Trade (Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership) Bill [HL]

Debate between Lord McNicol of West Kilbride and Lord Purvis of Tweed

Committee stage
Thursday 7th December 2023 Grand Committee

[Lord Purvis of Tweed (LD)]

My Lords, the Committee is in the debt of the noble Lord, Lord Lansley. He is rare among us in being able to identify the questions, ask them and then come up with a sensible answer, all in one. He did so on this. I am slightly anxious, because he took away the only thing I was going to mention: tied aid and some of the experiences that we have unfortunately had with it—we have banned it in the UK—and the Pergau dam situation with regards to contracts that have been issued. We have memories of how this can go awry.

I record a recent visit I made to Vietnam. I wish to see UK trade with Vietnam grow and am very supportive of any areas in which we can make that happen, but in some CPTPP member countries it is less clear than it is in the UK what the balance is between private and public enterprises and what are the funding mechanisms of bodies that would be open to potentially benefit from UK procurement access. The noble Lord asked valid questions, and I have a degree of sympathy with his conclusion that it would be worth accepting his amendment.

[Lord McNicol of West Kilbride (Lab)]

My Lords, there is very little to add to the detailed probing question—and answers—from the noble Lord, Lord Lansley. With that, I look forward to the Minister’s response.

Australia Free Trade Agreement

Debate between Lord McNicol of West Kilbride and Lord Purvis of Tweed

Monday 11th July 2022 Lords Chamber

[Lord Purvis of Tweed (LD)]

I was not born.

[Lord McNicol of West Kilbride (Lab)]

I was four. Negotiating from scratch in itself should not have been an issue, but analysing in detail the Australian agreement raises very real concerns about what has been negotiated and what has not. Parliament has been virtually neutered in the whole process. The Australian agreement was signed in December 2021 and the New Zealand agreement in March 2022. We are now in July with just over one week before Parliament rises. Yes, it has been examined by the International Agreements Committee and the International Trade Committee in the other place but it will then be laid before Parliament similar to any other statutory instrument.

I wonder, as many other noble Lords have this afternoon, whether better parliamentary scrutiny would have led to a better, fairer, greener and more equitable agreement. There is a paradox at the heart of the Australian deal—the Government’s own impact assessment estimates that our farming, forestry and fishing sectors will take a £94 million hit and our semi-processed food industry a £225 million hit. Yet, again by the Government’s own predictions, overall trade will increase by less than 0.1% of GDP by 2035, while there is fear of real damage to some of the UK’s most important sectors.

As many other noble Lords have this afternoon, I worry that the prize of the deal, the prize of the headline, the prize of being first was more important to the Government than the detail of the agreement itself. As my colleague Nick Thomas-Symonds MP said in the Commons:

“Other countries, in future negotiations, will look at what was conceded to the Australian negotiators and take it as a starting point.”—[Official Report, Commons, 5/1/22; col. 67.]


UK exports to Australia as a result of this deal are supposed to rise by 53%, but I see no great basis for that optimism. Few trade deals have ever had that kind of impact, and certainly not those between two countries where there is already a good trading relationship with historically low tariffs. The 53% is also somewhat higher than the original estimate. Can the Minister explain this leap in optimism between the original estimate and the secondary estimates?

As we have heard from the noble Duke, the Duke of Montrose, the noble Baroness, Lady McIntosh of Pickering, and the noble Lord, Lord Liddle, the labour, environment and animal welfare chapters are pretty weak and do not necessarily focus on UK interests. Would the Minister care to elaborate on any specific improvements negotiated which will bring a positive benefit to our labour, environmental or animal welfare standards?

Minette Batters, the NFU president, said:

“The government needs to level with farmers about the commercial reality of this and ditch the soundbites that lost any meaning a long time ago.”


She continued:

“It needs to set out a detailed agri-food export strategy, with complementary policies that will enable UK farmers to compete and adjust.”


Those were some of her more measured words, but she is right.

