Ecodesign for Energy-Related Products and Energy Information (Amendment) (Northern Ireland) Regulations 2025
Baroness Hoey Excerpts(2 days, 2 hours ago)
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Baroness Hoey
At end insert “but this House regrets that the draft Regulations treat Northern Ireland differently from the rest of the United Kingdom and have been introduced without consultation.”
Baroness Hoey (Non-Afl)
My Lords, before I speak to my regret amendment, I want to take this opportunity to thank the Secretary of State for Defence and the Defence Minister in this House for their very welcome decision to judicially review the decision of coroner Justice Humphreys, who ruled that soldiers who killed the IRA terrorists in Clonoe in 1992 should face trial. This has been widely welcomed by members of His Majesty’s Armed Forces and all decent, law-abiding people in Northern Ireland.
Turning to these regulations, I thank the noble Lord for his explanation of why they are needed. It is a change to have him here, giving the noble Baroness, Lady Hayman, a night off from dealing with Northern Ireland statutory instruments. He will not be surprised to hear that I disagree with some of the points he made.
We have had many regret amendments on statutory instruments, and they are a very important way of getting such issues on the record, even if there is not much chance of stopping these statutory instruments. These regulations really will hit home with people going about their day-to-day lives. They affect electrical household goods, household tumble dryers, smartphones, mobile phones and numerous other goods in everyday use. There are two central difficulties with the Ecodesign for Energy-Related Products and Energy Information (Amendment) (Northern Ireland) Regulations 2025. The first is democratic, and the second pertains to the division of the United Kingdom.
In the first instance, the standards set by this legislation have been drafted by a body of which we are not a part—the European Union—and which the people of the United Kingdom voted to leave in the biggest every manifestation of democracy in our history. I remind noble Lords that people in Northern Ireland had the exact same ballot paper as the rest of the United Kingdom. Yes, like Scotland, there was a majority in Northern Ireland to remain, but it was a United Kingdom vote which all political parties had promised to honour, whatever the outcome.
We voted to leave the EU in part because, even when we were represented in it, there was a democratic deficit in the way it worked. The way the EU does politics is entirely alien to our tradition, arising from the fact that the power of legislative initiative in the EU rests not with democratically elected politicians, as in our tradition, but with the unelected European Commission.
So now, for Northern Ireland citizens, the power of legislative initiative rests not only with an unelected body but with a foreign unelected body—what might be called a double whammy. We did not vote to leave the EU so that we would have no control over our laws in one part of our own country. The European Union has made absolutely no attempt to consult people and businesses in Northern Ireland on these changes, and now our own Government are rushing through the powers to enforce them, again without even the tiniest bit of consultation. They then have the cheek to suggest that this is not a problem.
Baroness Foster of Aghadrumsee (Non-Afl)
Can the noble Baroness share her views on the Secondary Legislation Scrutiny Committee’s assessment of this? When Mr Allister from another place raised the issue of consultation, the Minister there gave a very off-handed response; the Minister actually did not come to the committee until after it had commented on it. That adds to the sense that the Government are saying, “For Northern Ireland, we’re going to impose it—that’s the way it is. But for the rest of the country, we’re going to have a consultation”.
Baroness Hoey (Non-Afl)
I thank the noble Baroness. She is absolutely right: this is par for the course when it comes to anything to do with Northern Ireland. It is always treated as something that can be waved through. Of course, what they have said this time is that, in relation to the Windsor Framework, what the EU says has to be followed. The letter to the Secondary Legislation Scrutiny Committee from the Department for Energy Security and Net Zero Minister in the other place—in response, as the noble Baroness said, to Jim Allister, the MP for North Antrim—was even more dogmatic. It said:
“We have assessed the impact of this regulation on Northern Ireland and have found its impact on businesses and consumers to be minimal”.
Where is that assessment? Where have they done that? Earlier, I asked the Minister here to define “substantive”, but can he now define “minimal”? What does that word mean in that letter from the Minister in the other place? The businesses dealing with all these products certainly do not find this minimal, given the bureaucracy and the worry they now have around complying with this law.
Surely His Majesty’s Government are supposed to stand up equally for the interests of all their citizens, but here they are bowing down, once again, to the EU, without any sign that, even if they have to do this because of the law of the Windsor Framework, they are actually not happy about it and they wish they did not have to do this. As we look around the world today, there is no other developed western country that has agreed, in the face of pressure from a group of 27 foreign countries—including one that aspires to annex the part of the United Kingdom that we are talking about, Northern Ireland—to subject a portion of its citizens to this almost neocolonial situation.
