Ireland/Northern Ireland Protocol: Scrutiny of EU Legislative Proposals (European Affairs Committee Sub-Committee Report)

Baroness Ludford Excerpts

Friday 20th January 2023 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Ludford (LD)]

My Lords, I am delighted that the noble Lord, Lord Bilimoria, came through that terrifying experience to share his wisdom with us today, not least as the former president of the CBI. I absolutely endorse the tributes paid to the noble Lord, Lord Jay of Ewelme, for his chairmanship and stewardship as a sort of welfare counsellor to the sub-committee: he is not a former top diplomat for nothing.

This report is not about the protocol itself, but about the process of scrutiny. The noble Lord, Lord Jay, kept to the confines of his report in his initial presentation. As the noble Lord, Lord Lamont, said, it contains a plethora of constructive and practical suggestions, and these were referred to and, indeed, added to during the debate. While the noble Lord, Lord Jay, kept to the confines of the report and its subject, other speakers did not, beginning with the noble Lords, Lord Lamont, Lord Dodds and Lord Weir. They ranged a bit more widely, so I will give myself permission to do so just a little.

I went back to read the introductory report of the sub-committee from July 2021. Everything in that report is still entirely valid, including that the protocol was not created in a vacuum but as a consequence of Brexit. As the noble Lord, Lord Hannay, pointed out, this was a UK Government choice. The noble Lord, Lord Lamont, referred to paragraph 30 of the Government’s response to the report, which says:

“The imposition of EU law was a consequence of the EU’s unwillingness to accept other solutions.”


Well, as has been remarked on during the debate, the Government negotiated, signed and ratified. They insisted on ratification of the protocol, so this idea that “It’s nothing to do with us, guv”—particularly the “guv”—is, I think, pertinent in this context. Indeed, the introductory report from the sub-committee I just referred to, from two and a half years ago, said:

“Just as unionists and loyalists object to the Protocol being imposed without their consent, so nationalists and republicans point out that Brexit was imposed on Northern Ireland even though the majority of votes there were to remain in the EU.”


As the noble Lord, Lord Hain, pointed out, there was no democratic deficit before Brexit. I really do not want to go on too much about this, but I am responding to remarks made as if this came from outer space. For those of us who have some experience of the EU’s democratic processes, one of our main objections to Brexit was that we would become a rule-taker, not a rule-maker. The sub-committee’s report of July 2021 said:

“While there are mitigating steps that can be taken … there is no apparent way to eliminate the democratic deficit.”


That is absolutely true. The noble Baroness, Lady Altmann, was one of those who repeated the point that it was obvious what the problem was going to be. I say to the noble Lord, Lord Bew, that it is not a new acknowledgement, or some sort of new revelation, that there is a democratic deficit.

As this report concentrates on, the important thing is how we can mitigate and improve the management of the situation. The noble Lord, Lord Hannay, added to the suggestions in the report that the UK should stop blocking an EU office in Belfast—which obviously seems sensible—and the idea of having a Northern Ireland Executive office in Brussels. Scotland and London, among others—forgive my ignorance; Wales probably did as well—had their own offices in Brussels back in the day. It could be not just a section of the UK mission but an office in its own right, as the Scotland and London offices were.

My noble friend Lady Suttie referred to the Commission non-paper of October 2021, which had lots of sensible suggestions on how to improve the practical situation. That is what we need to concentrate on; how will it be taken forward? It is not helpful that we have had to labour for the last few years, as the sub-committee noted in its invaluable introductory report of two and a half years ago, against the Government’s apparent reluctance to accept their obligations under the protocol and the consequences of their policy choices, as we have heard from the noble Lord, Lord Liddle, and others.

I completely understand the dilemma of the noble Lord, Lord Liddle, over language when thinking about the former Prime Minister. I am afraid that there was dishonesty—“lying” may be unparliamentary, so let us stick to that term—about what paperwork and checks would be necessary. There was no clarity about what practical obligations would be imposed on stakeholders in Northern Ireland, so it has been a shock to business and others. By the way, I do not think the statistics bear out that the protocol has had a poor impact on the economic situation in Northern Ireland; the situation is rather to the contrary.

As the sub-committee has been pointing out for its entire existence, there was a paramount need for the British Government to be trustworthy, rigorous and honest and show good faith and good will in acknowledging what they signed up to and its implications, and then carry through the good governance machinery necessary to make it all work. Unfortunately, that did not happen. We had the internal market Bill and now we have the Northern Ireland Protocol Bill, which is parked—thank goodness—and will hopefully go up in a puff of smoke. Both of them have been detrimental, to put it mildly, to any chance of demonstrating trust and getting on with the necessity of implementing the protocol.

To quote the report we are discussing, this is not helped by the fact that

“the Government’s stated intention in pursuing the particular form of Brexit it has chosen is to give the opportunity for the UK (in respect of Great Britain) to diverge from EU Single Market rules.”

That complicates the situation because, if you have the moving target of regulatory divergence all the time, there will be no stability in the situation for Northern Ireland, which is effectively under single market rules.

Today we are trying to discuss day-to-day process rather than policy. One element that we can demonstrably very much rely on is the assiduous, diligent and thorough exercise of the scrutiny duties of our protocol sub-committee under the noble Lord, Lord Jay of Ewelme. As the noble Lord, Lord Dodds, said, no other body is doing this. The sub-committee on the protocol is filling a gap where the Government should be leading the way. I enjoyed some of the acerbic comments in the report on the Government’s failure to fulfil their duties in a prompt and efficient way. I thought some of the language reflected the experience of the noble Lord, Lord Jay, in his long career in Whitehall. It is not good enough to have sloppy Explanatory Memoranda —“unacceptably poor” is the phrase used.

I am running out of time. What occurred to me in reading the report was the need for trust, honesty, rigour, respect, fairness, engagement, fulfilment of obligations, provision of information, good will and good faith. That is all that is being asked for—I see the Minister grimacing; it is a lot—and it is not too much to ask from a Government who want to implement the obligations that they signed up to.

Finally, the noble Lord, Lord Godson, referred to the Irish Government. It is worth recalling that the sub-committee referred in its introductory report to the Irish Government’s important role in facilitating dialogue between the UK Government and the Northern Ireland Executive on the one hand and the EU on the other. We cannot expect them to take on too much, but we owe it to them to recognise the role they have played in the last few years.