister and the UK Government, we might not be in the sorry position that we are in right now, it is the failure to compromise that should shame every Conservative in the land? Donald Cameron I do not accept that at all because, over the last 50 years, Europe has never been a matter of principle for the SNP. It has always been a tactic—a tactic to be deployed in pursuit of independence. We saw hours after the referendum when the First Minister announced that she would legislate for an independence referendum on the back of Scotland being taken out of the UK against its will. To conclude, Presiding Officer, the SNP have never wanted Brexit to work. Whatever deal Theresa May had negotiated with Brussels, the SNP would have opposed it, and orderly withdrawal is not in their interests. That is why they are rejecting it. Their ideology has always trumped the search for a pragmatic orderly exit from the EU. To conclude, we support the Prime Minister in her negotiations. There is a deal on the table, there is an overarching desire across the country for us to get this done, and I support the amendment in Jackson Carlaw's name. I call Keith Brown to be followed by James Kelly. Thank you, Presiding Officer. I support the motion in the name of the First Minister, but I would like to consider in some detail the amendment proposed by the Conservative Party and, indeed, the actions and the record of this party, given its leading role in supporting, introducing and implementing, if that is the right word, Brexit. First of all, the Tory amendment talks about respecting the result of constitutional referendums. Demanding respect for 52 per cent from 2016, of course, no respect for the 52 per cent that voted yes in 1979. No question, neither of any respect for the 62 per cent in Scotland who voted remain. That remain vote has, at all times, by all Tories to be denied, denigrated and dismissed. We also regularly hear Tory MPs representing English constituencies proclaiming that they must speak up for the views of their constituents who, in their majority, voted leave. However, the supine subgroup of Tory MPs in Scotland will never be heard to speak up for the remain majorities in their constituencies. The Tories could not give a flying fig about the constituencies that they have who voted in their majority for remain. The next part of the Tory amendment says that they support leaving the EU with the deal. Let's examine the party that they have followed to get to this particular position. This is perhaps a dictionary definition of opportunism for Donald Cameron's benefit. In 2014, he may remember that the Tory position was crystal clear, vote no to independence to guarantee Scotland's place in the EU. That was a Tory position. I know that there are one or two original Brexit years among the Tory group, but I do not remember any of them saying in 2014 that they voted no to guarantee Brexit. Their party said the exact opposite. During the 2016 referendum, we heard Remainer Ruth in her debates with Boris Johnson when she laid out clearly the threat of economic calamity that Brexit posed. A threat that she has stated two years previously was only likely as a result of an independence vote. In the same year, my party stood on the platform of reserving the right to hold a referendum on independence if Scotland were to be forced out of the EU against its will, exactly what is now proposed. After the Brexit vote, we had demanding Davidson when the Tories were absolutely adamant. They said that the First Minister had to put every possible effort into safeguarding Scotland and indeed the UK's place in the single market. That was their position after the Brexit vote. In the next new term, when Westminster instructs Tory MPs and MSPs, they obey no matter what the cost is to Scotland. Far from demanding membership of the single market, that was their position after the referendum. The Tories in this chamber demand that we must leave the single market. Is that not opportunism? I am happy to give way to Donald Cameron if he can define it in some other way. No, he can't. Surely, this vote fast was the last Tory U-turn, the final capitulation of the craving Conservatives, but no. The next part of the Tory position was when they stated that there was the possibility in their motion of a no deal and where that comes into their calculations. The final resting position of the Scottish Tories is to refuse to vote to rule out no deal. They had the chance in the House of Commons that every single Scottish Tory MP refused to vote to rule out no deal. Unbelievable. From the avowed euro-enthusiasm of Ruth Davidson in 2014 and 2016, to every single Scottish Tory MP demanding that no deal is kept on the table in 2019—look at them now, all looking down at their papers. I think that, in my view, history will judge the Scottish Tories and their endless twisting to accommodate every farcical and incompetent move by the utter shambles of a Tory Government. 250 companies are going to the Dutch Government asking to relocate from the UK. No bother. Nissen, talking about withdrawing from the UK, Honda, the only plant that they have ever closed in their history, but no problem to the Tories. £14 million of public money to go to a freight company without any ferries, that is no problem to the Scottish Tories, not a word of criticism. Then we have, because it was so cackhandily done, another £33 million of taxpayer's money, something that we hear about concern about all the time in this chamber from the Scottish Tories, £33 million handed over to another company because the process was so bad and he wanted to keep how bad it was secret. Hush money, £33 million of taxpayer's money. Then, of course, we have a Government found in contempt of its own Parliament. Tory Government found in contempt of the Westminster Parliament. Then we have a deal, this fantastic deal that has taken two years to be, a record number of people voting against it, a record defeat in the House of Commons. This is strong and stable government, by the way. This is a smooth transition to Brexit that we are hearing about today. Then we have a Tory Government that promised endlessly that Scotland's voice should be heard and they set a new law, didn't they, when they gave a mere 18 minutes afforded to amendments in the voice of Scotland's MPs, topped out by Tory ministers. So the Tories have held Scotland in contempt right the way through this process. They've ignored its Parliament, they've ignored its Government, they've ignored their own constituents who voted for remain. But surely the last word has to go to the Tory Cabinet Minister who told the journalist Nick Hurley that even though we are in the Tory Cabinet Minister's words, heading for an iceberg, that means that Scotland and the UK are heading for an iceberg, presumably of titanic proportions. Even though we are heading for that disaster, Scotland has to remain strapped to the decks. It has no option but to go along with what the Tory Government itself says is a disaster. We don't have to do that. We have another choice, a far better choice, one that's far better than being bound to a Brexit Britain. The idea that anyone in Scotland would want to vote for the party of a shower of charlatans who Westminster have showed when it comes to the way they've conducted themselves over Brexit, bedeviled by factions, by contradictions, the idea that anybody would want to trust a party like that to run this place in 2021 is becoming nothing more than a tired joke. As you may guess, I support the motion in the name of the First Minister and I reject the Tories and their amendment. I call James Kelly to be followed by Gillian Martin, Mr Kelly, please. Thank you, Deputy Presiding Officer. I wish to support the motion before us this afternoon. This is a significant moment in the Parliament's history as both the Scottish Parliament and the Welsh Assembly hold debates on this important issue simultaneously and will no doubt reach a position rejecting Theresa May's deal and also rejecting a no deal in calling for an extension of article 50. The debate this afternoon was no doubt that the Tories are isolated if they look deeply uncomfortable over in that corner of the chamber and that, I'm afraid to say, it's quite rightly so. The reason that we're in this situation is because of the failure of leadership of the last two leaders and prime ministers of the Conservative Party, David Cameron and Theresa May. Prior to the 2016 referendum, David Cameron was seeking to try to navigate himself through the internal problems of the Conservative Party and placate the right agreed to hold a referendum. He thought that he could win that referendum and it wasn't the case. That's what resulted in your prime minister to come up with a plan, so there's no point in over here. Can I say to members that, if they want to make a point, intervene and don't just heckle across the chamber? The consequence of that disastrous decision was the referendum in 2016, which was then lost. Subsequently, that caused David Cameron his premiership. When Theresa May took over, as Patrick Harvie said, she declared Brexit means Brexit and tried to navigate and produce a solution that was in tune with Brexit. The reality was that she could not navigate her way through the internal politics of the Tory Party. She went to the country in 2017 to try and seek a bigger majority to ensure that she could get a deal through. That went catastrophically wrong as Theresa May ran aground on the election trail and was returned with an overall majority. Since then, the reality is that she has not been able to achieve any consensus within the House of Commons. That subsequently resulted in her losing her proposed deal by 230 votes. Up until now, all we have now, with 25 days to go, she has resorted to simply trying to run down the clock in the hope that, as we get near March 29, people will vote for that deal. However, all around us, you look at the evidence of the implications of Brexit and the implications of no deal. You look at the car industry, Honda and Swindon, closing down with a closure of 3,500 jobs. Jagger Land Rover was continually warning about the threat of Brexit and no deal Brexit. It is the implications for the trading arrangements. A lot of those companies require just-in-time production to get goods in and out of the United Kingdom. In reality, when the Government draws up plans for lorry parks, that will slow everything down and have a dramatic effect on the economic production of car companies. Specifically, in terms of no deal, there are drastic economic consequences. Experts have warned that the dangers to the exchange rate have been devalued by anything between 10 per cent and 30 per cent. The Bank of England has said that inflation could raise to between 4.25 per cent and 6.5 per cent, and there would be consequential changes to interest rates. All that would result in the real value of money slowing down in the economy, and that would ultimately lead to a reduction in demand and also a reduction in production, which would result in job losses and also have an impact on the Scottish budget. From that point of view, it is right that we assess the implications of where we are now and reject no deal on the basis of the drastic consequences of that and the fact that there is no support for any option to go through the houses and commons. That means that an extension of article 50 is the next logical position in order to extend the process. As part of that, a public vote must be considered and there must be the option to bring that back to the people. I know that people have pointed out previously the democratic result in 2016, but when you see the consequences of all that, the job losses, the drastic impact on our community, the reduction in people's living standards, then if that comes back to a public vote, we must have the option to remain. In summing up, we have a catastrophe before us. People have been let down. In order that we can plot a way forward, we need to clearly reject no deal, we need to look at an extension of article 50 and look at options going forward, including a public vote. Thank you very much, I call Gillian Martin. We call by Murdo Fraser, Ms Martin, please. Thank you, Presiding Officer. Over the last couple of months, any time my colleagues on these benches have warned against the impact of a no deal, the Conservative benches erupt calling on the SNP to back to Theresa Maysdale. Many of us have predicted that the Scottish Tories are trying to find a way to place the blame for a horrific no deal scenario on the SNP. Yes, the SNP Government, who every stage in the last two and a half years have offered a detailed, sensible, pragmatic solution that would do the least damage to Scotland and the wider UK. However, Scotland has been ignored and dismissed by the very people who would like to trot out hollow lines about Scotland being an equal partner. I am not feeling it. Let's for a moment forget about the no deal if we can and concentrate on what Theresa Maysdale would mean for the people of Scotland. So, Maysdale would take us out of the EU customs union and single market. That would mean a drop in GDP of over £9 billion by 2030, and it will hit Scots directly. It will mean job losses, income reduction and higher costs of living. However, we have been promised free trade agreements with individual countries by Maysdale Government. Let's count the trade deals that the struggling UK Minister for International Trade, Liam Fox, has secured so far. Of the world's 195 countries, Fox has managed to secure deals with only six. Israel is the largest among these. It buys £2.4 billion worth of UK goods and services, with £1.6 billion flowing the other way. However, at the other end of the scale, Fox managed to get Eritrea and Comoros, both of which bought no UK goods or services last year. The total sum of the six deals is a tiny fraction of what we currently trade across the EU. Currently, 44 per cent of all UK exports are to the EU. That has not been replaced. Negotiating trade deals are hugely complex. They frequently amount to hundreds of clauses covering standards, tariffs and vast numbers of products. Liam Fox was told that by trade experts, but Fox hubristically said in response that negotiating 40 trade deals post Brexit the minute after—the second after—would be quote, the easiest in human history. He's had nearly three years. Where are they? Of course, we know that an absolute red line of May is to get rid of freedom of movement. After all, this is a woman who created the frankly racist hostile environment, including the appalling Windrush scandal and the appalling Go Home vans. Brexit is in large part the love child of willful misinformation and right-wing dog whistle politics. Brexit years were quite happy to encourage finger-pointing immigration and EU membership, when in fact those who feel let down and disenfranchised are really the victims of perpetual economic failings of successive UK Governments. The simple fact is that freedom of movement has boosted Scotland's economy. May's deal means that Scotland will lose out on attracting thousands of working-age, tax-paying people who will enrich our communities, the people who staff our hospitals, our clinics, drive our trains, care for our ageing population, train our graduates and allow our food and drink industry to expand and prosper internationally. Our native-born population are just not enough to fill those jobs. The proposed immigration cap immediately bars people earning less than £30,000 from getting a work visa and that rules out people on starting salaries as university researchers, teachers, nurses, care workers, hospitality workers and many more. The policy is also discriminatory to women who are most likely to be earning under £30,000, I'm sorry to say. May's deal also means that we no longer have access to UK funding programmes and financial support. Those include infrastructure programmes that have co-funded roads in the most remote parts of Scotland. Research programmes that have meant that Scotland's hospitals and universities have been at the forefront of developing ground-breaking and often life-saving technology, including everything from finding cures for heart disease and the next generation of MRI scanners to flood prevention, marine protection and robotics. We are losing reach funding, which every single community that each of us represents in this chamber has projects reliant on. We are losing £11 billion of regional development funding. Stick that on the side of a bus. Presiding Officer, I've only touched the surface of why May's deal is so bad for Scotland and the wider UK, yet she still seems to think that she can bribe enough MPs to get it through. In addition to the £1 billion DUP pay-off, she's throwing money to English MPs in her last ditch attempt to bribe their MPs into some kind of submission. Yet, May has offered no such bungs to Scotland, and while we're at it, no such bungs to Wales. She doesn't have to, because in the case of the Scottish Tory MPs, they're not fighting for what's best for Scotland. Certainly the MP in my area, my area voted over 62 per cent to remain. He's not representing their views. The majority of them are submissively towing the line on our deal, or those in the lunatic fringes are content with a no-deal despite their constituencies being the worst hit. I'm sad to say yes, I will. I'd just be interested to know what the member says to our constituents in the north-east fishing industry, who would say that they can't wait to get out of the CFP. I'll tell you exactly what I say to the constituents in the north-east fishing industry, because the majority of constituents who work in the north-east fishing industry are in the processing sector. On average, about 80 per cent of their workforce are EU economic migrants, and if that grow of them stalls, we can look at fish processing factories in my constituency closing down. So many of the Scottish Tory MSPs campaigning against Brexit, including their leaders, will not stand up for what's best for Scotland's economy, as we've just seen. For the people of Scotland who stand in the cusp of feeling Brexit negative implications directly on their lives and on their pockets, they will never forgive them. Article 50 has to be extended, and a new deal must be reached that drops the damaging red lines. There needs to be a deal that will not harm every individual living in Scotland. I'm glad that my party continues to provide clarity of position in the midst of Brexit madness caused by the Tory party, and I'm glad to stand with colleagues in Wales to let sense prevail. I'd like to start my remarks on what I hope will be a point of agreement across the chamber. I do not want to see a no-deal Brexit. I believe that that will be damaging to Scotland's economy. Indeed, we've heard a whole host of warnings from those in business across Scotland as to what a no-deal Brexit might mean. Is it precisely because we should avoid a no-deal