Covid-19: Impact of No-deal Brexit on Vaccine Supplies

Baroness Ludford Excerpts

Wednesday 16th December 2020 Lords Chamber

[Lord Callanan (Con)]

The noble Lord makes a very good point. I can assure him that there are a number of backup plans. We have worked very closely with the suppliers and we are confident that the cold supply chain will not cause any problems. Obviously, everybody is aware that this vaccine has to be transported at a temperature of minus 70 degrees, plus or minus 10 degrees centigrade, and the manufacturers have put in place proper supply units that are maintained at that cold temperature and can also be used for temporary storage.

[Baroness Ludford (LD) [V]]

My Lords, I am involved with the diabetes research charity JDRF. It has been in regular contact with the Department of Health and Social Care and insulin manufacturers, and has been reassured about the stockpiles of insulin being held. The main concern now is around replenishment of supply. We are already reading about freight movement difficulties and with, or especially without, a Brexit deal, this could well get worse after 1 January. Will the import of the Covid vaccine from January affect the replenishment of supply of essential medicines imported from the EU, such as insulin, and what plans have been put in place to prevent disruption?

[Lord Callanan (Con)]

I can reassure the noble Baroness that there will be no disruption to supply. We have put in place extensive measures to avoid any impact on the supply of essential medicines, in addition to the vaccine, beyond the end of the transition period. The Department of Health and Social Care has put a huge amount of planning work into this, so I think that her concerns are unfounded.

Canada-UK Trade Deal

Baroness Ludford Excerpts

Tuesday 17th November 2020 Lords Chamber

[Lord Grimstone of Boscobel (Con)]

My Lords, I can confirm that every single agreement will go through the comprehensive CRaG procedure. There may be issues of timing because these negotiations often go to the wire. But I assure the House that, even if they need to be provisionally implemented, every single agreement will be subject to appropriate parliamentary scrutiny.

[Baroness Ludford (LD) [V]]

My Lords, about an hour and a half ago, the International Trade Secretary, Liz Truss, tweeted that later today, at a conference of the trade body, TheCityUK, she would

“set out how the UK can become a global hub for services and tech trade … Services sits at the heart of my vision for values-driven and value-generating trade policy.”

We have heard hardly a squeak from the Brexit talks about services, which represent 80% of our economy, or about the quest for a data adequacy decision, which is essential to the tech trade. We are six weeks out from the end of the transition period. Can the Minister tell us where we are on services and data?

[Lord Grimstone of Boscobel (Con)]

I congratulate the noble Baroness on monitoring the International Trade Secretary’s Twitter feed so carefully. I agree about the importance of services. I hope the noble Baroness will understand that it would not be appropriate for me to comment on ongoing negotiations.

United Kingdom Internal Market Bill

Baroness Ludford Excerpts

2nd reading & 2nd reading (Hansard): House of Lords
Monday 19th October 2020 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Ludford (LD)]

My Lords, I add my congratulations and welcome to the maiden speakers, whom I look forward to getting to know. I sincerely thank our committees, on the constitution, EU affairs and delegated powers, for their expert and powerful reports. Part 5 of the Bill, with its attempt to override an international law commitment, in an agreement the Government themselves signed and then enshrined in domestic law less than a year ago, is breath-taking. The comment by the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland that the Bill breaks international law

“in a specific and limited way”

is destined to go down in history alongside “economical with the truth”.

It was commendable, if regrettable, that the noble and learned Lord, Lord Keen of Elie, felt compelled to resign, as did the Treasury Solicitor Sir Jonathan Jones. I regret that this means we do not have a law officer here to answer the debate. The noble Lord, Lord Wilson of Dinton, pithily summed up the situation in testimony to the Constitution Committee when he said of the Bill that

“the constitutional position is that it is an outrage, and the political position is that it is hugely damaging to our reputation internationally.”

The Constitution Committee concluded that Part 5 clauses

“represent a disregard for the rule of law”.

The Bill is only one aspect of the cavalier attitude of Conservative Governments in the last few years to the law and constitutional convention. Examples include: trying to trigger Article 50 without parliamentary approval; illegal Prorogation; and launching attacks on lawyers as “lefty human rights lawyers”, “activists” and “do-gooders”. Was it a coincidence that a knifeman threatened to kill a solicitor last month?

Then they are grossly under-resourcing the justice system; and “taking back control” not for Parliament but for themselves, through an accumulation of executive power and overuse of statutory instruments, to the extent that the legal commentator for the Financial Times, David Allen Green, called it “government by decree”. He quoted Lord Hewart, a Liberal politician and judge who became Lord Chief Justice and who said, in his 1929 book The New Despotism:

“The strategy is different”—


from the “old despotism” of Charles I—

“but the goal is the same. It is to subordinate Parliament, to evade the Courts, and to render the will or the caprice of the Executive unfettered and supreme.”

