UK-EU Relationship (European Affairs Committee Report)

Earl of Kinnoull Excerpts

Wednesday 20th September 2023 Lords Chamber

Moved by

[The Earl of Kinnoull]

That this House takes note of the Report from the European Affairs Committee The future UK-EU relationship (4th Report, HL Paper 184).

[The Earl of Kinnoull (CB)]

My Lords, the European Affairs Committee published our report, The future UK-EU relationship, on 29 April this year. We took oral evidence between October last year and March this year, hearing from 43 witnesses, finishing with the Minister for Europe, Leo Docherty MP. We also received 58 written submissions. The Government responded to the report on 28 June and to certain follow-up questions on 31 August. I am very grateful to the usual channels for expediting this debate today.

Put simply, the report looks at the overarching state of the relationship between the UK and the EU and how this might be developed into the future. This inquiry looks forward and not into the rear-view mirror. We did not address issues specific to Northern Ireland, including the Windsor Framework agreement. These are handled by our sister committee on the protocol.

The inquiry focused on four themes: the overall political, diplomatic and institutional relationship; the foreign policy, defence and security relationship; energy security and climate change; and the mobility of people. These do not comprise an exhaustive list of areas in which the UK-EU relationship could be developed. However, we as a committee believe that they are especially salient at the current juncture.

Here, and on behalf of the committee, I thank our staff: Jarek Wisniewski, Jack Sheldon, Nick Boorer, Tabitha Brown, Tim Mitchell and Louise Shewey. Their commitment and professionalism underpin everything in our report.

I start with the overall political, diplomatic and institutional relationship. It was unhappily the case that, during our inquiry, this was impacted by the impasse over the Northern Ireland protocol. Now, however, there are signs of improvement, not least with the recent welcome news on Horizon Europe.

The current institutional framework under the trade and co-operation agreement and the withdrawal agreement includes a total of 32 committees and working groups that bring together the Government and the Commission. Two of these committees are political, with the others essentially powered by officials. It is a double-headed structure, with two sets of committees reporting to one or other of the political committees, each of which is set up under its respective big agreement.

The committee felt that this huge apparatus was operational but not really operating. We recommended that there should be a “considerable increase” in the intensity of activity within these structures. We must optimise matters, and it is vital that the committees hum with activity to the mutual benefit of all concerned. Can the Minister give us an update on the 32 committees’ level of engagement and work, and assure the House that, from the UK side, at least, activity and warm relations are seen as a priority?

Our second theme was the foreign policy, defence and security relationship. We welcomed the “close and productive” co-operation between the UK and the EU following the Russian invasion of Ukraine, as well as the effective co-operation in the imposition of sanctions against Russia, but called for closer co-operation on their implementation and enforcement. We specifically proposed that the UK and the EU agree a memorandum of understanding on the imposition, implementation and enforcement of sanctions, complementary to the G7 enforcement co-ordination mechanism.

In its response, the Government said that they are not currently considering an MoU with the EU but that they

“will continue to review options to maximise the efficiency of our cooperation with the EU going forward”.

I ask the Minister: what factors are influencing the Government’s hesitation about this MoU on sanctions, which I assume would track the enhanced sanctions partnership agreement reached already between the Government and the US Treasury?

We heard a lot on having a structured framework for foreign and security policy. The report recommends that the UK and the EU should “deepen and improve” working relations on foreign and security policy, with some limited structured arrangements for ongoing co-operation. We thought that a purely ad hoc approach was not wise. We felt that any such structured arrangements should include provision for the UK Foreign Secretary to engage with the EU Foreign Affairs Council at least twice a year.

To date, the Government’s responses are none too clear on this. On 31 August, the Foreign Secretary said that

“both sides are focused on making sure our cooperation delivers, rather than on institutional changes”.

Can the Minister give some further clarity here? It seems to me that engagement at the General Affairs Council would improve the chances of delivery.

I turn to our third theme, which is energy security. This is obviously a wide area, and we focused on several specific topics in our report. The committee welcomed the close co-operation with the EU since the Russian invasion of Ukraine and noted that, in part thanks to this, there had been no disruption to energy trading. The report made various recommendations —for example, on the need for more interconnectors. I am glad that the government response materials have been positive on the recommendations. I look forward to others developing this vital area.

Turning to emissions trading schemes, the UK left the EU ETS at the end of the transition period. A separate UK ETS was established, which is very similar in design. This began trading in May 2021, and the carbon price has since broadly tracked the EU scheme. The UK scheme is around 10% of the size of the EU one. We saw

“significant mutual benefits to be gained”

from linking the schemes, citing the Swiss precedent. We recommended entering negotiations in what we called a “can-do spirit” and noted that a link would be

“easier to achieve sooner rather than later, given the possibility of greater divergence over time”.

The Government’s response says that they

“partially agree with the Committee’s recommendation”,

but it does not make clear which parts they agree with. A follow up in correspondence has not shed much new light on matters.

Commentators are now referring to a growing divergence between the UK and the EU’s Emissions Trading Scheme. As the Government have previously assured us that they are considering linking our respective systems, I ask the Minister: does this remain the case, and what steps are being taken to take this forward?

