Retained EU Law (Revocation and Reform) Bill

Jonathan Reynolds Excerpts

Wednesday 24th May 2023 Commons Chamber

I want to say a few words, very gently, to the right hon. Member for Stalybridge and Hyde (Jonathan Reynolds), who is sitting on the Opposition Front Bench.

[Jonathan Reynolds]

Not right honourable yet.

[Andrew Jones]

I beg the hon. Gentleman’s pardon.

As our Committee is gearing up for the consideration, may I point out that the Labour party has not taken up its places? We regularly meet when there is no Labour representation. We publish our attendance records, and I have just been looking at one of them. I see “zero attendance, zero attendance, zero attendance”. I fully recognise that it is not easy for colleagues to get to every event, and there are many reasons why Labour members of the Committee cannot always join us. I am not criticising those who have been nominated, because they have other things to do, and indeed we have gone out of our way to highlight that in the attendance records. We have gone as far as to say that

“committee members have other duties in the House…They may have commitments”

and so on. However, if colleagues cannot join us for a prolonged period, it may be wiser for the Labour party to nominate others who can attend, and could have attended over the several years for which we have been sitting. I do not think it reasonable for Labour Members to complain about a lack of scrutiny and then not take up the scrutiny places that are theirs.

We expect the Committee to be busy. We have been given an indication that the instruments will start to flow through to us very shortly after the Bill has completed its democratic journey here, and I look forward to continuing the work that we have done in ensuring that the correct scrutiny is provided.