European Union (Withdrawal) Bill

James Heappey Excerpts

Committee: 6th sitting: House of Commons
Tuesday 12th December 2017 Commons Chamber

[Matthew Pennycook]

My hon. Friend makes a series of good points. I do not take the Government’s commitment in this policy area lightly and I do not take issue with it. What is at issue is the scope and powers of the watchdog and the timing. I share the concerns expressed by my hon. Friend and by the hon. Member for Brighton, Pavilion (Caroline Lucas) about whether the new watchdog will be up and running in time and whether it will have the powers necessary to carry out the same functions as the institutions and agencies that currently exist.

New clause 63 would ensure that robust new domestic governance arrangements for environmental standards and protections were in place before exit day. It would also ensure that the body tasked with filling the governance gap was established by primary legislation before that date and that its scope, powers, functions and institutional design were shaped by public consultation.

[James Heappey (Wells) (Con)]

Before the hon. Gentleman moves on, I am interested to understand whether the purpose of new clause 63 is a UK-wide set of policies that would apply in Scotland and Wales, which would therefore remove a competency on the application of environmental law from the Scottish Government to Westminster.

[Matthew Pennycook]

The scope of new clause 63 is for the environmental watchdog in England, as we have already said. There would have to be agreement between the devolved Administrations and the UK Government about whether they choose to take the same approach.

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[Angela Smith]

I am grateful for the opportunity to speak in this important debate. It is a real privilege to follow the right hon. Member for Loughborough (Nicky Morgan). I rise to speak primarily to new clause 18 and to new clauses 24 and 27 and amendment 124. I will also speak more broadly to a range of amendments that have been selected for today’s debate.

Clause 7, which today’s proceedings are primarily concerned with, stands as a significant extension of the powers available to Ministers of the Crown. The speech by the hon. Member for Weston-super-Mare (John Penrose) went to the heart of the debate we have had today in relation to what he called the principle of necessity. His test for whether clause 7 stands worthy to pass through to the next stage of the legislative process is, “Does it meet the principle of necessity or go beyond the test necessary to meet the principle of necessity?” I would suggest that, as it stands, the clause does not meet that test.

The right hon. Member for Loughborough made a point that my hon. Friend the Member for Nottingham East (Mr Leslie) made at the beginning of today’s proceedings: one of the key questions relating to that test is whether Members of Parliament in the future will look back at what we do today and over the next few months and determine that we gave Ministers too much power in this Bill. For me, that is one of the real questions at the heart of the principle the hon. Member for Weston-super-Mare outlined earlier.

As it stands, the only pieces of legislation safeguarded in the clause are the Human Rights Act 1998 and some aspects of the Northern Ireland Act 1998. As has been pointed out many times this afternoon, not even the Bill is safe from the hands of Ministers once enacted. As drafted, the Bill will give Ministers flexibility way above and beyond what is necessary, allowing them to create or amend any legislation on the UK statute book to mitigate any failure or deficiency in retained EU law.

I am not convinced that my constituents—even those who voted to leave the European Union—possess the sort of blind faith the Government seem to be asking for, and I certainly do not have that blind faith at the moment. Indeed, a number of parliamentarians on both sides of the Chamber clearly have significant reservations. Further, of course, I am not persuaded that such sweeping powers are necessary.

I understand that the time constraints associated with the article 50 process and the volume of legislative amendments required to implement Brexit put pressures on the Government—I totally acknowledge that. I also understand that putting all the corrections into the Bill at this stage would be entirely impractical and that the Government do require flexibility to respond to all eventualities as negotiations with the European Union take place. In that sense, the spirit of the debate today has been very helpful, and the Government have to concede that most of the contributions have been made with the intention of improving the Bill and ensuring that it works in protecting the legislation we want to transpose into UK law.

Even so, as I have said already, the powers the Bill asks for are too broadly defined and risk undermining the sovereignty of Parliament. There is a balance to be struck between giving the Government the necessary tools to implement Brexit and not forgoing parliamentary scrutiny. What the Bill proposes does not strike that balance, which is why I support new clause 24 in the name of my hon. Friend the Member for Bristol East (Kerry McCarthy), which stands as a really serious attempt to define properly the principle of necessity.

Just last year, the Brexit Secretary told the Commons Select Committee that he did not foresee any major or material changes being made by delegated legislation. If that is not necessary, what possible justification can he have for including such sweeping powers in the Bill?

In its recent report, the Lords Constitution Committee outlined a number of requirements of Bills granting Henry VIII powers. In essence, it recommended that the breadth of any powers given should be as narrow as possible, which is clearly not so in this case. This point is furthered by the Supreme Court justice, Lord Neuberger, who says that

“the more general the words used by Parliament to delegate a power, the more likely it is that an exercise within the literal meaning of the words will nevertheless be outside the legislature’s contemplation.”

In other words, the broader the powers given, the more likely that, if exercised, litigation will follow. That point was made very powerfully by the right hon. and learned Member for Beaconsfield (Mr Grieve), and the Government do need to respond to it.

