Retained EU Law (Revocation and Reform) Bill

Baroness Jones of Moulsecoomb Excerpts

Committee stage
Thursday 2nd March 2023 Lords Chamber

[Lord Hannay of Chiswick (CB)]

My Lords, I support Amendment 32 in the name of my noble and learned friend Lord Judge, and Amendments 42, 43, 44 and 141A.

I will make two very short points because so many of the points have been made more eloquently by previous speakers. First, the amendments we are discussing are not substitutes for removing the cut-off at the end of 2023. They are complementary to it for two reasons. The processes quite rightly being proposed could not all be got through in the time available before the end of this year; you also solve the cart and horses problem by removing the 2023 date. I hope we will not forget that when we come back to all this on Report, and we will see these two things as complementary.

Secondly, the arguments about the EU-based legislation that is completely immaterial to us—on reindeers, lemon exports and so on—are completely irrelevant. If you go back through the last 500 years of statutes past, the statute book is full of things that are completely irrelevant to the way we live now, and which are not enforced or implemented in any way. We do not seem to lose any sleep over it. Let us not lose any sleep over the reindeers or they will not bring the Christmas stocking with them.

[Baroness Jones of Moulsecoomb (GP)]

My Lords, I have not signed any amendments in this group—I was not asked, and I was not quick enough to get my name down. All of the issues have been covered absolutely amazingly by other noble Lords, so I will restrict myself to talking about the politics. The politics of this particular Bill are extremely interesting. I support all the amendments in the first group, simply because they are sensible and practical, and I like practical outcomes. But, at the same time, we ought to throw the whole clause out, and I do not see any option to do that. We want a democracy when we have finished voting on the Bill and, if it goes through as it is, we will not have one.

I will ask two political questions. First, why do we have the Bill at all? Quite honestly, it is terrible piece of legislation that is absolutely outrageous. In the 10 years I have been here, I have almost never had a glimmer of sympathy for the Government. But, having seen the Bill, I do: it is like the last gasp of a dying creature, and that dying creature is the popular Tory party of 2019, when it actually had some credibility and popularity, as I said. That has seeped and ebbed away, to the point that it is now in the most extraordinary position and putting forward legislation like this. It is an ideological monstrosity that caters to the worst parts of the right wing of the Tory party, and it will not have support.

I think the Conservative Party expects to run out into the streets and say, “We did it—we got rid of all EU law. Brexit has finally happened”. But, of course, that is simply not true: a lot of this is not EU law but British law. I am sure that the Minister himself had a hand in producing some of it, as a Member of the European Parliament. For anyone who has been in the European Parliament to say that this is pure EU law is complete nonsense. I do not want to accuse the Minister of telling lies, but it is nonsense. So why is it here? Is it here because the Conservative Party wants to get some sort of popularity or something? Why is it here? It is not a worthwhile Bill; it is a ludicrous Bill to bring here. There has been so much learned opposition, but still the Government insist on pushing it through.

My second political question is: what happens afterwards? Of course, it is all very well to put this through, but what happens when Labour is in government? Will the Conservative Party really be happy that Labour has these powers and can just whip out a piece of legislation and give Ministers all these powers? It is not a democracy when you give so much power to Ministers. That is not what Brexit was about—and I say that as somebody who voted for Brexit. I say to the noble Lord, Lord Deben, that he is perhaps a rejoiner now, not a remoaner—sorry, I mean remainer. It is perhaps time we understood that the damage has been done and this just creates more damage. It is time to drop the Bill. We will not have a democracy if it goes through.

[Baroness Ludford (LD)]

My Lords, I am pleased that everybody who has spoken in this debate is pulling in the same direction, which is an effort to rescue the Government from themselves. It is not only former diplomats and civil servants, in the words of the noble Lord, Lord Wilson, who applaud the remarks of the noble Lord, Lord Hamilton of Epsom; I am afraid to say to the noble Lord, Lord Hamilton, that it is also Liberal Democrats as well, which might be even more upsetting to him. But we are all, at least partially, on the same page as the noble Lord, Lord Hamilton of Epsom, and I do hope that we will be able to rally round a single powerful amendment for Report, based on elements of all of the laudable amendments in this group.

What has been brought out in the debate are the contradictions and hypocrisy of criticising the EU legislative process—which I happen to believe was democratic, but I will leave that there. But, even if you do not, introducing rule by executive diktat does not seem a very intelligent response to your criticism of EU lawmaking.

I think it was the noble Lord, Lord Carlile, who cited the report of the Constitution Committee; I think we are all grateful not only to that committee but to the Delegated Powers and secondary legislation committees—we have with us the former chair of the SLSC, the noble Lord, Lord Hodgson, who supervised the work for that committee’s report on this Bill before he stepped down. The DPRRC not only described the Bill, as we have frequently said, as “hyper-skeletal” but noted that approach taken by the Government

“contradicts pledges by the Government since 2018 that Parliament would be the agent of substantive policy change in these areas”.

Instead, they have made the Bill

“a blank cheque placed in the hands of Ministers”.

That is our objection. The Government would be wise to go back and think about what they are doing in this Bill. We are trying to put some order and reasonableness into the way it is being done. We are having to do a lot of the work that should have been done before the Bill was introduced. All the amendments, whether the one led by the noble and learned Lord, Lord Judge, and supported by my noble friend Lord Beith, or those led by my noble friend Lord Fox, the noble Baroness, Lady Chapman, and the noble Lord, Lord Lisvane, in one way or another seek to avoid the deletion of unidentified law unintentionally and to allow Parliament rather than Ministers control in a considered, explained, transparent and accountable way. Seriously, what is not to like about those two objectives?

