Construction Products (Amendment etc.) (EU Exit) Regulations 2019

Lord Adonis Excerpts

Wednesday 13th February 2019 Grand Committee

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government and Wales Office (Lord Bourne of Aberystwyth) (Con)]

My Lords, I beg to move that the Committee has considered the draft Construction Products (Amendment etc.) (EU Exit) Regulations 2019.

[Lord Adonis (Lab)]

My Lords, before the Minister continues, may I enter a protest at the fact that this discussion is taking place at all while the House debates the very issues of Brexit that we are supposed to be debating.

[Lord Bourne of Aberystwyth]

I am not giving way.

[Lord Adonis]

My Lords, I wish to make the point that it is totally unsatisfactory that we should be debating these no-deal regulations at the same time as the House is debating Brexit.

[Lord Young of Cookham (Con)]

Order!

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Adonis]

My Lords, the Minister was not his normal courteous self in declining to give way at the beginning. The reason he was not—indeed the reason Ministers are increasingly discourteous and disrespectful to the Grand Committee and the House on these matters—is of course that they are deeply frazzled by what is going on. They are having to rush through huge numbers of regulations in preparation for a totally unacceptable no-deal scenario, and it is therefore in their interests, as they see it, to suppress debate. What we have today is a classic instance of that.

I think the Minister would accept that these are important issues; the whole future of product standards and regulations is a vital issue for the future of the country and goes to the heart of our whole system of trade. At the same time as we are supposed to be debating this string of statutory instruments in the Grand Committee, the House itself is debating the whole state of the Brexit negotiations. That may account for the fact that there is almost nobody in the Grand Committee, because it is difficult for most of us to divide ourselves in two and be in two places at once.

I am very surprised that the usual channels agreed to the debate taking place in the Grand Committee today. I certainly would not have done if I was responsible for these matters, because it seems straightforwardly unacceptable that the Grand Committee should be discussing exactly the same matters that are being discussed in the Chamber. I hope the Minister might take back to the Chief Whip the concerns being expressed about these issues being debated here at the same time as the House is debating them. I see that one of my noble friends has come in, who is in the Opposition Whips’ Office; perhaps I may convey to the Opposition Chief Whip through him that it is totally unacceptable for the House to be debating statutory instruments in the Grand Committee on the same subject as is being debated in the Chamber. For that reason, I will certainly decline to express consent to this Motion at the end of the debate, and the House will need to debate this matter again fully when it goes to the Chamber, on the grounds that many noble Lords have not had an opportunity either to hear the debate or to participate in it.

On the substance of the issue, the status quo on exit is, as the Minister said, unchanged. Indeed, my understanding—perhaps he could confirm this in his reply—is that it is unchanged in all respects. The big issue is what happens to divergence thereafter. On that, he will say that it is a matter for government and Parliament thereafter, and this needs to be a dynamic situation. But—this goes to the whole issue of Brexit itself—if there is to be no divergence whatever and we are to continue to mimic the standards set for products in the EU, what on earth was the point of Brexit in the first place? Why are we going through this gruesome process, taking back control only to decline to exercise it because the best way of serving our industries and our economy is to continue to have the same product standards as the EU? However, if we diverge, which would largely be a matter of ideology, it would cause big problems of its own through the impact on the economy.

I note that Kit Malthouse, the Minister in the House of Commons, when dealing with exactly this issue, was unable to give any assurances, and quite rightly so. He said:

“I cannot speak for future Ministers, Secretaries of State or indeed Governments, who might decide to do something other”.—[Official Report, Commons, Fifth Delegated Legislation Committee 4/2/19; col. 10.]


That is completely true—of course he cannot speak for them. However, that goes to the whole point that no assurances can be given whatever that we will not in due course diverge—we may have a capricious Minister, for example. The Minister himself raised in his remarks the issue of Grenfell, aluminium product standards and building standards. That goes to the heart of the issue. What will happen quite quickly is that, perhaps because of domestic circumstances, developments or crises, and maybe not entirely wisely, we will decide quite rapidly to set and apply new product standards, different from those of the EU, which lead progressively —because this is an accretive process—to our divergence from European standards. The impact of that over time —maybe not each individual change but their cumulative effect—will be seriously to disadvantage our industries and businesses, and maybe our consumers, as standards diverge over time.

I know that the Minister will be unable to say anything other than “Nothing is changing on exit day” and “It is not our intention by these regulations to bring about any divergence”, but I think he will accept, as did his colleague in the House of Commons, that the whole purpose of the regulations—the whole purpose of Brexit—is to make such divergence possible. That divergence over time—perhaps not in each specific case, but over time—could be deeply damaging to our industries and consumers. That goes to the heart of the problems not only with a no-deal Brexit but with any Brexit at all.

However, as I will be making the same speech in the Chamber in due course, when other Members will be able to take part, because they are now debating the wider issue of whether we should be doing Brexit, I shall not elaborate any further.