Brexit: Preparations

Baroness Young of Old Scone Excerpts

Monday 21st October 2019 Lords Chamber

[Lord Callanan]

The long-term consequences will flow partly from the withdrawal agreement but also from the political declaration and the future arrangements. We have committed to involving Parliament fully in the detailed negotiating mandates for the future arrangements. I am sure there will be lots of happy hours for all of us, endlessly discussing these matters for a long time to come.

[Baroness Young of Old Scone (Lab)]

Will the Minister elaborate a bit on the context in which this Statement was made? At the beginning, I think I heard assurances that the Government are committed to securing environmental protections. So will the Minister tell us why non-regression on European environmental standards was removed from the binding element—the withdrawal agreement—and relegated to the non-binding element—the political declaration—thus leaving environmental standards to the mercies of the negotiation of the trade agreement? Will the Minister admit that that is asking us all to buy a bit of a pig in a poke, in that we do not know what the deal on environmental standards will be as a result of the negotiations on the free trade agreements? Will he tell me that this is the reason why members of the ERG are going around with broad smiles on their faces, laughing in the face of the environmental movement? They are notably flat earthers and climate change deniers.

[Lord Callanan]

The noble Baroness demeans herself with some of those statements. The original level playing field provisions were in the Irish protocol, which has been abolished and replaced with entirely new arrangements. We have committed to provisions in the political declaration, and she will know from her experience that our environmental standards go much further than many in the European Union. Only last week we announced legislation on the new environmental protection bodies, and we have announced legislation on single-use plastics which is far in advance of legislation from the European Union. We are proud of our environmental record and will continue with it.