Procurement Bill [HL]

Baroness McIntosh of Pickering Excerpts

3rd reading
Tuesday 13th December 2022 Lords Chamber

[Lord Alton of Liverpool (CB)]

My Lords, I have something to add before the thanks are completed. The Minister was good enough to express her thanks to the Cross Benches, and I draw the attention of the House to the all-party amendments which were included in the Bill. I begin by thanking her. As the noble Lord, Lord Fox, just said, it was unusual for a poacher to be turned gamekeeper in the course of the proceedings of the Bill and she did it with great aplomb and showed all the characteristics that we have come to associate with her, in the way that she dealt with constructive attempts to improve the Bill as it proceeded through Committee and Report.

As the noble Lord, Lord Fox, said, the Bill has enjoyed support from around the entire House and, of course, whatever form a Bill is in, we will all always want to try to add to it, if we are able to do so. I was therefore very grateful to the House for including the cross-party amendment I moved on the removal of surveillance equipment. I also supported the all-party amendment in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Hunt of Kings Heath, who is here, on the use of forced organ harvesting. Those two amendments are now in the Bill as it goes to another place. Unlike on ping-pong, this is a pristine Bill going to the other place. I hope that Ministers will engage with those amendments and not simply try to remove them.

There were two other amendments. The Minister will recall that the noble Baroness, Lady Stroud, moved an all-party amendment which was not taken to a vote. We had a discussion during Report about how that could be taken to the Minister who might deal with the Bill when it reached the House of Commons. I hope that the noble Baroness, Lady Neville-Rolfe, will be able to draw that to the attention of the House of Commons Minister and suggest that such a meeting should now take place.

With those remarks, I thank the noble Lord, Lord Fox, and his noble friends, but also the noble Baroness, Lady Hayman, and her noble friends—the noble Lord, Lord Coaker, in particular—and those on the Cross Benches who supported the amendments that we brought forward.

[Baroness McIntosh of Pickering (Con)]

My Lords, I think I am the sole surviving Member of the Committee here today who contributed. I congratulate my noble friend the Minister and the Bill team on getting the Bill thus far. I am obviously immensely disappointed not to have succeeded in my attempt to source more local food in our procurement contracts, but I hope that this can be redressed in the other place.

My noble friend alluded to something that is a source of great concern to me. I have in my possession the memorandum from the Scottish Government, which expressed their concern and inability to add their consent to the Bill. Does she not share my concern that it would be very regrettable if the Scottish Government felt obliged to carry out their own Bill in this area, because of their concern about the continued ability to carry out cross-border procurement? Could this still be addressed in the other place before the Bill reaches Royal Assent?

[Baroness Hayman of Ullock (Lab)]

My Lords, I am sure that noble Lords will be very surprised to know that I thank my noble friend Lord Coaker for supporting me and sticking with the Bill all the way through. It has been a long haul, and I think we are all pleased we are at Third Reading.

I thank the noble Lord, Lord True. At the beginning of the Bill, he gave me an awful lot of time, as did his officials, when we had some serious concerns. As the noble Lord, Lord Fox, mentioned, we had a bit of a sticky start. The officials worked incredibly hard to get us to a position where we could properly debate the issues in Committee; at the beginning, we were not in that position, unfortunately. We all congratulated the noble Lord, Lord True, on his promotion, but we were also delighted as a Committee when the noble Baroness took over this Bill, because she was genuinely interested in what we were debating and genuinely understood what we were trying to achieve. I think she worked very hard and brought in some important improvements to the Bill, having listened to Committee. I thank her for her time, efforts and energy in helping us all to come out with a Bill that was better than what we had at the start.

I also thank the noble Lord, Lord Fox, and other Members who took part for the constructive work we did going forward on the Bill. It is much appreciated. I think all Members of the Committee would agree that the Bill we have sent to the other place is in a much better state than it was when we received it. I thank everybody very much for their hard work. I hope the other place considers our amendments seriously—I think they make the Bill better—and perhaps brings some further improvements that we can look at when it arrives back. It has been a pleasure to work on the Bill, but I am pleased we are now moving on.