In December 2022, the EU Council agreed its general approach to a carbon border adjustment mechanism. A draft regulation is now progressing. The EU sees CBAM as a necessary part of its wider efforts to combat climate change. Without a CBAM in place, the EU foresees a risk of carbon leakage, whereby energy-intensive industries might relocate outside the EU and sell their goods back into the EU, effectively undercutting EU-based industry subject to carbon-reduction policies such as the EU ETS.

Under the EU’s current CBAM proposal, countries with an ETS linked to the EU’s would be excluded from such charges. As the UK and EU schemes are not currently linked, it is possible that CBAM could apply to UK-EU trade. I see no reason why the EU’s logic does not apply in reverse to the UK. All this of course strengthens the argument for linking ETSs. The Government have been consulting on measures to combat carbon leakage and their report on this area has not yet been published. Will the Minister say when we might expect the Government to provide an update on their position and where in the existing TCA committee structure CBAMs are being discussed?

The last section of our report examined the broad area of mobility of people, including the implications of the TCA’s provisions for both inward and outward business and professional mobility between the UK and the EU, but I will concentrate only on our work in the education and young persons sectors. The Government have made much of the Turing scheme, and we applauded it in its limited scope. However, we studied the Welsh Government’s Taith scheme. Indeed, we travelled to Cardiff. Introduced in 2022, Taith provides financial support for inbound educational group mobility. A Welsh organisation can apply for funding to send people out of Wales to another country and get funding to bring people to Wales. The Turing scheme provides funding for outbound mobility only. The Scottish Government have recently announced plans for a similar scheme to Taith, although details have not been provided. Of course, students in Northern Ireland can access Erasmus+.

We asked the Minister for Europe whether there are plans to introduce a scheme similar to Taith in England. He said the Government were

“open-minded and we look with great interest at the extent to which we might operate a similar scheme”.

In the most recent correspondence with the committee, the Foreign Secretary said,

“the Turing Scheme’s focus on outward mobility funding has not been a hindrance to forming partnerships between institutions, which may go some way to providing the kind of links the Committee is seeking”.

Three-quarters of the United Kingdom’s nations are already or will be establishing some form of reciprocal student exchange programme. Given the Minister for Europe’s admission that Erasmus+ has been “very beneficial” to the UK and the evidence that Taith has been successful in Wales, will the Minister comment on whether the Turing scheme will be enhanced?

The committee heard evidence that suggested that post-Brexit barriers to mobility between the UK and the EU, in both directions, have had an especially significant impact on young people, including workers and professionals in the early stages of their careers, as well as students across different educational levels. We recommended that the Government discuss with the Commission the possibility of an ambitious reciprocal youth mobility partnership, similar to the youth mobility schemes that the UK and EU member states enjoy with other jurisdictions, allowing young people to apply for fixed-term visas to travel and work. The Government’s response here was lacklustre, saying that the Government are

“exploring bilateral opportunities for reciprocal youth mobility schemes with international partners, including our European neighbours”.

Finally, will the Minister give us an update on discussions with the EU and individual EU member states about youth mobility partnerships?

There are many speakers and I look forward to the debate very much. I beg to move.

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[The Earl of Kinnoull (CB)]

I thank the Minister who, as ever, gave a very polished performance. Her speech was rich in detail and I look forward to reading it tomorrow morning. I must say that I am always amazed by her capacity for hard work. I have been interacting with her this week and we all owe her a lot of thanks for that hard work and for that effective response.

I also thank everyone else who has spoken; it has been a most interesting and wide-ranging debate, which went all over the place. As this is my last report—my swansong, as someone said—I thank all the people who have been on the committee with me. I have actually been on it since before the Brexit vote, for more than seven years, and it has been enormous fun. Strong comments have been made across the table, at times, but the committee has always ended up in a good place, with good humour. I hope we have produced things that will have a long shelf life and will be helpful to those who seek to improve matters through the years.

I finally thank my noble friend Lord Ricketts, who has taken on a jolly difficult task. He asked me to say how sorry he is not to be here—as noble Lords will know, he is on duty at the state visit—but I suspect he only half-meant that because I am sure he is being very well fed. I will quiz him on that when he gets back.

I want to underline three points. The first was on the comments about these 32 committees. Yes, just the number of meetings is not going to do anything, but the committees do publish their agendas and minutes. So when we on the committee say that we do not feel that these committees, which are forums for mutual opportunity, are firing on all cylinders, we mean that we have been looking at the agendas and minutes, not just at how many times they have met. And, as I said, these are mutual things, so if we can follow them up, everyone will benefit.

Secondly, the most popular theme among the speakers was some form of co-operation on foreign policy, defence and security. I heard what the Minister said on this, but I and quite a lot of people around the House regret that. These people have a lot of experience of knowing that ad hocism brings risk, and it is risk that we do not need. We have spoken a lot about having, as an absolute minimum structure, the Foreign Secretary visiting the European Foreign Affairs Council twice a year. I did not think that was too much structure. Certainly, if I were the Foreign Secretary, I would want to meet my opposite numbers from other countries—at least the major countries—regularly. I want to stress that.

