Brexit: Negotiations

Lord Judd Excerpts

Tuesday 20th November 2018 Lords Chamber

[Lord Judd (Lab)]

My Lords, the noble Lord, Lord Bridges, made the point that the political declaration is absolutely vital and central to our future. He is right; there is no question about that. We need to have a clear view of what the destination is in all our negotiations. What are the challenges facing us as we debate the issues? They are: the inescapability of global interdependence; how we handle economic and resource issues in the world community; security; migration—we talk about immigration, but that is the consequence of the huge migration issues covering the world as a whole—and climate change. In our own, more immediate society, there are the issues of poverty and social justice. As we heard powerfully from the noble Baroness, Lady Bull, culture, the arts and creativity—which make our country worth living in—are intimately related to the free movement of people.

As a nation, under any Government, we never really got the reality of the European project. It started with the coal and steel community, which was real: it was about how they were going to manage that community in their mutual interest. But anybody who thinks that the coal and steel community was an end in itself is self-deluding. It was always a political project; it was really about how you built peace and stability within Europe. There are now wider global issues as well. Whatever our party, whoever our leaders, wherever we are going, the words of the noble Lord, Lord Bridges, should be right in front of us: it is the political declaration. If we are in the community, or closely related to it, we have to have a strategy. If we are out of it, our own society has got to have a political statement of some convincing nature. In the end, the issues that face us are political ones of direction and strategy. Vision is what this country needs; vision and purpose. When I came out of government back in 1979, my family asked me what I had learned in my years in Parliament. I had one answer: within the political system as it was then—God knows how much more it is like that now—tactics were the total enemy of strategy. What is lacking is strategy.

Good Friday Agreement: Impact of Brexit

Lord Judd Excerpts

Thursday 11th October 2018 Lords Chamber

[Lord Judd (Lab)]

My Lords, what I have found immensely reassuring about this debate is the constant repetition of concern about real people living in a real situation, and real communities trying to meet that situation. I thank most warmly my noble friend Lord Dubs for having given us the opportunity of this debate, with all his very direct experience. I thought his speech was very telling. I also thought, in particular, that the way he emphasised people and identity, and the significance of all this in that context, was a very important way to start a discussion on this subject.

There has been, of course, rightful tribute to all those involved in the Good Friday agreement. All I can say is that, as far as I was concerned, I have always seen the Good Friday agreement as one of the great outstanding landmark achievements, not only in British and Irish history but in world history. As noble Lords will be aware, I have done a great deal of work internationally on community building, and I have been able constantly to refer to the Good Friday agreement as an example of how progress can be made in most difficult circumstances towards reconciliation and the achievement of a sensible way forward. To jeopardise that would be a major tragedy—in the real sense of the word; I do not use it lightly—in terms of present politics as against great history.

Various individuals have been mentioned, and I am glad that they have been—all those individuals involved in the negotiations that reached the agreement. Tony Blair was of course totally committed as Prime Minister, and that was important. But we should never forget that John Major did much of the groundwork that made the way forward possible, and a warm tribute is due to him as well as to others. I am glad that the noble Lord, Lord Trimble, is in our midst; of course there was international recognition for him in the form of the Nobel Peace Prize, but we all owe him a debt of gratitude.

I said that people and identity have been stressed. This was strongly underlined by my noble friend Lady Armstrong, who gave substance to that argument. My noble friend Lady Crawley made a powerful contribution, speaking emotionally, in the best sense, about what all this community of work had achieved.

I always listen with fascination to the thoughts of the noble and right reverend Lord, Lord Eames, who again emphasised the importance of democracy and peacebuilding. It is very grave that we are approaching the conclusion of this saga of British membership of the European Union with Stormont not operating. We are talking about the people of Northern Ireland and all that this means for them, without there being a formal political institution in which they can speak for themselves and contribute to this issue. That is a grave matter that we need to take seriously indeed.

When my noble friend Lady Crawley spoke I thought of my own involvements in Ireland and Northern Ireland. I remember when I was Minister for the Royal Navy and had responsibility for the Royal Marines, I always made a point of visiting the Royal Marines when they were on service in Northern Ireland. When I was subsequently Minister of State at the Foreign Office, I was delighted on one occasion to make a formal visit to Dublin. The extent to which the atmosphere has changed is beyond belief. My noble friend Lady Crawley talked about the removal of watchtowers and all that, and how people are now able to live normal, real lives and to be active together.

My last point in this important debate is that there have been courageous people at very modest levels of society who have made their stand over many years. I have been chief executive of two organisations which worked with people in Northern Ireland and in the Irish Republic, before the agreement and subsequently. We have never had any difficulty whatever in the work we have been trying to do together on international understanding, reconciliation and peace. These people have shown us what commitment to a decent, caring and just society can mean and what it can achieve. Let us keep those people at the centre of our attention and not become involved in an intellectual rigmarole of constitutional and legal jargon, and all the rest. That is of course vital, but we are talking about people being able to build their society together when so many want to be able to do just that.

