Haulage Permits and Trailer Registration Bill [HL]

Countess of Mar Excerpts

Report stage (Hansard): House of Lords
Tuesday 17th April 2018 Lords Chamber

[Lord Bradshaw (LD)]

My Lords, I would like to amplify what the noble Lord said. The effect on the logistics industry will be almost catastrophic if Brexit goes ahead. Are the main players in that—the FTA, the RHA, the Rail Freight Group and the Port of Dover—freely able to make their representations, or have they been made subject to some sort of confidentiality clause, which is a gagging clause, which stops them making representations?

[The Countess of Mar (CB)]

My Lords, may I help the noble Lord, Lord Berkeley, in his question about the rules of debate? If he were to make a point that I had not understood, I could ask him to clarify his point and he would then be allowed to get up a second time to do that, just briefly.

[Earl Attlee (Con)]

My Lords, I listened carefully to what the noble Lords opposite said and there is very little that I take issue with. They made very good points indeed. But my position is that we are sending Her Majesty’s Government in to negotiate the Brexit deal. The last thing that we want to do is unnecessarily to tie the hands of our negotiators and perhaps find out at the last moment that that hand-tying exercise has compromised our negotiating position. I sympathise with the points that noble Lords made, but I do not have sympathy with the amendments and I hope that my noble friend will advise the House not to accept them.