Finally, in the category “boring but important” is the whole saga that occupied about half my speech on ETS and CBAM. I am sorry to go into jargon. The thing is, the more you look at that and understand it, the more you realise that this is potentially quite a big problem and it is solvable—and solvable now, if there is a will. I do hope the Government will look at all that again. From the Minister’s speech, it did sound as though this is happening. Now that there are those, as I said, rather boring but really accurate and informative chapters of our report, that will tell you about the issue and I think it is something that we can solve.

We are fated to have a close relationship with Europe. The ties of blood, culture and history are so strong. I am not talking about a political relationship; but, as liberal democracies, that is something we share greatly with them. As the noble Lord, Lord Kerr, was saying, it is a pretty wintry world outside liberal democracies, which are rather rare. So we should stick together and use the very good apparatus we have built—the powerful trade and co-operation agreement, and others—to optimise things and build something friendly and proximate, and that will have to be dynamic. I beg to move.

Motion agreed.

Protocol on Ireland/Northern Ireland: Follow-up Report (European Affairs Committee)

Earl of Kinnoull Excerpts

Monday 11th September 2023 Grand Committee

[The Earl of Kinnoull (CB)]

My Lords, I will make three brief points. The first follows on from the point made by many other noble Lords about the noble Lord, Lord Jay, and his industry, expertise and skill. I say that from first-hand knowledge, because the European Affairs Committee and its sister committee, the Ireland/Northern Ireland protocol committee, had to be very closely co-ordinated throughout everything to ensure we were not tripping over each other. That took the form of a weekly meeting during pretty well the whole of the currency of these reports. I never left those meetings unimproved and without being amused. I pay tribute to the noble Lord.

The second point is to underline the issue of regulatory divergence and how it is proceeding apace. Another and different meeting that we regularly had between the committees was the sift meeting, which considered the EU documents being sent through to the committee family. We had to decide whether those documents would be dealt with by the Ireland/Northern Ireland protocol committee or by the European Affairs Committee. This gave us a great look into what was going on. Regulatory divergence is proceeding apace. This issue will add a lot of long-term complexity to the relationship between the UK and the EU and will throw up many issues. It will need to continue to be watched.

The final issue is the merits of an SPS agreement. This has been considered by the European Union Committee and the European Affairs Committee several times. The committee has reported several times and unanimously said that there should be one. In its very carefully nuanced paragraph 129 of the report on the Windsor Framework, the Ireland/Northern Ireland protocol committee asks the Government to come back to it on the merits of such an arrangement. Thanks to the noble Baroness, Lady O’Loan, I have been able to look at the Government’s response at great speed this afternoon. It would appear that the Government have not responded to that paragraph at all. I would be very grateful if the Minister could give some indication as to whether there will be a response to it.

European Union: Border Control Checks

Earl of Kinnoull Excerpts

Thursday 16th December 2021 Lords Chamber

[The Earl of Kinnoull (CB)]

On SMEs in the EU and the UK, our thoughts were twofold. First, the Brexit support fund was not fully spent because it had rather narrow confines. Secondly, does the Minister agree that the Brexit support fund and similar things should be redoubled to help our SMEs and that our old friends the trade specialised committees under the TCA should be fired up and meeting to try to ameliorate matters for SMEs both in the EU and in the UK?

[Lord Frost (Con)]

My Lords, the Brexit support fund was indeed not fully used, which suggested to us that it was not the best means of providing support to companies. That is why we have brought in the export support service, which I hope will grow and become more focused in time—in particular to help SMEs, which obviously have most difficulty in dealing with the new arrangements.

The noble Lord is obviously correct to say that this is business for the trade specialised committees, and when we have particular evidence of difficulties, we will certainly raise them in those fora.

EU–UK Partnership Council

Earl of Kinnoull Excerpts

Thursday 16th December 2021 Lords Chamber

[Lord Frost (Con)]

My Lords, I very much agree with the thrust of the question of the noble Baroness. I think it is well known that we have wanted to get the Horizon arrangements up and running for some time; it is a matter of great disappointment that we have still not managed to do so. It is not 100% clear why, but that is the situation. However, the good news is that we have now agreed that there will be a meeting of the relevant specialised committee before the end of this year, provisionally on 21 December. I hope that might mark a change in the approach being taken and enable us to move this forward.

[The Earl of Kinnoull (CB)]

My Lords, the very first of those declarations made that day concerned financial services. There was an agreement that, by March 2021, an MoU would be concluded to get regulatory framework co-operation. That has not happened, although there were some technical discussions. Will this declaration feature on a future agenda for the Partnership Council, as it is certainly important? Until that MoU has been done, the EU will not assess us for the various equivalence decisions that are so vital to the City. China has 14 equivalence decisions, Mexico has 13 and we currently have two, which are time-limited.

[Lord Frost (Con)]

My Lords, the noble Earl is right that there is a provision to agree an MoU. Indeed, there were discussions at the start of this year provisionally to agree that text. Those discussions have paused, again for reasons that we are not 100% clear about, although we can speculate. Naturally, we hope it will be possible to pick them up and move this forward, given that, as the noble Earl knows, some of the equivalence decisions are now imminent if not quite yet urgent.