Northern Ireland: Legacy of the Troubles

Lord Judd Excerpts

Wednesday 5th September 2018 Lords Chamber

[Lord Judd (Lab)]

My Lords, it is incumbent upon the whole House to put on the record our admiration for and thanks to the service men and women who served in Northern Ireland with such effectiveness. Their role was to establish order, the rule of law and trust. That is why it is vital that we pursue transparently, openly and convincingly any issues which may raise doubts and anxieties about things that could have happened. But we must be careful how we do that because we cannot simply load all the responsibility on to service men and women who were serving in impossible conditions.

Northern Ireland is not in a good place. We still do not have a Stormont. We are hurtling towards March 2019 with no hard evidence of how we are going to reconcile the problems of the border.

I just make this point: what has led to reconciliation and peace in Northern Ireland owes a great deal to ordinary people in both communities who have worked tirelessly at building trust and confidence. The importance of the EU charter of rights cannot be overestimated. It was vital because it gave confidence to both communities that there was a setting of commitment to justice. In the current situation, the term “justice” becomes more important than ever, but let us remember that this has high significance for building a sense of shared responsibility between both communities.

European Union (Withdrawal) Bill

Lord Judd Excerpts

Wednesday 21st March 2018 Lords Chamber

[Lord Keen of Elie]

I will certainly give consideration to that point, but it is not immediately clear to me that the clause could be used to evade those limitations. I will address it in due course.

[Lord Judd (Lab)]

Before we conclude this part of our deliberations, I refer back to what my noble friend said. I have every respect for the Minister—I mean that. I am quite sure that he would never, with ministerial responsibility, go against the clear intention of Parliament with these residual powers. But are we absolutely certain, with all the unpredictability and turbulence of politics across the world today, that every possible Administration would act as responsibly as he would?

[Lord Keen of Elie]

I am not sure that I am in a position to answer that question. Nevertheless, when we legislate, we must also legislate as to what a future Administration would do with that legislation. I quite accept that point.

--- Later in debate ---

These are the sort of problems that need addressing soon and urgently if people are to have confidence in the Government’s commitment to the Belfast agreement and the principles that underpin it. I do not wish to be alarmist, but I do not think we should take for granted anything that might happen if we do not address these questions. Recently, I have been reading about events just before and during the First World War, when we saw the Home Rule debacle, the Easter Rising, the Irish war of independence and the Irish civil war—possibly the most terrible of them all. We are playing with fire. I hope the Government are listening and I hope they will take the principles of the Good Friday agreement as setting a demand for action and not just for rhetoric.

[Lord Judd]

My Lords, I am very privileged to have had the insights of those who really are part of the Irish community and to hear how they see things. That is invaluable. It has also been powerful to hear the words of the noble Lord, Lord Patten, with all his experience and integrity.

I emphasise one point: those of us associated with the amendment brought forward by my noble friend Lady Lister of Burtersett are very struck by how deeply perturbed those who are standing for, working in and developing the concept of human rights in Northern Ireland are about the absence of equivalence in the legislation, as things stand. The people of the Republic will have the reassurance of the charter. We are told that the charter is impossible in our future. What will be the equivalence of protection for the people in Northern Ireland—those who belong to the minority and are currently confident, having the concept of the charter behind them? We really must have an answer to this question. My noble friend has pursued it on at least three occasions in Committee without getting any convincing response whatsoever.

I do not mind saying that I was very moved by the words today of the noble and right reverend Lord, Lord Eames. I will never forget him standing at the Cross Benches last Wednesday, when he implored all of us involved in legislation, and the Government, to remember that we were dealing with the most sensitive issues—ones that went right to the hearts of ordinary people as they went about their lives. It is not just a fix—a management arrangement—that we are about, it is about being able to relate to people, their fears and anxieties, their hopes and aspirations.

In that context—I do not want to overplay it, but it is true—since Wednesday last week I have been thinking of the two words that the noble and right reverend Lord emphasised in his peroration. He spoke of the indispensability of consent and trust. We cannot build a future worth having in Northern Ireland—and in the Irish Republic—if something has been foisted on the people as part of a solution to a very complex political issue. It has to give them the feeling that they can develop their lives together in confidence. It has been very exciting for those of us outside Ireland to witness the amount of good work between the different communities in the context of the Good Friday agreement. I ask the Government to take these points seriously and I hope we will get an answer to my noble friend’s question.

[Lord Alderdice (LD)]

My Lords, I am very grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Patten of Barnes, not only for the passionate and articulate way in which he introduced the debate on this group of amendments—particularly Amendment 261—but also for the lifetime of commitment that he has given to the issues of Northern Ireland. That length of commitment speaks a great deal to me, as someone from that part of the United Kingdom.

