European Union: Negotiations (European Union Committee Report)

Baroness Bennett of Manor Castle Excerpts

Monday 16th March 2020 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Bennett of Manor Castle (GP)]

My Lords, I thank your Lordships’ House for its forbearance in allowing me to speak into the gap. I echo many noble Lords in congratulating the noble Earl, Lord Kinnoull, on the excellence of his report and to offer the Green group’s support to the amendment tabled by the noble Baroness, Lady Hayter, in the interests of democracy.

I will not repeat the many concerns expressed by noble Lords about what is happening with aviation, chemical regulation, Euratom, the ideologically driven direction that the Government are taking, or indeed the concerns others have rightly expressed about the lack of consultation with the nations. I join the noble Lord, Lord Barwell, and many others in congratulating the noble Lord, Lord Kerr, on his excellent explanation of the Northern Ireland situation and I am sure I will be linking to that on Hansard many times in the future.

I want to draw attention to two issues in the report, particularly paragraphs 114 and 115, which highlight the disturbing divergence on the climate emergency and more broadly on sustainable development. The Government keep telling us that they want to lead the world on tackling the climate emergency; in which case, we have yet to hear an explanation of why signing up to a level playing field, presumably a level much lower than we are aiming for, is a problem. I also draw attention to paragraph 104, which highlights the fact that the EU decision has a very specific and strong focus on small and medium-sized enterprises and how the arrangements will work for them. It is unfortunate that there is nothing in the Government’s statements along those lines.

However, the main part of my speech has another focus. I compliment the House on its extremely strong concentration, in the circumstances, on the topic which we are debating. I think we know, however, that the country is perhaps somewhat less focused than usual on the deliberations in this Chamber at this moment. Your Lordships may not know that, as we have been debating, the Prime Minister apparently said—I am paraphrasing—that noble Lords and MPs over 70 must stay away from Parliament. That really brings us to the words of the noble Lord, Lord Cormack, and of the noble Lady, Baroness Wheatcroft. Every government resource, every official attention, every bit of funding is going to have to go to managing the coronavirus. There is no capacity to deal with the huge questions we have been covering today. It would be a dereliction of duty to take attention away from the focus on the coronavirus.

To be dismantling more than 40 years of close interrelationship with the EU and to establish new national rules on everything from aviation to trade, agricultural rules and workers’ rights with the entire country distracted would be profoundly undemocratic and dangerous. The process has to be put on hold. We have already postponed the local government elections in May. If we cannot manage to deliver basic democracy, having acknowledged that business as usual is not an option, we need to do the same with Brexit. I conclude by agreeing with the noble Baroness, Lady Noakes. She said that this House should reflect the opinion of the country at large as currently constituted. I think the country wants us and the Government to focus on the coronavirus.