Definition of Qualifying Northern Ireland Goods (EU Exit) Regulations 2020

Baroness Hayter of Kentish Town Excerpts

Monday 30th November 2020 Grand Committee

[Baroness Hayter of Kentish Town (Lab)]

My Lords, I also thank the Minister for introducing this SI. There are a couple of issues I would like to raise, although we will support it when it goes through the House.

First, there is that funny thing that this SI relates to the internal market Bill, which, as the Minister knows better than most, has yet to complete its passage through the House. Indeed, looking at the post-Report version of the Bill, which is some 51 pages long, compared with the original 57, it is far from being a ready-cooked product. However, I have to say to at least three noble Lords in the Committee that I have every reason to believe that, if the original clauses are reimposed in the Commons, they will promptly be taken out again by your Lordships’ House.

Be that as it may, as the noble Lord, Lord Dodds, and the noble Baroness, Lady Suttie, said, we have been told that the anti-avoidance measures which are to accompany this are due to arrive here “in due course”, but we do not know when that will be. Brandon Lewis said that they would

“be in place by the end of the year”,

which gives us just a month to get them done, although for some of us that includes Christmas. It is fairly obvious that, if anything that happens to be in Northern Ireland—other than things subject to customs controls—can enter freely into GB, the temptation to use the no-checks entry points as a back door will be attractive to some, either on competition or quality issues, or perhaps for worse reasons. That would be especially worrying if it was a way of avoiding tariffs. I know that the National Crime Agency has warned about the risk, alongside the Police Service of Northern Ireland. That is especially important in the light of another point I wanted to make, which has been mentioned by other noble Lords.

The definition which this order seeks to capture is not only temporary but unclear. The Government say that they will come up with a more refined definition in due course, but there is no explanation of why they have been unable to do so, and it is very hard to imagine how they will enforce something that is so temporary. My noble friend Lord Hain set out some examples of where the definition is grossly inadequate, and I think that few of us will forget his little pig, born in the Republic of Ireland, slaughtered in Northern Ireland, made into sausages in the Republic and packaged in Northern Ireland. I look forward to the Minister’s answer as to whether, tasty as it may be, it is a Northern Ireland or a Republic of Ireland sausage.

Fourthly—and the Minister will know of our concerns in this matter—to say that everything on sale in Northern Ireland can be sold anywhere and everywhere in GB risks undermining the devolution settlements, which in certain areas allow for and indeed welcome divergence. If higher-emission vehicles, plastic bags, peat pots or single-use plastic forks can be sold in Belfast, the Minister is telling us they must be sold in Bangor, even if the Welsh Government have decided to the contrary. We remain committed to using the common frameworks mechanism for sorting out these issues. Can the Minister explain whether this order would trump anything decided by the common frameworks process?

I also ask the Minister what assessment the Government have made of the risks of counterfeit—or, as has been mentioned, lower standard goods—being placed on the market in Great Britain, possibly at considerable consumer detriment, if they only have to be placed in the market and not even actually sold and therefore checked in Northern Ireland. Given that the Government seem to have prioritised flow over control, in the words of my noble friend Lord Hain, this risk is real. I assume that our trading standards inspectors could do nothing if goods arrived legally but unchecked in Great Britain.

We know that Northern Ireland businesses are already concerned about the January deadline, with representatives from retail, manufacturing and farming saying that they will simply not be ready for the new Irish sea border and need a further transition period. Manufacturing NI has called for a grace period in which the UK and EU could “provide comfort” that goods could keep moving. The Northern Ireland Retail Consortium said that business was being given only six weeks to implement changes which would normally take two years, and it needs some sort of phase-in period. That is even more the case with the lack of clarity in the definition included in this order and, as we have said, the lack of any indication of anti-avoidance measures.

Can the Minister outline his response to how such businesses feel about this order and detail the involvement of the devolved Administrations with its preparation, given the concerns that I have that it would undermine the devolved settlements, forcing anything sold in Belfast to be sold in Wales, say, despite its laws to the contrary? Perhaps he could supply that timetable for the anti-avoidance measure, which the Northern Ireland Secretary said would be done by the end of this year.