Beyond Brexit: Institutional Framework (EUC Report)

Earl of Kinnoull Excerpts

Monday 6th December 2021 Grand Committee

Moved by

[The Earl of Kinnoull]

That the Grand Committee takes note of the Report from the European Union Committee Beyond Brexit: the institutional framework (21st Report, Session 2019–21, HL Paper 246).

[The Earl of Kinnoull (CB)]

My Lords, on 24 December last year the EU–UK trade and co-operation agreement was concluded between the UK and the EU. Few of the 500 million people directly affected would not have been grateful for the clearing of this first great hurdle in establishing the new relationship between the UK and the European Union. The European Union Committee and the other members of our committee family set about analysing what had been agreed that day, which comprised not just the trade and co-operation agreement but two other agreements and 15 declarations. These were the final reports of the family of European Union committees of this House. Those committees—there were seven when I succeeded as chair the outstanding noble Lord, Lord Boswell of Aynho—have sought for almost five decades to scrutinise all matters and to inform the House and people more widely of every relevant issue through report, correspondence or debate.

The suite of five Beyond Brexit reports, three of which we are debating today, were the final reports of the European Union Committee after nearly 50 years of service to the House and just over 50 Brexit-related reports to the House. I hope that the committee today and, through it, the House will warmly thank the staff who have enabled matters. In the Brexit period of almost five years, these 25 or so officials were led by Chris Johnson. I know that all will want to recognise his outstanding service and to thank him. The clerk of the European Union Committee throughout the period was Stuart Stoner, and equal recognition and thanks are due to him and to all the staff concerned. I especially want to cite those who are in less frontline roles. The contributions of all were essential to our efforts in this long period of sustained activity. It is fitting that the noble Lord, Lord True, is today standing in for the noble Lord, Lord Frost. He has also been most helpful and generous with his time in public and privately, and I place on the record my thanks to him and to the noble Lord, Lord Frost, for his similar support.

I turn now to our report, Beyond Brexit: the institutional framework. Some 11 months or so on from the announcement of the trade and co-operation agreement, we have two associated agreements on nuclear matters and classified information, and 15 declarations, which I shall call the TCA package. This debate represents the first opportunity for the House to take general stock of the position and how it matches up to the various words and aspirations of the TCA package. In the interests of time, I will restrict myself to four areas, knowing that the speakers’ list for this afternoon’s debate will enable us to cover many others in this huge, varied and complex arena.

In particular, I will leave all mention of the Ireland/Northern Ireland protocol to my noble friend Lord Jay of Ewelme, the chair of the Protocol on Ireland/Northern Ireland Sub-Committee. I very much look forward to his contribution, as I do those of the noble Baroness, Lady Donaghy, the redoubtable chair of the EU Services Sub-Committee, and the noble Baroness, Lady Armstrong, an outstanding veteran of the European committee family, who is stepping in for the noble Baroness, Lady Verma, the equally strong chair of the EU Goods Sub-Committee.

The first of the four areas I want to consider is governance. The TCA governance apparatus comprises 24 committees and working groups of various types. I remind all that this is in addition to the eight set up under the withdrawal agreement. At the top of the tree is the Partnership Council, a very powerful entity that can itself agree changes to the TCA, in much the same way that the Joint Committee, at the top of the withdrawal agreement tree, can.

The speed with which the TCA was created inevitably and rightly left much detail to be agreed at a later stage. The logical fora for discussions on this quantitative detail were the committees, particularly the 18 specialist committees and four working groups of the TCA. These bodies are staffed by officials, not politicians, but I regret that they do not seem to be operating in a meaningful way. Recent Answers to Questions in the House have suggested that they have not even all yet met; and other disclosure has suggested that often, the ones that have met have not had agendas which would suggest that substantive discussions are going on. I therefore ask the Minister to update us on the position of these bodies. Have they now all met? Are they now operational as bodies that will tweak the TCA to the mutual benefit of the signatories?

The second area that I want to touch on is the 15 declarations. The first declaration is a joint one concerning financial services regulatory co-operation between the UK and the EU. The second paragraph states:

“Both Parties will, by March 2021, agree a Memorandum of Understanding establishing the framework for this cooperation.”


No such MoU has been signed, although technical negotiations were concluded back in March. This failure to sign the MoU means, in turn, that the EU will not assess the UK for equivalence, which was originally promised for the end of July. The curious result is that the People’s Republic of China has 14 financial services equivalence decisions with the EU, Mexico has 13 and the UK has just one, which relates to clearing and is time-limited.

A later joint declaration concerns the UK’s participation in EU programmes. This includes Horizon Europe. That declaration’s fourth paragraph states:

“It is the Parties’ firm intention that the Specialised Committee on Participation in Union Programmes will adopt the Protocols at the earliest opportunity to allow their implementation as soon as possible, in particular with the ambition that United Kingdom entities would be able to participate from the beginning of the programmes”.