Brexit that we should be supporting a withdrawal agreement? That is the opportunity that the House of Commons had back in January. At that time, voices across Scotland were raised urging support for the Prime Minister's withdrawal agreement. It was backed by the Scottish Chambers of Commerce, as we've heard. It was backed by the Scottish Whiskey Association. It was backed by senior companies like Diageau. It was backed by entrepreneurs like Sir Ian Wood. It was backed by the National Farmers Union of Scotland and it was backed by the Scottish Fishermen's Federation in a second. Many of those bodies accepted that the withdrawal agreement was not perfect, but it was a necessary step to avoid a no-deal. I thank the member for giving way. The fundamental fact is that it wasn't backed by Parliament, so would he therefore agree with the CBI that no deal, which he accepts is not an outcome that anyone wants, should be ruled out, as the CBI has been arguing for? The way to rule out a no-deal is to vote for a deal. You cannot roll it out in the abstract. I regret the members of the Labour Party, members of the SNP, members of the Liberal Democrats, and yes, some members of the Conservative Party voted against the withdrawal agreement in the House of Commons and put us at risk of a no-deal Brexit. If we want to avoid no-deal, we have to vote for a deal. There were those in the House of Commons who were concerned about the impact of the Irish backstop question. The House of Commons later demonstrated that if concerns with the backstop could be dealt with, then a majority would exist for the withdrawal agreement. That is why the Prime Minister has continued to negotiate with the EU 27. If a solution to the backstop can be found, then we have a way forward. We need to find a way through this, because it is important that the Government of the United Kingdom delivers on the outcome of the EU referendum. To fail to do so would be a democratic outrage. We should not forget, as we have already heard from Jackson Carlaw, that more than 1 million Scots voted to leave in 2016. To listen to some people on the SNP benches, you would think that this group has been airbrushed out of history. The biggest single component of those 1 million Scots were SNP voters. As the SNP voters, who in large numbers switched to the Conservatives in the general election in 2017, so disillusioned were they were the SNP stands. I know that there are those who believe that we should have a so-called people's vote. In other words, a rerun of the 2016 referendum. We know that that is the SNP position. We know that is the Liberal Democrat position. We think that it may be the Labour position, depending on what day of the week it is. I am not quite sure. However, we have already had a people's vote. We had it in 2016, and the people made their choice. It seems to me fundamentally dangerous. At a time when already there is so much distrust of our political institutions for the establishment to say effectively to the people that you have made the wrong choice. We are going to keep asking you the same question until you give us the right answer. What can be more dangerous for democracy than that? Are there a whole range? I will give way briefly. I am grateful. I will tell him what would be more dangerous to democracy than that. We would be failing to call out the fundamental corruption of the leave campaign. They are the people culpable, not the people who voted. Mr Fraser, please wait until you are called. Thank you, Deputy Presiding Officer. I say to Mr Harvey that we are somebody who was part of the yes campaign in 2014. We now know that, towards a pack of lies, an independent Scotland would look like he is going to seek coming here to talk about somebody else's campaign. It would take a whole range of practical questions about a second referendum that I have not been answered. It would take at least six months to organise, which means that, the earliest we can hold it would be in September. What would the question be? There are at least four different possible outcomes. Excuse me, I have no idea what you are saying because of the rumbling from your own ranks. Thank you. Can you keep them in order, Presiding Officer? I should, yes, and I am. Mr Fraser, I do not need lessons from you to keep the chamber in order. Continue. Thank you, Deputy Presiding Officer. I knew that a second referendum would take at least six months to organise. That means that the earliest we could contemplate would be September. What would the question be? There are at least four possible outcomes, at least four, that people want from this process. Some people want no Brexit at all, some people want Brexit on the Prime Minister's terms, some people want Brexit on some other terms, as yet undefined, and some people want a no-deal Brexit. How can you have a referendum to give a majority for any one of those propositions? Nor is there much evidence that a second referendum would come to a different result from the last one. The opinion polls at this moment show on the remain leave question that remain would have a small lead. That is exactly what the opinion polls told us in advance of the 2016 referendum. The chances are that we would go through the whole expense, trouble and delay that a second referendum would involve, and we would end up back exactly where we started. The reality is that the Scottish National Party knows this. Quoted in the Herald newspaper on 12 February, a senior SNP source said of the People's Vote campaign and I quote, It's dead and everyone knows it. Many people in the party are taking this view now. The reality is, for all their rhetoric, about how bad a no-deal would be. There are many in the SNP who actually want no-deal, because they believe that it would drive up support for Scottish independence, because that, after all, is the only issue that matters to the SNP. From the very start, they saw Brexit as an opportunity to advance the independence referendum. Within hours of the referendum result being announced, back in June 2016, Nicola Sturgeon was on her feet in Bute House, telling the world that she was instructing her civil servants to draw up legislation for a second independence referendum. Everything that they have said and everything that they have done since that point has been all about independence and nothing else. Fortunatley, the Scottish people have more sense. There is no evidence of support for independence, growing indeed people who are increasingly angry at SNP opportunism over Brexit. We do need to avoid no-deal. We do that by backing the withdrawal agreement. That was the case in January and it is still the case today. That is what business wants, it is what farming wants, it is what fishing wants. It is clearly in Scotland's interests that we should get on and vote for it before more damage and uncertainty is caused. Thank you, Mr Fraser. I call George Adam to be followed by Claire Baker. Thank you, Presiding Officer. One thing that I will agree with Murdo Fraser is that the people of Scotland do know better hensories and he has never won an election in Scotland and he is buff. As we are all aware, for the first time in 20 years of devolution, the Scottish Parliament and the National Assembly for Wales are debating and voting on the same motion. Together we are declaring opposition to the damaging EU exit deal agreed by the UK Government. That is an unprecedented event and I think that it speaks volumes in itself. The Prime Minister's deal has power to cause major lasting damage to jobs, living standards and public services and in over 20 years of devolution, never before has something had the power to affect our two countries in such a way. As parliamentarians, we have the ability to use our voice for change in this way, so I can only hope that the UK Government takes stock of what is brought us here and why we are jointly taking this historic step. With that in mind, I am delighted to stand up in our nation's parliament and reiterate the message that has been put forward countless times by our First Minister, Mike Russell and my colleagues today before me. Scotland did not want this. It is not the choice that we made. Our message to Theresa May is clear, rule out a no deal, extend article 50 process and consider another referendum. From the very beginning, the twists and turns of the whole Brexit process in Westminster has resembled a comedic pantomime more than a functioning Government. I think that we can all agree that we are no further forward now than what we were two years ago. I, like many people, enjoy a good pantomime. You see it quite a lot in here, but I certainly do not expect it to come straight from the stages of Westminster, filled with your usual pantocast of characters, the bumbling baddie, or will they won't they plotline and more dodgy one-liners than you would hear in an 1970s Saturday night TV variety show. The House of Commons would have been entertaining the past few months if that was not so serious. We are asked to trust the UK Government as the attempt to drive us off the Brexit cliff edge. Is it any wonder that, with 24 days to go, people across our country have lost faith in the UK Government? The current withdrawal agreement means that Scotland faces being taken out of the EU against our democratic wishes, taken out of the single market against our economic interests and cut off from our European friends and neighbours against our will. That is something that we are not okay with. We have made the fact blatantly clear since the day and the hour of the Brexit process began. Nevertheless, we have been depletedly ignored and sidelined. However, I cannot say I am surprised that the Westminster Government has handled this as badly as it has. Just when you think enough is surely enough, the cycle of broken promises, disappointment and confusion only continues to spin out of control. The Scottish Parliament rejected the draft deal on December last year, yet, time and time again, our First Minister has continued to reach out and attempt to establish an open and constructive dialogue, only to be shot down and ignored. The exit deal on the table at the moment does not even mention Scotland once within its 500-plus pages. On top of that, it fails to guarantee key rights, human rights, environmental rights and employment rights, which Scotland needs once and should never be forced to give up. Currently, Theresa May's approach would take Scotland out of the single market, despite the clear fact that 62 per cent of Scots voted to remain. Our First Minister has been very clear, ever since the Brexit vote, that the voice of the Scottish people should be respected as a very minimum. That means staying in the single market in the customs union. If it is possible for Northern Ireland, why not Scotland? Yet again, the UK Government simply does not seem to care about Scotland's wishes. The economic implications of all this are startling at best. The UK Government's own analysis, published last week, predicted that a no deal could leave the UK economy 9 per cent smaller after 15 years, compared to what it has been. If 15 years seems far away, Scottish Government analysis has shown that the implications of a no deal Brexit be felt almost instantly in Scotland. By the end of this year alone, there is a potential for GDP to have been contracted by 7 per cent, with unemployment increasing by nearly 4 per cent by mid 2020. That is equivalent of more than 100,000 additional people out of work. Things are already hard enough for many people in my constituency after a decade of unforgiving Tory austerity. As you know, I love my town. I represent and bring issues of importance to Paisley to the chamber as often as I can. While that is something that is frequently mentioned and friendly jest by colleagues in the chamber, that is not a joking matter. Brexit of any kind will have generational negative consequences to many families within my community. I live in a wonderful town and one that I love serving and I will do my utmost to make sure that Paisley continues to flourish, but that is getting increasingly difficult with our Westminster Government, who continues to demonstrate beyond any doubt that Scotland is not an equal partner in the UK. The lack of respect that has been shown to us is appalling, especially when all signs point towards Brexit having devastating impact on jobs and investment in our country. Like you, I really have no idea what is going to happen in the next coming weeks, but I do know one thing. It is time for Scotland's voice to be heard. Why should we continue to be treated like an unruly child who is told to be seen and not heard? Scotland did not want this. The time has come for us to gain some control of our future. We cannot continue to be led by the shambolic UK Government. The people of Scotland deserve better, and they deserve a lot more than what Westminster offers us. I call Clare Baker to be followed by Jenny Gilruth. This afternoon is a significant debate. We are here to express a united opposition to a no-deal Brexit. The voices of the Scottish Parliament and the Welsh Assembly will join together to make clear our opposition to an outcome that would damage our economy, our communities and our society. The UK is possibly on the brink of leaving the EU. During negotiations, the prospect of a no-deal Brexit has loomed. A no-deal scenario should have been ruled out of negotiations. I do not accept the argument that it has been necessary to be there to demonstrate a level of resolve or seriousness. I do not think that anyone involved in those negotiations treated that as a game. This attempt to use brinkmanship could only result in self-inflicted harm to the UK, and everyone can see that. The argument that it would be as bad for the EU is thin. The 27 countries would still be a powerful group in terms of trading, international relationships and influence. The UK would be left isolated. From an international viewpoint, we would be a country that has failed to reach an agreement with the EU, which is a trading bloc that is enormously attractive to other countries, and we were there negotiating with the huge advantage of already being aligned. That hardly makes us look competent. A no-deal exit would have an immediate impact on people's daily lives. No-deal will mean no transition period. Prices and shops would shoot up as we move to WTO rules. Our own trading goods may be surplus and food stocks will rot. Travelling to the EU will become bureaucratic and lengthy and there is no clarity over flights. The issue of the Irish border would be unresolved, with the hardening of the border looking unavoidable. Surely it is inconceivable that the UK could leave on those damaging terms. Yet there are senior politicians who believe it as a preference. There are those who argue that leaving with no deal would provide us with opportunities. This is nonsense, and it is not possible to find any serious authority arguing this case. When we were granted access to UK Government leaked papers on three Brexit scenarios about a year ago, it is no secret that it contained the negative impact that leaving with no deal would have on economic growth and our economy. It would not be credible that, after gaining that analysis, a no-deal scenario could be pursued. The UK Parliament remains divided. This is a crisis in UK politics and it is not acceptable that the Government continues to try and secure the vote with packages of money to areas of the UK that it has neglected and forced austerity on and are set to do even greater damage to with either a poor Brexit deal or a catastrophic no-deal. The sensible approach to adopt now is to request an extension to the article 50 process that enables the Parliament and the country to reach a level of consensus. There are a number of options and scenarios regarding what comes next. An extension that is necessary as the clock has been run down, that even with a deal there is not enough time to pass the necessary legislation or have the scrutiny. My view is that there should be a more meaningful extension. The lack of a deal with parliamentary support is the responsibility of a Government that has been closed, objured, secretive and has made little attempt to meaningfully engage with parliamentary committees here and at Westminster. With Opposition parties, surely if there was a time to take Parliament with you, that time is now, and with devolved Governments. The result of the referendum left us in a situation that I did not want to be in, one that I campaigned against, and one that has left us with an extremely challenging situation. It was a time for unity, which needed a Prime Minister to recognise the manners of the result and attempt to chart a course that was mindful of how divisive the referendum had been and what the result meant for the country's economic future. But also what it said about what kind of country we are, how we engage with our countries and how we treat and value people who wish to come and live here. I am a member of the Culture, Tourism, European External Affairs Committee, and we have been taking evidence on the article 50 negotiations. We had a series of meetings in Brussels in January prior to the meaningful vote. From the perspective of the EU 27, the deal was done. They had negotiated in good faith with the Prime Minister, it was not their job to get the deal through the UK Parliament, they had already got 27 member states to agree it. It may not be unreasonable for them to assume that the Prime Minister was negotiating with a degree of authority, but a general election resulting in a minority government, a Conservative party that is driven over Europe and a marriage of convenience with the DUP, which is turning out to be not particularly convenient, leaves the Prime Minister in a weak position in her own country. Trying to build consensus in Parliament at this last minute, when MPs never had influence or ownership of the deal will lead to failure, or if the manoevers of the last few days were to get it through a coalition that was cobbled together acting in its own interests rather than those of the whole country. A deal agreed in Parliament on those terms is unacceptable. We are looking at the prospect of a people's vote. If there were an amendment attached to a public vote, a type of ratification vote, that is expected to have the support of Parliament. Those circumstances, or another route towards a public vote, demands a realistic delay to the article 50 process. It was the Prime Minister who decided on 29 March as decision day, and that is no longer realistic under any scenario. Undoing our years of EU membership, our trading, environmental, social, judicial ties is proving to be difficult, complicated and, in my view, disadvantageous to the UK. At a time of global uncertainty, with old and new threats and challenges, countries should be more co-operative as we address issues such as climate change, food insecurity, extremism and poverty. I believe that the