United Kingdom Internal Market Bill

Debate between Joanna Cherry and Drew Hendry

Report stage & 3rd reading & 3rd reading: House of Commons & Report stage: House of Commons
Tuesday 29th September 2020 Commons Chamber

[Drew Hendry]

I will make some progress.

In setting out to break international law, the Government are undermining trust, respect and shared values in a very specific but very unlimited way. The Bill sneers at the words “trust”, “honour” and “obligation”. Because of this Bill, any deal, understanding, commitment, promise or even legally binding treaty is now utterly dispensable—think of that! The questions now must be: what is the next inconvenient law for this Government? What happens to society as the Government embrace lawbreaking? How will international players treat their agreements with the UK? Make no mistake: this is going rogue.

Both the former Prime Minister—the right hon. Member for Maidenhead (Mrs May) still sits in the House and is likely to vote against the Bill—and the former Northern Ireland Secretary have spoken out against this action. The Law Society of Scotland has confirmed that clauses 40 to 45

“would empower Ministers to make regulations that are contrary to the Withdrawal Agreement… and preclude challenge in the UK courts through clause 45”,

and that the Bill, if enacted,

“would breach Article 5 of the Withdrawal Agreement.”

Part 5 of the Bill has triggered international condemnation. As we have heard, presidential candidate Joe Biden warned that

“Any trade deal between the U.S. and U.K. must be contingent upon respect for the Agreement”—

the Good Friday agreement—

“and preventing the return of a hard border.”

There are already meetings in Washington amid American interest in Brexit’s implications for Northern Ireland. The Government’s amendments to part 5 of the Bill create more problems and unanswered questions. As Professor Mark Elliott, in consultation with Graeme Cowie of the House of Commons Library, points out:

“clause 45(1) provides that regulations made under clauses 42 and 43 ‘have effect notwithstanding any relevant international or domestic law with which they may be incompatible or inconsistent’. How is this to be reconciled with the fact that clause 45 as amended now contemplates the possibility of judicial review?”

He goes on to note that Government amendments 12 to 15 would produce an “extremely odd outcome”, and that amendment 13 appears to attempt to “cancel out” the effect of amendment 14. He concludes:

“It leaves us with a Bill that clearly authorises Ministers to break international law”.

[Joanna Cherry]

Does my hon. Friend share my concern that Government amendments 12 and 13 may render incorrect the statement by the Secretary of State that the Bill is compatible with convention rights under section 19(1)(a) of the Human Rights Act 1998? Is he aware of any plans the Government have to revisit that statement? I asked the Minister about that, but he did not seem to understand the point I was making.

[Drew Hendry]

My hon. and learned Friend makes a telling point. No, of course the Government have not brought anything forward on that, because this is a Cummings-directed Prime Minister and a complicit Tory Government who have sought to justify a law-breaking, democracy-reducing, shabbily produced, lazy and dangerous Bill with a breathtaking factionalism bordering on pseudologica fantastica.