Product Regulation and Metrology Bill [HL]

Baroness Lawlor Excerpts

Report stage
Wednesday 26th February 2025 Lords Chamber

[Lord Fox (LD)]

Thank you. There is not much more, your Lordships will be pleased to know. We will be focusing on the key issues. When we come to further groups, your Lordships will see that the work we on these Benches have done has been to try to prioritise proper scrutiny of the issues that I have talked about—safety, the environmental impact and the consumer, as well as legal issues—and to make sure that that can be done and this Bill changed in a way that survives contact with a huge government majority in the House of Commons. That is what we will be doing, and that is why we will not be supporting the noble Lord, Lord Sharpe, on his amendment.

[Baroness Lawlor (Con)]

I am awfully sorry: I was not quick enough on my feet before the noble Lord, Lord Fox, spoke. I should like to speak for a few minutes in support of my noble friend Lord Sharpe—if that is all right with the noble Lord, Lord Hunt.

I support my noble friend’s amendment because I think it sets out the framework and purpose clearly, and that is very important when we are making laws by statutory instrument. Besides, I think it is important to retain regulatory autonomy, and I will discuss that point with the noble Lord, Lord Fox, in a later group, but I do not think this is the time to have that discussion. It is regulatory autonomy that allows us to do all kinds of things to protect our consumers and ensure that we make the right sorts of laws for our products and our economy. That regulatory autonomy also allows us to align with any laws we like from any jurisdiction and, of course, the Government have a point in that.

My concern about not having an explicit regulatory autonomy aim in the purpose clause is that it would make us out of step with our existing arrangements with other trading partners, where we have agreed outcomes, conformity assessment procedures and other arrangements to recognise. We should not militate against that, which we may be in danger of doing if our purpose does not state these things explicitly.

[Lord in Waiting/Government Whip (Lord Leong) (Lab)]

My Lords, I thank all noble Lords who have given up so many hours to meet me and my officials to go through this Bill. I really appreciate those meetings. I thank the noble Lord, Lord Sharpe, for his amendment seeking to introduce a new clause about the purpose of the Bill. Likewise, I thank all noble Lords who have spoken this afternoon.

We have had many hours of debate on the Bill and I think that we all support the intent of this amendment—the importance of improving product regulation. On that, I hope that there is consensus. As the Secretary of State for Business and Trade pointed out when giving evidence to the Lords International Agreements Committee, the powers that the Bill would provide give the UK regulatory autonomy. If the previous Government had continued in office, they would have needed the same Bill.

We require this Bill, as powers in other legislation are inadequate for updating our extensive product metrology and regulatory regime and responding to new risks and threats. I refer to the point made by the noble Lord, Lord Jackson, about secondary legislation. This is about 2,000 pages of highly technical regulations. It is not a good use of parliamentary time to use primary legislation every time these are updated. There are, however, differences in how we go about improving regulation. That often requires a balance to be struck, such as where obligations sit, or regarding requirements that businesses must meet. That nuanced debate, which we heard during the Bill’s passage, may not be best served by introducing a broad “purpose to improve” in the Bill.

The Bill is about strengthening the UK’s regulatory autonomy. It will make sure that there are appropriate powers to regulate products to suit the UK’s needs and interests. Parliament will have ultimate control, with oversight of the regulations made under the Bill. The Bill is about providing powers to enable the UK to change regulation to suit the UK’s needs and interests, ensuring consumer safety and certainty for businesses. The Bill is necessary because we do not currently have those powers as a nation state. As I said earlier, all changes will be subject to parliamentary scrutiny.

I hope that I have been able to outline why this amendment is not necessary and ask that it be withdrawn.

--- Later in debate ---

[Baroness Lawlor (Con)]

My Lords, I rise to speak in favour of my Amendments 21 and 59, and to support the amendments, to which I have added my name, from the noble Lord, Lord Frost.

Amendment 21 is designed to prohibit ambulatory provisions and dynamic alignment with any foreign law, including that of the EU, which is specifically mentioned in the Bill. Amendment 59 would introduce a sunset clause for regulations under subsections (1) and (2) of Clause 1 for using foreign laws under subsection (7), so that they expire after four years. As explained throughout all the proceedings on this Bill, this is an open-ended measure; it gives sweeping powers to the Minister to make law by decree, including to import and mirror EU laws. That is a very different matter from updating and making safe our own laws. I would like to thank the Minister for his constant courtesy and willingness to discuss these issues, and for making it a pleasure to work on this Bill, though the subject is not to my liking.