In their March 2017 White Paper, the Government said that their proposed procedures represented

“the beginning of a discussion between Government and Parliament as to the most pragmatic and effective approach to take in this area.”

I am afraid that so far, despite the concessions made, we have not got there. There are issues relating to the scope of the Bill that have been very clearly articulated today. Amendment 392, accepted by the Government, represents progress, but it does not go far enough because it deals only with part of the problem.

Triage is fine, but at the end of the day the scrutiny process does not allow Parliament to amend or send back a statutory instrument for further consideration by the Government. That is a real weakness in the scrutiny system that must be addressed, as the right hon. and learned Member for Beaconsfield said. That is why I support new clause 18, which gives Parliament the chance to look properly and in depth at what is needed to ensure that Parliament has proper powers of scrutiny over the delegated legislation process in relation to this Bill. The Hansard Society report gives us a really good start in that process. The Government have no need to be alarmed about new clause 18. This can be done reasonably quickly, and Parliament has the right to expect it.

The hon. Member for Brighton, Pavilion (Caroline Lucas) is not here to speak to her new clause 27, which is a shame, because the environment is at the very heart of the Brexit process, yet so far it has been fairly peripheral to the debate. If we are going to get Brexit right, the Government need to understand that environmental standards are the one thing that matters to every citizen in this country. Everybody who voted in the referendum, whether leave or remain, will expect the Government to maintain environmental standards at least to the level where they are now.

[James Heappey]

The hon. Lady says that the environment has been peripheral to the debate so far. I am sure that she will have seen the comments from the chief executive of Greener UK and the enthusiasm of that organisation regarding the debate that we had in this Chamber one evening two weeks ago when we spent four hours debating the environmental parts of the Bill.

[Angela Smith]

The test of whether the Government are committed to maintaining environmental standards—and indeed to improving them, as the Secretary of State continually tells us—will be whether their approach to our future outside the European Union allows those environmental standards to be maintained. If we fall back on World Trade Organisation rules, it will be extremely difficult for this country to maintain environmental standards at the level we enjoy now.

The Environment, Food and Rural Affairs Committee is currently looking at this issue. People in every single aspect of the agricultural sector—whether beef, lamb, poultry, pork, cereals or grain—have said that if we fall back on WTO rules, environmental standards may have to fall because we will lose our competitive edge and we will not be able to compete within that scenario. Environmental standards are not being taken seriously enough by the Government.

It is all very well for the Secretary of State to make populist claims about what he wants to achieve—when, indeed, what he was claiming he had already achieved has not been delivered—but he has to put his money where his mouth is. He cannot be a hard Brexiteer and a champion for environmental standards. The two are completely contradictory. [Interruption.] The hon. Member for North East Hampshire (Mr Jayawardena) can shake his head, but every sector in the economy is making this point.

The chemicals industry wants to stay within REACH, as does the water industry. Every major industry in this country likes the environmental standards that we enjoy now and wants to maintain them but worries about the impact on our environmental standards of not having a deal and not staying in the single market. It is all very well to live in a wonderful cloud cuckoo land and think that we will continue to enjoy in future everything that we have got now and that we will be able to do trade deals across the world, while ignoring the reality that we live next door to the European mainland. I do not know whether the hon. Gentleman thinks we can deliver that, but those on his side of the argument have so far failed to tell us how we will do so.

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[The Temporary Chair (David Hanson)]

Order. Before I call the next speaker, I remind hon. Members that we are just over an hour away from the knife, and I still have 11 hon. Members seeking to catch my eye. Time will have to be very limited if all hon. Members are to get in.

[James Heappey]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Hanson. I wish to speak about the many amendments that concern environmental regulation, specifically new clause 27, amendment 104 and new clauses 62 and 63. Like many other speakers, I have received some excellent briefing material from Greener UK, which encapsulates the ambitions of many in the non-governmental organisation community, and I would like to thank it for the enthusiasm with which it has engaged with colleagues on both sides of the House. It has made an excellent effort in seeking to make very clear what it expects. It is clear also that there is a consensus about what we are trying to achieve. There is just a slight disagreement about how exactly to legislate for it.

I hope that hon. Members on both sides of the House, irrespective of what they think should be done to the withdrawal Bill, would congratulate the Environment Secretary on the excellent commitments he has made in recent weeks. They have shown very clearly that the ambition for environmental regulation after Brexit is not merely to maintain the status quo, but to take UK environmental regulation further. That is great news.

We also want the environmental principles enshrined in UK law. We debated that point at length the other week, and there was some satisfaction that that was indeed the Environment Secretary’s intent for the Bill he will bring forward. I agree with my near neighbour, the hon. Member for Bristol East (Kerry McCarthy), that it was a shame that Hansard could not record his nodding during the speech of my right hon. Friend the Member for West Dorset (Sir Oliver Letwin), but there is no doubt that those of us in the Chamber clearly saw his acquiescence to the requests being made.

[Kerry McCarthy]

I think Hansard did record that the Environment Secretary nodded his assent, but I am not entirely sure that he knew what he was nodding his assent to.

