European Union (Withdrawal) Bill

Duke of Wellington Excerpts

Committee: 10th sitting (Hansard): House of Lords
Monday 26th March 2018 Lords Chamber

[Lord Hannay of Chiswick]

My Lords, I support this amendment, which is in my name, too, and also Amendment 343, which contains more of the same objective. The purpose of the amendment, as the noble Baroness, Lady Hayter, has said, is to remove from the Bill the date of 29 March 2019 for its entry into force. Putting that date in the Bill is neither necessary nor desirable—and that, clearly, was the view of the Government when they tabled the Bill because, as the noble Baroness said, there was no mention of that date in the Bill at all when it was tabled last April. It was subsequently inserted—for reasons that I shall not dwell on, because I do not particularly want to speculate about dealings within the Government’s party; they were clearly something to do with that—only at a later stage, at which point there was a lot of rejoicing from those who believe that leaving the European Union at any cost is a good and noble objective. The formulation was then watered down a bit by the House of Commons before it sent it to us—but I suggest that it should be removed altogether.

The Government have basically dealt with the issue of whether the date is necessary. It is perfectly clear that it is not necessary, otherwise why did they table a Bill without it? But is it desirable? On desirability, I would argue strongly against it, as has the noble Baroness, Lady Hayter. For one thing, it risks closing off one option that exists under Article 50 and will exist all the way through to 29 March: namely, that the EU 27 and the UK might, by common accord, wish to prolong the two-year cut-off date from the time of notification of our intention to withdraw. I do not intend to speculate under what circumstances such a wish might arise, because they are manifold. It could be for a very short period of a purely technical kind due to an absence of time to conclude all the work that needed to be done, or it could be for a longer period, which would obviously have rather more important implications. The Brexit committee in the other House has raised that possibility; it has canvassed it and I do not think that it is wise for us to put in this Bill something that contradicts it.

The point at issue is not whether such a postponement of the two-year deadline might or might not be in the national interest. We will only know that when the debate on it takes place. I argue that to foreclose the option now, so as to make it difficult—probably impossible—to proceed in that way is not sensible; rather, it is irresponsible. I have no doubt that the Minister will tell us that the Government have no intention whatever of making use of the postponement option. Her script can be easily imagined—and it is of course the Government’s entire right and privilege to say that. However, that is different from trying to bind Parliament to say it, which is what they are seeking to do with this provision: to lock us all into the Brexit tower and throw the key out of the window. That is never usually a very good way of proceeding.

So I hope that, on further consideration, the Government will agree. All they are being asked to do is revert to the original form of the Bill which they themselves introduced last July and to have no reference in it to the date of 29 March.

[The Duke of Wellington (Con)]

I support Amendment 334, a cross-party amendment to which I have added my name, and which goes with Amendment 343. As other noble Lords have said, it is a modest amendment which simply restores the original wording of the Bill. As has also been said, here and in the other place, the Bill is about process not outcome. The amendment makes no attempt to delay the date on which we leave the EU. I believe that we will be told by the Government that one justification for putting the date in the Bill is to remove uncertainty. There are many uncertainties ahead of us, post Brexit, but there is surely no uncertainty about the date on which we leave the EU. It is clear that, under Article 50, we leave the EU on 29 March 2019 unless it seems at the time to be in the national interest for the Government to request a limited extension or delay in order to complete the process of withdrawing.

It could be that the withdrawal and implementation Bill has not yet passed through both Houses of Parliament. The European Parliament may not yet have passed it. There could still be matters to negotiate. There could be various reasons, but the point is that it could be in the national interest, at the time, to seek a delay. I am sure that a small delay would be granted by the other 27 member states if we were near the end of the process. I am aware that an amendment tabled in another place by Sir Oliver Letwin gave Ministers the power to change the exit date. However, I believe it is right—this is the fundamental point of the amendment—for this House to ask the other place to think again about the necessity of putting the date in the Bill. Is that necessary? Is it expedient? This amendment and the related amendments are intended to give the Government, and Parliament, greater flexibility. I hope the Government will accepted them in the spirit in which they are intended.

[Lord Adonis]

My Lords, the noble Baroness needs to be very cautious about taking on the noble Duke, of Wellington in a debate. I hope that she will be able to agree with her ducal colleague. There are two key points here: one is fundamental, the other pragmatic. The noble Duke made the pragmatic one, which is compelling. There could be reasons, perhaps to do with the final ratification processes, why it is in the public interest to delay and we should not put obstacles in the path of that. There is also a reason of fundamental constitutional principle why we should not agree to this. We are being asked to agree to a date for leaving the European Union, and to put it in statute, before we know what we will be doing after we leave. Until we have the withdrawal treaty, we will not be aware of what the terms of withdrawal are—