As the fourth musketeer, as it were, I want to say something slightly different about why I think this amendment is not just important but critical. On 6 December last year, on the fifth day in Committee, Lady Hermon, the honourable Member for North Down, spoke about the key principles of the Belfast agreement in an amendment almost identical to this one. When the Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Exiting the EU, Mr Robin Walker, responded, he kept talking about the agreement, the commitment to the agreement, and the way the agreement was backed up. Lady Hermon came back to him saying that the issue was not the agreement but the principles, and he really did not seem to get it, because he kept coming back to saying that they were committed to the agreement and would ensure that the agreement was there.

I want to say why I would go even further than the noble Lord, Lord Patten of Barnes, in saying that it is not just a question of whether this would be a problem or harmful but why this is absolutely essential not that the precise wording of all the amendment is included, but that the principles of the Belfast agreement are included. I shall explain why.

We have had many decades of trying to get agreements in Northern Ireland. We have had them before, and they did not work as a peace process because they did not address the key disturbed historic relationships in these islands. In many ways, this was the understanding that the European project stepped out with, with Monnet, Schuman, Adenauer and so on. They understood that it was the relationships between the different countries and communities that were essential—and, as we know, the whole complicated edifice was created in which there could be co-operation.

One frustration for me is that colleagues who, like myself, are committed to remain, have failed to address the question of why, after 40 years, one of the parties is seeking divorce and many others are very uncertain about whether they want to stick with it. My own view is that, as time went on and we moved from the first generation of those who were committed to those who were there later, we moved from the things that were put in place as the instruments to ensure the fundamental purpose of the project, which was to stop war and build relationships. The instruments were things such as the market, the common currency, and the opportunity for European political leaders to be at the top table of global affairs. Those instruments became the purpose of the exercise for many of those who were involved. When in any set of relationships the instruments of the relationship become a substitute for the purpose of the relationship, the relationship is already beginning to fail.

My concern is about the commitment to the Belfast agreement, a legislative agreement with a commitment to certain kinds of constitutional and institutional matters and a commitment, as the noble Lord, Lord Patten, knows well, to changes in the administration of justice and changing policing—all the important things, including the things that are mentioned in the other amendment about human rights. Those things will not keep the relationships alive if we forget that the relationships are the key issue. That is why I want to see the principles written into the Bill.

When I was involved in the process, we came to a point of understanding this in a very long and painful way. Most of those with whom I was involved are no longer involved politically, or even around at all. As I look around, I see those political leaders who represent the three key relationships not understanding what it was about—the relationship between political leaders in Northern Ireland. We are a long way from the relationships between David Trimble and Seamus Mallon, never mind those between Ian Paisley and Martin McGuinness. Let us not forget that Dr Paisley was not too keen about the Belfast agreement when it came out in the first instance. But the relationship between the political leaders in Northern Ireland does not have the same constructive engagement now. In the relationship between north and south, we are being pulled apart—sometimes by those who say that they want to unite the island. What about the relationship between London and Dublin, between the British and Irish Prime Ministers? Think back to the kind of relationship there was between John Major and Albert Reynolds, or between Tony Blair and Bertie Ahern. We do not have that kind of relationship in either direction.

The European Union itself was the model and the inspiration; it was the container for the relationships that kept the British and Irish Governments together and working, so that when John Major and Albert Reynolds became Prime Ministers, they had already been Finance Ministers and worked together, and they said, “We know it’s impossible but we’re going to have a go”.

European Union (Withdrawal) Bill

Lord Judd Excerpts

Committee: 5th sitting (Hansard): House of Lords
Wednesday 7th March 2018 Lords Chamber

[The Earl of Clancarty]

Absolutely. Whatever happens, we will be at a disadvantage to everyone else in Europe and that is really significant.

[Lord Judd (Lab)]

My Lords, I support the amendment. When this whole matter originally came before the House, we had the firm assurance from the Front Bench opposite and the strong assurance from the Prime Minister that this was to be a top-priority issue in their considerations of our future. As the noble Lord, Lord Cormack, said so powerfully, here we are, way down the road, and we have made no progress whatever.

The reason why I feel so strongly and passionately about this issue is that I fear that we are demeaning and undermining the whole concept of citizenship. Citizenship is something that people have fought for and struggled for centuries to establish. There are thousands and thousands of people from Britain in Europe. I declare an interest: in my extended family I have family members living in Europe and family members living in this country who are married to Poles, Czechs and so on, and it is a very rich experience. Such people have gone to Europe in the confidence of citizenship and all it has meant historically—to make new lives and build their future in the knowledge that they have citizenship of Europe.

Do we or do we not stand by the concept of citizenship? If we do, how can we contemplate any future in which we have not absolutely guaranteed that people have their rights of citizenship? My noble friend referred to anxiety being out there, and it certainly is. We are talking about men, women and children; about the futures of people who are working; about vulnerable people who have reached old age in the context of what they believed was European security—about real human situations. We need firm, unequivocal assurances from the Government that we believe not just in the right of citizenship, but in the whole concept of citizenship that has been established across Europe in our history. We want cast-iron guarantees that, in one way or another, that is going to be fulfilled.