EU will continue with or without the UK to provide a leadership role on the international stage, promote important values and protect the rights of its citizens. We should strive to remain part of that community. Thank you very much, Ms Beaker. I call Jenny Gilruth to be followed by Liz Smith. Ms Gilruth, please. Thank you, Presiding Officer. Alexander Orlov is not necessarily the most obvious of Brexiteers. First off, he does not actually exist. But, much like a ferry company that does not own any ferries, why let the facts get in the way of a good old-fashioned and terribly British joke? Promise £350 million on the side of a bus? Watch on as a young MP is murdered while attending her surgery. And shout simple at the SNP leader in Westminster, all for a bet about afternoon tea. What an absolute embarrassment this country has become. Today we join forces with our Welsh colleagues in a show of solidarity against the recklessness that has consumed our politics since the 23rd of June 2016. Nine hundred and eighty-five days later, we have no clarity for business. Nine hundred and eighty-five days later, our EU nationals live in fear of what is to come. Nine hundred and eighty-five days later, the Prime Minister has no deal. But not to worry chaps, because it's simple. Yes, the Prime Minister of this country would rather quote a CGI meerkat than face up to the political catastrophe that Brexite has become. Shame on her. Today's debate is designed to send a message to the Prime Minister. And if Theresa May would rather obfuscate responsibility for Brexite, then let her try to ignore the voices of the people whose lives her in action continues to make a misery of. So let me tell you about four voices from my community, four women, all EU nationals from my constituency in Fife. Nicole Penman from Kenneway worked at Higgs and Mark Hinch and for our national health service. She's lived in Scotland since 1977 and she's married to a Scot. She's paid her taxes and she continues to do so on her pensions. She told me, I can't understand why we should be on a separate database to target us for what we have to wonder. Is it that we cannot be trusted? I wonder if Theresa May is using us as a bargaining chip. Or what about Annette Zimmerman, who has lived with her partner in Scotland for years and regards Fife as her home? She spoke about the toxic atmosphere which Brexite has enabled and her feelings of stress and anxiety. Yesterday, Annette was travelling back to the UK. She was advised that her passport should now electronically indicate settled status. Annette explained that to border security. She told me, Not only did nothing show, but the border control officer did not even know what I was referring to when I explained that the settled status is supposed to come up electronically. Even when I produced the settled status letter, he seemed utterly clueless, had clearly not been briefed, and nothing was showing on the machine either. Or what about Dr Petra McClay, who has dedicated her working life in this country to educating our children? As a German national, her ability to apply for UK citizenship is not dependent on her contributions to this country over the last 15 years. Rather, it is predicated on her wealth and a price tag of £1,300. Or what about our fourth constituent, a woman who turned up to my surgery last week in tears because she has been refused universal credit due to being classed as not habitually resident? Her entitlement to benefits has never before been queried, but now Brexit allows the authorities to do exactly that and to make her feel alien in a country she has lived in since the age of three. This is the hostile environment that Brexit has created for EU nationals. Theresa May must rule out a no deal, and let me say to Donald Cameron, although I see he is not in the chamber anymore, she must not do it for my party, she must not do it for Plaid Cymru, she must not do it for Labour, for the Greens or for the Liberals, the Prime Minister must rule out a no deal for the EU nationals who live side by side with us all in this country. I support a people's vote because I want an end to the sorry mess that Brexit has become. Now, I understand that there are those on the Conservative benches and elsewhere who do not agree. I respect their right to do so, but what is unforgivable is their abject failure to rule out a no deal. They know the damage no deal would cause, many have said as much, but by blithly refusing to rule it out, they deliberately belittle this Parliament and the Welsh Assembly in the process. Jackson Carlaw's amendment today is nothing short of a disgrace. I hope that every EU citizen who works in this Parliament who serves Jackson Carlaw his lunch, who works for a parliamentary committee supporting members, who monitors the security in this building remembers it, because here is what Jackson Carlaw believes, leave it alone Holyrood, loud and clear from the leader of the opposition, let the big boys sort it out. However, he conveniently forgets that it is precisely because we have left it to Westminster that we remain with 24 days to go with absolutely no clarity over what Brexit is going to mean for the United Kingdom. Today is ultimately a test of devolution. Today we seek to challenge that as two United Legislatures, Scotland and Wales, the second and the third largest countries in this so-called United Kingdom. So will the Prime Minister finally listen? Presiding Officer, this Parliament works best when we are united, yet there are some in this place who wish our politics to be small. But for the rest of us we have a responsibility to our constituents to raise the level of our political discourse above a meerkat. Above a Prime Minister who would rather depend on the votes of the DUP than act on the best interests of the people of this country. In my classroom I used to have the Edwin Morgan poem open the doors pinned proudly to the wall. So let me close in his words. We give you our consent to govern. Don't pocket it and ride away. We give you our deepest dearest wish to govern well. Don't say we have no mandate to be so bold. We give you this great building. Don't let your work and hope be anything other than great. Let us do great work here today and with the support of our Welsh colleagues, let history remember the Conservative Party and the Prime Minister Theresa May for their abject failure to do the right thing for the people of this country. I have a little time in hand in this debate so that I can give some extra time for interventions if there are any. I call Liz Smith to be followed by Tom Arthur. Thank you, Deputy Presiding Officer. I think that everybody in this chamber, whatever our political views, however we voted in Brexit, fully acknowledges that the result of the 2016 referendum led us to one of the most difficult periods that there have ever been in British politics. Recognising the complexities and the difficulties of Brexit has made us question a lot about ourselves, but it has also raised questions about the political process and how it operates. Brexit has been deeply troubling. It has been very emotive and divisive in exactly the same way that the independence referendum was in 2014. However, as we try very hard to take an objective stance on the current debate, I think that we should remember three things. Firstly, we have a democratic duty as politicians to respect the right of the referendum, even if we do not personally like the result. Secondly, voters want us to focus on an outcome that works for them and their families rather than having to watch endless wrangling over constitutional structures. Thirdly, as we listen to the public, we must carefully listen also to those sectors on which our economic future depends, most especially in business and industry, the majority of which, if not all, believe that we should support the deal. We should also acknowledge that, in 2014, when the people of Scotland made a decision to stay in the United Kingdom and in 2016, when the people of the UK made a decision to withdraw from the EU, they made those decisions when the terms of the plebiscite were agreed beforehand. That agreement embodied the acceptance on both sides that the result of the referendum would stand. As I said in the last Brexit debate in this chamber, I was personally very disappointed with the result of the EU referendum. I strongly believed that the economic case for remaining, for some of the reasons that Willie Rennie set out in his speech, I believed that those economic reasons were powerful and I believed that the majority of people would think so too. But I was wrong. Yes, I will. John Mason. I thank Liz Smith for giving way. I would just ask her the same question. As an individual or an organisation can change their mind, would she accept that we can respect the vote but the country might want to change its mind and shouldn't it have that opportunity? Liz Smith. I think that the trouble, Mr Mason, is that if we continually go back to the people because we have not accepted what they said in the first place, when the terms were agreed, we are in danger of undermining our democracy, which is very precious to everybody in this chamber. I had to accept, like many others who voted to remain, I had to accept that people took a decision that was not what we would have chosen. And I think that there are some interesting things about this. I won't have to just make some progress if you don't mind. What we have seen within all the torturous negotiations, within all the reaction to them, is a constant battle between respecting the democratic will of the people, in other words, ridding British politics of all the things that were seen by the 52 per cent of the disadvantages of an increasingly bureaucratic EU, especially in terms of too much control over our laws and borders, and preserving those aspects that were seen to be advantageous, the overwhelming number of which were economic. So the country has been faced by a national debate, which has been played out across the country and within families, according to different criteria for dominating among sleeve and remain voters. And we need to respect that fact, something that I think, in my view, has never been accepted by some in my own party on the right wing. And I don't think that it's been accepted by some in the SNP, who have persistently implied that the Scottish electorate was not divided in its opinion on Brexit when, of course, it was. And that is why we have had this constant use of Brexit as the resonant debtor for the promotion of independence in Scotland. I have said before, and I'll say it again, the arguments for Scottish independence are seen by many as perfectly coherent political belief, which in 2012, the Edinburgh agreement was signed by both the Scottish and UK Governments, and it was to be tested in a referendum. It was tested in that referendum, and that referendum was lost. There was not a sufficient number of voters who were persuaded of the benefits of an independent Scotland. The economic analysis was not judged to be in favour of an economic independent Scotland. Not enough people were persuaded that Scotland was better off outside the UK, but some in the SNP have never accepted that, just as some in the Conservative Party, I believe, are not prepared to accept the outcome of the Brexit debate. Mr Harvie. Patrick Harvie. I'm grateful to the member for giving way. She debates in her usual calm and thoughtful tone, and I respect that. But she does seem much more focused on the 2014 referendum than the consequences of the 2016 one. Does she not acknowledge that the people she's spoken of who want an end of the wrangling will be deeply disappointed if this is not only the beginning of a Brexit process, but the beginning of 10 or 20 years more figuring out what happens after Brexit? The only way to draw a line under this is to give them the chance to cancel it. Liz Smith. Mr Harvie, the people who are going to be most upset and to whom we should be listening most are people who have given us an unqualified view that to get on with the decision is in the interests of our jobs, our investment and the way that Scotland operates in the future. I think that it was Murdo Fraser and Donald Cameron gave us the views of the Scottish Chambers of Commerce, the Heads of the UK's Four National Farmers Union, the Scottish Fishermen's Association, major sectors in the Scottish Whiskey Association and major companies like Diadol. Those are not people who are arguing about the abstract and finer points of the constitution but about what is best for their sector. I think that I'm just about to finish. What is best for their sectors and for our livelihoods post Brexit and it is on that basis, Deputy Presiding Officer, that we must respect what has happened in this referendum, even if we choose that it's not something that we have agreed with personally ourselves. If we don't do that, we are seriously in danger of undermining our democracy. Tom Arthur, followed by Daniel Johnson. Thank you, Presiding Officer. I'm very grateful for the opportunity to participate in this debate, although I suspect that, like many in the chamber, I wish that this was not a debate that we were not having to have. I find it deeply regrettable that we are in this situation, and no more was that underscored for me yesterday when visiting pupils at St Benedict's High School in Linwood in my constituency of Renfisher South, because it is a generation of young people who are going to be deprived of opportunities and chances, which my generation and generations preceding mine have been able to take for granted. However, in engaging with young people, I seek always to look for opportunities to be positive and to discuss the future, regardless of the situations that we find ourselves in. No opportunity affords that more than the opportunity to talk to modern studies classes in our high schools. In speaking to the S3 modern studies class that is in St Benedict's High School, I posed a range of different questions, some about my personal background, some about matters as trivial as what are the names of my pugs. However, I was asked one question that really stopped me and floored me. I have often asked about what are the responsibilities of an MSP and I am able to iterate and list them off, but I was asked what is your biggest responsibility as an MSP. That certainly gave me a cause for thought. What is the biggest responsibility of an MSP? We, who are privileged to sit and to stand at Reeves desk in our national parliament, who may only have a fleeting period of time here, what is our biggest responsibility? I have to say, and I do not wish to sound too grandiose in saying so, but I believe that it is a duty to preserve and to strengthen democracy, particularly as we find ourselves at the end of this decade in a world where populism and even extremism is rearing its ugly features, whether that be in Trump, in the United States or from national in France, the alternative for Deutschland, although the regime is currently in power in Poland and in Hungary and menacing democracies elsewhere across the continent. Members from all sides rise and speak of the importance of respecting the result in 2016. That is something that I take very, very seriously. I think that it is a well-made point, but it is a point that I feel requires further discussion and further debate. First, we have to ask ourselves why did people vote to leave? Why did more than 17 million people in the UK, why did a majority in England, a majority in Wales and over one third of our fellow Scots choose to vote leave? I think that there are a number of reasons, but I would suspect that it is a very small number of people who did so out of pure ideological reasons, because they imagine the UK taking a role of a Hong Kong on steroids in the mid-Atlantic as a buccaneering free trade state. I think that it is a minority, a very small minority of that, because we believe that regulations made in Europe impinge on their life in a negative way. Rather, I think that what was the driver of much of the leave vote, particularly in many communities in England, was the gross and entrenched inequalities that exist across the UK, economic inequalities, geographical inequalities, jobs lost over decades to globalisation and automation, the persistent scapegoating of immigration by right-wing tabloid press. I feel that those legitimate sentiments of genuine anger and frustration were hijacked and manipulated by a class of, frankly, Tory ideologs at Westminster, who have never reconciled themselves to the loss of an empire that predates their own birth. An idea of it was being brilliantly explored and written upon by the Irish writer and commentator, Fintan O'Toole. So what was it that these people voted for if they did not vote for this ideological purity or return of empire? I believe that it was for many, it was frustration to send a message that they were tired of the inequality that persists in many parts of the UK, that they wanted something different, that in many respects, as many of those who voted for Trump did, it was for them a vote for hope. I vote, I would disagree with, I vote that I do not believe will deliver what they wish, but it was a vote for something. If we fail to understand that, then we're in danger of not being able to fundamentally address these issues in drivers that led people to vote for leave. But is Brexit, yes, certainly? Liam Kerr Isn't the member failing to understand that a whole lot of people in the north-east voted to come out because they wanted out of the common fisheries policy? Tom Arthur I recognise the range of reasons, and my party's position on the CFP has been well known for decades, but there's a broad suite of reasons for this, and I think it's incumbent upon us as parliamentarians to seek to explore that. And the question is, will Brexit deliver for those people? Will it address the concerns that people have? And I think that if we are being honest with ourselves, we know perfectly well that it will not. It will not in itself address inequality. It will not address lack of opportunity. And fundamentally, what has been produced in the withdrawal agreement is unworkable. It is riddled with irreconcilable paradoxes. The paradox of wanting close association with the European Union but the capacity to engage in trade with other nations. It is simply not possible. One cannot have both. It seeks to reduce immigration, but the reality is that to get anywhere and trade negotiations with China or India, there will have to be relaxations on visa rules, and we have already seen the increase in immigration from outside the EU, which will offset the immigration that was coming from within the EU. And on the issue of preserving standards and presenting Britain and the UK as a world-class producer of goods, it will mean compromising our standards, as has been made clear by the revelations of what the United States would be demanding in trade negotiations. And