Trade Bill

Baroness Bennett of Manor Castle Excerpts

Committee stage & Committee: 4th sitting (Hansard) & Committee: 4th sitting (Hansard): House of Lords
Thursday 8th October 2020 Grand Committee

[Baroness Suttie (LD) [V]]

My Lords, it is always a pleasure to follow the noble Lord, Lord Wigley, and the noble Baroness, Lady McIntosh, both of whom always speak with such passion and conviction, particularly on these matters. This group of amendments, including Amendments 61and 62, to which I have added my name, is about establishing the principle of the need for consultation and consent with the devolved authorities and legislatures, and about laying down some markers for how we can establish open and effective methods for dispute resolution in our unwritten constitution.

As the noble Lord, Lord Wigley, has said, more than 20 years on since the various devolution settlements were agreed, the stresses and strains of our uncodified system are in danger of being tested to breaking point as a result of Brexit. Future United Kingdom trade deals risk highlighting these stresses and strains yet further, which is why it is so important to test the Government’s responses to many of these issues as we debate these amendments this afternoon.

Twenty years ago, when the devolution settlements were being devised, there were fewer party-political stresses on the system, as Labour was in power—in coalition or otherwise—in Edinburgh, Cardiff and Westminster. Clearly, now that we have an SNP Government in Edinburgh, a Labour-led Administration in Wales and a re-established power-sharing Executive in Belfast, as well as a fairly nationalist Conservative Government in Westminster, our mechanisms of consent and trust are being tested to the limit.

I should perhaps declare an interest as a Scot with an Irish passport currently living in the county of Kent. Those of us who are not nationalists have a collective interest in ensuring that we find ways to make our future constitutional settlement and trading relationships work effectively throughout the whole United Kingdom. I therefore hope that the Minister agrees that providing the necessary information to the devolved legislatures to allow scrutiny of any future trade agreement—as set down in Amendment 62—is the very least that can be expected and is surely in everyone’s best interests. Providing the text at least two months before the agreement and inviting comment from the devolved legislatures would provide the kind of buy-in and involvement that will assist in developing coherence in policy-making across the United Kingdom.

We should remember that this should always be a two-way flow of information. The UK’s devolved legislatures are often in a stronger position to understand the impact of new trade deals on local businesses and communities. Obviously, this is particularly true in the case of Northern Ireland, where the impact on SMEs could be very significant, not least because of the complex supply lines. Does the Minister acknowledge that free trade agreements will have a direct impact on the effectiveness and scope of devolved policy-making and legislation? Does he also accept that consent mechanisms with the devolved Governments are vital to maintaining the coherence of our United Kingdom?

I will turn now to a very specific FTA: that of Japan. Can the Minister say to what degree the Northern Ireland Executive and Assembly were kept informed during the negotiations, given the very particular set of circumstances faced by Northern Ireland resulting from the Northern Ireland protocol? Does he accept the analysis of a Stormont official who said the week before last:

“Some Japanese goods sold in Britain as part of a new trade agreement may not be available in Northern Ireland due to the Brexit deal”?


Turning to the future role of the Joint Ministerial Committee—covered in Amendments 50 and 76—it should be noted in passing that, despite his new title of Minister for the Union, the Prime Minister has not yet presided over a plenary session of the JMC, as far as I am aware. The JMC has until now been a consultative rather than a decision-making body but, given the likely increase in tensions, surely it makes sense to increase both the frequency of meetings and their capacity for decision-making.

As Professor Nicola McEwen said in her evidence to the Lords Constitution Committee a couple of weeks ago, the JMC on EU negotiations is currently the best-functioning of the JMCs, but is likely to cease to exist at the end of transition period and, as yet, there are no clear indications of how it will be replaced. Can the Minister say whether there are plans to ensure that the JMC meets more frequently? What plans are there to replace the JMC on European negotiations from 1 January next year? Does the Minister agree that it is increasingly vital to have regular meetings of the JMC, so that we can have greater consultation and co-ordination? Can he also say whether thought has been given to establishing additional sub-committees within the JMC framework to discuss such issues as international trade and international relations?

No doubt the Minister will say in his reply that all sorts of assurances on consent and consultation have already been given, but, for those kinds of assurances to carry weight, there has to be a significant level of trust. Tragically, that trust has been eroded throughout the whole Brexit experience, which has led to the very real need for the amendments we are discussing, and the need to put mechanisms for both consultation and consent in the Bill.

[Baroness Bennett of Manor Castle (GP) [V]]

My Lords, it is a great pleasure to follow the three noble Lords who have opened our session and to express my broad agreement with the direction of everything they said.