As yet, however, the UK’s vast higher education and research community has no access to Horizon Europe, which is now nearly a year into its seven-year cycle. Could the Minister comment on the above examples and commit to providing the Committee with a full picture of the declarations a year on?

The third area concerns the dispute resolution provisions under the TCA. Chapter 4 of our report is devoted to explaining these complex arrangements. The conclusions set out in paragraphs 129 to 135 note, among other things, that the provisions are “novel”. We have seen in the disputes over fishing with France outstanding matters that need to be resolved. The two remaining disputes, one over UK waters and one over Jersey waters, have been rumbling on for some considerable time, with much work both being done on the megaphone by politicians and in offices by patient officials in the UK, the EU and France. These disputes represent in the TCA the first public test of a dispute, yet the resolution machinery is not being used. This is an active choice by both parties to the TCA, for either is able to engage the process.

I firmly believe that the parties need to use the dispute resolution procedures as part of the confidence-building process in the whole of the new TCA apparatus. Whatever the seemingly attractive reasons for dealing with these problems outwith the TCA apparatus, that reasoning is wrong when looked at in this wider view. Will the Minister explain why the current fishing disputes with France are not being dealt with using the TCA dispute resolution provisions within Part 2 of the TCA?

The fourth and final area concerns the scrutiny of the TCA, in particular parliamentary scrutiny. We dealt with this in paragraphs 76 to 91 of our report. I begin by thanking the Government for their part in the substantial efforts to bring into being the parliamentary partnership assembly. Indeed, I understand that the relevant Motion will be brought to this House later this week. I hope that it will allow the parliamentary partnership assembly to meet later, in the first quarter of 2022. The vital interparliamentary dimension of the new relationship between the UK and EU will then be immeasurably strengthened.

However, the scrutiny committees of both Houses have yet to conclude an agreement with the Government as to how to scrutinise the TCA and the withdrawal agreement. The European Union Committee and its sister committee in the House of Commons had the benefit of the scrutiny reserve resolution in a four decades old agreed process. The current interim and ad hoc arrangements for the TCA and withdrawal agreement serve no one well and are inconsistently applied, as they have not been set out in a clear and precise way.

The winning formula will include agreement on which documents—with, of course, appropriate Explanatory Memoranda—will be deposited with the scrutiny committees; how and when the contemplated textual changes to the TCA and withdrawal agreement will be scrutinised; how often and for how long Ministers will commit to appearing before the committees; and the way briefings will be given on meetings of the Partnership Council and the joint committee. Will the Minister comment on the necessity for proportionate scrutiny and on the wisdom of having these matters agreed in writing in advance?

In closing, I note once more what rare beasts liberal democracies are. We live in a world replete with far less attractive authoritarian regimes where basic freedoms such as free speech are withheld. The things that divide the UK and the EU currently are of a small nature compared with those that unite us. The DNA of the proud European Union Committee, and its torch, have been passed to the European Affairs Committee and several of the other new and vibrant committees of this House. Our work will continue. I therefore look forward very much to this afternoon’s debate. I beg to move.

--- Later in debate ---

[The Earl of Kinnoull (CB)]

My Lords, I thank everyone who has taken part in this utterly absorbing debate on three reports that remain very current despite being quite old. I thank the Minister for being on his feet for half an hour and batting back many of the balls in his typically agreeable way.

One of the most notable comments, to me, was made by the noble Baroness, Lady Chapman. She said how pleasant it was that this was a forward-looking debate. From here, as we look at European Union things, it will be important to be forward-looking. It is for historians to deal with the past; it is for us, I am afraid, to deal with the future. There are many issues to be addressed.

That takes me to something that I had forgotten today but that I think we should note: the centenary of the Anglo-Irish treaty. It is an incredibly important document and my relatives had something to do with it; I feel it is worth marking. In his excellent speech, the noble Lord, Lord Jay of Ewelme, listed the many issues that his committee is dealing with in Northern Ireland, in what is a very complicated and difficult environment all round. I am glad that his committee is able to shine its light on things and explain to people what is going on in a way that I feel is very clear. He gave a wonderful speech, which I am looking forward to reading. It showed just how many hard yards there are to go on that.

Outwith Northern Ireland, I felt that four themes came through this afternoon. The first was scrutiny. I am the person dealing with the noble Lord, Lord Frost, on scrutiny. We have not as yet been able to get to a satisfactory position on that. It is heartening to hear that so many others worry about it. I hope that message will be taken back by the noble Lord, Lord True, to say how much we care about finishing this off and getting to a settlement on it.

The other three issues have a common theme. The first was SPS and the wisdom of reaching some sort of agreement on it. I declare my interest as a small-scale farmer. We do not export anything, but the idea of being in the export business with the current SPS things is very frightening indeed. It stretches through to many other bits of our industry.

The second issue was performing artists. The noble Lord, Lord Hannay, was the first person to talk about this. I will back up a bit of what he said. Three different types of action need to take place. There is a certain amount of unilateral action that the Government can take to at least ease some of the issues. The Government have started to deal with the bilateral actions, although the bilateral deals done with the various European countries are wildly different and not done on a common basis, so it is very complicated for ordinary mortals to understand the situation in a given country. Then there are the things that need to be dealt with by the trade and co-operation agreement machinery. That is a very complicated task, and it needs a lot of co-ordination to get it right. We have started what I think will be a long line of correspondence on this, but I hope the Government will feel it well worth putting in the effort for this vast industry of more than £100 billion of turnover per year.