[Lord Haskel (Lab)]

My Lords, I shall speak to Amendment 211, which is in my name and deals with our rights but in a slightly different way. It would ensure that after withdrawal, our rights and protections remain intact by maintaining the standards at home and at work that we have come to expect in our daily life as part of our normal existence, and that those standards would not be sacrificed or lowered in any future negotiations.

I tabled this amendment some weeks ago and was pleased to see it reflected in the Prime Minister’s speech last Friday and in her Statement on Monday, when she spoke of maintaining current standards in some sectors. My amendment calls for them to be maintained in all sectors, because we cannot pick and choose where our quality of life is concerned. Even Monsieur Barnier seems to agree, and in his recent draft document he speaks of equivalent standards.

European Union (Withdrawal) Bill

Lord Judd Excerpts

Committee: 4th sitting (Hansard - continued): House of Lords
Monday 5th March 2018 Lords Chamber

[Lord Judd (Lab)]

My Lords, I rise to support these amendments very strongly. One of the sadnesses of recent social and political history in Britain is that although this country won immense respect at the time when the convention was being drafted, it has never been fully incorporated into our law. That applies to successive political Administrations. Now, with Brexit, this is being thrown into strong relief. Incidentally, I am very glad to see that those who are speaking to these amendments have emphasised how this illustrates why the charter matters and how we have been wrong to treat it so lightly.

I want simply to say this: we were champions in the drafting, introduction and birth of the convention. Whatever happens on Brexit, we must take the opportunity presented to us by these amendments to ensure that what is enshrined in the convention is made in every way absolutely fundamental to the policy and the work of any future Administration.

[Baroness Meacher (CB)]

My Lords, I rise to speak to speak to Amendments 68, 97 and 158, all of which would ensure that following our departure from the EU, children’s rights will continue to be given due regard. The Government have claimed that the Bill will ensure continuity—in fact, a number of noble Lords think that is correct—and that there will be no legislative cliff-edge if or when we leave the EU.

However, whether by accident or by design, there is a gaping children’s rights hole in the Bill. These amendments would not introduce any new policy or extend provision; rather, they require only that where EU legislation has been developed in line with the principles of the UNCRC, new UK law or amendments to retained EU law will also pay due regard to the UNCRC. The Government have argued in previous debates that children’s rights are fully protected in UK law. I will clarify that this is not actually so and I want to pay tribute to the Children’s Society and a number of academics who have enabled me to do this. The Government argue that, for example, the Human Rights Act 1998 incorporates the ECHR into UK law and does the job of protecting children’s rights. However, that ignores the fact that the ECHR is confined principally to civil and political rights, while remaining relatively silent on a range of social and economic rights that form the substance of EU law. There are further problems in relation to the process of bringing a claim for an alleged breach of ECHR rights.

The Children Act 1989 provides important protections for children in both public and private proceedings, but it does not regulate the full range of children’s rights that are covered by EU law such as consumer protection, health and safety, and non-discrimination; other speakers have mentioned one or two of these. It also does not cover the cross- border recognition and enforcement of family orders which are currently regulated by Brussels I and II. Furthermore, the Children Act 1989 is often interpreted narrowly, to the detriment of the fuller range of rights set out in the UNCRC. A crucial example, as the noble Baroness, Lady Massey, said, is the right of a child to be heard following abduction before a return order is made. The crucial question is, does the child wish to be returned? It is pretty desperate if they do not, and they will not be able to make their wishes known, as I understand it, even if they are of an age and maturity to make that appropriate. The Children Act 2004 places obligations on local authorities but does not extend those to immigration authorities or commercial or private entities to whom public authorities have contracted out aspects of their children’s services. These days, of course, much of that work is contracted out.

The Equality Act 2010 provides a number of protections for children and young people. However, it does not cover many of the issues that are a real worry for children, post Brexit. For example, it does not promote the need for public agencies to act in the best interests of the child as a top priority in the way the UNCRC does, which the EU implements. The Immigration Act 2016 proposes to withdraw leaving care support from unaccompanied young people at age 18, as has been mentioned, if they do not have leave to remain or are not asylum seekers. A lot of these kids probably do not have the knowledge and information they need to be in a position to claim those rights. There is therefore a human rights issue here, for which there is no provision in UK law. The Modern Slavery Act 2015 provides good protection for young people. However, the removal of Section 32 of the EU charter following Brexit will weaken protection against child labour. It will leave weak obligations on business in this area. Also, the EU trafficking directive includes requirements to have regard to the children’s best interests and to consider the long-term outcomes for children. These are absent from the Modern Slavery Act, wonderful though that Act is.

At an EU level, the rights of the child are currently guaranteed by Article 24 of the charter and are one of the fundamental rights mentioned explicitly in the commission’s strategy. They are thus included in the regular fundamental rights check, which the commission applies to relevant draft EU legislation. These safeguards will not apply to new UK laws or amendments to retained EU law. If, or when, we leave the European Union, we will thus need to correct the statute book and legislate for the future in areas of previous EU competency, such as matters relating to justice, specific areas of social policy, consumer protection and research and development. Across the UK, the range of issues where children could be exposed also covers data protection, paediatric medicine clinical trials, food labelling, television advertising, the rights of migrant children to access education and healthcare and, importantly, cross-border family law, as others have mentioned.