The anger arises on two bases from this. The first is the substantive effect of the removal of the rights of equal citizenship that we have enjoyed for over a century. The second is what I would describe as hurt arising from our being rendered, as I said, second-class compared to the rest of the country on account of the fact that, while our rights to consultation can be dismissed as not important, the rights of other UK citizens must be defended.
Another difficulty arising from paragraph 7.2 relates to the fact that it demonstrates how the mistreatment of Northern Ireland is creating pressures, not for this mistreatment to end, which would be great, but for attempts to be made to limit the destructive effects of divergence with the rest of the country. This is a huge issue, because it demonstrates how the failure to try to deliver Brexit for Northern Ireland is actually undermining Brexit for the whole of the United Kingdom, aligning Great Britain—drip, drip, drip—with Northern Ireland and thus the European Union. This demonstrates how, rather than respecting the biggest democratic vote, we are undermining and destroying Brexit freedoms for the whole United Kingdom and, I believe, greatly weakening the integrity of our political system and a belief in that referendum result.
Of course, we know that the European Union stated that the price of Brexit for the United Kingdom would be Northern Ireland, and I am afraid that weak leadership was shown by the former Prime Minister, now the noble Baroness, Lady May, who started this whole process by almost kowtowing to the European Union in the way that we started to discuss Brexit.
It is striking that, when challenged on these matters by the already mentioned honourable Member for North Antrim, Jim Allister, the Government made no attempt whatever to defend themselves. They simply acknowledged what the Explanatory Memorandum failed to acknowledge: namely, that there had been and would be no consultation in Northern Ireland because the laws from the EU apply to us automatically. Just let that sink in, because I genuinely believe that many noble Lords in this House, Members of Parliament and very many members of the public just do not realise that Northern Ireland has been left in the EU for so many areas of law.
Once again, the Minister in the other place was blunt:
“There is no requirement to consult on this legislation. These regulations apply automatically in Northern Ireland under the terms of the Windsor Framework and the European Union (Withdrawal) Act”.
There was not a single sentence of regret, or a statement that the Government understood the outrageous nature of what the protocol had done to their own citizens in Northern Ireland, or perhaps a commitment to work to withdraw from that agreement with the EU. But no: nothing. Just a simple acceptance: the EU says; we must accept. Put bluntly, our citizenship has been traded away to get a trade and co-operation agreement for GB, despite it violating the cross-community consent principle of the Belfast agreement.
The Minister also plainly stated the Government’s intention to undermine the Brexit gains of Great Britain by consulting on the introduction of the EU Commission’s legislation in GB:
“We will therefore consult on the introduction of aligning regulations in the rest of the UK as soon as possible”.
That was in March, but in February I got a letter from the Minister for Energy Consumers telling me about this statutory instrument and saying at the end of it, on GB:
“We will consult as soon as practically possible on the merits of alignment with new EU regulations and will align where it makes sense to do so. GB may not align unless in the interests of consumers, businesses, and our wider policy goals”.
So can the Minister say what has happened since that letter in February from the Minister saying that they would align only where it made sense to do so, and that they would be taking into account the interests of consumers and businesses, and the Government’s statement, which said very clearly that they would want to align as soon as possible? So there has been a change, and is it part of the Government’s reset policies which we keep hearing about?
On the difference in respect to Northern Ireland, it was said that the EU regulations automatically apply under the terms, and we know that. This idea that, if we in Northern Ireland have EU laws and GB then aligns with them in order to bring Northern Ireland and Great Britain into alignment, that somehow changes things, is deeply flawed.
The application of the same laws to GB will not save the integrity of the UK’s internal market for goods. This has already been lost for most purposes by the imposition of the international SPS and customs border, which cannot be crossed either on the so-called red or green lanes without an export number, customs and SPS paperwork and checks. Even if we align, all that still goes on. Alignment with the rest of GB does not change the fundamental issue of over 300 areas of law in Northern Ireland continuing to be imposed on citizens by a foreign entity, with no say in those laws for the people of Northern Ireland.
I have a few questions that could have been dealt with earlier had this legislation been developed in line with the norms of respect for citizenship and had there been more time for consultation—indeed, had there been any consultation. One of the distinctive things about Northern Ireland, as my colleagues here from Northern Ireland know, is that a significant proportion of people locate their tumble dryers in garages or outhouses. Not surprisingly, this was not taken into account in the development of the legislation. I am not sure how much the Minister knows about tumble dryers, but there is now real concern because unlike condenser and vented tumble dryers, which work at any temperature, the new heat pump tumble dryers work only at ambient temperatures. Below 5 degrees centigrade, they do not work at all. From 5 degrees up to ambient temperatures, they work, but very inefficiently, and will waste far more energy than condenser and vented tumble dryers. To save energy, many people in Northern Ireland with these new tumble dryers will be spending more on energy. Has any consideration been given to this by the Government?