It sounds very modern.

The Government’s claim that the Bill is simply an insurance policy or safety net has spectacularly backfired. As our EU Committee observed, it has

“in effect, placed the United Kingdom in the wrong”.

The EU responded accordingly by insisting on tougher enforcement provisions and sending a letter of formal notice—the first step in infringement proceedings. The Irish equality and human rights commissions from north and south, as well as the Anglican Primates, have expressed deep concern that the Irish protocol to the withdrawal agreement might be breached, and the human rights and equality provisions of the Good Friday agreement overridden.

The Bingham Centre for the Rule of Law notes:

“The ideal of Magna Carta—that no one is above the law—is a source of global inspiration”,


and the Bar Council and the Law Society highlight the prejudice to the position of London as a centre for international practice and dispute resolution, and to our attempt to accede to the Lugano Convention.

The 20th anniversary of Human Rights Act has just passed, and it is the 70th anniversary of European Convention on Human Rights in a few weeks. It was a Conservative lawyer and politician, Sir David Maxwell Fyfe, as he then was, who was largely instrumental in drafting the ECHR. It is shameful not only that the modern Conservative Party is weakening its commitment to the convention and the HRA, but that our Prime Minister had to be forced by the EU, in order to protect security ties, to pledge not to “materially alter the spirit”—whatever that means—of the Human Rights Act. This was billed as a “compromise” by Mr Johnson.

Part 5 of this Bill is a disgrace. The noble Lord, Lord Howard, was quite right to say that Parliament should fix this Bill and not leave it to the courts; hence the amendment in the name of the noble and learned Lord, Lord Judge, should be supported.

Post Office: Horizon Accounting System

Baroness Ludford Excerpts

Tuesday 6th October 2020 Lords Chamber

[Lord Callanan (Con)]

Yes.

[Baroness Ludford (LD) [V]]

My Lords, I too pay tribute to the noble Lord, Lord Arbuthnot, for bringing a measure of justice to this case. In a debate in February, he said:

“It is hard to find words strong enough to condemn the people in charge of this catastrophic fiasco. What have the people in charge suffered as a result? One of them, Paula Vennells, has been given a CBE and now sits on government-sponsored boards. None of the rest, as far as I can see, have suffered at all.”—[Official Report, 25/2/20; col. GC 87.]


When the Minister, the noble Lord, Lord Callanan, answered a question from the noble Lord, Lord Arbuthnot, in March, he said:

“There is no question but that the Post Office management at the time behaved disgracefully but none of them is now in post.”—[Official Report, 5/3/20; col. 719.]


None the less, what are the Government doing to hold these people to account, at least by reviewing honours and public sector appointments awarded?

[Lord Callanan (Con)]

The noble Baroness makes a very good point. I made my views clear on this matter earlier in the year, and I have written to the Department of Health and Social Care—the letter is now public—expressing my views on this. Of course, there are appropriate procedures that need to be followed in appointments and in honours, but personally I would have no problem with those matters being looked at.

Nissan in Sunderland

Baroness Ludford Excerpts

Tuesday 5th February 2019 Lords Chamber

[Lord Henley]

The origin rules problem is very detailed and complicated in terms of the percentage of any car that is manufactured on any particular site. If the noble Lord would like me to do so, I shall write to him in greater detail on that subject.

[Baroness Ludford (LD)]

My Lords, can the Minister inform us how many Brexiteer parliamentarians have been CEOs of major manufacturing companies, such that they purport to know better than the CEOs of, say, Honda or Airbus what the problems of Brexit are?

[Lord Henley]

I am not sure that that question really deserves a response.

European Union (Approvals) Bill

Baroness Ludford Excerpts

2nd reading (Hansard): House of Lords
Wednesday 25th October 2017 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Ludford (LD)]

My Lords, I thank the Minister for introducing this small but, I am sure, perfectly formed Bill. It is mildly bizarre that these relatively limited matters require primary legislation because of the European Union Act 2011. I was not allowed to be active in the House at that time as I was an MEP, but I imagine that the idea was to prevent big new federalist projects slipping into UK law through the European Communities Act. I am not sure that rather modest matters such as this were envisaged as needing primary legislation.

As the Minister said, Article 352 allows the EU to adopt an Act necessary for the attainment of treaty objectives when there is no specific legal basis available in the treaties. I am not the world’s expert on the treaties, but I am quite surprised that there were no other specific articles in the treaties that would have allowed Serbian and Albanian accession to the Fundamental Rights Agency and competition co-operation enforcement with Canada. If the Minister has any information on why there was not—there are plenty of articles in the treaty—perhaps he could enlighten us.