In conclusion, I do not believe that these gaps in UK law are the Government’s intention, but an oversight that can and should be corrected between Committee and Report. Does the Minister agree that if this Bill is about providing “certainty and continuity” for people—as the noble Baroness, Lady Evans of Bowes Park, said at Second Reading—it is only right that the Government provide certainty and continuity for children also? I would be grateful for an assurance from the Minister that he will take these matters back to the department for consideration before Report. Also, it would be helpful if children’s rights could be included on an agenda for a briefing session on the Bill with Ministers in the next few weeks.

Leveson Inquiry Update

Lord Judd Excerpts

Thursday 1st March 2018 Lords Chamber

[Lord Keen of Elie]

The decision made by government was that part 2 of the Leveson inquiry would not go forward, and I commend to the noble Lord the terms of Sir Brian’s own letter. I do not think it would be appropriate for me to seek to paraphrase him; it is far better that this letter, which will be placed in the public domain, should be considered in that context.

[Lord Judd (Lab)]

My Lords, does the Minister agree—I am sure that if he does, he will have widespread respect—that the press has a long-standing and historical role in society? It is in many ways the lifeblood of democracy itself because a democracy can function well only if the quality and truthfulness of the press can be seen and respected. It is also the guardian of human rights and individual freedoms. Commercial pressures have always been there—on how to make newspapers pay, for example—but, ultimately, it is in fulfilling that historic purpose that they will be respected in society. How can we have a society in which journalists and writers are able to act honestly, and with a real sense of commitment to truth, if they are to be seen as subjects of a regime run by irresponsible owners?

[Lord Keen of Elie]

To a large extent, I concur with the observations made by the noble Lord, Lord Judd. It is for society to demand from the press the sort of press that it requires in order to maintain its freedoms and its democratic traditions. We have to remember that society is also the customer for that press and therefore carries considerable weight in that context. We see that reflected in the demise of the News of the World. It was not just a question of closing down a newspaper; it was a recognition that that newspaper had so lost its way that society—its customers—would have responded in a very particular way in any event. It was not an altruistic act but, I rather suspect, a realisation of the reality of the situation that the newspaper had found itself in.

European Union (Withdrawal) Bill

Lord Judd Excerpts

Committee: 3rd sitting (Hansard): House of Lords
Wednesday 28th February 2018 Lords Chamber

[Viscount Trenchard (Con)]

I agree with what the noble Earl said about the balance between work life and family life, particularly with regard to the recently adopted hours which are becoming commonplace in your Lordships’ House, but I regret to say that I cannot support the amendments, because they do not achieve their intention.

As the noble Baroness, Lady Hayter, recognised, the intention of her amendment is to ensure continuity and certainty in the law both before and after exit day. She worries that the powers granted to Ministers to amend retained EU laws should be both restricted and subject in each case to an enhanced scrutiny procedure, which would also provide for a period of consultation with the public and relevant stakeholders. But the effect of the amendments is to increase uncertainty and, ironically, reduce the likelihood—the certainty that is needed—that retained law will continue to provide exactly the same protections as before. Indeed, the period of public consultation to be provided in the enhanced scrutiny procedure gives the impression that policy changes may also be entertained. As we have heard from Ministers, the Bill is not about policy change.

Without these powers, there are huge risks that retained EU law will be defective for technical reasons—for example, due to the enormous number of references to Union institutions, which all need to be changed. Such changes would take so very much longer if each change was made subject to the enhanced scrutiny procedure proposed by the noble Baroness. That is just one area in which the amendments are counter productive.

[Lord Judd (Lab)]

My Lords, I shall speak to Amendment 23A but, before I do so, I should like to say how much I admired the clarity with which my noble friend introduced the lead amendment in the group and how warmly I support the amendment in the name of my noble friend Lady Kennedy on the issue of human rights.

I have two points to make. The first is that the anxiety out there in British society should not be underestimated. There is a great deal of anxiety among extremely good quality people who are doing dedicated work in the spheres with which we are concerned. Secondly, as a layman in no way involved in practising law, I have always understood as a citizen that what is terribly important about the law is its clarity and transparency. As we consider the amendments we must therefore not inadvertently allow doubt and misgiving as to whether there has been full transparency, and full commitment to that transparency, to creep into our future.

It is therefore very important, and I make no apology for proposing it, to get written into the Bill the fact that we seek to protect existing rights of citizens in the spheres affected. I shall read to the Committee the points that Amendment 23A says should be, and seen to be, central to the deliberations and negotiations that lie ahead. They include: human rights and equality, in which we have made great progress; privacy and data protection, which we have debated at great length in this House; and immigration and asylum protections—I am certainly one who believes there is much more to be done in that realm, but the Bill is not about that. My amendment is therefore not about that either but about protecting what we have. The other points are,

“criminal justice protections … employment protections … environment and public health protections … consumer protection … access to housing, education and health and social care”.

