Health Protection (Coronavirus, Restrictions) (Leicester) (No. 2) Regulations 2020

Lord Hunt of Kings Heath Excerpts

Thursday 24th September 2020 Lords Chamber

[Lord Hunt of Kings Heath (Lab) [V]]

My Lords, I am very glad to be able to take part in this debate, and I thank the Minister for his introductory remarks. Of course, these two regulations were laid some weeks ago, and I make no apologies for returning to a major theme of the debate on Covid regulations last Friday. Of course, we are faced with a huge backlog of regulations, some more of which we are debating later today, with a whole set more to be debated tomorrow. All of these are retrospective and highly restrictive of the way we live our lives.

In responding on Friday, the Minister pointed to the rapid nature of decision-making in the crises and stated that parliamentary scrutiny is valued by the Government, with regulation debates being taken seriously. I do not think there is any question about the Minister’s own commitment to this House, but the Government’s record is one of consistently riding roughshod over Parliament, with major announcements made elsewhere, a Prime Minister who has consistently tried to take Parliament out of decision-making and special advisers in Downing Street instructing Ministers on what they can and cannot do, often with little notice.

This may be a small point, but the Minister may be aware that, once again, the House of Lords Secondary Legislation Scrutiny Committee has criticised his department for the quality of the Explanatory Memoranda that are laid in relation to these kinds of regulations. Specifically, it notes that there is not enough detail and that they are too vague. In particular, the amending regulations simply do not give Members enough clarity about what is entailed. The Select Committee says:

“When law is imposed with immediate effect in this way it is even more important that the explanatory material provided is clear and fit for purpose.”


I accept that, at the beginning of the crisis, extraordinary measures had to be taken, but we are now six months in, with many more months to come. Surely, we have to find a better way of doing things? Ideally, we should be debating regulations before they come into force. If that is not possible, then they should be taken soon after they have been laid, not weeks and, sometimes, months later.

We should also have the ability to see and question the leaders of the local authorities involved. Neither of the SIs before us seems to include the details of consultations with the appropriate local government leaders. I know that, today, the Minister mentioned the important partnership between the Government and local authorities, and I certainly echo his tribute to the local directors of public health and, indeed, the staff of Public Health England. However, I refer him to the comments of Sir Peter Soulsby, the elected Mayor of Leicester, who said that he had been kept in the dark with regard to what it would take to get the restrictions lifted. He still has not received an answer and has also compared Leicester to other areas with higher rates and no restrictions, asking why the city was being treated differently.

Therefore, I hope that, today, the Minister might be able to say what Leicester has to do to get the restrictions lifted. Secondly, when regulations are laid in the future, can we have an explicit statement by the leader of the appropriate local authority as to his or her views on the regulations?