Council of the European Union: UK Presidency

Debate between Lord Bridges of Headley and Baroness Boothroyd

Tuesday 19th July 2016 Lords Chamber

[Lord Bridges of Headley]

No, my Lords. The noble Lord also speaks with a lot of experience on these matters. That is exactly why we need to make this decision in a timely manner and after due consideration of all the points that have been raised this afternoon.

[Baroness Boothroyd (CB)]

My Lords, as we have no Commissioner at the moment in Europe and we are informed that we must continue as full members of Europe, is it not right that we should appoint a new Commissioner to that organisation?

[Lord Bridges of Headley]

Last week my right honourable friend the Prime Minister confirmed to the Commission president that Sir Julian King is the UK candidate to replace the noble Lord, Lord Hill. As I am sure a number of your Lordships know, Sir Julian is an experienced diplomat. It will now be for the President of the European Commission to propose a portfolio for the new Commissioner.

House of Commons: Ministers

Debate between Lord Bridges of Headley and Baroness Boothroyd

Monday 30th November 2015 Lords Chamber

[Lord Bridges of Headley]

My Lords, this House is an extremely good place to debate a number of the constitutional changes that we are making. We have done so in the past few weeks over the Scotland Bill, and the noble Lord, Lord Purvis, has a Bill before this House on the convention idea, which again we will be discussing next week. We will continue to perform this useful role in all these matters.

[Baroness Boothroyd (CB)]

My Lords, when is the situation in the Commons that is politely called “programming” going to cease so that Bills that go into Standing Committee there are properly scrutinised and debated? It is a total disgrace that they come to this House with only one-third of the Bill having been examined. It is high time that there was proper scrutiny there and programming was brought to an end by both parties.

[Lord Bridges of Headley]

The noble Baroness speaks with a great amount of experience and wisdom on these matters, and I am sure that the other place will take note of what she has to say.