I want to feel confident, in the immense amount of work lies ahead, that those issues will be in the Bill as primary considerations. I hope that the Minister, for whom my admiration increases all the time with the clarity with which he responds to amendments, will be able to reassure me that there will be some way to ensure that these things are not just implied in what is proposed but are there specifically.

[Baroness Drake (Lab)]

My Lords, I shall speak to Amendment 21. The Bill gives Ministers what the Constitution Committee described as,

“an unprecedented and extraordinary portmanteau of powers upon which the Government could draw”.

We are now seeing growing concern that by our giving such powers, well beyond those needed to effect legal continuity, Ministers could use them to effect substantive policy changes. That is what is at the heart of this tension.

Many important protections currently enjoyed by UK citizens are not written into Acts of Parliament but underpinned by membership of the EU, which cannot be weakened by the UK Government. Once some of those protections are brought into domestic law by secondary legislation, there is no assurance that they can be changed only by primary legislation. The Bill will also allow Ministers to use the delegated powers contained in existing UK legislation to effect significant policy changes to retained EU law. The powers under Schedule 8 have already been referred to.

The merit of Amendment 21 is that it poses greater protection by enhancing scrutiny of ministerial amendments to retained EU law and restricting the modification of retained EU law by subordinate legislation to technical provisions. Such modifications could not limit the scope of or weaken standards and protections afforded to UK citizens. Amendment 21 makes a clear distinction, which the Bill fails to do, between technical and substantive policy changes—between necessary amendments to retained EU law to provide legal continuity and the wider issue of discretionary amendments that implement substantive changes to policy.

I want to refer to employment rights and consumer standards to illustrate the amendment’s merits. There are many EU-derived equality and employment protections enjoyed by the people of this country that are essential ingredients of economic fairness and social cohesion. These are rights which working people now take for granted, including rights to paid holidays, equal pay for equal-value work and equal treatment in the workplace.

European Union (Withdrawal) Bill

Lord Judd Excerpts

Committee: 2nd sitting (Hansard - continued): House of Lords
Monday 26th February 2018 Lords Chamber

[Lord Judd (Lab)]

My Lords, like the noble Viscount, I had the privilege of serving in the Foreign Office back in the 1970s. I underline his comment that it is a great shame that Lord Hurd no longer sits in the Chamber as he certainly was a very effective and powerful Foreign Secretary. One of the reasons he was successful was that he listened to people and adopted a reasonable approach to finding solutions.

There is no greater responsibility for a Government of the United Kingdom than to look after the well-being and safety of their people. At the moment there is a total dereliction of duty. We are about to abandon ways in which we have worked to protect the well-being of British people, while having absolutely no convincing indication of what is to replace our current methods of co-operation. Defence and security are inseparable and cannot be contained within national frontiers. They both require international solutions and co-operation. We also know, and debate it often in this House, that our armed services are very fully stretched; some would say overstretched. They cannot possibly do all that it is necessary to do on their own; they have to work with others. We have devised means whereby we can successfully co-operate in the interests of the British people. How on earth can we, with any sense of responsibility at all, say that we will withdraw from the existing arrangements without knowing exactly how we will fill the gap and maintain that indispensable co-operation?

This amendment, so ably moved by the noble Lord, Lord Wallace, is absolutely crucial and I am therefore very glad to have added my name to it. It does not apply just to this sphere, of course. We are being asked to buy a pig in a poke in too many areas. However, we cannot defend the British people by buying pigs in pokes, but by having absolutely convincing, watertight arrangements in place. There can be no interregnum between one regime and the next; we have to undertake this in time. Will the Government please this evening begin to give us some indication of precisely what the arrangements will be and what resources will be put into them?

[Lord Hannay of Chiswick (CB)]

My Lords, I was urged by my noble friend Lady Deech to be more polite to President Trump, so I will respond to that by thanking him extremely warmly for having brought home to us the value of the European Union’s common foreign and security policy. In the year he has been in office, he has singlehandedly illustrated why our national interests in a number of areas are much closer to those of our European partners than to those of his Administration: for example, as regards the nuclear deal with Iran, the rather unfortunate decision to move the US embassy to Jerusalem, his very lukewarm support for NATO, his withdrawal from the Paris climate change agreements and his trade policy. In all these areas he has brought home to us why this debate and this amendment, which I support, are vital to our future national interests. I hope that when the Minister responds, she will be prepared to go a bit further than generalities.

As others have already said, there is a complete lack of specificity in what the Prime Minister has said—she has, quite laudably, set out in very firm terms her desire that this should be a major pillar of the new partnership—about what the Government have in mind. It really is time that we saw more. The Prime Minister has spoken about a new treaty. We are in a negotiation. Normally, if you are in a negotiation and make a proposal, you table it. I have not seen the treaty. Has anyone seen it? I do not think that anyone has. Does it exist? I suspect not because, judging from the rather lukewarm attitude of the Foreign Secretary, he might not be able to produce much of an input into it.