the withdrawal agreement does not confront any of these issues. It sits in a status of paradox. It is rather like the paradox of Buradon's ass, which tells of a donkey at an equidistance between a pale of water and a bucket of water and a haystack. And this starving dehydrated donkey cannot choose which one to go for, so it dies. And that is the reality of the withdrawal agreement. Buradon's paradox is about the difference between determinism and free will. And the issue of determination, determinism is important, because this withdrawal agreement is the result of red lines that the Prime Minister did not have to set. But these red lines have led to this path. And the negotiation itself, which has led to this miserable compromise, which cannot command the support of the House of Commons, is a result of the Prime Minister who has shown utter incompetence in these negotiations, not only in setting the red lines, but in triggering article 50, the one card that she could play, triggering it prematurely. Presiding Officer, you're indicating it at a time's up, but I hope that I'll be able to contribute something to this debate. Thank you. Daniel Johnson, followed by Alasdair Allan. Thank you, Deputy Presiding Officer. I'm very pleased to be speaking in this debate, in part because it is an historic occasion when we debate side by side with our colleagues in the Welsh Assembly. But it also allows me to return to the topic of my first speech, because Europe is a defining issue for me in terms of my politics. But when I spoke in my first speech to this Parliament, I hoped that it wouldn't be a defining issue for this Parliament. Unfortunately, it is. And it is for one simple reason that Brexit and remaining in Europe, or how we exit, isn't just a theoretical issue for my constituents. It's one of very real and immediate concern. I'd like to, at the beginning of my speech, reflect on what Jenny Gilruth was saying, because it's those human consequences that really matter. It's about people's jobs, people's livelihoods, and their families. In my constituency, around 10 per cent of my constituents are non-UK EU citizens. Kings buildings, which belongs to Edinburgh University, which is in my constituency, around 17 per cent of staff. Over a third, or around a third of the academics, are EU citizens. The financial services industry employs tens of thousands of people both directly and indirectly. And if you want to understand the implication of this standard life alone, has 500,000 retail customers in Germany, one country in the EU, which it will not be able to service, if we don't retain passborting as part of our membership of the single market. And it has already had to make the decisions. Open the offices, register the new companies and other parts of Europe in order to do that. And then, with three weeks to go, with three weeks to go, we still can't say what is going to happen. When those people come to my surgeries and surgeries, I cannot explain to them what they should expect on March 30. And did even settled status, that fundamental issue of whether people will have the right to stay here, that process will not fully open till March 30. The day after, Brexit is supposed to happen. That's why this debate is so important. But let me also turn to the issues that are at hand, because I think that much of this debate has been one of false options that have been provided, an option of either trading with Europe or trading with the rest of the world. But the reality is, after four decades of our membership of the EU, but also four decades in which globalisation has expanded hugely, we're not just talking about trade with the EU, but because our membership of the EU has provided us with a passport to trading with the rest of the world. There are 750 international agreements that we enjoy the benefits of through our membership of the EU. 750 agreements that we would need to replace if we were wanting to continue to enjoy those benefits. That's why the Government's estimates of crashing out on WTO rules is estimated to cost this economy in the United Kingdom 9.3 per cent of GDP. But it's not even as simple as that because it's often presented as though there's a rule book ready and waiting for us to make use of. But even the WTO themselves say that it would take three months to agree the tariffs and quotas in order to trade on those terms. That's if you even accept that the WTO is able to function because the United States has continually frustrated its ability to operate. It refuses to replace arbitration panel members as reported just yesterday in the FT. That is why companies such as Honda, Nissan, Ford and Jaguar Land Rover are having to make decisions now about putting their investments elsewhere either in Europe or the rest of the world. That's why there are very real concerns about medicines, radioisotopes and the ability to people to get the healthcare that they need. So people with 24 days to go have a right to ask how on earth have we arrived at this situation. We are facing an unprecedented but more importantly a foreseeable and unavoidable economic shock that this Government is willingly taking us towards. In my view, this UK Conservative Government is deficient in the first duty of government when that is to provide its citizens with security and stability. From that outset, this Government's approach to Brexit has been chaotic and one dictated by its own internal agendas. It has had an ostrich-like approach of denial, denial about the impact of Brexit, denial in terms of the support that it may or may not have for its deal, a denial that it should have realised when its deal was comprehensively voted down in the House of Commons, but also denial in terms of the reality of what it could achieve through a Brexit deal. It was in denial about the four freedoms of the EU, four freedoms that the EU consistently said were non-negotiable and, despite that, the UK continued with its approach. I think that Patrick Harvie put it very well. When the result first came in, with the narrowness of that, with the issues at hand, I think that many of us expected a deal to come forward. There was a compromise, a compromise that reflected that 48 per cent of people in the United Kingdom voted to remain. Instead, we had the nonsense of Brexit means Brexit, which Theresa May used to conceal the fact that she was pursuing a hard Brexit. A hard Brexit dictated to the UK Government by the European Research Group, a party within a party. And if you wanted evidence of that, anyone listening to Good Morning Scotland today, listening to Mark Francois, dictating the terms on which the European Research Group would accept the deal, it could be under no illusion of the reality of that fact. Indeed, he was talking about a panel of experts that would judge whatever Theresa May came back to the Commons with. A panel of experts that was going to include Bill Cash amongst others. It's a nonsense. This is no way to run a country. This is no way to govern. It's governing on the basis of short-term calculation rather than national interest. It's governing on the basis of sound bites rather than facts and reasons. That is why we should reject this deal. It is disappointing to hear the Tories offer straw man of May's deal or no deal. Many of their colleagues in the House of Commons have had the courage to speak up, to say that we must rule out a no deal. And it is hugely disappointing to hear not one Conservative member speaking up against that ridiculous and dangerous proposition. Some of them should have the courage to vote today. Rule out a no deal, because that is what is in the interests of the United Kingdom. The Tories don't want to hear this again, so I'm going to say it again. Scotland voted overwhelmingly to remain in the EU. Our interests are now being completely ignored by a shambling UK Government that wants to drag Scotland out of Europe, whatever Scots or whatever this Parliament might think about it. But since Brexit is close enough now to qualify perhaps for its own... Excuse me, Mr Allan. Can we stop the private conversation here? Please don't come into the chamber and immediately start talking across benches. Thank you. Alison Allan. But since Brexit is close enough now to qualify for its own grim kind of advent calendar, let me put this as nicely as I can to the Tories. Brexit is now just 24 sleeps away. After almost three years of self-eviseration, the UK Government will now ask Westminster to back a damaging deal and astonishing 17 days before Brexit is scheduled to happen. Theresa May's deal to use a vivid Scots expression has been so in way a het needle in a burning thread. Article 50 must now be extended to prevent a no deal departure and bring the issue back to the people. A no deal, which some Brexiteers still talk of as if it can be briskly and harmlessly achieved by gunboat, has consequences across Scotland and not least in my constituency. As much as 24 per cent of the Western Isles workforce are employed in sectors that are considered most exposed to the effects of a no deal. Analysis from the chief economic advisor to the Scottish Government shows that a no deal Brexit would lead to a 10 to 20 per cent drop-in exports, a billion pound less investment in 2019, 10 to 30 per cent depreciation in the pound. The UK has failed to offer a single meaningful assurance to any of these businesses. As the First Minister said today, the Scottish Government has sought to find compromises all the way through this sorry process to protect Scotland's interests. And it was, I have to say, depressing today to hear the idea of compromise again dismissed by the Conservatives. But there is an obvious lesson here about what happens when another Government makes Scotland's decisions for it. And of course, there are obvious remedies. In my constituency, however, a restaurant owner has been in touch to say that rising food prices are already impacting on his business. An artist in my constituency has written to me with concerns around customs arrangements and how that will affect exhibitions. A cafe owner has expressed her worries about the costs that she could face in importing materials. And then, there is the seafood industry, a major player in the Hebridean economy. The threat of a post-Brexit export tariffs and border delays is causing very real concern for an industry that depends entirely on getting live shellfish live to its primary export markets in France and Spain. And meanwhile, many crofters in my constituency asked me for the UK's plans on agricultural subsidy beyond 2020. Presiding Officer, with barely three weeks to go, I wish I could write back to my constituents and give them reassuring answers to all those questions about what the UK Government's plans are, but I can't. Last year, the Scottish Government made a series of modest proposals on another issue of vital importance to our economy and to our society, and that is immigration. There were proposals that were designed to overcome the risks posed to Scotland by our unique demographic situation. The response from the UK immigration secretary, Caroline Noakes, was memorably that she was not prepared to give the Scottish Parliament quote, any powers that were not enjoyed by Lincolnshire County Council. EU nationals should never have been asked to pay a fee to stay in the country that they have made their own, and it is welcome news that the UK Government has finally listened on that, but EU nationals should not be asked to apply for the rights that they already have anyway, and we now need clarity on whether the unrealistic deadline for those applications will also be scrapped. That entire story underlines exactly why Scotland needs the power to create a fairer immigration system. I come back to mention my constituency. The Western Isles is a diverse, vibrant place. European nationals have settled in the Western Isles and made the islands their home. They have made an immense contribution to our culture and to our economy. The uncertainty that they have been put through by the UK Government is scandalous. Removing freedom of movement will have an adverse effect on Scotland and, in particular, on island communities. The islands suffer indeed, yep. Patrick Harvie. I am grateful to the member for giving way, and I do not think that he does suggest that freedom of movement is only of economic value, but will he take the opportunity also to make the wider social value that freedom of movement is not simply something that we should defend as a tolerable burden because we get an economic benefit? It is something that is liberating for human beings. It is an extraordinary political achievement in its own right, and it should be defended in the broadest terms possible. Alistair Allan. I am very happy to see all of that. As I said just now, it is important to our society, and I have said many times in the past and I will happily say again that Scotland has benefited immensely culturally from being open to people from other EU countries. However, what I want to do, Presiding Officer, is to end where I began simply by saying that Scotland did not vote for Brexit and that we should not be dragged out of the EU against our will. Our wishes have been utterly ignored before, during and since the 2016 referendum. Brexit is a bid for British isolationism, and I look forward to the day when Scotland recalls with relief the moment that she forged her independent path in Europe and in the world. Stuart McMillan, followed by Jamie Greene. Thank you very much. Just before I start, I want to touch upon just one of the points that Alistair Allan and Patrick Harvie just spoke about regarding freedom of movement. The issue for me in terms of freedom of movement is not just about the people who come to Scotland to enrich our society and our communities. It is about the opportunities offered to Scots to actually go to the EU nations to enrich themselves, enrich their learning and then also bring that back to Scotland when they do return at some point in the future. So it is that two-way process which sometimes is a point that not everyone picks up on. I say that because I benefited from actually studying in Europe. I studied in France twice, Germany and also in Sweden. So I know that the absolute benefit that being a member of European Union has actually afforded me from a personal perspective but also how I've managed to then actually help others within my community, not just as an MSP but certainly as a friend and a colleague and as a member of my own party. But Presiding Officer, I genuinely welcome the fact that this co-operation today between both the Scottish and the Welsh Governments to actually have these debates taking place at the same time. And the strong message from both Scotland and Wales today will actually highlight how concerned the elected members feel on behalf of their constituents and also their respective nations. I'm under absolutely no illusion that no matter what is discussed in this chamber today, the Conservatives will not relinquish their intransigent position which is increasingly isolationist in the extreme. To be 42 days or as Alasdair Allan says, sorry, to be 24 days or sleeps as Alasdair Allan stated earlier on, away from leaving with no deal, no transition and no idea of the terms of the relationship going forward is nothing short of a disgrace. The calamity that has been the approach to the Brexit discussions from the UK Government are laid bare for all to see and the so-called mother of all parliaments isn't just crumbling physically, it's crumbling internally. The strong and stable has long since been dumped into the bin and the worst of the isolationists has been on show for far too long and certainly for the last number of months dragging the weakest Prime Minister in history on a road to nowhere. Presiding Officer, the Tories want us to sign up to the Prime Minister's offer. How can any politician representing a Scottish constituency maintain any credibility by agreeing to a deal that puts Scotland at an economic disadvantage? If that deal has passed and with Scotland being at an economic disadvantage the Northern Ireland then I'm quite sure that when we start to lose inward investment in the future and that inward investment goes to Northern Ireland as compared to here then the Tories will be the first ones to complain and actually blame this Scottish Government and also this Parliament even though it will be them who've actually created that competitive disadvantage for Scotland. Now the UK Government's own analysis shows that the catastrophic impact of a no deal would have on business and also trade. UK economy estimated to reduce by some between 6.3 per cent and 9 per cent after 15 years. The worst-hit areas to be its Wales 8.1 per cent Scotland 8 per cent Northern Ireland 9.1 per cent and the North East of England 10.5 per cent reductions. It's also warned that some food prices are likely to increase and there's a risk that consumer behaviour could actually exacerbate or create shortages. I'm signing off that this is absolutely imperative that an extension to article 50 happens to avoid a no deal scenario. The Tories don't want to prolong the process. They obviously don't realise that if we leave on the 29th of March the issue of Brexit, the economy, trade, education, access to medicines and many many more examples will still need to be addressed. Brexit doesn't end on the 29th of March. The next phase of Brexit starts. I'm signing off that the EU withdrawal negotiations have proven once and for all that Westminster and the Westminster elite and the Tory party hold Scotland in contempt. Minister after minister after minister has either resigned or been sacked. However, somehow Chris Grayling is still in place. Now what an utter disgraceful shambles whilst more people are going to food banks, the Tories give out dodgy contracts for boats that don't exist and then they pay 33 million pounds on hush money because of their arrogance and complete stupidity. And it's the estimator that Chris Grayling has actually cost the UK taxpayer some £2.7 billion pounds. Now if that was any Scottish Government minister the calls from the Tories to get that minister sacked would be just to go off the scale. Now Presiding Officer then there have been the financial bungs to get the DUP and some other politicians on site. The DUP got their £1 billion bungs for the contents and supply arrangement and we've also heard about that Northern Ireland gets an additional £140 million both of which have got absolutely no Barnett consequentials and I suspect this is what's called the union dividend. Now once again Scotland gets shafted and it's to be put back into its box. Now yesterday the UK Government announced their stronger towns fund of £1.6 billion of post Brexit cash. No cash for Scotland and no cash for Wales. They've got to bid for it. Yet another union dividend. Now Donald Cameron all on spoke of an orderly withdrawal obviously that's going well isn't it Mr Cameron? Now Presiding