Scotland Act 1998: Section 35 Power

Baroness Bennett of Manor Castle Excerpts

Wednesday 18th January 2023 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Williams of Trafford (Con)]

My Lords, the Green Benches have been waiting to get in all through these questions, so we will hear from the Greens first, and then I think the House would probably like to hear from the noble Baroness, Lady Kennedy.

[Baroness Bennett of Manor Castle (GP)]

I thank the noble Baroness. This debate has made many references to the Scottish Government and the Scottish First Minister. I ask the Chamber to acknowledge that we are talking about a law passed by the Scottish Parliament by a significant majority—I hope everyone would acknowledge that. I note also that the First Minister of Wales has said that he would like to introduce the same provisions in Wales and will ask the Government for the right to do so.

I entirely sympathise with the desire for compromise and talks expressed by the noble Baroness, Lady Chapman. The Statement says, and the Minister has repeated, that the Government want to talk to the Scottish Government and get around the table to come to a compromise. But they are arguing that it is impossible to have different gender recognition certificate systems in different parts of the UK. If this is the case, what kind of compromise are the Government going to offer? How can the Bill be amended rather than just being thrown out, if that is what the Government are demanding?

[Lord Offord of Garvel (Con)]

That just indicates the sensitivity of the matter we are dealing with. On the face of it, the Scottish Government Bill allows the Equality Act to continue, because the GRC works within the architecture of that Act, but the Bill has changed the criteria for applying for that GRC, and that has a significant impact, as we have discussed. Therefore, it will need to be discussed in detail and sensitively.

At the end of the day, the issue we are dealing with in this Chamber right now is that the Government believe it would be significantly complicated to have two different gender recognition regimes in the UK, and that this would create a lot of problems between Scotland and England. As the noble Lord, Lord McConnell, said, up until now, and at all points through the discussion, it was considered that the Scottish system should remain within the UK system. We do not see any evidence for why that has changed.