The last thing was the machinery of the trade and co-operation agreement, and it is not heartening to hear that one of the specialised committees has not met yet and many of the others have met only to agree their rules of procedure. I am afraid that is an indication of the common theme among those last three issues: the state of the relationship between the UK and the EU. I very much regret it. In culture, history and blood, these are our neighbours and friends—and we have fallen out with them.

We need to rebuild that trust and respect. A little bit of that will be in the parliamentary partnership assembly; a little bit will be everywhere. I know that people in this Room who have taken time to speak in this debate will all feel that very strongly. I do not think there is anything to ask the Government because I think they agree, but in the rebuilding of those it is important to realise that everything communicates—every newspaper article in the Daily Mail; everything. We need to rebuild them because, as I observed in the last bit of my speech, the real issue in life is the authoritarian regimes and the nasty way in which they deal with their populations. We are very lucky to live where we do.

Motion agreed.

Protocol on Ireland/Northern Ireland: Impact on UK Internal Market

Earl of Kinnoull Excerpts

Thursday 18th November 2021 Lords Chamber

[Lord Frost (Con)]

I thank my noble friend for his question, which is a good one. The safeguards in Article 16 are what they say they are: safeguards. They are not an on/off switch but are significant and potentially capable of being used in a significant way. We as a Government will always proceed on the basis of predictability, certainty and clarity. There is a one-month process of consultation for the use of Article 16 between notification and activation, and we would expect to follow all the necessary procedures to provide the maximum possible legal certainty—if we reach that point.

[The Earl of Kinnoull (CB)]

My Lords, can the Minister say to what extent the protocol situation has affected the operation of the trade and co-operation agreement and the other EU-UK workstreams?

[Lord Frost (Con)]

My Lords, the trade and co-operation agreement and the withdrawal agreement are obviously separate. I have said that the difficulties we are having on the protocol are at the heart of some of the broader mistrusts that exist in the process at the moment. That said, the implementation of the TCA is going well. The specialised committees have largely met. The trade committee met earlier this week and, despite difficulties on issues such as fisheries, we are nevertheless implementing the TCA well and effectively, and the processes are working well.

Protocol on Ireland/Northern Ireland: Effect of Renegotiation on Other Trade Negotiations

Earl of Kinnoull Excerpts

Thursday 21st October 2021 Lords Chamber

[Lord Frost (Con)]

My Lords, as I have said on previous occasions, the question of trust is important and it takes two sides to create trust. As I set out in the speech in Lisbon to which the noble Baroness previously referred, there are a number of things that the EU has done that have not necessarily been conducive to building trust either, but we need to move on from that and generate new momentum to try to reach agreement on a revised protocol. On the question of SPS regulations, the difficulty is that free trade agreements are not the only reason why you might wish to evolve your own agri-food regulations, and indeed the EU has evolved its own autonomously since the start of 2021. Where there is divergence it is for that reason, not because of anything that we have done.

[The Earl of Kinnoull (CB)]

My Lords, 24 committees and groups were set up under the trade and co-operation agreement. Have all 24 now met and can they be considered fully operational?

[Lord Frost (Con)]

My Lords, they have not all met yet, although they have largely met. I think four of these committees still have to meet this year, then the trade partnership committee, and then we hope for another meeting of the Partnership Council before the end of the year. The agendas for specialised committees are published on GOV.UK for those who are interested. So the programme has well begun and we expect to complete a full round by the end of the year.

Imports from EU to GB: Business Preparation

Earl of Kinnoull Excerpts

Thursday 16th September 2021 Lords Chamber

Asked by

[The Earl of Kinnoull]

To ask the Minister of State at the Cabinet Office (Lord Frost) what steps Her Majesty’s Government are taking to prepare businesses for the introduction of new checks and controls on imports into Great Britain from the European Union on 1 October 2021 and 1 January 2022.

[The Minister of State, Cabinet Office (Lord Frost) (Con)]

My Lords, on 14 September I announced a pragmatic new timetable for introducing certain controls for goods imported from the EU to the UK to give businesses more time to adjust. These controls will be introduced in two stages, on 1 January and 1 July. The Government continue to support all businesses trading with the EU in all sectors, including by putting in place additional staffing, comprehensive guidance for businesses and funding infrastructure to ease border processes.

--- Later in debate ---

[The Earl of Kinnoull (CB)]

In February 2020, the Government indicated that full border controls on EU imports would commence on 1 January 2021. In June 2020, the Government announced that many controls would instead be phased in, with mixed deadlines, from April to July 2021. In March 2021, the Government delayed the introduction of this mix of controls further, with phases from October 2021 to March 2022. Earlier this week, just three weeks before the first part of the mix was due to be implemented, the Government announced yet another delay, with phases from January to July 2022. Three times now, businesses have spent time, and no doubt money, preparing for key deadlines, and three times they have seen the can kicked down the road. What steps will the Government take to restore business confidence in their timetable for import controls, and will they compensate businesses for their wasted efforts?

