Civil Jurisdiction and Judgments (Amendment) (EU Exit) Regulations 2019

Debate between Lord Beecham and Lord Adonis

Tuesday 29th January 2019 Grand Committee

[Lord Beecham (Lab)]

My Lords, I have practised law for a long time—fortunately none of it in relation to the EU and the complications we are debating today. I defer to the more qualified Members of the Committee today, some of whom have already addressed us.

These regulations might best be described as a hors d’oeuvre to the four-course Brexit banquet we are being served today—although, curiously, neither the Joint Committee on Statutory Instruments nor the Secondary Legislation Scrutiny Committee has raised any concerns.

In addition to reverting to the pre-EU membership system, the statutory instrument repeals a decision that currently allows the UK to co-operate on civil and commercial matters in the EU judicial network. What estimate have the Government made of the impact on the UK of that change, and what consultation took place with industry or other potentially interested parties given that the so-called Brussels regime operated on a reciprocal basis?

The Law Society, which is generally supportive of the statutory instrument, is concerned about the loss of the existing framework for determining which national court has jurisdiction and for recognising whether or not there is a choice of court between the parties to disputes.

The impact assessment contains a disturbing paragraph which states:

“Businesses and individuals litigating in the courts of EU countries will have an advantage over those litigating in the UK as UK litigants cannot guarantee the judgment they get from the UK courts is enforceable in the EU but litigants who get a judgment from the EU courts, will almost always be able to obtain enforcement of it in the UK”.


It is a one-sided deal, as it were. The English legal system has prospered remarkably through its participation in the EU but that looks to be one of the costs and losses that it will incur.

The Law Society notes that hitherto the existing system has fostered cross-border trade and encourages litigants to use the UK courts in the knowledge that their judgments would be enforceable across the EU and calls on the Government to accede to the Lugano convention—which, as the noble and learned Lord has indicated, is not an EU organisation although the EU is a party to it. Can the Minister indicate the Government’s response to that suggestion?

[Lord Adonis]

My Lords, the only noble Lord who has not been prepared to take interventions is the Minister; it is unprecedented in my experience of Grand Committees. It is a straightforward attempt by the Government, which I am afraid we have seen time and again, to suppress parliamentary debates and shorten proceedings in a Grand Committee. One can understand why the Government wish to do this: it is simply impossible now to introduce and enact all the statutory instruments relating to no deal in time for the UK to leave the European Union at the end of March unless they are not scrutinised by Parliament. If they are not, the Government can increase the volume that come before the Grand Committee day by day. The hundreds more that have to come can then be hustled through. I say to the noble and learned Lord, who we hold in high esteem as a barrister, that if these sorts of proceedings and this sort of short-circuiting of due process were taking place in a court in which he was appearing, I imagine that he would be the first to criticise it. It is our duty to hold him to account. As he is not prepared to follow the normal conventions of the Grand Committee and the House, that should lead us to refer this regulation to the House for further debate as a matter of principle, not least because of all the issues raised in the debate.

European Union (Withdrawal) Bill

Debate between Lord Beecham and Lord Adonis

Committee: 8th sitting (Hansard - continued): House of Lords
Monday 19th March 2018 Lords Chamber

[Lord Adonis]

My Lords, the noble Lord, Lord Shipley, drew attention to a significant weakness in our constitutional arrangements. The paradox of devolution as it has developed in recent decades in respect of Scotland and Wales—and Northern Ireland, to some extent, although it has a more complicated history—is that the greater the degree of formal statutory devolution, the greater the degree of formal statutory consultation with central government.

As these debates have unfolded in the interminable Committee, which I now think of almost as the committee for public safety on the Bill and which we have held over many weeks, I am struck by the fact that we have devoted huge amounts of time to arrangements with Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland. They have a population of 10 million between them; England has a population of 53 million and we have spent almost no time on it—indeed, I think this is the first substantive debate we have had, in a very thin Committee at 8 o’clock in the evening, on the arrangements for consulting and liaising with England on devolution. That goes to the heart of the big problem in our constitutional arrangements, which is that sub-national government in England has no formal relationship in terms of statutory bodies or arrangements with central government and is largely ignored. I hope that the Minister, who is very reasonable, will at least reflect on the fact that the responsible leaders of English local authorities who are in the House this evening—including the noble Lord, Lord Porter, on his side—appear to have more confidence in the consultative machinery in place in the European Union than in central government here in London. That is quite a telling sign.

The bit of English government that I have had most contact with in recent years, as a Minister and politician, is the government of London. The single most significant and positive change made by the British state, in respect of the government of England in the last 20 years, was establishing a Mayor of London with substantial powers and a real degree of autonomy. When I was sitting on the Benches opposite as a Minister, I can say that you took the call of the Mayor of London; he is elected by a million votes and has statutory responsibilities. For other local authority leaders in England, with little formal status—nothing like the clout of the Mayor of London—and no formal machinery in place, it is very hit and miss whether their voice is heard at all in London.