Officer I'm conscious of the time and I support the motion in the name of of the First Minister. I am Scottish and I'm European and I recognise that the EU is not perfect but I also do recognise the benefits that that being a member of the EU actually brings and I want to I want to protect interests of Scotland Wales and also the UK as a whole. Now that's why extending article 50 is so vital. A second referendum is vital and rejecting the right-wing extremist is absolutely vital as well. Thank you very much. Jamie Greene followed by James Dornan Thank you Presiding Officer I've met some of the protagonists who worked on the withdrawal agreement document and I believe that the effort of the civil servants and negotiators involved on both sides of the channel who worked in earnest to find compromises on very difficult subjects should be both acknowledged and commended and not brushed aside casually because pragmatic diplomacy doesn't work for your political hyperbolic headlines. Trying to do something that no EU member has ever done before in the 40 years since Britain joined the European common market has not been just difficult but divisive. We cannot ignore the fact that the deal in question agreed with the EU 27 has raised many political questions. Questions over the backstop if it was ever required and how temporary or otherwise it could be. Questions over the nature of Northern Ireland's relationship with the EU and of course questions and valid questions over what our future relationship with Europe might look like. The First Minister says reject the deal. The sad truth is that this deal was rejected by so many long before it was even published or read. Let us for a moment have a think. Let's have a think about what is the purpose of a withdrawal agreement. What was its purpose? It was fourfold. One, to agree a financial settlement that both parties felt was a fair reflection of the UK's existing financial obligations to the EU's multi-annual financial framework. Secondly, it was to secure the rights of the 3 million EU citizens in the UK. Something I believe these benches wanted and I believe that every other member of this Parliament wanted. Thirdly, it was important to also secure the rights of the 2 million Brits living overseas in Europe, including many Scots who have chosen to make Europe their home too. And fourth, it was to ensure that no hard border would exist on the island of Ireland. It had to find a compromise that respected the Good Friday agreement but acknowledged that there would be a land mass on which one part of it would be an EU member state and the other not. And I believe the negotiators, I'd like to make some progress please. I believe the negotiators did and are still doing their very best to offer the comfort that is needed that there will be no hard border but nor will we end up in some form of permanent purgatory of transition. The withdrawal agreement also did one other thing and this is the important thing. It was to ensure consistency and continuity and transition for businesses in Scotland and in every other part of the UK. We knew that from day one. The Prime Minister's Florence speech made it clear that both sides recognised that there would be a need for some form of transition. When article 50 was triggered, so many businesses and business groups told us they told politicians loudly and clearly that two years negotiating period as defined in the Lisbon Treaty was simply not long enough to allow businesses to prepare for this Brexit. They wanted and they needed that extended period of time to help them to prepare for the new world wherever that new world may be. Now I know in this chamber and outside of it there are a multitude of views on what that future relationship could or should look like. Norway, Canada, Canada plus, Canada plus plus, the Swiss model, Turkey, Ukraine, the customs union, a customs union or just full single market access which comes with full acceptance of the four freedoms of the EU. But whatever your views on remaining or leaving on this model or that model surely entering into transition in 24 days time must be the priority for each and every one of us and every politician in this country to secure the rights of citizens to offer that much needed transition for business to settle our financial commitments to the EU and I cannot think for the life of me why anyone would want to oppose that. I will if it's very brief. Ross Greer Thank you. I just want to go back to the very important point that the member made about the Northern Irish Backstop. Does he recognise that any backstop the UK could unilaterally withdraw from or any backstop that is time limited would risk a hard border and thus does breach the Good Friday agreement? Jamie Greene It is precisely the reason that the backstop is the last resort if no agreement between the EU and the UK can be reached. Nobody wants to get to the backstop point. And if there is a backstop I understand why there are concerns about it being a permanent transition. There is no desire on either side of the channel for permanent transition and that's why I believe as it is worded in the withdrawal agreement at the moment the backstop does work in its current form but I accept that people do want some more comfort that we will not end up in permanent transition. If the withdrawal agreement on the table is such a bad deal which so many say then why does the EU 27 think it is a good one? Is there some EU wide conspiracy to construct a deal which works for neither them nor us? I do not believe that there is. I would like to make some progress. I do not believe that anyone in this chamber wants a no-deal scenario. We have heard it. I do not believe that anyone outside of this chamber really wants a no-deal scenario. And on that I do agree with the First Minister but I should point out that that is what will happen. Motions in this chamber will not change the underlying process by which a member state leaves the EU. And the unfortunate political motivations the unfortunate political motivations behind today's debate simply labour the unchangeable truth. There is no political consensus in this Parliament over Brexit. There is no evidence to suggest that new government or a general election will somehow magic the impossible over Europe. And who believes genuinely that there is any appetite in Europe to rip up the deal and start again. Nobody I've met in Brussels believes that to be the case. Now we know Labour's opportunism on this. They think that this is the quickest route for Jeremy Corbyn into Downing Street. I respect him for having that view. But he says he respects the referendum in one breath and says let's have another in the next. It's no wonder Mr Finlay that Labour plummeting towards 30 per cent in the polls. And it's also clear that the SNP will not just vote against this deal but they clearly have no desire to vote for any deal. The First Minister made that abundantly clear in her opening speech. What remains at the heart of their approach to Brexit is nothing but independence with membership of one union coming second to the leaving of another. The EU is nothing more than a pawn in that game. If I have time Presiding Officer can I talk about the issue of the second referendum because I think it's an important one. Given that that now seems as confirmed today to be the official policy of every other party in this chamber to have another vote. What message can I ask you? Does that send to the 1 million Scots who voted to leave? Or the 17 million voters across the UK voted to leave? I'll tell you what it says. It says your vote doesn't matter. Now if you have a problem with two question referendums or if you're concerned that a 49-51 result is too close that is a laudable and a valid debate to be had. But there's nothing to suggest that a second referendum will be any different from the first. And can I also say any politician in this place who stands up and says that a leave voter did so out of prejudice or far right sentiment needs to have a serious think about their understanding of Scottish voters and 1 million of their fellow citizens. It is that very content it is that very content for the Scottish electorate is the reason that so many voted to leave. You must come to a close now, please. Thank goodness, Presiding Officer, that there's one party in this chamber that is willing to put a question to the people and have the decency to respect its decision. And for that reason I support Jackson Carlaw in his amendment. James Jordan, followed by Alex Rowley. Thank you, Presiding Officer. Can I just, before I start, just say that I think that if anybody is holding voters in contempt as the Conservatives who are holding in contempt 1.7 million voters who voted to remain with an EU. When the people of Scotland go to the polling station they expect their vote to be carried out by their elected representatives to the best of our ability. And that is the very essence of our representative democracy. The people of Glasgow can't vote for me to be their MSP. And the people of Glasgow voted overwhelmingly by 67 per cent to remain in EU as the 62 per cent of the people of Scotland. Westminster said to represent the people of Scotland at a UK-wide level but if there were any doubt about the validity of that statement then the last few months have shown us that nothing could be further from the truth and that Scotland's voice continues to be drowned out. It frustrates me to see Scottish Tories who campaign to remain in EU. People like Jackson Carlaw, Miles Briggs and Adam Tomkin to name but a few not only perform such a sharp U-turn in their EU positions but now put their party interests before the people they represent. Their Tory Government in London has completely lost control on what they claim to be our glorious union has now become the laughing stock of Europe. The Prime Minister seems more concerned about appeasing the hardline ERG and DUP while feeling miserably at the much more important Brexit negotiations and holding the country together. Whether it's a no-deal Brexit or the Prime Minister's Brexit the UK is facing an economic catastrophe the likes of which we have never seen before. That's a new word I've just created there. At the same time political parties have elected members walking out and other representatives are more concerned about self-interest or internal party politics than the plikes which face the people who elected them. Presiding Officer whilst the Brexit chaos at Westminster seems another world away the people and businesses in my Kit Kat constituency are the ones who are already suffering. There's a business in my constituency called Arturo's deli the only Portuguese deli in Glasgow which makes wonderful coffee and also beautiful cakes but more so its owner Arthur employs several locals and his shop serves as a community hub for people as they go about their day. Arthur Santos came to the UK from Portugal in 2006 he married the UK national opened a business in Scotland and has been a vital contributor to the local economy in my Glasgow Kit Kat constituency as my waistline unfortunately shows and that's probably the only time that the whole chamber has agreed with me since I get elected in 2007. I have another friend who came here 40 years ago 40 years ago she worked hard became a social worker had a good career had three children no, one child sorry three grandchildren her daughter is now a councillor and she has been a great benefit to this community the community of Glasgow the community of Scotland the sort of people that we should be trying to entice over here and what happens now she has too along with Arthur he has to fill in one of these forums that is completely ridiculous that somebody who's made their life here who's benefited this community in this country is now having to prove that they're worthy of staying here migrations hugely benefit Scotland and taking away free movement will not only impact individuals and families but also the country's economy and our diverse communities it's an absolute disgrace that EU nationals like Arthur and Marissa that have already made Scotland their home are now being forced to apply for settled status to remain here saying officer our EU citizens should not be made to apply to the shambolic an incompetent home office to retain rights which they are already entitled to however in my constituency it's not only EU nationals who fear Brexit my constituent Isabella has serious concerns about her medical supplies some of which have short shelf lives and which come from EU and I've heard from constituents with epilepsy who are worried about the supply of primadon and constituents with diabetes who are concerned about how they will get their insulin should there be no deal and then we come to trade has been pointed out by the FM and others UK Government's own analysis shows a catastrophic impact and no deal outcome would have on business and trade the assessment published last week predicting and no deal could leave the UK economy 6.3% to 9.9% smaller after 15 years compared to where it would have been just now should be enough for any Government to rethink their position and look for another way out but not here saying officer last week I met with a local printing firm in my constituency who do most of their business abroad they're extremely competitive and more than hold their own against all competitors they've invested £8 million into the firm in the last six years but Brexit looms over them like a dark cloud companies like them fear further expansion may not be possible if markets are closed off or if access is restricted which would clearly give their competitors an advantage and let's also not forget about the benefits of EU funding in the event of a no deal scenario the UK's departure from EU would mean UK organisations would be unable to access EU funding for European social fund projects after Brexit there are many areas through Glasgow that have benefited over the years from ESF and ARDF funding for example the greater Glasgow comm university trust which provides access to a community education degree and benefit and a number of my constituents from Casimal this degree programme provided access to work at the then living wage rates of pay which also gave on the job training and practical experience EU funding future trade prospects the supply of medicines freedom of movement and the rights of EU nationals all threatened threatened by a shambolic Westminster Government who have shown no leadership throughout this process instead the only leadership Scotland has witnessed is that of the First Minister in our outstanding Brexit Secretary Mike Russell today due to their work for the first time in 20 years Scottish Parliament in the national assembly for Wales have been debating the same motions simultaneously here we have two national governments working together in the best interests of their people and stark contrast to the reactions of the Tory government at Westminster Presiding Officer I can stand here and talk for another six minutes about how a no-deal Brexit will adversely affect my constituency but time limit is nice to bring the chamber together but time limit is and I echo many of the sentiments of my colleagues who have spoken before me but even more than that I echo the voices of the Scottish people who voted to remain they've made it absolutely clear that a no-deal Brexit would be catastrophic for Scotland culturally, socially and economically we are potentially only 24 days away from a catastrophic no-deal disaster the Prime Minister must write to the EU asking to extend the article 50 process immediately she must also bring forward legislation to enable a second referendum an EU membership with the option for remain in the ballot paper Presiding Officer a few years ago that well-known prophet Boris Johnson used the word Titanic to explain how successful he thought the Brexit process was going to be Titanic is certainly an appropriate word for it however Scotland is another path it can take Presiding Officer Scotland's people will soon enough decide their own future instead of being shackled to this sinking ship called the UK Thank you Alex Rowley followed by Bob Dorris Thank you Presiding Officer this has been an interesting debate today and one which I believe demonstrates that the Scottish Conservatives are in complete denial about the situation that we find ourselves in and the threat to the Scottish economy and to people's livelihoods The situation that, as James Kelly said, was created by the Conservatives in their first instance in an attempt to address their long-standing internal divisions over Europe and now by their complete failure to put country before party it is also worth making the point that even if an agreement was to be reached in the coming weeks it would be very difficult to put in place the required six acts of Parliament and 600 statutory instruments and get them agreed before the 29th of March That is why I do hope and I do believe that our European neighbours and partners will recognise the need for an extension of article 50 and agree to this if voted through Westminster I would also suggest that whilst there are difficulties in agreeing an extension past the European elections at the end of May where there is a will there is a way and I do think it would be possible to negotiate an extension that takes us beyond the European elections if this time is needed to find the best way forward All of this means we must and should take a no-deal Brexit off the table I know that many people have spoken in that I have spoken to in recent weeks saying that they are just fed up with it all and just want it to be over but a no-deal Brexit would not be the end it would be the start of a further period of much more complex negotiations and a period of instability that would cost jobs increase uncertainty and indeed hardship for communities up and down Scotland As Professor Jim Gallacher notes in today's times he states that Government officials here in one of the world's richest countries have been considering whether there would be enough food in the shops or medicines in the hospitals if we leave with no relationship and no deal The Conservative Government is content to spend £171,000 an hour preparing for a dangerous and unnecessary no deal a no deal that many economists say would be catastrophic and a no deal that for Scotland has the potential to push our economy into recession Imagine that £171,000 an hour being spent instead on education on health on housing on building our economy The Tories in here today should be apologising to the people of Scotland not proposing or opposition to taking a no deal off the table Professor Gallacher is amongst many who would like to see an extension of article 50 used to engage more widely He argues for citizens assemblies a measured deliberative process in which ordinary citizens hear the evidence consider the options and come to a view He acknowledges this could result