[Lord Frost (Con)]

My Lords, it has of course been an extraordinary year to 18 months economically. We have been dealing with a pandemic of unpredictable quality, and it is very clear that there are global strains on supply chains and other aspects of the business environment. That is why we do not apologise for taking this series of pragmatic decisions to respond to the evolving situation. We have no plans to evolve these changes further, and the money that businesses have already spent in dealing with the situation will have been well spent.

Protocol on Ireland/Northern Ireland (EUC Report)

Earl of Kinnoull Excerpts

Monday 13th September 2021 Grand Committee

Moved by

[The Earl of Kinnoull]

That the Grand Committee takes note of the Report from the European Union Committee The Protocol on Ireland/Northern Ireland (9th Report, Session 2019–21, HL Paper 66).

[The Earl of Kinnoull (CB)]

My Lords, the protocol on Ireland/Northern Ireland has never been far from the news since it was agreed. Activity over just the last few days shows how timely today’s debate is. The encouraging thing is that dialogue is seen by all as the correct route forward. The two reports provide analysis of the protocol approximately seven months before and seven months after it came into effect on 1 January this year. I will introduce the first report, undertaken by the former European Union Select Committee, which I chaired. My noble friend Lord Jay of Ewelme will introduce the second report, which was undertaken by the new Sub-Committee on the Protocol on Ireland/Northern Ireland.

I thank the Chief Whip for bringing forward this debate at this time. I also most warmly thank the staff of all the committees concerned. I particularly thank Chris Johnson, who was the principal clerk at all the relevant times, and Stuart Stoner, who has the unique distinction of being the clerk to both committees when the reports were settled.

The European Union Committee’s report on the protocol followed its previous scrutiny of the revised withdrawal agreement and political declaration negotiated by this Government in October 2019. That report included a much shorter initial analysis of the protocol and was published in January 2020. It was clear to us that, as it was such a technically complex and politically contentious document, further detailed work on the protocol was a necessity.

Our fresh inquiry started in February 2020. There followed a careful process which included discussions on the ground with politicians north and south, business leaders and academic experts. The Government published a Command Paper on 20 May on their approach to the protocol, which we took into account. We published our report on 1 June 2020. The report was intended to be a reasonably complete guide to the protocol on which any interested party could rely, with analysis of the protocol, its recitals, its 19 articles and seven annexes. In our conclusions and recommendations, we highlighted the main elements of the protocol, the tensions and contradictions at its heart and the “many unanswered questions” about its operation that remained outstanding. The government response of August 2020 was commendably on time and addressed some of the issues we had raised but was less helpful on many others, on which the Government were simply silent.

A moment ago, I said “tensions and contradictions” because there is not only the matter of the recitals at the front of the protocol and how they relate to the true construction of the articles, and especially their implementation, but also the matter within the articles themselves. In particular, there is an inherent tension, or perhaps an apparent contradiction between and among, Articles 4, 5 and 6. Article 4 states:

“Northern Ireland is part of the customs territory of the United Kingdom”.


This is reinforced by Article 6, which states:

“Nothing in this Protocol shall prevent the United Kingdom from ensuring unfettered market access for goods moving from Northern Ireland to other parts of the United Kingdom's internal market.”


However, these are offset by Article 5, which applies the entirety of EU customs legislation, including the union customs code, to Northern Ireland. Article 5 thus retains a single regulatory zone for goods on the island of Ireland, achieving the key aim of avoiding a hard border between Ireland and Northern Ireland. Yet this requires the imposition of new customs processes and regulatory checks on goods moving from Great Britain to Northern Ireland.

The first paragraph of our summary noted that:

“On the one hand, the UK Government has been unable to explain precisely or consistently what it agreed with the EU. On the other … the EU’s insistence that ‘the rules are the rules’ has left Northern Ireland businesses fearing that there will be no flexibility to apply the Protocol proportionately. This has led to a diminution of trust between the two sides, with the upshot”—


in the words of a witness—

“that Northern Ireland has felt like ‘a pawn in the game’.”

Those words date from 1 June 2020 and events since then, notably in the last few days, suggest that the drafting has withstood the test of time. A good number of the issues that we highlighted in June 2020 remain matters of contention today. Indeed, the report anticipated many of the concerns set out over a year later in the Government’s Command Paper, Northern Ireland Protocol—Next Steps, published on 21 July this year. There are many potential illustrations of this point. To pick just two, in paragraph 25 of our report we said:

“The Protocol must ultimately be viewed through the lens of the peace process, and therefore judged by the impact it has on the people, communities and economic prosperity of Northern Ireland and Ireland.”


The first of a few questions for the Minister is: will he confirm whether or not he agrees with that assertion?

--- Later in debate ---

[The Earl of Kinnoull (CB)]

My Lords, I was just drawing the Committee’s attention to a couple of paragraphs in our report in which we referred to issues that we felt were most important in 2020, and which are still current today. The second of my two examples is in paragraph 91:

“There is a real danger that businesses based in Great Britain could conclude that it is economically unviable to continue to operate in Northern Ireland … thus undermining Northern Ireland’s economic model, its future prosperity and, potentially, its political stability.”


