United Kingdom Internal Market Bill

Lord German Excerpts

Committee stage & Committee: 3rd sitting (Hansard) & Committee: 3rd sitting (Hansard): House of Lords
Monday 2nd November 2020 Lords Chamber

[Lord German (LD)]

It is a pleasure to follow the noble Lord, Lord Dunlop, and to echo many of the points he has just made, caution being one of them and care for the union another. I want to illustrate some of his points in what I have to say. I must declare my interest: I am Welsh and I live in a recipient area of huge amounts of European funding.

This part of the Bill is definitely a bolt-on: it has nothing to do with the operation of the internal market or with the four countries being able to trade freely together. This is about the replacement money for the EU funds—how it will be spent and by whom. Fortunately, I asked a question of the Minister in this very Chamber a few months ago about the European money that came to Wales. I was given a guarantee, which I am hopeful the Minister will repeat today, that the people of Wales will get, pound for pound, what the European funds gave them. That was the guarantee given in this Chamber by the Minister. If he wants to check, I can refer him to the relevant Hansard. The point I am making is this. It was not a question of the receipt of the money: I am pleased to bank the £2.2 billion that the European funds have given to the people of Mid and West Wales—that is two million people—over the last six years, but I am worried about how that money will be spent and what effects it will have. Effectively, this part of the Bill puts the cart before the horse. We have to agree a whole set of rules which cross devolved boundaries in ways we can only guess at, and nowhere are we given clear answers to fundamental questions about upholding and respecting the devolution settlements in the UK.

The implication in this part of the Bill is that it will have no impact on the functioning of the Barnett formula or on additionality, referred to by the noble Lord, Lord Dunlop. However, that is only an implication. Will the Minister give us today the answer to that fundamental question: will it have no impact on the normal functioning of the Barnett formula?

There has been no problem thus far with the UK Government seeking to spend money in Wales, in collaboration with the Welsh Government. Long may it continue, and I will encourage the Government. However, the key word is collaboration. Now, we are being asked to approve a law so broadly drawn that it will have a coach-and-horses effect on the powers of devolved Governments. I have to say to the Government that if it is not done collaboratively, spend does not necessarily mean approval. Approval will not automatically be given when the legal framework is in the hands of the devolved Governments. Factors such as planning approval, environmental impact assessments and curriculum development legislation all have a bearing here.

The Explanatory Memorandum implies that the UK Government will determine what moneys are available and how they are spent. The Welsh Government have had major control over the design and implementation of EU structural funds spent in Wales. For a few years, I had that responsibility in the Welsh Government. It is different, of course, for the smaller cross-EU programmes such as Erasmus and Lifelong Learning, which includes Comenius for school exchanges. These programmes were centrally designed but nevertheless locally administered.