Can the Minister confirm that it will be illegal for a shop in Northern Ireland to bring in new condenser or vented tumble dryers after 1 July, while it will still be quite legal for similar shops in England, Wales and Scotland? As he may know, there is much toing and froing between Scotland and Northern Ireland. Many people from Northern Ireland who have relatives in Scotland go over on the boat for holidays there. After July, can a member of the public who is perhaps in Scotland for a holiday in their car buy a tumble dryer there and bring it back to their home that few miles across the water? Will they be arrested for having a non-EU-regulated tumble dryer or hairdryer or any of the other goods affected by this regulation if they bring them in from Great Britain? Will shops holding the various utilities mentioned in these regulations be able to continue selling after that date? There is huge confusion among small businesses and how this is being rushed through is not helpful. Those are just a small number of questions that this statutory instrument raises. I appreciate that if the Minister cannot answer them directly, he will write.
This SI should be opposed as wrong in principle and wrong in practice. It is another way of making another hole in the unity of the United Kingdom. I beg to move my amendment.
Lord Hunt of Kings Heath (Lab)
My Lords, what I think I said was that, in line with the scrutiny committee’s recommendations, we will commit to publicising future changes through a parliamentary Statement to both Houses.
Baroness Hoey (Non-Afl)
My Lords, first, I thank everyone who has taken part in what seems to have become a fairly regular late-night discussion of a statutory instrument that goes slightly wider than the specifics. I also want to say a genuine thank you to the Minister, because he has certainly made us feel that he has been listening and that he will take back some of the points that have been made, when perhaps sometimes, in the busy schedule of all Ministers and officials, they do not get the detail of what is causing so many problems. I genuinely hope that he has learned something —I do not mean that he does not know what he is talking about, but I hope that he has learned a little more tonight about some of the very strong feelings.
My crucial point is that I never seem able to get Ministers, Opposition Front-Benchers, and certainly not the noble Lord from the Liberal Democrats, to actually say that they want to see changes to the Windsor Framework. They keep saying—the noble Lord has said it again tonight—that they are committed to the Windsor Framework. Yet, time after time in this House, we hear of all the things that are wrong with the Windsor Framework and how it is not working.
I know that the noble Lord, Lord Bew, will be a strong supporter of the Windsor Framework, as he has since the beginning—until, perhaps, there have been changes in all sorts of ways. We cannot ignore the realities of what is happening to the principle of it. As we have more such SIs and more discussion of them, I hope that we will finally get the Government and Opposition to recognise that this is not sustainable and cannot go on. In any kind of discussions with the European Union, the Government must put first and foremost the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland as a unifying force—as something that needs to be unified.
I will quickly remind people of all the other little things to do with the Windsor Framework that are just so annoying. There is the pets issue—the idea that you have to deal with extra bureaucracy to take your pet on holiday to Northern Ireland. We could not ban the live exports of animals for slaughter in Northern Ireland, and we cannot even get a ministerial answer to how many have gone off to other awful parts of the world to be killed in very cruel situations. The noble Lord, Lord Dodds, asked a question, and he got the answer back that it was a devolved matter, but it was not devolved when the law was brought in.
People are still finding it very difficult to get seeds to Northern Ireland. There are many other issues, such as parcels. Very soon, someone in England wanting to send a present to their relative in Northern Ireland will have to send the parcel from a post office as if they are sending it to a foreign country. That is going to cost the Post Office more, as well, so where will the costs go? Every month, every week, every day, there is something new. Noble Lords need to realise that this issue is not going to go away, and we will continue to come back on it. But I thank everybody once again, and I would like to withdraw my regret amendment.
Gas Storage Levels
Baroness Hoey Excerpts(2 months, 2 weeks ago)
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Lord Hunt of Kings Heath (Lab)
My Lords, Rough was closed in 2017. At that time, when the party opposite was in government, I do not think that it raised any concerns at all. Indeed, the then Energy Minister, the noble Lord, Lord Harrington, said that the closure of Rough would not cause a problem with security. In 2022, Centrica decided to re-open the site. This was a commercial decision by the company. It now seeks government support. One needs to draw a line between the announcement that it made last week and its request for government support.
Baroness Hoey (Non-Afl)
My Lords, many people in the public will still not understand the logic of why we spend some £14 billion buying gas from Norway from the same North Sea that we ourselves could be taking it from. Does the noble Lord think that Norway cares any less about the environment and net zero than we do?