Perhaps the Minister might comment on that as well.

Chapter 12 of our report concerned the governance of the protocol. This is in three layers: the Joint Committee, which sits at the top of the withdrawal agreement; a specialised committee on Northern Ireland; and the joint consultative working group. Much of the detail of how the protocol should operate lies within these very powerful bodies. The Joint Committee, after all, has even the power to alter the withdrawal agreement itself. We were concerned in June of last year that it was not meeting and beginning to crack through the many matters of implementation detail. Indeed, the Minister has answered more than once at the Dispatch Box questions from me on this topic. Perhaps he might give us an update as to the recent and currently planned meetings of these bodies and their current workstreams.

In our final conclusion, we said:

“it is incumbent on all parties, including the UK Government, the EU, the Irish Government, and the political parties in Northern Ireland, after the divisions of the past four years, to work in a common endeavour to prioritise and urgently address the interests, stability and prosperity of the people and communities of Northern Ireland. As we concluded in our 2016 report, anything less would diminish the efforts of all those who have worked so hard for peace and good relations across these islands.”

These issues will be resolved only by dialogue in a spirit of trust. My final question to the Minister is therefore this: in the light of the publication of the Government’s July 2021 Command Paper and the further extension of the grace periods announced last week, what steps is he taking to ensure that the ongoing talks with the EU will take place in such an atmosphere of co-operation and trust, above all putting the interests of the people of Northern Ireland first?

Our report highlighted many other issues, and I am sure we will hear about many of them. In particular, it highlighted the vital importance of parliamentary scrutiny of the operation of the protocol. I was therefore delighted when, in December 2020, the Liaison Committee of this House agreed that the new European Affairs Committee, which I chair, should appoint a dedicated committee on the protocol. At this point, I will pass the baton to the Chair of that committee, my noble friend Lord Jay of Ewelme, to introduce his own report.

--- Later in debate ---

[The Earl of Kinnoull (CB)]

I suppose the refrain of the afternoon is that we are where we are, which is almost at the end. I would like to add my thanks to all noble Lords who have taken part in what has been an absolutely absorbing and very high-quality debate, with views from every side of this very difficult set of problems.

I want to make three very brief observations. First, I note the sheer scale of the achievement of the noble Lord, Lord Jay, and his committee in producing a punchy and very helpful report by consensus, knowing what strong feelings there were sitting around that table. I hope that the Government, when they read the output of that committee’s work now and in the future, will listen all the more carefully knowing where it has come from. It is a remarkable achievement. My second point was prompted in this debate by what the noble Lord, Lord Woods, said, right at the start: a grace period extension is not a solution. It was very heartening to hear the Minister grapple with this issue and say that dialogue is the way forward, and to see him look very determined indeed to get that dialogue going. It will not be an easy road. This brings me to my third point, one I think everyone has raised this afternoon, which is trust and the importance of it. Trust is the necessary fertilizer of any successful dialogue, and it is important to carry on building that trust. Every single thing communicates in trust, which needs to be built by all sides. It is not just the Government or just the EU; it is also the concern of other parties involved in this very difficult negotiation. Everyone here should be part of that process and, having said that, I beg to move.

Motion agreed.

Northern Ireland Protocol

Earl of Kinnoull Excerpts

Wednesday 21st July 2021 Lords Chamber

[Lord Frost (Con)]

My Lords, it is clear that the balance we have in the protocol is not working at the moment, and I have explained why on many occasions. The issue raised by the noble Lord is one reason why we think changes to the governance arrangements in this protocol are so important. It simply does not fit with the reality of the situation to have laws imposed and policed by institutions outside the UK territory and subject to the judgments of courts that are not courts of the UK. If we can agree that—I recognise that it is a significant point—I think we will find some of the problems raised by the noble Lord beginning to melt away.

[The Earl of Kinnoull (CB)]

My Lords, there are 32 committees set up under the TCA and the withdrawal agreement, only three of which are directly relevant to the Ireland/Northern Ireland protocol, leaving 29 that are not—presumably now 30, given the overnight news on Gibraltar. Does the Minister share the concerns of many that the trust problems that are taking place within the Ireland/Northern Ireland protocol might leak across to these other 30 forums, which would be most unfortunate? If he shares those concerns, what are the Government doing to address that?

[Lord Frost (Con)]

My Lords, where there are trust problems between us and the European Union, they stem ultimately from the issues that we have on the protocol. I agree 100% with the noble Lord that we must try to nip that in the bud and stop it getting in the way, in a durable way, of the rest of the relationship. The issue of Gibraltar that he raises obviously is a dispute about a different issue. There are analogous elements, but it is important to keep these things separate. The mandate that the EU agreed yesterday does seem to be problematic in a number of ways, as my right honourable friend the Foreign Secretary made clear yesterday. But I do not think it makes sense to connect one thing with another. We deal with each of these issues on its own terms and try to proceed in a constructive way.