The Government justify this approach by referring to the highly technical nature of the Bill and the sheer number of regulations. They seek to reassure us by saying that they will use these powers only when in the best interests of the country. There are good reasons for prohibiting dynamic alignment with any foreign laws, as well as for not allowing ambulatory provisions. I will speak about those first. Not only should we do so to temper the use of the open-ended power proposed for the Executive, which is the subject of constant discussions and of my noble friend Lord Hunt’s eloquent and persuasive amendment today; there are also good economic and trade reasons to prohibit dynamic alignment with foreign laws, including those of the EU, which the Bill specifically mentions.

I would like to mention a few of those reasons. UK law is well tested and brings certainty to businesses in developing goods for market and competing overseas. Here, the Minister is on very strong territory in saying that many of us would be happy with such laws having gone through such a process, without having to go through parliamentary process every time. Our processes operate under a legal system that is celebrated for its expertise, experience and independence. It follows well-understood process systems: evidence-based testing, some scientific assessment, and consultation with consumers and producers alike. So, by the time the goods get to market and are approved, everyone understands what is at stake. They know the laws and they have been consulted on them; they trust the science and the evidence base.

However, laws and regulations made elsewhere under a code-based system—I refer particularly to the EU’s—are often based on input from officials who are remote from the area of law they are making. With the EU, there is the danger that we are importing anticompetitive laws because, as has been pointed out—including by one of the current President’s economic advisers—EU laws are protectionist. The EU has a different economic system, which was designed by the French to lock in, for very good reasons, the German economic growth that was expected after the Second World War. I can understand the French’s reasoning. They have a centralised command-system economy, which may work for France. So there are very good reasons not to import, on a dynamic basis, laws which are protectionist.

In Committee, I gave examples of where these laws add cost, drawn up by EU economists. They would also mitigate—some economic law lawyers will corroborate this—against our free trade treaties with other trading partners, such as the CPTPP. These are reached on the basis of mutual agreement over standards, which are subject to conformity assessment and independent dispute arbitration and regulation. If we are going to mirror—and mirror dynamically—one set of laws, particularly those of the EU, we may be increasing costs and changing standards, and be in breach of our agreement with the CPTPP.

I turn briefly to why we want a sunset clause. There are very good reasons for having sunset clauses. They bring benefits to legislation, and they give Parliament the chance to consider its merits after a fixed period, which is especially needed for a law imported by statutory instrument. They involve the user in the regulatory plan: for instance, they know that the law in question is going to be introduced on condition that it will be assessed, and that involvement can institute behavioural changes. A sunset clause helps to safeguard democracy and bring legal certainty. It makes clear in legislation what is subject to expiry, when, and under what conditions. Professor Helen Xanthaki, at UCL, has pointed out that sunset clauses improve the quality of legislation and they

“serve as tools of clarity, precision and unambiguity; and as tools for efficacy”.

For these reasons, I ask the Minister to consider my amendments and the others in this group. They open up this measure, and require any Government to be more open, broadly, to foreign laws, ensuring that any laws we do import are subject to a sunset clause and that there will not be dynamic alignment, which goes very much against the transparency and clarity that are the hallmarks of good legislation.

[Lord Fox (LD)]

My Lords, I was going to give a long analysis of the economics that demonstrate how poorly manufacturing businesses have performed since the implementation of the trade and co-operation agreement, but that would have been a Second Reading speech, so I decided not to give it. Instead, I will speak to the amendments we have before us. I am grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Russell, for tabling his amendment and for allowing me to sign up to it.

Members on the Conservative Benches seem to find terror wherever they go. There is danger; there are plots, schemes and Trojan horses all over place. I would not like to live in their world; it must be very frightening. This Bill does what it says it does, and this amendment does what it says it does. It makes simple a process that has been put forward very carefully and in a measured way by the noble Lord, Lord Russell of Liverpool.

There are all sorts of things that the Liberal Democrats would like to do that are far more extreme than the noble Lord’s amendment, but we recognise the limitations of this legislation and the nature of what we are debating. That is why I have supported the noble Lord, Lord Russell. It is a simple and modest measure that has the practical benefit of helping out businesses.

To close, the noble Lord, Lord Jackson, said that it would not be sensible to close off options—quite. Closer alignment with EU regulations within the government negotiated red lines would yield a boost to the UK economy of between 1% and 2%. That sounds like an option to me.