Conformity Assessment (Mutual Recognition Agreements) and Weights and Measures (Intoxicating Liquor) (Amendment) Regulations 2021

Lord Lansley Excerpts

Tuesday 15th June 2021 Grand Committee

[Lord Lansley (Con)]

My Lords, I am glad to follow my noble friend the Minister, who set out the purposes of these regulations fully and clearly. First, I draw attention to the register of interests in that I am the UK co-chairman of the UK-Japan 21st Century Group. As that may imply, I wish to speak only to Part 3 of these regulations, which relates to Shōchū.

I raised an issue relating to this towards the conclusion of the passage of the then Trade Bill—now the Trade Act 2021—because of the implications of timing. Before I get to that, my noble friend explained Shōchū, which is a distilled liquor that is stronger than sake but not as strong as whisky. As he said, it is an artisanal product in Japan. The bottles in which it is prepared and sold there are an integral part of its overall presentation, so I completely understand why this was something that our Japanese friends particularly wanted to see made available in this country in the same way as it would be sold and marketed in Japan.

For those who are of a certain turn of mind, I realise that I have 10 minutes but I promise not to take up all the time available. One of the perversities of our Hybrid Sittings is that the less you have to say, the more time you have to say it. Last week, I had to talk about the carbon budget in seven minutes, but by contrast I now have 10 minutes to talk about Shōchū. Such is life.

Those with an interest in the media may recall the 1956 American film “The Teahouse of the August Moon”, with Marlon Brando and Glenn Ford, which looked in a whimsical way at the American occupation of Japan after the war. Of course, the teahouse in fact purveyed not tea but sweet potato Shōchū—and a successful film it was, too.

The question that came up in the Trade Bill debates was that, in the UK-Japan Comprehensive Economic Partnership Agreement, the relevant Annexe 2-D—for the benefit of those who want to go and look for it, it is on page 693 of the agreement—makes it clear that the United Kingdom is obligated to make the traditional bottle of five gō available in the United Kingdom; one gō is 180 millilitres, so five gō is the 900-millilitre bottles. The relevant footnote to that obligation says:

“The United Kingdom shall expeditiously take necessary steps to ensure the fulfilment of this obligation and shall notify Japan no later than 90 days after the date of entry into force of this Agreement of the completion of its domestic procedures necessary for the fulfilment of this obligation.”


The point at issue then was that the Trade Bill was going beyond 90 days. In the event, the 90 days were up on 30 March this year, the Trade Bill did not receive Royal Assent until 29 April, these regulations was laid on 12 May and we are approving them on 15 June. I think no harm is done, and our Japanese friends have been entirely understanding at each stage that we have trespassed beyond the 90 days and of why we have done so. For the benefit of those writing trade agreements in future, it would probably be best if they put timetables in and related them to the completion of the parliamentary procedures rather than the entry into force because the entry into force was done under a provisional application prior to parliamentary scrutiny.

The only other point I want to make is that, as my noble friend said, there is a different territorial aspect to this. By virtue of the Northern Ireland protocol, we cannot in this agreement, which is a continuity-plus agreement, vary the rules as they apply in the European Union single market, so the traditional five-gō bottle will be available in Great Britain but will not be available in Northern Ireland. As it happens, this is not strictly consistent with the text of the UK-Japan Comprehensive Economic Partnership Agreement, which states:

“Single distilled shochu … produced by pot still and bottled in Japan, shall be allowed to be placed on the market of the United Kingdom in traditional bottles of four go … five go … or one sho.”


One shō is 1,800 millilitres. There is a discontinuity between the text of the agreement, the treaty as such and what we are able to fulfil in our domestic procedures. That is a pity. Given that this is the first time we have had a continuity-plus agreement implemented into legislation, it has in a very modest way illustrated the complexity of the problems that we will have to encounter if the Northern Ireland protocol continues to impose these kinds of distinctions between the Great Britain market and the Northern Ireland market.