in a second vote in the country but makes a valid point that campaigning now in a second referendum would be bitter and divisive Whether or not there is time to take on board these ideas now remains to be seen but the point that referendums do not lend themselves to inform debate and tend to create division and bitterness must surely be taking on board for the future The key point of today's debate is to make a clear statement that no deal must be removed from the table Maes no deal threat is empty and hugely expensive wasting billions of pounds we should be spending on vital public services It is a damaging attempt to appease the faction in her own party when she needs to reach out to overcome this crisis Labour are ready to talk to the Government and others in Parliament about a sensible alternative plan but not while Theresa May is wasting £171,000 an hour of taxpayers money on dangerous and unnecessary no deal brinkmanship If the Prime Minister is serious about finding a solution that can command support in Parliament and bring her country together she must listen not only to the majority of MPs and members of her own cabinet but also to the devolved administrations here in Scotland and in Wales who are overwhelmingly against a no deal Brexit Labour will put forward our support and support an amendment in favour of a public vote to prevent a damaging Tory Brexit or a no deal outcome both of which would be so damaging for our country This is in line with our policy that was unanimously agreed at conference last year and a policy that we have stuck to We believe we will consider any back bench amendments that is consistent with this approach Any such amendment to support a public vote could be attached to the Prime Minister's deal or a version of it should it win a majority in the House of Commons We will also continue to push for the other available options to prevent a damaging Tory Brexit or no deal including a close economic relationship based on our credible alternative plan or, as Richard Leonard said, a general election No deal would be deeply damaging for Scotland's economy It would be damaging to people It would be damaging to access to healthcare and to people's quality of life That's why this Parliament should unite and agree that we demand a no deal be taken off the table Bob Dorris, followed by Stuart Stevenson Thank you, Presiding Officer I want to raise a very specific matter which is causing significant concern and alarm to clinicians, patients and families in Scotland and right across the UK in relation to Brexit It's in relation to Scotland's access to European reference networks, ERNs Presiding Officer, can I assure MSPs that this is not going to be a dry consideration of an abstract concept? Rather, it's a very real looming threat to some of the most unwell and vulnerable constituents that we all represent I am convener of the cross-party group on rare genetic and undiagnosed conditions Our membership heard from some clinicians with STAT warnings at our meeting on 5 February from Professor Peter Mosse and Professor Jonathan Berg about the threat of Brexit in European reference networks Not an abstract threat but some very real examples of how it will impact on patients with rare genetic and undiagnosed conditions European reference networks connect patients, clinicians and researchers right across Europe that allow knowledge and expertise about rare disease to be shared across Europe providing patients with access to diagnosis and transformative care without the burden of long distance travel ERNs enable researchers to engage rare disease patients across Europe to support clinical trials offering families hope that an effective treatment or even a cure will be developed for their rare condition At present, the UK Government and the EU have not agreed on a withdrawal procedure that protects the UK's ability to continue to be involved in ERNs and that's a scandal Without continued involvement of the UK, the capacity of the reference networks will be diminished and the network risk is falling short of their ambition to raise standards and equity in rare disease care across the UK Professor Moseley explained that clinicians in Scotland and the rest of the UK have already been informed that they would be prohibited from participating in and benefiting from data collection by ERNs from 29 March 2019 It's not just a threat it's already happening Professor Moseley explained that potential implications of being removed from ERNs include reduced access to the best diagnostic and surgical expertise and the quality of patient care will suffer potentially resulting in patients dying The introduction of inequalities the UK being unable to take advantage of research collaboration and unable to contribute or benefit from innovation Professor Berg at the same meeting echoed those comments made by Professor Moseley and explained that a large axe had fallen meaning that no patient data will be accepted by the EU after 29 March 2019 and that he would no longer be able to seek diagnostic expertise for his patients for our constituents through European reference networks which will be damaging for UK patients Can I thank the genetic alliance UK for their work in this area and a lot of the information that they've given me in preparation for this afternoon's debate Present there are 24 thematic ERNs involving around 20,000 healthcare professionals and 300 centres of excellence right across 26 European countries at present In Scotland seven centres of excellence exist four of them sit within NHS boards including my own in Greater Glasgow and Clyde and they provide very real support for patients and families with a wide range of conditions including rare skin, lung and bone disorders The specialist healthcare alliance who also have been campaigning on this subject estimate there's 150,000 UK patients cared for through European reference networks not an abstract concept but 150,000 patients put at risk by Brexit The protect ERN campaign is calling on the UK government and the EU to secure the sustained involvement of the UK in European reference networks In December 2018 the UK government stated that in a no deal scenario UK clinicians would be declared to leave the ERN on the 29 March We know that is already happening Genetic alliance have said for two long patients and families affected by rare conditions in Scotland and across the rest of Europe have had to struggle to access the correct diagnosis specialist knowledge and appropriate treatment ERNs offer a unique opportunity to transform care and treatment for patients but only if we can maintain momentum and ensure that they can utilise all that specialist knowledge that exists but it's been all put at threat Can I quote Louise James who is a parent representative on Swan UK who son Scott has an undiagnosed condition and participates in 100,000 genomes project a really really worthwhile pan UK project She spoke about two other children She spoke about a little boy called Zach He's currently he's seven and currently in Bristol's children's hospital His gastric issues are so rare here in the UK they are struggling to treat him and he's becoming seriously unwell There is however a doctor in Italy that has researched and treated children just like little Zach and shortly he will be travelling there for surgery The follow-up care will be done here in the UK but using the expert knowledge from that doctor in Italy There's also a little boy called Sam He is three blind in his seizures that so far medicine has failed to control He's the only boy in the UK to be diagnosed with grin one However, there's a big study in Leipzig that is fast leading to potential treatments only by comparing that knowledge widely can we get a diagnosis and treatment for everyone That means carrying on the good work right across Europe where these networks are already in place are adding great value to the quality of life of children like my Scotty just like little Sam and little Zach along with adults right across Europe Presiding Officer No deal must be taken off the table not for the political classes but for our constituents and the patients that I've just outlined here this afternoon Article 50 must be extended My preference is that there is no Brexit The only one cast iron guarantee in reassurance I can give my constituents and families that those that I've mentioned here this afternoon but Maze Brexit is not fit for purpose it does not give those reassurances we seek but I don't give a monkey whether it's Maze Brexit or Corbyn's Brexit I just want to make sure that whether you're Mary Hill or Madrid or Springburn or Stockholm the people I represent the families I represent get the best quality healthcare for the treatment of their conditions and it's the matter of life and death Let's bin Brexit let's make sure no deal's taken off the table and let's serve our constituents The last of the open debate contributions is from Stuart Steadenson Thank you very much Presiding Officer There's one person in all this I do feel a very small degree of sympathy for briefly and that is Theresa May I have a quotation from 2,400 years ago from Sophocles which I think is especially for her The keenest sorrow is to recognise themselves as the sole cause of all their adversities and of course I say that because in choosing at the outset to give away one of the most important negotiating tools she had at her disposal before getting anything in return invoking article 50 giving away time it's the one thing we all get equal amounts of and when you give away time you give away the debate There are some other interesting quotations and I think I want to spend a little time talking about fishing of course and about how that is dealt with in many of the documents The First Minister referred to the American negotiating document and I'll come back to that in a minute or two but in any negotiation where you end up with a printed document it's as well to remember what Tom Witt said the large print giveth but the small print taketh away Now in large print terms fishing figured in Theresa May's speech at the mansion house in January 2017 there was a single mention of fishing in a very substantial speech and that single mention said that we should in essence deliver equity in fishing to foreign countries not a single word about a fisherman in the UK, Scottish, English, Welsh, Irish not a single word only about the foreigners She realised her mistake and in Florence she said there should be equity between our fishermen and the fishermen of other countries In other words she's teeing us up for selling our fishermen out again Today we've got practical problems We're now in the small print We need export health certificates if we're going to land fish from Scotland in other countries Now how is a vessel fishing of Greenland coming to decide where it's going to land in Norway and the Netherlands and Denmark and Scotland and England because they make these decisions while it's sea when they don't have the certificate that enables them to make that choice It's a cost but it also is a delay and it costs time Now let's have a look at some other small print that there is in the American negotiating document And let me just read one paragraph It happens to be under sanitary and psycho sanitary measures Include strong provisions for transparency and public consultation that require the UK this is Americans saying this to publish drafts of regulations allow stakeholders in other countries to comment on those drafts and require authorities to address significant issues raised by these stakeholders and explain how the final measure achieves the set of objectives And how much other countries have to sign off And this is repeated under technical barriers to trade where essentially the same thing is also said It's quite clear that if the UK thinks is getting independence if you're to look at the last big country with whom we might wish to have a trade deal their negotiating terms it tells us exactly they want to control the way in which the UK operates in that regard And of course we've nothing much to give And think about the NHS and they're all there Under trade in services the negotiating terms say apply to all service sectors discrimination against foreign suppliers not allowed retain flexibility for US non-conforming measures In other words they're allowed to not conform to the measures but the UK must And under state-owned and controlled enterprises and that would be the NHS ensure SOEs act in accordance with commercial considerations with respect to the purchase of goods and services In other words you can't run it simply without opening up to commercial competition That's what the Americans want It's been a long-term issue between the United States and the European Union about the privacy and use of data that is collected in the US state Well under financial services the negotiating document says commitments to ensure the UK refrains from imposing measures that restrict cross-border data flows In other words our data should be able to be lifted from the UK and taken to the regime in the United States where personal data is not protected in the way that we are used to expect and require And in agricultural goods non-tariff barriers against US agricultural goods must go In other words we must accept chlorinated chicken we must accept hormone-treated beef it's all in there and here's another one and this is a real cracker under labour require the UK the UK to ensure that foreign workers are protected under labour laws not the US that doesn't really matter they can keep people out as long as they want to Now let me just come back as I reach for the end of my contribution Presiding Officer and look at the small print that goes with the agreement because the afternoon's all been about the agreement and very little discussion about the political agreement and of course for the fishing industry paragraph 75 which reads within the context of the overall economic partnership the partners parties let me say it again within the context of an overall economic partnership establish a new fisheries agreement inter alia on access to waters and quotashares in other words we don't get the sea of opportunity that we've been promised we don't get to get control over our fishing waters in our own rights let me just conclude Presiding Officer with a quote from another age of great difficulties 1862 The American Civil War I'm currently reading the latest biography of Frederick Douglass who visited Scotland in 1843 interesting enough an ex-slave and he wrote and this is I think something we should direct to our conservative friends and I have conservative friends he is the best friend of this country who at this tremendous crisis dares to tell his countrymen the truth it's time the Tories started talking the truth to themselves and not spreading falsehoods about others now moved to the closing speeches disappointing to note that not everyone who took part in the debate is currently present in the chamber and I call first of all Alex Cole-Hamilton for up to seven minutes please thank you very much Presiding Officer it is a great privilege of me to close for the Liberal Democrats in this afternoon's debate I'm grateful for the Government affording time for it and I bid good wishes to our colleagues in Wales we stand together at an inflection point in the history of these islands not since the early days of World War II have we been faced with an inflection point of this magnitude and it is a sad reality when comparing those two fulcrum moments in our nation's history that we realised that in 1940 Great Britain stood alone surrounded by enemies but today we stand alone surrounded by friends friends who are currently trying desperately to coax us out of the tree into which we have inexorably climbed and they do so with affection and with concern these are days of national humiliation and it is an irony that a once great country should be laid solo by a jingoistic elite who hunger for that greatness still but with every passing day push it still further beyond reach they have brought us to the cliff edge of no deal as if it were both a lever of negotiation and a preferred destination let us remember Presiding Officer this is the same elite who in part persuaded some of those people who voted leave to do so because there is a proposition that 80 million Turks stood ready to enter our shores on their accession to the European Union that came from a narrative arc that stoked an old fury over 40 years it has ascribed the blame for social negative social outcomes to incomers and to foreigners and mourned the loss of a country that frankly never existed they do not speak to the Britain that I still recognise one that is welcoming tolerant and resilient that last quality Brexiteers and ERG members now play up as some kind of virtue in the calamity we now face it's true we are a resilient people in the teeth of both war and global economic depression the people of these islands have endured but these times of hardship those times in the history of hardship of this nation were thrust upon us at no point in our nation's history have we imposed a state of emergency on our own citizens as we do so now Governments throughout history Presiding Officer make bad decisions decisions that harm us but the normal course of things is that the population are afforded a chance to correct that course at the ballot box at subsequent general elections at this time no such opportunity has been afforded to the people of Great Britain and that is why on the 24th of June when the result was known our party was the first to call for a referendum on the final terms of the deal I am grateful to members from across the aisle from all parties who have joined us in that for their solidarity that focus on resilience has led Brexit he is likely in Fox to say that no deal whilst he used to say it was preferable is now survivable Presiding Officer the cold reality of that is that a Brexit without a deal may not be survivable for all of the people that we represent indeed I am sure I am not alone in the sense of panic visited in my mail bag from constituents who have contacted me each of whom who rely on life-saving medicines with a short shelf life who have to be taken in a time sensitive manner and which are produced on the continent who have deep concerns for conditions of epilepsy diabetes or HIV each of which could prove fatal should those resources dry up the first duty of any government any government should be to offer comfort to our most vulnerable citizens and to protect them from harm and this UK government has singularly failed in that regard and when the health secretary of the United Kingdom Matt Hancock boasts that the UK is now the biggest buyer of fridges in the world he diminishes himself he diminishes the office he holds and he diminishes this entire country Presiding Officer it's not just patients but farmers as well and we've heard a lot about the NFU and why we should