Recognition of Professional Qualifications (Amendment etc.) (EU Exit) Regulations 2018

Lord Stevenson of Balmacara Excerpts

Monday 11th February 2019 Lords Chamber

The Government must now reassure the public about this document and in more general terms.

[Lord Stevenson of Balmacara (Lab)]

My Lords, we have covered a lot of ground in the last half hour or so. One important point which has not been made follows on from those made by the noble Lord, Lord Adonis, and other noble Lords. It is puzzling that the Government have chosen to ignore the question of how our important services trade will survive, both in the event of a no-deal Brexit and, more generally, if and when we leave the EU. This SI in some senses plays to that concern.

In the Trade Bill, which is currently paused in your Lordships’ House and may reach Report shortly, there is virtually no mention of trade relating to services at all, yet that is 80% of our GDP and consumes a huge amount of our resource and activity. At the heart of services activity is the General Agreement on Trade in Services, which we are members of through our WTO membership and which will apply to us once we leave the EU. However, without any statement at all in the Trade Bill and no confirmation that the Government understand and support the very important services work that relies so heavily on professionals and their ability to move and support their work, knowing exactly where the Government are coming from is a bit puzzling.

My noble friend Lord Adonis is right to raise the connection here between the right to free movement of persons and the freedom of establishment, which are key pillars of the GATS deal. He is also right to ask why the opportunity was not taken in this SI—as, indeed, it has not been taken in the Trade Bill—to support those who must deliver services in this country, in the EU and wherever they trade to generate the return and income we will need if we are to continue to enjoy our current standard of living. In that sense, the idea that somehow, through this statutory instrument, we will encourage non-tariff discrimination and barriers seems perverse. I hope that the Minister will have some answers to that question when he responds.

Paragraph 7.16 of the Explanatory Memorandum sets out the issue but then ducks out of it, for all the reasons given by others in this debate. It is not just about farriers, although it is a curious feature of life that they are not regulated in one part of our United Kingdom but they are in the other three. Discriminating against the rights of free movement, persons and services and the freedom of establishment to provide those services is one thing. However, we currently enjoy a system—whether through the EPC or through the EU’s general regulatory arrangements—whereby established regulated professionals in professions with established training standards automatically qualify to trade wherever they are able to do so. We are trading that for the system we are introducing, which will be devolved to professional bodies. Admittedly, some of these are of great stature and longevity and will, I am sure, act in the first instance. However, because it is not a national system and will not be subject to national standards, it is bound to be variable and to raise the concerns mentioned by my noble friend and raised in the other place of a possible tit-for-tat arrangement under which regulations made in this country—regarding accountants or lawyers, for example—are seen as unsatisfactory by others in the EU, who may introduce tit-for-tat regulatory change to prevent our nationals qualifying. That seems an extraordinary situation to open up and I would be grateful if the Minister would respond to that point.

The underlying issue is the approach we will take if we leave the EU—with no deal or with a deal—to protect the way our citizens are treated. My noble friend Lord Adonis is right: it would be a strange Government who set out deliberately to devalue the possibility of their citizens earning a living and a valuable income for this country in the way this instrument appears to suggest. This is probably not the place to raise all the wider issues mentioned by the noble Lord, Lord Dykes, but he certainly has a point when he asks why we are going through the pain to achieve something that does not seem in any sense optimal for those involved in it. Clearly, minimal consultations were carried out and were mainly focused on whether these regulations will apply in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland without difficulty.

I would be grateful if the Minister would respond to this statement towards the end of the Explanatory Memorandum:

“Devolved Administrations have confirmed their agreement for UK Parliament to lay this legislation UK wide”.


That is what this statutory instrument does. It goes on to say:

“This has been sought under the terms of the Intergovernmental Agreement”.


I am not sure which intergovernmental agreement that refers to, but if the Minister could write to me with the details, I would be grateful.

[Lord Henley]

My Lords, as the noble Lord, Lord Stevenson, put it, this is not about farriers—I will not deal with that question, unfortunately; my noble friend Lord Gardiner will possibly have to deal with it on some other occasion—or about why they are not regulated in Northern Ireland but are regulated in England, Wales and Scotland. I do not think anyone knows the answer to that question, and I will not try to answer it, just as I do not know why, for example, hairdressers are regulated in Italy but not here. In France, they are doubly regulated; you find that if you want to be a hairdresser who makes home visits you must have one form of qualification, and if you want to operate from a shop, you must have another. Again, we do not consider that necessary, but obviously we have to make provisions for UK citizens who want to work abroad to do so when that is possible.

However, before anyone thinks it is all sunshine out there under the current system—the noble Lords, Lord Fox and Lord Adonis, in their little exchange seemed to imply that as a result of these regulations we would get further restrictive practices—I remind noble Lords of the restrictive practices that happen already. One has only to look at the position of UK ski instructors—to take one example from the 600 or so professions that can be affected—and the problems they have had trying to operate in France, where, for some reason, throughout these wonderful years restrictive practices have always come into effect to try to exclude UK ski instructors from operating.