European Union (Withdrawal) Bill

Debate between David Lammy and Chris Leslie

Committee: 3rd sitting: House of Commons
Tuesday 21st November 2017 Commons Chamber

[Mr Leslie]

Would it not be great if we were having a proper debate about retaining Francovich protections, albeit possibly making an amendment? The hon. Lady may well have a case for increasing or decreasing the level of the damage thresholds in place, but that is not what we are debating; we are debating simply the deletion of this Francovich protection—that right to redress—from our laws and protections. I would be happy to discuss with her where that level should be set, as there is a debate to be had about that, but we are talking about the principle, yes or no, and whether this should be retained within this legislation.

[Mr Lammy]

My hon. Friend rightly suspects that the Government will say that removing the charter from the UK will not affect the substantive rights that individuals already benefit from in this country. Does he agree that the problem is that the Government do not go on to say what those substantive rights are? If we simply leave it to the common law, a future Parliament—it may not be this one—could determine that it is right to erode those rights. That is why it is important we stick with the charter.

[Mr Leslie]

We need to make sure that if we are transposing legislation, it is a true copy and paste, but that is not what has been proposed. I am not in favour necessarily of cutting off our relationship with the single market or the customs union. There are a lot of debates on the Brexit choices we have before us, but here we are dealing with a set of separate discussions about the rights that our citizens—our constituents—could have in a post-Brexit scenario, and we need a better justification in order to be convinced than that we should just throw these overboard at this stage.