back the deal but the NFU also pointed to the fact there is a surge in numbers of farmers reported to them who are currently on what they call suicide watch because of the anxiety that they feel about the products that they won't be unable to sell in the event of a no-deal Brexit we know all about the fruit pickers who are integral to the just-in-time economy but the lammers, the sheep farmers who will lose £30 per lamb in the event of a no-deal Brexit never mind the difficulties they may have in exporting to the continent but the biggest threat is to peace on the island of Ireland that no deal would bring and no deal would drive a coach and horses through the good Friday agreement and very possibly lead that island and potentially the mainland to a state of civil war no form of Brexit is less harmful no form of Brexit does not cause harm and for all of these reasons my party has articulated the basic necessity that in the cold light of dawn now the reality of this departure from the EU is known we should credit the British people with the maturity to say in the solemnity of the pulling stations where this first started is this really what you meant and if it is not then you should have the right to return us to membership of the European Union Presiding Officer we've heard something of the deficiency of unicorns that currently exist at Westminster there is a deficiency also in no-deal planning the sum total of our preparation has been laid out in this debate in an out-of-court settlement to Eurostar a ferry company which has never floated a boat in its entire existence and a pile of fridges that would embarrass a magnet showroom these are days of humiliation for this country I want to close by saying to the ERG members and those hard Brexit-y isn't some of whom may sit on benches to the left of me that the threat of no deal you have promised to take back control but we have no control in the current circumstances that we find us in the threat of no deal you hold a gun to nobody's head in terms of negotiation but our own and the constituents that we in this place represent you have sought to restore these islands to greatness but that greatness currently lies in ruins it is high time that the emperor that you recognised that the emperor of no deal which you have created or your colleagues have created isn't just underdressed he is stark bollock naked there is no promised land there is no land of milk and honey and for that reason the Liberal Democrats will support the government motion tonight thank you could I urge the member thank you could I urge the member just to watch his language in his chamber and to please use terms that are more respectful called Ross Greer thank you Presiding Officer there are moments that we can be proud of broad agreement across this Parliament often those moments of unity seeers rally round a progressive cause or a statement of values and today we are doing that between here in the Welsh Assembly five parties are doing that members have made statements in support of a broad internationalism of a progressive outward looking society and have the incredible achievements in peace and freedom that we've played our part in as a participant in the European project but fundamentally what we are doing here today what we are uniting in today is a damage limitation exercise a defensive action against the single most self-destructive political act in our post-war history and that profoundly saddens me I was not elected to this Parliament to spend my time here on damage limitation especially when that damage comes from something that Scotland voted overwhelmingly against like Tom Arthur I was visiting a school yesterday where a 17 year old Polish student simply said to me I hope I get to stay what a profoundly distressing thing for that young man to have to contemplate what a profoundly depressing state the UK government has taken us to where that young man was worried about being thrown into the cruelty of the immigration system that the UK government already runs for citizens of countries outside of the European Union the scale of chaos the incompetence the instability playing out at Westminster has now gone on for so long that there's a danger of it being normalised but this is not normal as the First Minister said in opening this is a developed nation in peacetime why have the Tories brought us to the point of stockpiling medicine and fuel why are they unable to choose between the preservation of the Northern Irish peace process and satisfying the obsession of extremists on their own back benches why is the cabinet minister responsible for over £2 billion worth of screw-ups who gave a ferry contract to a company with no ferries still in office the answer to that last one Presiding Officer is quite simple Chris Grewling voted leave it is another example of what Patrick Harvie referred to the Prime Minister put in Tory party interests ahead of basic competence at the highest levels of the British government and her strategy of running down the clock playing chicken with her back benches is reckless it's irresponsible it's certainly not statesmanship it's hard to explain to the public why a no deal Brexit would be so catastrophic what we talk about the warnings they sound unrealistic but we have a responsibility to try because this is a very real threat we need to tell the public what will happen to the supplies of food the fuel of basic goods what will happen to jobs and their rights and funding from everything from youth clubs to agriculture the threat to medicines is particularly profound especially for those like James Dornan's constituent who rely on repeat prescriptions and the number of cases that Bob Dorris mentioned there are people whose lives depend on daily or frequent medication for epilepsy, diabetes, asthma and far far more any shortages of medicines can be fatal as the English health secretary has apparently laid bare to the UK cabinet they have been warned about this and Alex Cole-Hamilton is absolutely right to say it is a national humiliation that we have a health secretary bragging that the UK is now the world's largest purchaser of fridges so that they can store that stockpile medicine it shouldn't need said but apparently it does medication saves lives and nothing which puts access to it at risk should be tolerated and yet for the Prime Minister it's a risk worth taking and for some Tory MPs it is the outcome they actually want I know the Scottish Government has published guidance on no-deal preparations and I appreciate that but the page on medicines and the NHS is not reassuring as it stands the government is simply warning that there may be shortages but the page doesn't yet provide advice on what to do if there actually are shortages or what people should be doing to prepare and I appreciate absolutely that the Scottish Government did not cause this crisis but they must also ensure that the public are adequately prepared to the greatest extent that they can now, while Rennie was absolutely correct to say that there's no Brexit outcome that would see us better off that's something that I'm sure we will all remember when the born again breaks the tears on the Tory front bench next attempt to lecture the rest of us on what's best for Scotland's economy and again we should be clear about what a no-deal scenario means for Scotland's economy according to the Government's projections they reckon we'll be facing an up to 7% drop in our GDP by the end of this year that's breathtaking but for most people that's an abstract figure what it means in practice is up to 100,000 lost jobs for those fortunate enough to still have one the value of their wage will plunge every day items will become more expensive if they're available on the shelves at all and sometimes I just can't tell which Tories don't grasp this and which do but don't care they're pitiful stronger towns fund for England shows this ignorance and contempt the headline figure of £1.6 billion quickly falls apart already suspiciously low and far lower than what is provided through European funding it gets worse when you discover that it's spread across seven years if, and it's a big if because they haven't bothered clarifying this yet if Barnett applies to the fund Scotland would receive about £26 million a year to put that in context when the Greens got the threshold frozen for the high rate of income tax in the first budget that we negotiated in this term it raised more annually than the most that the stronger towns fund might deliver for Scotland that's a minor concession that we secured in one budget that is worth more to Scotland than the Westminster Government's flagship Brexit fund this Brexit bride fund does show how we got here though communities that were abandoned by the state and devastated by austerity were won over by leave campaigners promising a change a Brexit dividend putting that claim on the side of a bus that they knew there was no chance of it being fulfilled certainly not with the likes of them in government but the damage that Brexit will do to these communities goes far beyond what this pitiful pot of bungs offers and I commend the Labour MPs who have already rejected it the very Labour MPs that it's aimed at if anything it's made the Prime Minister's task more difficult it's further alienated those Labour MPs and it's further alienated Tory MPs whose constituencies it won't apply to but on that note of those communities who did vote leave I can only ask Jackson Carlaw who accused others of being elitist who believed that 17 million people were duped did the Conservative party no longer care about the rule of law the leave campaign broke the law they acted illegally they breached spending limits they stole data more serious investigations into their funding are on-going if the referendum had been binding rather than advisory it would have been struck down on that basis I cannot imagine Mr Carlaw being so prosaic had the yes campaign been found to break the law but Tory hypocrisy is nothing new here we know what the choices are now a terrible deal already rejected by MPs the disaster of no deal or revoking article 50 ending this sorry process and remaining it looks like MPs are unable to make that choice so the solution for them is clear vote for an extension to this process and hand the choice back to the people now they've seen the lies of the leave campaign collapse under the weight of reality they deserve to pass their verdict thank you and I would just urge Mr Greer as I did Mr Carlaw Hamilton just to be careful about your use of language and be as respectful as possible to the chamber as to all members call Neil Findlay to conclude Presiding Officer it's just 24 days until the UK is scheduled to leave the EU 24 days to go and the country remains still in limbo we see businesses unclear on the regulations they have to comply with the exporters in the dark about transport arrangements about customs procedures workers in EU citizens ensure of their futures or their rights that no one sure of data sharing arrangements or banking arrangements we see a lack of clarity over the operation of our borders especially in Northern Ireland the list goes on and on and on and on and it's outrageous to think that we're now at this stage in March and we're still uncertain about how we will leave the EU or indeed if we will leave the EU on the 29th of March and Richard Leonard Willie Rennie, Patrick Harvie the First Minister and many others were right not only is that a dominant indictment of the sort of chaotic administration the Tories are running but it's a serious threat to the livelihoods of thousands of people across Scotland and across the communities of the UK and of course it won't be Jackson Carlaw or Mr Tomkins or Boris Johnson who will suffer the consequences oh no not for the privileged few things will carry on as they were as we saw when Jacob Rees-Mogg of all people with all the brass neck that he has had bred into him moving his business interests to Dublin it will be the same people who always suffer it will be them that feel at most the working people of this country who toil every day to keep our economy moving and whose taxes pay for public services the business owners selling into the EU who still doesn't know what if any tariffs will apply or what regime of bureaucracy and paperwork will be needed they still don't know if by the end of this month they will be left working under WTO rules with all that that means because WTO rules are about much more than tariffs and trade it's about energy transfer it's about food and food safety it's about agriculture it's about manufacturing and it's about jobs jobs and jobs again it's been two and a half years since Cameron and Osborne pulled their tactical masterstroke quite spectacularly backfired and two years since Theresa May called an election that was equally as successful and we had Jamie Greene accusing Labour of opportunism for calling for a general election well I have to ask Mr Greene was it opportunism when Theresa May tried to exploit the situation in a general election and it blew up right in her face with less than a month to go we are no clearer on the way forward with Parliament and deadlock we're told no deal has to stay on the table as a negotiating strategy will I ask the Tories across this chamber how would you obsess the success of that strategy when you see Honda leaving Swindon Nissa and refusing to make their new model in Sunderland and when businesses in Scotland fear for their futures and workers their jobs as Daniel Johnson so well described does Mr Carlaw still believe this is all part of a clever strategy is it a cunning plan if it is then it could have easily been drawn up by Baldrick with the Government preparing for food shortages stockpiling medicines commissioning lorry parks social care providers on the edge over a staffing crisis tax payers as many people have mentioned shedding 33 million for ferry services that never existed and rising tension in Northern Ireland after decades of painstaking work to bring peace and the potential of a huge increase in mass unemployment is this all a price worth paying for a Tory no deal the reality is that all of this and all of the people are affected are simply viewed as collateral damage in the Tory civil war over Brexit let no one be under any illusions we're in this mess because of the Conservative party the referendum was conceived and executed by them and the representatives in Scotland have stood aside applauding Theresa May's every move as she is hidebound by the Brexiteers and the DUP offering crumbs to MPs in northern and midland seats and even trying to woo trade union leaders who her party has all their time vilified I've watched in this chamber time again as Adam Tomkins and Jackson Carlaw defend the Prime Minister's farcical moves which has put this country on a trajectory that could wreck our economy and so much more and I have to say at this point I haven't heard Mr Tomkins speak but you know this all the way through I don't believe he believes a word of it I wonder if he will take this opportunity to say enough is enough and calling the Prime Minister to rule out no deal and her bad deal that was remember rejected by the House of Commons in a record defeat or does he put his subservient loyalty to his latest political party ahead of his constituents' jobs it's obvious what this is really about it's about the 40-year civil war in the Tory party over Europe that has dominated the politics of the UK for far too long Jacob Rees-Mogg and Boris Johnson are the true heirs to Enoch Powell and Norman Tebbett I say put an end to the war and get on with securing a deal that delivers a new comprehensive UK EU customs union to ensure that there are no tariffs with Europe avoids any need for a hard border in Northern Ireland whether people voted leave or remain they didn't vote for this and they certainly did not to see them in their communities impoverished today this Parliament has the opportunity tonight to unite with her friends and the Welsh Assembly and send a message to the Prime Minister take no deal off the table extend article 50 drop your deal that has been so comprehensively rejected by the UK Parliament and today by this one and the Welsh Assembly Thank you and can I ask Adam Tomkins to wind up for the Conservative Party Thank you, Presiding Officer The withdrawal agreement delivers on what business wants it delivers on the UK's priorities it delivers on the EU's priorities and it even delivered on what the SNP demanded business said business said that it wanted legal certainty and an orderly Brexit while the withdrawal agreement delivers on this it provides legal certainty on trade on goods on customs on excise duty on intellectual property rights on data sharing on public procurement and also on police and judicial co-operation all of that, Presiding Officer, is jeopardised by those who don't back this deal The UK's priorities going into the withdrawal negotiations were that the common travel area with Ireland should be maintained that we in the United Kingdom should regain control of EU immigration that citizens rights be protected that workers rights be protected and that going forward we have the closest trading relationship with the European Union of any non-member state country in the world and the withdrawal agreement delivers on all of this The SNP demanded four things of the withdrawal agreement Mike Russell called for a transition period the deal provides it Nicola Sturgeon called for a guarantee on EU citizens rights the deal provides it Nicola Sturgeon criticised a blindfold Brexit this deal ensures that it will not happen in one minute and Mike Russell called for no hard border on the island of Ireland this deal ensures that that will not happen what the SNP demanded has been granted in this withdrawal agreement and still they're minded to vote against it First Minister I know this is deeply embarrassing for Adam Tomkins because he doesn't believe a word that he's saying but let me take it at face value he talks as if it is only the SNP that opposed the Prime Minister's deal if the deal is so perfect if it is the triumph that Jackson Carlaw talked about why is it that most Conservatives do not support the deal either Adam Tomkins Presiding Officer I support this deal I think that we should all support this deal and that the way in which we deliver what the First Minister set out her store this afternoon saying we should do which is to take no deal off the table is to back the deal Presiding Officer The SNP talked of how they have compromised but the reality is that they boxed themselves in with their own red lines two years ago and they've had their fingers in their ears ever since for insisting that we remain in the EU single market and customs union would mean in reality that we wouldn't be leaving the EU at all you cannot take back control of your borders if you stay in the single market I've already given to the First Minister once and you cannot