[James Heappey]

For those of us with an environmental mindset, there is a temptation—and I may say more about this later—to think that it is almost too good to be true that the Environment Secretary should sit there and, quite unequivocally, nod to all those requests. People are not quite willing to accept that it is true, but I am not sure that the things that my right hon. Friend has been saying about environmental matters in recent weeks should do anything to discourage us from believing that it is. He really has been setting the pace.

The non-governmental organisations have raised a number of matters. I agree with what they are saying, but I also believe that what we are already doing in the Bill and—much more importantly—our commitments beyond it will meet their expectations. Their concern about the governance gap is entirely justified. There needs to be a new body to reinforce the regulatory standards that we establish.

Significant powers relating to our environment are being vacated by the EU, and we must, as a matter of urgency, ensure that those powers are allocated to either existing or new regulatory bodies. Those bodies must be independent, they must be accountable, they must be accessible to the public who are seeking redress, their processes must be transparent, and they must have teeth so that they can hold Governments and others to account. We all agree on that, and nothing that I have heard from the Environment Secretary suggests that his ambition for legislation on the environment post-Brexit will not deliver those requirements.

[Wera Hobhouse]

Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

[James Heappey]

I will gladly give way to my diocesan neighbour.

[Wera Hobhouse]

Does the hon. Gentleman not agree that the environment does not stop at borders, and that international agreements on environmental protection are vital? The danger that I see is that the UK is going it alone. It is important that we all do this together—and, in fact, we have been doing it together, which is why we have the single market and the European Union.

[James Heappey]

I take the hon. Lady’s point, but I am not sure that the EU is necessarily the only vehicle for the purpose. The Minister for Climate Change and Industry, my hon. Friend the Member for Devizes (Claire Perry), attended the One Planet summit in Paris today, where she talked to representatives from countries all over the world, outside the EU and within, about arresting climate change.

The marine conservation Minister, my hon. Friend the Member for Suffolk Coastal (Dr Coffey), was in Malta six or seven weeks ago at a global UN conference on ocean rescue. Again, that was not an EU vehicle, but the UK was showing leadership among countries around the world. I understand that the Minister for Agriculture, Fisheries and Food, my hon. Friend the Member for Camborne and Redruth (George Eustice), has been at a conference about fishing in the last couple of days, and that the discussion was not EU-orientated but global. I am therefore not entirely convinced that the UK is “going it alone”. We are clearly well embedded in a whole range of international forums in which we can discuss our environmental ambitions globally.

As the hon. Lady rightly said, these are issues that cross borders. However we regulate the environment in the United Kingdom—and I am confident that we will be much more ambitious here than the EU is currently with its own regulations—we cannot turn our back on the rest of the world. Indeed, there is no evidence that we would, given the amount of international engagement that we already have, and the extent of the leadership that we are showing on so many issues relating to the environment and climate change.

I was surprised to note the Scottish National party’s support for new clause 27, in particular. I accept what was said earlier by the hon. Member for Greenwich and Woolwich (Matthew Pennycook) about the intention to establish a regulatory body in England that might seek to be matched in Scotland and Wales, and that agreement would be sought from the devolved powers. However, the Bill refers specifically to a UK-wide regulatory framework. I will gladly give way to any SNP Member who wishes to intervene, but I wonder whether that in some way challenges the SNP’s desire for the greater devolution of powers rather than their centralisation. Why would the SNP support a measure that refers to centralised regulation?

Furthermore, the DEFRA consultation on the new enforcement body must be published urgently. [Interruption.] I will gladly give way.

[Stewart Malcolm McDonald (Glasgow South) (SNP)]

rose—

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[James Heappey]

As I said, the DEFRA consultation on the new enforcement body must be published urgently; I agree with the NGO community on that, and Members on both sides will want to encourage the Environment Secretary to do exactly that. I also agree that our ambition should be that the new Bill to establish this new body, and to make the UK’s environmental ambitions post-Brexit clear, should be passed through Parliament by March 2019. We will all want some reassurance from the Secretary of State in the near future that that is indeed his ambition.

Earlier, my right hon. Friend the Member for West Dorset spoke at much greater length than I intend to on the detail of this, but he is absolutely right that the Environment Secretary is clearly meeting the ambitions of everybody who is contributing to this debate from an environmental perspective. Some might choose to put their fingers in their ears, say it cannot possibly be so and seek to manufacture disagreement where there is none, but the Environment Secretary—in this Chamber, in the press, in the speeches he has been giving to the environmental community, and in his meetings with NGOs, I believe—has been very clear about what he intends to do.

Seeking to amend the Bill simply for the sake of amending it does not add anything to our ambition for stronger environmental regulations post-Brexit. We can be very confident that the Government are leading us in the right direction on environmental regulation. They are going far further than the EU currently does, and that is the key point: we should see current EU regulation merely as the floor for UK environmental regulation post Brexit, not the ceiling. I am confident that the Secretary of State has every intention of doing that.

[Several hon. Members rose—]