As always, agreements include carve-outs. How confident is the Minister about the predicted rise in exports given the protections to Australia’s services market? This is in stark contrast to the lack of protection given to the UK food sector in the tariff schedules. Were any of our devolved nations involved in adding to our 12 pages of carve-outs? As I understand it, the Australian states were consulted and state protections included. Were any of the concerns of the UK’s devolved authorities recognised and incorporated into our carve-outs?

I fear that the Australian agricultural corporations will not be held to the same high standards as our farmers. Animal welfare standards have been mentioned a number of times, but what the Government have agreed is a non-regression clause. To be clear, that does not mean that the standards will be the same in both countries. What will actually happen is that meat produced to lower animal welfare standards will get tariff-free access to the UK market. So much for the promise that the Government had no intentions of striking a deal that did not benefit British farmers. Australia’s former negotiator said:

“I don’t think we have ever done as well as this.”


How much engagement did the National Farmers’ Union have after the agreement in principle was published? Was the NFU given the opportunity to raise concerns or make counterproposals? More importantly, was it able to assess the true impact of the FTA before it was finally signed?

The UK granted Australia generous agricultural market access. Why was this not leveraged to press Australia for more ambitious commitments on climate change? As we have heard, there is no reference to the temperature goals which were fundamental to the Paris Agreement, nor to reducing Australia’s reliance on coal, which was addressed in the free trade agreement with New Zealand. As my noble friends Lady Liddell and Lady Hayter have said, we now have a Labor Government in Australia so there is an opportunity to revisit it.

With the energy security Bill making its way through Parliament, this feels like a missed opportunity for the Government to show leadership on the world stage on an issue which is increasingly global, instead of taking an insular approach. Tariff-free access to our UK markets is a prize that Ministers should not give away easily. However, looking at the concessions made by this Government, are we not right to worry? This was a deal the UK Government “were advised” they had to do for the bigger prize of CPTPP accession. I would like to hear the Minister’s views on that.

I return to my opening point, and I cannot put it any better than the noble Lord, Lord Kerr of Kinlochard, with regard to this Australian deal. We are allowed only to debate it; we can do nothing about it.

Subsidy Control Bill

Debate between Lord McNicol of West Kilbride and Lord Purvis of Tweed

Committee stage
Monday 7th February 2022 Grand Committee

[Lord Purvis of Tweed (LD)]

My Lords, it is a pleasure to follow the noble Lord. I was thinking that it is not usual for us to have difficulty hearing what the noble Lord, Lord Dodds, says: it was down to technology and I am glad it got sorted. I welcome his amendment because it is another opportunity for the Minister to address these serious points. As the noble Lord indicated previously in Committee, on my Amendment 53, we have tried, as the noble Lord, Lord Empey, asked us to do, where there are difficult areas, to navigate a way forward. Because he is absolutely right: before his resignation, the noble Lord, Lord Frost, said in the Chamber—I think it was in reply to the noble Lord, Lord Hannan—that the Government’s intention was not to replace the protocol but to improve it.

So, we are in a situation where the noble Lord and I come, perhaps, from a different starting point but reach the same conclusion: we find ourselves in an undesirable situation but it is one of the Government’s making, and if there are ways to ameliorate the position, the Government have to come up with the solutions, because what is not really in question, as the noble Lord, Lord Empey, said, is that the Government are not looking to replace the protocol. We are, then, tasked with trying to remove one of the barriers that the Department for the Economy in Northern Ireland has indicated, which is that uncertainty is itself a barrier, and that has to be recognised. That uncertainty is ongoing, which is already one of the damaging impacts, as the noble Lord, Lord Dodds, indicated.

We are, I think, in month four now of a three-week process that Boris Johnson promised to Jeffrey Donaldson of a short, sharp negotiation on the protocol. Four months in, it might just be that Boris Johnson is not so reliable in the commitments he gives—it is a suspicion of mine, but it may well be the case. Nevertheless, as the Minister, the noble Baroness, Lady Bloomfield, indicated to me last week in Grand Committee, when I asked if it was the case that, if the Government secured everything they asked for in the negotiations, then EU state aid rules will continue to apply:

“To respond to the concern of the noble Lord, Lord Purvis, that state aid rules would continue to apply even if the UK’s negotiating position were accepted, these are specific and limited circumstances. I trust that this will allay the Committee’s concerns on this important issue.”—[Official Report, 2/2/22; col. GC 244.]