take advantage you cannot take advantage of Brexit you cannot take advantage of Brexit and develop your own independent trade policy if you stay in the EU customs union let me finish the point Mr Swinney and most of all Presiding Officer you cannot seriously demand a place at the UK's negotiating table if at the same time you are plotting to break the UK up John Swinney I just like Mr Tomkins to clarify one point that he's just made he's attacked the First Minister for believing that maintaining our membership of the single market would be a good thing Why was that Ruth Davidson's position in the aftermath of the referendum? Adam Tomkins The position of all Conservatives Presiding Officer is that we must obey the verdict of the British people we should deliver on the referendum results that the British people voted for in a fair and lawful referendum and that we as the United Kingdoms should leave the European Union but for the SNP for the SNP independence as we've heard over and over again this afternoon independence transcends everything and for the SNP Brexit is simply an opportunity to be weaponised in the nationalist's endless pursuit of independence independence at any cost Presiding Officer I've made plain my opposition to a no deal Brexit many times but the way to avoid a no deal Brexit is not to delay Brexit but to back the deal The withdrawal agreement negotiated by the Prime Minister's team on behalf of the United Kingdom is even after all this time the only deal on the table Of course it can be tweaked Of course it can be clarified Of course it can be added to with a new legally binding codisill if necessary but there is no evidence Presiding Officer no evidence at all that the withdrawal agreement can be replaced we've had three weeks three years and there is no credible alternative plan anywhere near the table If you want to avoid a no deal Brexit back the deal that's what business wants that's what Scottish farming wants it's what fishing wants and it's what voters overwhelmingly want Presiding Officer what have we learnt about the party's positions this afternoon well we've learnt from the Lib Dems the Lib Dems have proved yet again that their commitment to democracy is as threadbare as the EU's when Denmark rejected the master's treaty the EU said you got it wrong so vote again when Ireland rejected the niece's treaty the EU said you got it wrong so vote again and now the UK has rejected the European Union the Lib Dems have nothing to say but you got it wrong vote again well I believe Presiding Officer and on these benches we all believe that referendum results must be respected and that it is our duty as elected politicians to deliver on what the people have voted for and the British people voted to leave from Labour what have we learnt this afternoon well we've learnt that yet again not only do they not have a plan for Brexit they don't even know if they want Brexit at all or not but they would rather get into bed with the SNP than support what the people of the UK clearly voted for in 2016 the withdrawal agreement protects workers' rights yet Labour MPs are still planning to vote against it and when asked whether Labour want a general election or a second referendum or whether for Brexit to be delivered or delayed or even abandoned we get nothing but confusion from Labour and then we have the SNP proving once again that they are addicted to referendums and Presiding Officer addicted to losing them proving that they are hell bent on voting against a withdrawal agreement despite the fact that it delivers what they demanded proving that they want as disorderly a Brexit as possible in order to pursue their pet project of independence and proving of course that they are committed to dragging Scotland back in to the EU's hated common fisheries policy against Scotland's will there is an alternative Presiding Officer an alternative that respects the results of constitutional referendums an alternative that supports leaving the European Union with a deal an alternative that says there should be no delay to article 50 and most of all no reversal of Brexit I support the amendment in Jackson Carlaw's name Thank you very much I call the cabinet secretary Michael Russell Thank you Presiding Officer we now know that the Scottish Conservatives we now know that the Scottish Conservatives will be fighting the next election under the slogan which may not do them much good obey Mrs May this is the only thing that she works for them I look forward to seeing that on endless posters perhaps with a picture of a Dalek which would go down particularly well I have to say that the bulk of this debate today has been a very useful contribution from this Parliament and from the Parliament in Cardiff their debate is just coming to an end as well and I'm glad to say that Mark Drakeford sent me a message this afternoon which he wanted me to use at the start of my contribution and I shall do so and Mark has said that we have seen many remarkable days in the last three months but today is another one it's the first time in 20 years of devolution that the two Parliaments ours and yours are simultaneously debating the same motion that is a sign of the seriousness of the threat which faces Wales Scotland and the whole of the United Kingdom the threat of a no deal outcome after nearly two years of painful and on the UK side incompetent negotiations we must together send an unequivocal message that this threat can and must be averted and of course this afternoon as these two Parliaments have been debating this unprecedented threat to both Parliaments there's also been the leak of a letter in Northern Ireland from David Sterling the head of the Northern Irish civil service and he warns the parties in Northern Ireland of the grave consequences which could have a long lasting effect on society in the province so in Wales in Scotland and in Northern Ireland there is a very acute sense of the pending disaster that is Brexit and this debate has reflected upon that with some very good contributions I would mention and there have been so many but I'd mentioned Jenny Gilruth's the reminding answer of Edwin Morgan's poem in 2014 Daniel Johnson's very passionate defence of Europe and like Daniel I have to say that I too I'm motivated by a strong pro-European sense I identify as a European as he does and he brought that to this chamber Alasdair Allyn's customary original speech Keith Brown and Bob Dorris referring to the European reference networks I've met with representatives of those networks who are very worried indeed about the effect on rare disease research and coordination right across Europe and I know that my friendly cabinet secretary for health has written to the UK government about that very particular issue and Neil Findlay at the end and I don't often quote Neil Findlay with approval but I'm going to today Neil Findlay at the end making the point very effectively to Jackson Carlaw and his colleagues and if I might paraphrase it in a phrase what will happen in Brexit is what often happens the rich shall take the profit and the poor will take the blame because it won't be Jackson Carlaw that's queuing up for medicines it will be our constituents who are queuing up for medicines but what we heard this afternoon was in one party certainly a most extraordinary defence of the indefensible and I want to spend a little bit of time in my summing up examining why that is the case I find it really hard to understand the position of the Scottish Conservatives what do they think is actually happening when they look at the evidence around them for example businesses large and small are saying that Brexit is a disaster this very afternoon Willie Walsh, the head of British Airways said that it was shocking the way in which the UK Government had behaved on Brexit EU nationals are in distress Jackson Carlaw when mentioned Mrs MacDonald but there are endless people who come to my surgeries we've heard it from from Jenny Gilruth and others who are in real distress about this situation and we know of UK citizens who are in equal distress living in other countries we know that medicines are being stockpiled that there are threats to food supplies and there are preparations as the First Minister said in her opening speech that are unprecedented in peacetime we know and it was a point that Alec Cole-Hamilton made that the UK Government is an international laughing stock indeed the New York Times reflecting on Chris Grayling said that he even exceeded the norm in what it described as a golden age of ministerial incompetence that is a leading American newspaper commenting on the Conservatives in Government we know that the economic projections are all bad we know that the House of Commons is paralysed and their own party is deeply split we know that there is unprecedented co-operation between the parliaments of these islands and even in this chamber between parties and again and again they are isolated in this chamber we know that the EU 27 are refusing to budge on the withdrawal agreement that's absolutely obvious the attorney general arriving in Brussels this afternoon said there's always hope it's not really much of a negotiating stance is it and they also know that their own members here and you only had to have the evidence of your own eyes their own members here are deeply uncomfortable because they're trying to justify the unjustifiable and what they're doing is trying to preserve not democracy we had all those fine words about democracy what they're trying to do is to preserve their party Donald Cameron upbraided me this afternoon for quoting Burke claiming that I rejected in my quoting from Burke in the last debate the people's vote and its result I suggest Mr Cameron might want to go back and read Burke he probably reads it more often than I do because Burke is a leading conservative theorist and indeed the latest book on his political thought comes from a Tory minister Jesse Norman but he argued and always argued representatives are more than ciphers and I thought was a Tory position until they got hung up on the Brexit referendum when Burke actually wrote his letter to the electors of Bristol in 1774 the quote that Mr Cameron objected to he was about to become their MP in 1779 five years later he was about to leave being their MP but he continued to reflect on his duty and in his final letter to the electors in Bristol he said this he that is the representative is in Parliament to support his opinion of the public good he does not form his opinion in order to get into Parliament or to continue in it and that is what we have seen with the Conservatives backing a referendum because they want to stay in power in London no matter the cost so why are the Scottish Conservatives supporting that defending the indefensible why are they doing that well I can only suggest from my own observations of what I've seen over the last years what is happening and I think there are three reasons why they are doing so and there are three things that the Scottish Conservatives are trying to avoid and the first is their own powerlessness just as the Prime Minister and her cabinet have no respect for this chamber they have no respect for the Scottish Conservatives too they do not reckon in the annals of conservatism elsewhere but the Scottish Conservatives do not want to recognise that so they shout all the louder for Brexit this also makes them confront an uncomfortable truth about what has happened in devolution because what has happened not just in Scotland but also in Wales is a divergence a political divergence and there is a divergence between the way in which Scotland operates and Wales operates and governs and what's happening in the complete mess at Westminster and they don't want to confront that because many of them aspire still to go to Westminster we've seen them come and go here they come into this parliament they're elected here and the noblest prospect they see is to go somewhere else they don't want to confront that I notice I notice a number of them shouting that that's not the case they're the ones they can shout presiding officer as much as they want they're the ones who haven't been selected to go elsewhere I'll have to say and anyway and the third thing the third thing they have to confront the third thing they have to confront is their own divisions because there are sensible moderate conservatives on those benches there are one or two who know how ridiculous the position is that they have found themselves in they know that they are defending the indispensable and that's why they indulge in the displacement activity we've seen this afternoon blame the SNP attempt to smear it on others to hide their own tensions in a very real sense Brexit has brought out the absolute worst in the Scottish Conservatives and you can see it on their benches the more they grin the more they shake their heads the more they realise that this is terminal for them unless they wake up to their obligations of Scotland Mr Chapman goes on grinning Mr Chapman will continue to grin until he is defeated and it won't be far off I'm glad to say I am glad to say no let me uh let me let me bring this let me bring this let me bring this to a conclusion by leaving the Tories presiding officer to their own misery let leave the Tories to their own misery and let's stand back let's stand back and look at what has actually taken place today what this chamber I hope will do in the next 10 minutes is be very clear what is unacceptable first of all a no deal is unacceptable and must come off the table that is what Wales will say that is what Scotland will say secondly it will say that the Prime Minister's deal is utterly unacceptable as it is it is another catastrophe and to say we do not wish that that is what we will say that is what Wales will say and then we will go further and we will say that the time has come for people to choose the time has come to overcome the selfish narrowness of the Scottish Conservatives and their masters south of the border the time has come to say to the people of this country what do you want do you really want to continue with this farce and nonsense which the Tories know better Tories know that that is the case do you want to continue with this or do you want to actually go back and consider again the way in which we should as a country go forward no I'm sorry sorry Mr Scott I don't have time and you are one of the ones I respect in this you are one of the ones I respect in this and I don't want you to embarrass yourself because you don't have to you don't have to you don't have to stand up you don't have to say say you don't have to Presiding Officer Presiding Officer you don't have to stand up for what the Tories are Order please order you could find a better way forward Presiding Officer this has been a useful debate if it does nothing else it will send a message and the message is this the Scottish Conservatives are representing are not representing Scotland they are representing the Conservatives and that in Scotland is a one-way ticket to oblivion thank you that concludes our debate on EU withdrawal negotiations point of order from Tavish Scott point of order if I may Presiding Officer I lodged a parliamentary question on 1 February regarding the future of the air discount scheme following an earlier response I had received suggesting an announcement would be made in due course this asked in light of the current scheme ceasing on 1 April whether it will confirm by what date the announcement will be made a further reply from the transport secretary was received on Friday last week stating the Scottish Government will make a formal announcement before the current scheme ends today a mere two working days later the Scottish Government did make such a full announcement on the air discount scheme Presiding Officer the ministerial code 3.5 states when the Parliament is meeting ministers should ensure that important announcements of government policy are made in the first instance to Parliament it is hard to see Presiding Officer what possible justification there can be for a minister to wait a month before giving Parliament a non-answer to a written question on Friday only for the substantive announcement to be made to the media two days later surely the appropriate action for the minister to take would be to provide a holding reply on Friday and a substantive response today Presiding Officer can you advise on how ministers might avoid such a discurtsy to Parliament in future and indeed what is the point now tabling a parliamentary question in the first place Can I thank the member for advance notice of his point of order and on which I can advise while I am not responsible for the operation of the ministerial code I note that the Scottish Government did not follow one of the methods set out in the good practice guidance on announcements to make this announcement those methods include ministerial statements as well as government inspired questions or GIQs as they are now known this guidance exists to ensure that announcements by the government on matters of importance do not enter the public domain before being communicated to the Parliament this underlines the point that ministers are accountable to the Parliament and the Parliament should be able to hold ministers to account and it ensures transparency in proceedings now I appreciate that some judgment is required about whether the announcement should be made using one of those methods and if so which method should be used however it is clear that the member has shown an interest in this matter and has written PQ offered the opportunity for the announcement to be made to the Parliament I'm also sure that other members would be interested in this matter I therefore invite the government to reflect on this point and to give some consideration on how it informs the Parliament of policy matters in the future thank you so we now turn to decision time and there are two questions as a result of today's business the first question is that amendment 16107.1 in the name of Jackson Carlaw which seeks to amend motion 16107 in the name of Nicola Sturgeon on EU withdrawal negotiations be agreed are we all agreed or not agreed we'll move to a vote members may cast their votes now the result of the vote on amendment 16107.1 in the name of Jackson Carlaw is yes 29 no 89 there were no abstentions the amendment is therefore not agreed so the final question is that motion 16107 in the name of Nicola Sturgeon on EU withdrawal negotiations be agreed are we all agreed we're not agreed we'll move to a division members may cast their votes now the result of the vote on motion 16107 in the name of Nicola Sturgeon is yes 87 no 29 there was one abstention the motion is therefore agreed and that concludes decision time we'll now move to members business in the name of Neil Findlay on Scottish Government declines help of mesh expert but we'll just take a few moments for the ministers and members to change seats a few minutes