I am grateful to the right hon. Gentleman for his intervention and for coming to a similar view to the Labour party. He is a Scottish MP, and I want to express my sympathies with those affected by the incident that is unfolding in Edinburgh, where a ship has capsized, injuring, we believe, 15 or more people. Our sympathies are with him and with the people of Scotland today.
The Government have said that today’s vote is the main vote that the House will get on the Windsor framework. My speech will focus on why Labour supports the deal overall, but I will begin with the Stormont brake, which is the subject of the regulations before us today.
The democratic deficit was always one of the hardest parts of the protocol deal to reconcile. Of course, businesses and most people in Northern Ireland want to continue accessing the European market as well as the internal market, but the cost of this access was having no say on the rules that had to be followed. The Stormont brake will give representatives a say once devolved government is restored. It is impossible to argue that this is not an improvement on the current situation.
Thirty MLAs from two parties will be able to trigger the brake, but just as important is the new Committee of the Assembly that will scrutinise new laws affecting Northern Ireland. There are understandable concerns about how the brake will work in practice, but the best way of stress-testing it is through experience, and we can get that experience only by restoring Stormont. We all want to see Northern Ireland’s devolved Government back up and running—I know that is what DUP Members want to see, too.
I will state the obvious before going further: Northern Ireland’s economy has huge potential and is doing well. The Prime Minister eloquently explained why on his last visit to Northern Ireland, but he did not need to do so, because everyone who lives in or runs a business in Northern Ireland already knows. The challenges posed by the protocol go much deeper than market access, and that is what needs the most attention during this period of tortuous renegotiation.