I have attached my name to Amendment 31 in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Stevenson. I do not intend to go through each amendment in this group one by one, except perhaps to note that Amendment 61 in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady Ritchie, and Amendment 76 in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Bruce, seem to be the strongest and to address the key issues. But all the amendments address issues of concern and at least seek to prevent what we could describe as a dictatorship from Westminster.

On the broad picture of what is happening with this group of amendments, as we have said again and again during our discussions on the Bill, trade is now understood to be a far more complex matter than it was thought to be decades ago when your Lordships’ House and the other place last considered it. Occasionally we hear from a small rearguard, saying that trade has nothing to do with the environment or labour standards or considerations beyond the narrowly neoliberal economic —indeed, that such issues should not be raised at all here. But that argument is clearly well past its sell-by date.

Carbon emissions from the products we consider trading have an impact on us all, as does the environmental destruction associated with them. If we think about the origins of the current pandemic, we see that the destruction of nature anywhere in the world has an impact on us all. The impact is also very directly onshore. If we think about the exposure of the situation of the garment industry in England, particularly in Leicester, the nature of trade and the failure of regulation—indeed, the failure to have the will to regulate—are part of that story. And, of course, bringing junk products in produces waste that must be dealt with.

That brings me to devolution. The aim of devolution —the direction of travel—is to allow nations to choose their own routes and, for example, set higher environmental, labour and food standards, as we have sadly seen happen for England. We will look at that a great deal more when we come to the Internal Market Bill, but in this context we are talking about foreign trade. Whatever Westminster might seek to inflict on England in the form of free trade zones or the destruction of standards by bringing in inferior, damaging, disastrous products, the whole point of devolution is that nations can make their own democratic choices in systems far more democratic than in Westminster, and not see them undermined by an influx of low-standard foreign goods or services. They must be able to say no to these goods and services in their trade. In these amendments, we seek to ensure that that possibility is there. It is a democratic essential.

[Baroness Ritchie of Downpatrick (Non-Afl) [V]]

My Lords, I refer Members to my entry in the register of interests. It is a pleasure to follow the preceding noble Lords, who have made particular cases in respect of several amendments. I will address Amendment 61 in my name—to which the noble Baronesses, Lady Suttie and Lady Altmann, and the noble Lord, Lord Hain, have added their names—and Amendment 62 in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Hain, to which I and the noble Baronesses have added our names.

Before I explain the need for proper consent and scrutiny arrangements with the devolved Administrations, it is important to note that those two amendments deal specifically with Northern Ireland. Although there have been devolved settlements in the regions of the United Kingdom over the past 20 years, we in Northern Ireland have been subjected to in-and-out periods of devolution. We have sometimes had periods of direct rule, although the last time the Northern Ireland Executive and Assembly were not sitting and we did not have the other infrastructure associated with the Good Friday agreement, basically Westminster made some decisions, but it was not a form of direct rule because amendments to the then Northern Ireland Executive Bill addressed those particular issues.

Because of the sensitivities of dealing with the devolved arrangements in Northern Ireland, and because of their intricate nature, it is important that the relationships that were manifest in the Good Friday agreement—relationships between unionists and nationalists in the north, between the north and south of Ireland and between Ireland and Britain—are nurtured and not set aside or fractured in any way. Yesterday, the good bishops of the Catholic Church in Ireland stressed the importance of underscoring that shared space. Their fear was that Covid, Brexit, all these trading arrangements, the Trade Bill and the Internal Market Bill could fracture those relationships in a very unnecessary way.

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[Baroness Bennett of Manor Castle (GP) [V]]

My Lords, I will speak first to Amendment 97, in the names of the noble Lord, Lord Purvis, and the noble Baroness, Lady Sheehan, to which I have attached my name. It is a pleasure to follow both the noble Lords. I particularly associate myself with the comments on ending fossil fuel subsidies made by the noble Baroness, Lady Sheehan.

Since they have already amply explained the amendment, I will simply note that we are coming out of an arrangement as an EU member where there was—as I was frequently forced to repeat during the Brexit debate—the generalised scheme of preferences, which meant that there were no tariffs and no quotas on goods from the least developed countries, except on arms and ammunition. Some of my reservations about the role of trade have already been expressed and will be extended in my comments on Amendment 39. We often hear words about development aims from the noble Lord, Lord Ahmad of Wimbledon, in your Lordships’ House. We can only hope that we will not be damaging the least developed countries with our trade policies. A regular report would be a way of checking on that. This is a modest amendment with which I hope the Government will agree. They could use it to display the progress on one of their avowed policy aims.