It really comes down to “specific and limited”. “Specific and limited” will mean that there is the ability for reach-back. It will mean that, for parent companies, the guidance will stand that they will now have to start to run two sets of accounts. It will mean that there will be dual reporting, depending on whether it is state aid or subsidy control. It will mean that there will potentially be dual challenge mechanisms. It will mean that the CJEU will still define the state aid component elements of it. Whether or not there are streamlines, whether or not it is more efficient, whether it is less bureaucratic, as the Government’s Command Paper said, or whether it is “specific” or “limited”, it still means that it is different; it still means that it is not the UK approach. That, I think, is symbolic, but it is also important in content.

I will not use any of the language of “territorial nature” et cetera; that is not for me to say. I will close with one element, though. In the 100-page document The Benefits of Brexit, there is not a single independent reference to Northern Ireland at all. That was published on the day that the Northern Ireland First Minister resigned. We are in difficulty, Minister, and I think that taking what has been offered by some as a way of making the situation better is something the Government should consider very carefully indeed.

[Lord McNicol of West Kilbride (Lab)]

My Lords, it is a pleasure to follow the noble Lord, Lord Purvis, and his detailed analysis, especially picking up and bringing back some of the issues from last week. With his contribution and the others, I will be short. I am grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Dodds, for tabling this probing amendment and facilitating discussion on this hugely important topic. I will focus my short remarks on the bigger picture rather than the specific details, which I think have been covered well enough.

Regardless of where people stand on the Northern Ireland protocol and the Government’s negotiations to reform it, it is a part of international law, as we have heard. This legislation therefore needs to be consistent with it. There are different legal opinions on the matter and, while some are favourable to Her Majesty’s Government’s approach, others suggest that decisions relating to Northern Ireland will at best be complex but at worst be subject to challenge or litigation. Neither of these outcomes would be good for firms, businesses or the authorities operating in Northern Ireland.

When this Bill was in the Commons, the Government were asked if they would pause to allow room for negotiations to continue. The answer was no. Despite the passage of those months, we appear to be no closer.

With that, I will leave my comments and look forward to the Minister’s response.

Subsidy Control Bill

Debate between Lord McNicol of West Kilbride and Lord Purvis of Tweed

Committee stage
Wednesday 2nd February 2022 Grand Committee

[Lord Purvis of Tweed (LD)]

My Lords, I support my noble friend Lord Fox and will add a couple of points. First, on the streamlined schemes, there is the potential for them to be very major and, in effect, a policy driver in themselves. But if they are laid and are not in an order, which we would have the ability to scrutinise, they will not necessarily come with an equalities or impact assessment. It will be a fundamental weakness if they are simply laid. It goes against the grain of what we have been trying to argue, which is for good-quality proposals that come with equalities assessments. It will bypass that and that is a retrograde step.

On the ability to amend without there also being scrutiny, I point out, having checked on legislation.gov.uk, that there are 15 references to deposit-takers in other legislation and 34 references to insurers. What the Government propose is simply to amend primary legislation and a suite of other measures. The area of confusion for me is that there is also legislation that relates to Scottish insurance, which could be changed by a Secretary of State without there being proper scrutiny of that either.

My final point relates to the element of secrecy in Clause 47(7). The Government seem to be proposing that we go back to a situation of hue and cry, in which measures by the Treasury that could be supporting individual businesses will never be reported. We will know only if there are whistleblowers, if people are raising concerns and they have that knowledge. We saw to our cost with the Libor-fixing situation what can happen when there is a lack of transparency and reporting. It is simply not good enough. When I was a member of the Finance Committee of the Scottish Parliament, we had mechanisms for our committee to meet in private when Finance Ministers were able to say, either on the grounds of national security or during the economic crash, that there were reasons why information would not be made public at that point. We were briefed and there would, subsequently, be a report that Parliament could have. There are other mechanisms for secrecy than this approach.

Finally, I have been a Member of two Parliaments for 18 years now. I never thought I would read a parliamentary committee highlighting this statement:

“In other words, because the Government might be defeated if the direction could be voted upon, there should be no parliamentary procedure and no vote.”