This really is getting important now. We are only a year away from dropping out of all the complex machinery which makes the common foreign and security policy work. I have to say to my noble friend Lady Deech that her caricature of common foreign and security policy is bizarre. For example, the idea of a nuclear agreement with Iran originated in the European Union, and it was followed up, rather belatedly, by the United States. Therefore, I do not think that we should belittle such co-operation. In any case, the Prime Minister is firmly of the opinion that it matters and that we need to work very closely with the EU. I wonder whether it would not be better to say here and now—perhaps the noble Baroness the Minister replying to this debate could do so—that our co-operation in this area of common foreign and security policy is not subject to the rubric “Nothing is agreed until everything is agreed” and that it is, as we are trying to say but have been rather hesitant about saying, completely unconditional.

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Deben (Con)]

My Lords, one of the themes that has come through in the debates on many of the amendments so far is that the Government are enthusiastic about where we are, keen on continuing the links and determined that we shall not in any way fall out from those, but unwilling to commit themselves to the obvious solutions. We have heard in this debate tonight an exact repetition of what we have had before.

In other words, some of us are saying that these things were achieved with great difficulty. The European arrest warrant caused enormous argument and could be a really dangerous thing if it were not properly protected by the European Court of Justice. Like everyone else, when I became a Member of your Lordships’ House I was asked what subjects I was particularly going to speak on. The first was the environment, the second was Europe and the third was human rights. Therefore, when the legislation that we are now part of was going through in its various forms, I was very concerned that it was properly protected. However, I was very aware, as is the House, that crime does not know any borders, particularly the type of crime that the noble Baroness, Lady Massey, was talking about.

We need the protection that the warrant gives. When we were kids and we read stories of derring-do, we all knew that the first thing that people would try to do was to get across the channel because then they would be out of the reach of British law, and indeed of the law in many ways. I believe strongly that first of all we have to recognise that what we have we did not get easily and did not arrive simply. To suggest that somehow or other we can produce a different system and call it something else, because that would be convenient to the people who are ill informed enough to want to leave the EU, seems extremely dangerous. We should recognise that this took a lot of doing.

The second point, which has been made very interestingly, is about the nature of mutual recognition. Very often we are divided by not understanding the words that we use. There is an attitude in Britain that suggests that we get it right and other people do not, and therefore they had better do it our way because we know best. That has been our besetting sin throughout the period of our membership of the EU and, if we leave, we will get even worse at it. In other words, we are very keen to teach other people but not frightfully good at learning from them. One of the things that we have learned—I think by accident; certainly not by design—in having to co-operate on these issues is that we have understood much more clearly the problems, difficulties and solutions that others have had in our European home. We have to recognise that understanding mutual recognition is not easy, and the idea that we can suddenly create a different mechanism for doing it is very far-fetched.

On my third point, I have great admiration for the Prime Minister. I do not understand how every morning she wakes up and thinks, “God, I’ve got another day of this”, and deals with some of the people that she has to deal with—I will not list them but we all know which ones I mean. However, it is not good enough to have good intentions and show generalised support. My noble friend who is answering for the Government has given us a great deal of good intentions and noble views but no actual support for real policies and actual determinations. This is not something that we can pass off by merely having good intentions, because it is very hard and we have to be tough about it. We have to say to our friends, “We actually want, and will have, exactly what we have today on these matters because there is no alternative that is better and there is no way that we are going to invent one”, because crime will not wait.

This is a rather important amendment. All it says is that the Government have to move from intentions to reality before they can move. That is not an unreasonable thing for the House which is responsible for our constitution to ask.

I hope that my noble friend is not going to say how important all these things are, how valuable they are, how much the Prime Minister is in favour of them, but that just at the moment, because it is all part of the negotiation, he cannot go further than that. If he does, perhaps for all our debates he might just turn on the recording. That is evidently the answer we are going to have on everything, because that is the answer we have had so far today on everything. If it goes on like this, this House will have to ask whether the Government intend to have a debate or discussion about things that matter, about the future of our nation and our people. Are they going to have a discussion about the things that protect our people, the policing which has to cover areas beyond our borders? Above all, are they going to have a discussion about how this affects Ireland? We have for too long taken for granted the fact that the Irish situation is, at least to a large extent—much less so than the newspapers would have us believe, but still to a large extent—peaceful. We must none of us forget that.

I have to tell my noble friend that it will become increasingly difficult for the Government to uphold their position unless they are prepared to take seriously this House’s demand that they tell us what they want. How can you negotiate with people unless you can say very clearly what you want on crucial issues, and what could be a more crucial issue than this?

[Lord Judd]

My Lords, at the end of all these proceedings, some months down the road, there will be a vote in Parliament. At that time, it will be essential that we know exactly what we are voting for. That is why the speech by the noble Lord, Lord Deben, is so important. There is a fundamental difference between good intentions and concrete policy, there to be implemented. As in our previous debate, the issues are too big; there is no room for an interregnum or period of doubt. We must be able to move from what we have to what is necessary overnight. We must have firm policies and firm decisions that follow from them.