I also support Amendment 39, in the names of the noble Lord, Lord Purvis of Tweed, the noble Baroness, Lady Sheehan, and the noble Lord, McConnell of Glenscorrodale. As I am a regular proponent of the sustainable development goals as a way of bringing systems thinking and understanding of planetary limits into our policies and plans, this will probably come as no surprise to this Committee. I confess—and I acknowledge in advance—that the other proponents may not thank me for my support. I go back to the words of the amendment:

“Any future international trade agreement ... shall only be eligible for signature or ratification ... if the provisions ... do not conflict with, and are consistent with, the provisions of the Sustainable Development Goals”.


I remind the Committee that the United Kingdom is not on track to meet one of those goals—to which we are of course a signatory. Business as usual will not do it, for us or for the rest of the world. Globalisation and trade have done great damage to the social, environmental and economic fabric of our world.

I have already referred to the trade and investment requirements of the Zero Carbon report by the Green House think tank. Any agreement meeting the sustainable goals or any such trade would require a total transformation of our current system. If passed, the amendment would do nothing less than ensure a peaceful economic revolution—one that could greatly boost the national steel industry and the growing of fruit and vegetables. It would utterly transform our economy, very much in line with Green Party policy for one-planet living. But that is—perhaps I do the signatories to the amendment a disservice—something more than they intended.

There is no justification for the fact that salmon accounts for 74% of our fish-trade carbon footprint. In 2019, we exported 125,000 tonnes of salmon—48,000 tonnes of it by air—over half of which was flown to the US and China. We also imported almost the same amount—101,000 tonnes. The air-freighted salmon we exported was 64 times more carbon-intensive than the almost identical, if cheaper, salmon that we imported. No trade deal aligning with the sustainable development goals could allow that.

In 2019, just 16% of the fruit and 54% of the vegetables we consumed in the UK were grown here. We have a climate which is ideal for growing apples and pears yet, in 2019, we imported 438,000 tonnes more than we exported. The greatest carbon impact came from those imported from furthest away—South Africa and New Zealand.

Then there is the massive water footprint of the flowers, fruit and vegetables we bring from around the world, and the human misery—literally blood, sweat and tears—in the seams of fast fashion. A trade deal aligned with the sustainable development goals could not allow this to continue, for of course it would be about delivering the sustainable development goals for other nations, as well as for ourselves.

Two-thirds of the 2 million tonnes of higher-grade steel used in UK car manufacturing is imported, yet we currently export four-fifths of our scrap steel, which could be an important resource for making new steel through renewables-driven arc furnaces. This is a sustainable development goals approach that would reshape and largely end both directions of trade.

Trade policy and trade deals currently lock in harms, encourage and support the production of dirty products and fill our shores with rubbish. A lot of it is utterly pointless. We export 1.25 million tonnes of ice cream every year and import 3 million tonnes. Those figures have both doubled in the past decade. Let us think of the waste and pointlessness of such exchange and acknowledge that in a sustainable world, one meeting people’s needs and not trashing the planet—a world achieving the balance of economic, social and environmental goals that are the sustainable development goals—the trade landscape would look very different. I commend the amendment to the Committee and urge everyone to back it.

[Lord Judd (Lab) [V]]

My Lords, I am glad to see this important clause being proposed as an addition to the Bill. I am also glad to see that Amendment 97 is before us. Sustainable development requires a global response and the commitment of all those who have signed up to the development goals. Either we take the development goals seriously or we do not. It is no good joining the world in saying that we are determined to establish these goals and work towards them and then, by something we do in the sphere of trade, undermining the very principles on which they are based. If the Government are serious in their commitment, as given to the international community at the UN, this clause should be totally acceptable. I really cannot see any reason why it would not be.

Amendment 97 is very important. Having spent much of my life working on the issues of the third world, it can be very sad to see how trade arrangements can undermine years of effort towards development and progress in some of the poorest parts of the world. We know that the world is not a level playing field. I have often heard it said by different Governments that one must ensure that developing countries have a level playing field, but it is not quite as simple as that because many of them are not fit to play on that level playing field. There has to be a situation in which they can be brought to be active players on it.

This is rather like what I was saying on the proposed new clause: either we are serious in our commitment or we are not. We have now had set up by the Government this great new department, which brings so many aspects of our international relations together, including overseas development and what used to be the responsibility of a special ministry. We are constantly assured, and reassured, that things are going to be better on the front of commitment to the third world than before because all these different elements are working together.

This is a test of how serious we are and how far those new arrangements are really working for a better lot for the third world. Again, as I said on the new clause, this amendment should be totally acceptable to the Government if they are serious about their commitment to the goals that they have undertaken. The Government tell us with great passion that, in our efforts to determine our post-EU role, we are going to be positive, constructive and key players in the international community. Well, if we want to be that, we must not just pass airy-fairy resolutions and make airy-fairy statements. We actually have to deliver in the nuts and bolts of the world the policies that are necessary—and nothing is more important in the nuts and bolts than the trade arrangements.