Brexit Opportunities

Lord McLoughlin Excerpts

Thursday 16th September 2021 Lords Chamber

[Lord Frost (Con)]

My Lords, we certainly recognise the urgency of the situation and very much share the noble Lord’s anxiety on this question. The relative stability in Northern Ireland is because our Command Paper proposals are regarded as a good set of proposals that are capable of resolving the problem. Obviously, it is one thing to put them forward and another to see them implemented, so we absolutely need to have a meaningful negotiating process with the EU, which we do not quite have yet, to see whether we can resolve the issues centrally and to know that quickly. If we cannot do so, as I have said, other ways forward are possible.

[Lord McLoughlin (Con)]

My Lords, I very much welcome the Statement by my noble friend. Can he assure us that the Government will be able to respond quickly in certain areas when problems arise unexpectedly—not least on the issue of lorry drivers, which is perhaps a good example at the moment, and the requirements of the CPC regulations? For some lorry drivers who recently retired and are unable to go back into the industry because they do not have CPC regulation, would one of the solutions not be to allow them to operate within the United Kingdom without that regulation if they have a long record of driving safely?