Official Controls (Amendment) Regulations 2024

Lord Dodds of Duncairn Excerpts

Wednesday 29th January 2025 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Ritchie of Downpatrick (Lab)]

My Lords, I welcome my noble friend the Minister to the Front Bench, as well as the noble Lord, Lord Caine, on behalf of the Opposition, and the noble Baroness, Lady Suttie, on behalf of the Liberal Democrats. I declare my interest as a member of the Secondary Legislation Scrutiny Committee in your Lordships’ House, a member of the UK-EU Parliamentary Partnership Assembly and a member of the Government’s Veterinary Medicine Working Group—which is all related to the European Union.

A very interesting YouGov poll was published in the last few days; it showed that the public in the UK wanted to join the EU again. This cannot be discounted, and I would like to leave that point with the Government. An interesting analysis was provided by Piers Morgan—who would not exactly have been seen as a remainer—who said he cannot see why the reset does not involve rejoining the European Union. Little benefit has come out of Brexit for the people of the United Kingdom, and we should make that point quite clear.

I support this statutory instrument, which is also supported by Logistics UK, which has had major problems with the border target operating model and its implementation. However, it makes the case for the single trade window, which is not reflected in this particular legislation. As I have already said to my noble friend the Minister, this is an issue which requires legislation. As my noble friend the Minister has said, there are some benefits in this statutory instrument which need to be highlighted, including amendments to provide a long-term legislative basis for the border target operating model beyond temporary powers.

The organisations involved in haulage and in bringing in and transporting plants and animals have no fundamental objection to this. However, they feel there is a risk that giving the BTOM a long-term legislative basis reduces the pressure on the Government to make a comprehensive veterinary and SPS agreement with the EU. I know my noble friend the Minister has already referred to this in her speech, and it is one of the areas that we have looked at in the Veterinary Medicine Working Group. I would be most pleased if my noble friend the Minister could confirm the ongoing situation.

This statutory instrument includes amendments to extend policies which are currently applied only to EU goods to goods from the rest of the world. This makes sense, as it will mean that rest of the world goods imports do not have an unfair advantage over EU goods regarding the border target operating model’s bureaucracy and costs. It also provides amendments to allow the BTOM to be updated more responsively to biosecurity risks. This sounds sensible if it is used only in cases of genuine biosecurity risk. It would be problematic if changing risk classifications became a way of raising more revenue for the Government.

In short, there are minor issues that are benefits in this statutory instrument. As a member of your Lordships’ Secondary Legislation Scrutiny Committee, we raised the point about administrative powers, which my noble friend the Minister addressed in her opening comments. However, there is disappointment that safety and security declarations will be made via the Government’s existing sub-optimal service, rather than the single trade window. That is why organisations such as Logistics UK—from which I have received representations and a briefing—in their spending review submissions to the Treasury have called for the development, thorough testing and introduction of a single trade window which efficiently and effectively operates as one border portal, and which is interoperable with international systems, to reduce the bureaucratic and cost burden on businesses. Can my noble friend say what the possibilities are of this happening?

In supporting this statutory instrument, I look forward to seeing the reset being promoted by the Government leading to a more enduring solution for all the people of the UK, including those in Northern Ireland. We need to ensure that there is less trade friction, but that is why we have the Windsor Framework and the BTOM; they are both devices to manage the trade friction that would not have been there if we did not have Brexit. It all comes back to that horrible little subject. Many who once were Brexiteers now see that there is little value in it and that we should be reverting back to where we once were.

[Lord Dodds of Duncairn (DUP)]

My Lords, I am grateful to the Minister for introducing these regulations and explaining them in such detail. I congratulate the noble Baroness, Lady Hoey, on tabling the regret amendment, which means that the matter can be debated properly in this Chamber and given the scrutiny that it deserves. Far too many of these regulations are being laid by negative procedure and affirmative procedure and are being brought to the Grand Committee. The full scrutiny of Members in this Chamber needs to be brought to bear on the contents of these regulations, because they have significant effects. A lot of them are very technical in nature—when you listen to the Minister introduce the matter, it sounds extremely technical indeed —but when one delves into it, one can see the significant ramifications, as the noble Baroness, Lady Hoey, pointed out in her forensic analysis of the regulations, and the effects and implications that they have.

I am sure that the Minister, having listened to her noble friend Lady Ritchie of Downpatrick, will go away and say that the answer to this is to persuade the Prime Minister to come out publicly and declare his wish to rejoin the European Union. He may try to resist that, for obvious reasons, not least that it would further diminish his standing with the people of the United Kingdom. There will be those who say that the answer is to undo Brexit, but I think that that debate is long gone. The issue that we are debating is how Brexit is done. The problem that we have in Northern Ireland is not the fact that we had Brexit but the fact that Brexit has been done in a way that separates Northern Ireland, wrongly, undemocratically and unconstitutionally, from the rest of the United Kingdom. Brexit can be done and must be done, if the institutions at Stormont are to endure in the long run, in a way that does away with the current problems.

On the issue at the heart of these regulations—the biosecurity of Great Britain, as the noble Baroness, Lady Hoey, explained at length—we had a recent example of the problem that is being created. On 16 January, the Defra Minister in the other place, Daniel Zeichner, told Members of Parliament about the steps being taken by His Majesty’s Government to protect people from foot and mouth disease in Great Britain. He said:

“The Government have taken decisive and immediate action. The import of cattle, pigs and sheep from Germany has been stopped to protect farmers and their livelihoods”.


The Minister did not talk about Northern Ireland voluntarily, but, when he was challenged, he said:

“Northern Ireland farms are just as important. In Northern Ireland, the controls will apply to meat and live animals moving from a 3 km protection zone and a 10 km surveillance zone surrounding the affected premises in Germany. Those products cannot be moved to Northern Ireland”.—[Official Report, Commons, 15/1/25; cols. 331, 336.]


The biosecurity of Great Britain was so important that the import of all cattle, pigs and sheep from Germany had to be stopped immediately. By contrast, cattle, pigs or sheep could come to Northern Ireland from anywhere in Germany, so long as they did not come from a 10 kilometre surveillance zone surrounding the affected premises.

The levels of protection the UK Government insisted on for Great Britain, and rightly so, could not have been more different from those the EU provided for Northern Ireland, the UK having abdicated its biosecurity responsibilities in relation to Northern Ireland, as the noble Baroness said. In this context, the claim by the Minister in the other place that Northern Ireland farms are just as important looks limp, pathetic and absurd.