We heard some nice phrases in the debate. It was said that we wanted to avoid the “unannounced repeal” of legislation, which was translated perhaps in a rather more blunt, northern way, if I may say so to my noble friend Lord Beith, as “washing stuff down the plughole”. We heard about a “circular economy” of the law from the noble Lord, Lord Deben. I might recycle that—oh, dear—at some point. The noble Lord, Lord Kerr, described the processes in the Bill as “bizarre” and “constitutionally improper”. Several amendments, including Amendment 42, led by my noble friend Lord Fox, seek to avoid the default loss of laws that our citizens will not even know they have lost—various speakers, including the noble Lord, Lord Kerr, mentioned the effect of that.

So we are trying to establish default retention and to build in specification of objectives for any revocation. A lot of the amendments are sister amendments to those debated on Tuesday in an earlier group—we had Amendment 48 on consultation and reporting. All of them aim to introduce a reasonable, considered, parliamentary way of doing things which will not surprise all the businesses, unions, consumers, employees and so on, who will not know what on earth is going on.

I realise that Amendment 50, which proposes a super-affirmative process for revocation, may offend the reservations of the noble Lord, Lord Lisvane, and my noble friend Lord Beith about amendable SIs, but I am sure that, with the skill of both those very experienced parliamentarians, we will be able to think of a better way of drafting everything. But I think that all the aims that we have debated in this group are worth pursuing.

Retained EU Law (Revocation and Reform) Bill

Baroness Jones of Moulsecoomb Excerpts

Committee stage
Tuesday 28th February 2023 Lords Chamber

[Lord Jackson of Peterborough (Con)]

I thank my noble friend for making that point, but mea culpas go both ways. Some of us were saying four years ago that some of those technical solutions could have been tried then, and we were accused of magical thinking. In fact, we were actually right. So just to wind up—because I know the Minister, for whom I have an enormous amount of respect, is staring at me—I think the Bill should go through. It would be offensive to democracy for it not to go through, and I look forward to a position where it gets Royal Assent eventually.

[Baroness Jones of Moulsecoomb (GP)]

My Lords, this is offensive for democracy if it does go through.

[Lord Fox (LD)]

Very briefly, the reason we are welcoming the noble Lord, Lord Benyon, is not because we have grown fed up with the noble Lord, Lord Callanan; it is because he is the major shareholder in this Bill as regards the number of amendments. I hope that, as well as dealing with the 24 particular laws that are in this group, he will use his response to explain the process that his department is going to undergo in order to deal with the other 1,757 laws that are not included in this group. I think it will be very important if he is able to do that.

Strikes (Minimum Service Levels) Bill

Baroness Jones of Moulsecoomb Excerpts

2nd reading
Tuesday 21st February 2023 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Jones of Moulsecoomb (GP)]

My Lords, I recently asked on Twitter: “What do you call a corrupt, far-right Government that bans strikes, bans protests that are too noisy, suppresses the right to vote, gives police spies legal immunity, takes the power to make or reject laws away from Parliament and hands it to Ministers?” I had quite a few replies, most said “fascism”, which was fair enough, but there was one response that said “scared”. This is a Government of the rich who are making suitcases full of money while avoiding paying their taxes and I think they are scared. No one but a terrified Government would keep bringing these terrible laws to your Lordships’ House.

The Government are scared that the people on PAYE suffering from inflation, high interest rates and 13 years of Tory austerity are going to demand their money back—the money that was stolen with the PPE fast track and numerous other government scams that have put money in the pockets of their friends while fleecing the taxpayer.

Many of those on strike in the last few months have not had a proper pay rise for the last decade. Instead of earning respect for years of being underpaid for the work they do and carry on doing, they are lectured on the need for further restraint by the richest Prime Minister in this country’s history. Clapping does not pay the bills. We heard that after Covid and it is still true.

Instead of meetings and compromise, the workers are being hit with draconian laws. Ministers are being given huge powers that could see them ban strikes across six public services, potentially involving millions of workers. These are not minimal powers or targeted powers; they are the powers of a dictatorship, which can be interpreted by Ministers as widely as they choose.

There is no recognition, as we have heard, of the “life and limb” provisions that are already in place during strike action, which exempt certain categories of staff from strikes where there may otherwise be a direct danger to people. The Government do not recognise existing agreements because they, once again, wish to invent a problem that does not exist, in order to justify a right-wing policy that suppresses opposition. They have done it with voter ID and the clampdown on the right to protest. Of course, the Johnson Government ended a ban on employment agencies supplying workers to temporarily replace striking workers. That ban had been in force since 1976, but the Tories overturned it.

What happens when teachers and nurses do not get paid enough? We get the situation we have today. People give up on public service and move to the private sector instead. The number of children packed into school classrooms goes up and the results go down. The number of NHS staff vacancies gets longer and so do the waiting times. Those who can pay, go private. Money will buy smaller class sizes in private schools, just as money will buy a shortcut to healthcare. That is ultimately why many in this Government do not want to give a pay rise that matches inflation. Austerity is a political choice. If we taxed the rich, we could pay the deserving. The truth is that many in this Government want public services in a permanent state of collapse because it matches their privatisation agenda. These anti-strike laws are an attempt to stop public servants from protecting our public services.

I will be brief, because a lot of people have said a lot of incredibly valuable things—mostly on this side of the Chamber, obviously. I have two final things to say. First, this thing about minimum service levels—the noble Baroness, Lady Whitaker, asked about this—what does it mean? I wonder what it means, because this Government have not managed to hit a target ever since they were elected, so I cannot think how they are going to manage minimum service levels. Secondly, on the Minister’s opening—a fine opening, Minister—the public expect essential services to be there when they need them. Why do the Government not get round the table and negotiate? Why are they behaving like complete and utter oafs? I really hope that we can throw out this Bill and I am thrilled that Labour will repeal it as soon as it gets into power—that will not be too long now.