Brexit: Customs Procedures

Lord Davies of Oldham Excerpts

Monday 15th January 2018 Lords Chamber

[Lord Davies of Oldham (Lab)]

My Lords, is the Minister aware that Parliament needs to be kept very fully informed about developments in this area? There is no way that Parliament can speak on behalf of industry and the workers in industry without a clear understanding of where the Government are at on these issues. Will he therefore recognise that there is an element of concern that the cross-border trade Bill, which is at present before the other House, may well be defined, in the way the Government have drawn it up, as a money Bill? Therefore, this House, with its expertise, will have a very limited ability to express its views on such matters.

[Lord Bates]

As the noble Lord will know, those are technical matters; it is officially for the Speaker in the other place to determine what is a money Bill and what is granted a certificate. On the importance of that Bill and debating it, he is certainly right. In the other place, the Treasury Select Committee and the Public Accounts Committee have been looking at and probing the system’s readiness, as they should. We published a trade White Paper, which had a tremendous amount of feedback that we have incorporated and learned from. We have also published working papers on future partnerships that we have shared with our European colleagues because we want to make sure that the borders work well together.