Clearly, it is a good thing to enable Serbia and Albania to become observers in the Fundamental Rights Agency. This highlights the way that human rights commitments underpin European peace and development. I had some experience of those two countries in my early years in the European Parliament, when I was on the European Parliament delegation for south-east Europe, as it was then called, when the countries were all lumped together. There has been progress towards candidate status for accession to the EU. I am sure the Minister would agree that, even with Brexit—if Brexit takes place—the UK is supportive of the accession ambitions of the western Balkan countries.

In moving the Motion on the Bill—I cannot remember whether the Minister repeated these words—the Minister in the other place, Margot James, highlighted that the mandate of the Fundamental Rights Agency is to improve knowledge and awareness of fundamental rights issues, so observer status for Serbia and Albania would help them benefit from the experience of good practice and evidence from EU member states on human rights. It is somewhat ironic that we are approving this decision to help Serbia and Albania in their progress towards accession to the EU, as we in the UK —on current plans—are moving away. It is also ironic that, in doing so, we are acknowledging the vital role that fundamental rights play in European co-operation. While we seek to leave the Fundamental Rights Agency and the EU Charter of Fundamental Rights, I would submit that those instruments are as important to the UK as they are to Serbia and Albania.

On the EU-Canada competition enforcement agreement, I have not seen any response from the Government to the question raised in the other place as to whether the UK would seek to participate in that agreement after Brexit. That might have to be preceded by the question of whether the UK will seek a competition enforcement co-operation agreement with the EU itself. As the Minister has pointed out, post Brexit, UK firms which do business in the EU 27 will be affected by this agreement. It would seem very unhelpful if the UK itself were not part of these arrangements, both between the UK and the EU and with third countries such as Canada. Could the Minister therefore let us know the state of play on those two dimensions, with the EU and regarding participation in the Canada agreement?

Could the Minister also amplify a little on what data protection safeguards are in the Canada agreement? He mentioned independent oversight. We will discuss on Monday, in Committee on the Data Protection Bill, the relevance of fundamental rights to data exchange. The Government do not plan to incorporate the Charter of Fundamental Rights, so there is an issue about the underpinning of fundamental rights on data protection in this country. That could, therefore, affect an adequacy decision by the European Commission on data transfers between the UK and the EU. Could he tell us whether, in the assessment of the Government, that matter has a relationship, as I would contend that it does, in situations such as this where data is going to be transferred, potentially between the CMA and the European Commission and then with third countries such as Canada? It seems to me that there are quite a few interlocking issues here, but particularly concentrated on the exchange and flows of data.

Is the UK going to seek an agreement with the EU on competition enforcement co-operation? Is it going to seek to participate in the EU-Canada agreement? Will a necessary prelude to both those instruments potentially mean that the UK has to secure an adequacy decision from the Commission on data transfers? I would be grateful if the Minister could answer those specific questions, either now or later. However, it will not surprise him to hear that, broadly, we on these Benches welcome the content of the Bill.

Nissan: Sunderland

Baroness Ludford Excerpts

Monday 31st October 2016 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Neville-Rolfe]

The noble Baroness is completely right about the north-east: I always love the opportunity to visit, and have been to Newton Aycliffe in the not too distant past. We have a catapult not far away researching world-leading innovation. We are in constant discussion with Hitachi on its investment plans, which are indeed very important. This is the sort of foreign investment that we need to continue to welcome to the UK and the north-east.

[Baroness Ludford (LD)]

My Lords, I would not wish to look a gift horse in the mouth, and it looks as if the Government intend to seek membership of the single market and the customs union. My noble friend Lord Foster’s question on that was not answered. On behalf of the Government, will the noble Baroness come clean about that objective, instead of all this secrecy, confusion and incoherence, as a Member of the other place, Andrew Tyrie, the Conservative chairman of the Treasury Committee, is urging? He is also saying that the secrecy has nothing to do with the conduct of negotiations but everything to do with the confusion and incoherence in government. Please can we have a clear answer about the single market and the customs union?

[Baroness Neville-Rolfe]

We have already said that it is a priority for our negotiations to support UK manufacturing and ensure that the ability to export to and from the EU is not adversely affected. We need to remain competitive. Our ambition is high. In relation to the customs union, we made it clear that we are seeking the best possible deal with the widest possible access and that we do not expect exports to the EU to be adversely affected.

Clearly, work on this continues, but your Lordships can be clear that our ambition cannot be denied. We are not giving a running commentary because, as the noble Baroness will know, in negotiations, you cannot reveal every detail as you go along. Talking about confidentiality, we have not published the correspondence with Nissan, which she was perhaps hinting at, for the very good reason that investors in the UK—I used to be in business—must be able to have confidential discussions with the Government on their plans and be sure that those will not be revealed to their competitors. That is the way you have to work in the modern competitive world.