This provision should not progress. It is as simple as that.

[Lord McNicol of West Kilbride (Lab)]

My Lords, I am grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Fox, for tabling these amendments. As we have heard, they reflect the bulk of the DPRRC’s recommendations. I also thank the noble and learned Lords, Lord Judge and Lord Thomas of Cwmgiedd, and the noble Lord, Lord Fox, for signing Amendment 50, even if it was not to support me but the recommendations of the DPRRC.

The DPRRC took the unusual step of voicing its concerns for Clause 47(7) at first, rather than working through the Bill and its clauses in turn. That goes to highlight even further its real concerns, specifically around issues of transparency and secrecy. We will come on to further amendments on transparency and try to open this up because, as we have heard, when you shine a light on the decisions being made, they are put under scrutiny. Issues and concerns can be brought to the fore so that we do not, as the noble Lord, Lord Purvis, said, end up relying on whistleblowers.

Taking the point made by the noble Lord, Lord Purvis, it may be that the immediate release of certain directions and information could have undesirable consequences in terms of market behaviour, but there must be other ways of taking it forward. The noble Lord has touched on one of them at the Scottish Parliament, where meetings were in private but the information was subsequently released.

At Second Reading, the Minister said:

“However, we will of course take into account the findings from the Delegated Powers and Regulatory Reform Committee’s report and we will review accordingly.”—[Official Report, 19/1/22; col. 1712.]


I know we are all sitting here waiting to see if any of those will be enacted, and I very much look forward to the Minister’s response. The words of the DPRRC have been quoted but it is worth putting on the record points 13 and 14 in its 17th report, which say that:

“We do not recall any other occasion where the Government have argued that one reason why Parliament should not be able to scrutinise delegated legislation is because the Government might be defeated on it … Neither have the Government cited any precedent where the ability to disapply a legislative provision (here, the Bill’s subsidy control requirements) can be achieved by a direction that can be kept secret from Parliament.”


With that, I look forward to the Minister’s response.

Professional Qualifications Bill [HL]

Debate between Lord McNicol of West Kilbride and Lord Purvis of Tweed

Committee stage
Tuesday 22nd June 2021 Lords Chamber

[The Deputy Chairman of Committees (Lord McNicol of West Kilbride) (Lab)]

I have received one request, so far, to speak after the Minister. I call the noble Lord, Lord Purvis of Tweed.

[Lord Purvis of Tweed (LD)]

My Lords, I am grateful to the Minister for indicating that we will have more information on Report, but we have been asking some questions of concern since Second Reading, so I think the very least the Minister and the Government can do before we start Report, and indeed before the deadline for amendments on Report, is to provide information. Otherwise, it is pointless once we are on Report.

My question follows up a question from the noble Baroness, Lady Hayter, on trade deals to which the Minister referred. In an earlier group, in response to a question I had about legal services in the Australia deal, the Minister categorical ruled out that there would be mutual recognition of lawyers in the Australia deal to try to allay my fears that it would override the internal market Bill. The attachment in the Minister’s letter to me, which is about the agreement in principle, has a specific paragraph:

“Legal services provisions which will both guarantee that UK and Australian lawyers can advise clients and provide arbitration, mediation and conciliation services in the other country’s territory using their original qualifications and title”.


If that is not a new agreement on professional qualifications that will have to be implemented by this legislation, in which the Minister is intending to using a Henry VIII power rather than primary legislation under previous commitments, how on earth can we trust any other commitments about intent from the Dispatch Box?

[Lord Grimstone of Boscobel (Con)]

I thank the noble Lord, Lord Purvis, for that. I really believe that we have to wait until we see the detailed text of the Australia FTA, which will be subject to proper scrutiny. I think if there is one thing that the noble Lord and I agree on, it is the need for proper scrutiny of free trade agreements once the text is available. Trying to debate these free trade agreements purely on the basis of brief references to what they say is not something that I believe either he or I would feel is satisfactory.

Coming back to his earlier point, I will communicate with noble Lords as fully as can before Report on the matters to which he referred.