I served on the Home Affairs Committee under the chairmanship of the noble Lord, Lord Hannay, when we were having that dry run, and very interesting it was, too. What I found very telling was that virtually every witness working in the field, when the question, “Will your work become more difficult if we leave the European Union than it is at the moment?” was put directly, said unequivocally yes, they needed the European Union to meet the challenge of the job. Forgive me if I repeat myself, but it is terribly important. Crime is international; it does not recognise frontiers. That is true of trafficking and, as my noble friend said, of drugs. It is true of terrorism. These things do not know national frontiers. Therefore, you must co-operate and work closely with others who face the same difficulties.

The other point I want to make is that, more recently, serving on the Justice Sub-Committee under the chairmanship of my noble friend Lady Kennedy, it has become very clear that we have underestimated—it is rather tragic that the British people have not understood, or begun to understand—how much British lawyers and British legal expertise have been contributing to the strength of European law, which is in all our interests. British lawyers have made a terrific contribution and they are very much respected. In taking evidence from practitioners in this sphere—the chairman is here to strike me down if I am misquoting—they told us over and over how the law is improving under the present system. The overriding authority of the European Court is crucial, however, because it provides a context in which everyone can have confidence in the necessary reciprocity. These amendments are very important, and I hope the Government will take them seriously.

Brexit: Justice for Families, Individuals and Businesses (EU Committee Report)

Lord Judd Excerpts

Wednesday 20th December 2017 Lords Chamber

[Lord Judd (Lab)]

My Lords, it is a great pleasure to follow the noble Lord, Lord Cromwell. I found myself in agreement with much of what he said, particularly the emphasis at the end of his speech upon the absence of any firm indication whatever about mechanisms—the working arrangements that will ensure the right outcome. This is becoming deeply disturbing because there are countless thousands of people out there who are uncertain and worried stiff, not only on this count but about so many aspects of Brexit and what is going to happen. Effective reassurance on this is terribly important.

It is significant that the report has had the endorsement of the noble and learned Lord, Lord Hope, and what he said was important. He emphasised the importance not only of reciprocity but of certainty, and he is absolutely right. For him to bring all his legal experience to bear in emphasising those points is indeed significant.

Other noble Lords have spoken about the need for clarity, relating again to the point made by the noble Lord, Lord Cromwell, that we need to be clear about the structures and arrangements for enforcement. Clarity cannot be overemphasised.

It has been a great joy to serve on the committee, not least because of the very special nature of our chair. She is one of the most effective chairs I have ever served under. She brings a firmness which we all recognise, together with her, if I may use these words, kindly and in the best sense wicked, devastating charm—look out when it is in operation; she is ruthless at times—and her incisiveness. We had a very good indication of that in the way that she introduced the debate.

It has also been a joy to serve on the committee because of the commitment, seriousness and quality of fellow members of the committee. I have never gone away from a committee meeting without feeling challenged and impressed by what is gathered around that table. The House would do well to take its findings seriously.

Sometimes, we fail to thank our witnesses. We owe them a great deal for the candour with which they spoke. I am one of those who learns from personal experiences; I learn from them all the time. I therefore always take away from something in which I am really involved anecdotes which help to inform my attitudes to life. I shall never forget the occasion on which two very distinguished and highly qualified lawyers were giving evidence to the committee, but broke off to say—I am not quoting them literally, I am reporting what I heard—“We are lawyers. What we want to say now is not necessarily professionally in our personal interest, nor in our interest at all, because if things do not work out satisfactorily, there will be lots of work for lawyers in times ahead. But we are dealing with family matters. Surely everyone around this table cares about children. What is so awful in the handling of family matters in the legal system is how children can so easily be trampled on. We want outcomes that are in the best interest of children. What is significant is that it is beginning to work”.

I was taken to task by our chair the other day in a private conversation to say that they did not say “it is beginning”, they said that it is so effectively working on a cross-border basis. Of course, that is related to the role of the European court, enforceability and the system by which every member country is in the end legally accountable to one authority. We must have something very good indeed if it is to replace what the European court has brought.

The other thing that has come across to me in the work of this committee, which has come across day after day—and it has come across to me in other committees in which I have served—is the gap in which we are operating between reality and myth. I cannot find, in all the experience that I have been through on European matters, anything to substantiate the myth about the wicked nature of the European Court and the reasons why we have to extricate ourselves from its operation. Of course, there was a building and learning experience—but those who work in the system find it so effective and important. On the whole European issue, I hope that in this House, if nowhere else, we will want to feel that we have made a contribution not just to the well-being of British people but to the evolution of law within the European Union in the interests of people throughout the European Union. We do not hear enough about that argument. What is going to happen to that? Our lawyers and legal profession has played a key part in the evolution of European law, which is just not recognised or understood by the British people.

The myth has reigned too long. We must have reality—and that reality rests on making sure that, whatever happens, we have something that is as good as the European court.