The paradox of the Brexit vote is that the areas that are the least consulted and engaged with by central government in England—which, to be blunt, is most of England outside the south-east—are also the areas that voted most heavily for Brexit. There is a big and fundamental commentary there on the state of the government of England: whether we complete Brexit next year or not, the substantial unfinished business of constitutional reform in Britain over the coming years will be the government of England outside London. That is not something we will determine at 8 o’clock in the evening in debate on amendments to the EU withdrawal Bill, but it is quite clear that the whole EU withdrawal process has set in train a set of concerns that will be very difficult not to address.

I want to make one final comment so that we can put the entire constitution on the agenda in one short debate. I suspect that the future of the House of Lords will have a part to play, because if we have proper devolved arrangements for the regions or cities of England—however we choose to provide better government for England—we will have something that starts to resemble a genuine, balanced federation in the United Kingdom. Once we have that, the obvious and logical successor to this rather toothless and nominated House of Lords would be a proper federal second Chamber. Who knows? If we can envisage withdrawing from the European Union, we can certainly envisage having a federal second Chamber of the United Kingdom in our lifetimes.

[Lord Beecham (Lab)]

My Lords, I refer to my interests in the register as a vice-president of the Local Government Association and a councillor in Newcastle.

Of course, it is understood that the north-east will be the region most adversely affected by the departure from the EU that Brexit will bring about. It is ironic really that the population in the north-east is greater than that of Northern Ireland. Of course Northern Ireland has its own history and problems, but it has not been overlooked in the north-east that in cash terms the offer made to the North of Tyne Combined Authority amounted, over 30 years, to less than half the amount recently secured by the DUP as a condition of supporting the Government. We feel somewhat underfunded compared to other places. Not to be included in any of the discussions that will take place—and are currently taking place—rubs salt in more than somewhat.

Localism Bill

Debate between Lord Beecham and Lord Adonis

Monday 12th September 2011 Lords Chamber

[Lord Beecham]

My Lords, I am grateful to the noble Baroness for her assurance that parliamentary approval will be required before designating any authority to have a referendum. However, I am surprised and disappointed that it should be thought necessary for the Secretary of State to prescribe a referendum when it is evident from the absence of any requisition by a mere 5 per cent of the electorate that there is any such interest from the local community to start with.

Moving on to the amendment tabled by the right reverend Prelate and supported by my noble friend, I find it surprising that it should be thought that paralysis would ensue if there was a delay of a year between the referendum and a subsequent mayoral election. It could even have been argued that it would have been better to have followed the precedent of the 1973 local government reorganisation, when a shadow authority was elected and did not actually take office for a year. That actually gave the incoming authority time, on new boundaries and all the rest of it, to assimilate the problems of the area and develop an appropriate response, changing structures and the like. To suggest that it is essential to move straight into the position where the nature of the authority changes during the year strikes me as illogical, potentially disruptive and damaging, and in fact onerous for the newly elected incumbent, should there be any newly elected incumbents to that position. He or she would be entering into office half way through the year, unable to do very much at all about the existing budget, and contending with structures that would be difficult to rearrange in a short time.

Moreover, in terms of cost, surely it would be less expensive to have an election coinciding with the normal municipal election in the following year. I quite take the point made by the noble Baroness that there have been some instances of mid-year referendums, but if one is looking at the issue of cost it is, I should have thought, clearer that there would be a cost saving to have them at the same time as the local election. Indeed, that point has been made for us, conveniently, in connection with the debate over the timing of the elections for police commissioners, if indeed we are to have those.

[Lord Adonis]

Is my noble friend aware that in only one of the cities in which referendums are going to be held next May will there be a municipal election in 2013? In all of the other cities there would need to be a special election held in May 2013 if the election of the mayor were to take place anyway. I assume that my noble friend does not think that paralysis is an issue. I do not understand the read-across with shadow authorities at all—a shadow authority has been created, whereas the mayor by definition has not been elected, so that point does not hold. I assume that my noble friend, in his antipathy to mayors, does not think that it is a good idea to delay by a full two years the interval between a positive referendum result and the first election of a mayor.

[Lord Beecham]

I am certainly tempted to think so, but I will resist the temptation. In any event, what would be the worst thing of all, I suspect, is the coincidence of a police commissioner election and a mayoral election. We would then have two elections which would be, and I quote again,

“exciting local affairs, with colourful personalities”,

with one running for mayor and one running for police commissioner, and, quite conceivably, on conflicting manifestos. I think that that would be an absolute recipe for confusion and the worst of all possible worlds. We will revert, no doubt in a couple of days, to the issue of the timing of any police commissioner elections, but if the current intention of the Government is to proceed in November, then I think that that makes the proposition advanced by the right reverend Prelate and my noble friend quite difficult and untenable. I hope that the Government will think again, or think further, about the proposition that has been put to them, and will in particular avoid that coincidence.

For myself, I think the shadow proposition would actually be better, but of course there is not an amendment to that effect, so I cannot very well move it. I think the worst of all possible worlds would be police commissioner elections and mayoral elections in however many authorities there will be—there are 11 authorities coming forward. So I hope that the Government will, on this occasion, prove unbending. I beg leave to withdraw my amendment.