European Union (Notification of Withdrawal) Bill

Lord Forsyth of Drumlean Excerpts

Committee: 1st sitting (Hansard): House of Lords
Monday 27th February 2017 Lords Chamber

[Lord Davies of Stamford (Lab)]

My Lords, I agree very much with my two noble friends, who have set out very well the purpose of the amendment. I, like them, feel that it is a disaster for our country to leave the European Union in any circumstances, and that the economic costs have not begun to be properly assessed in this country, although as every week goes by we become more aware of some of them. However, I think it is common ground, even with those who think that we should leave the European Union and who voted and campaigned for that, that there are economic costs and even they would accept that those economic costs are very serious.

The economic costs essentially affect manufacturing, particularly areas such as automotive and aerospace where there are a large number of supply chains in the European Union going across countries, with parts and components and so forth going back and forth more or less the whole time. That business will be very severely affected by our leaving the customs union and the single market, particularly where we would have to pay tariffs, as we would do in the case of motor cars, for example. The other area is financial services, which accounts for 10% of the gross national product of this country, as we all know. The City at the moment is the financial capital of the European Union but that is likely to cease if we left the European Union. It is very difficult to imagine how it could continue to be that unless we had some way of remaining in the internal financial market.

The great thing about the EEA is that it is a way of avoiding some, if not all, of the economic costs—there would be a loss of investment in many areas and as time went by there might be threats to our competitiveness as a country, both in services and in some of the manufacturing areas I mentioned. Nevertheless, it would mitigate and very much reduce the economic costs, which everybody is agreed are considerable and serious. Therefore, it seems extraordinary that the Government have not even bothered to consider or negotiate the possibility of our remaining in the single market by virtue of becoming again a member of EFTA or otherwise.

The Government have very reluctantly conceded that there should be some parliamentary process in this procedure of leaving the European Union. They have very reluctantly conceded that they should report to us at least as much as the European Commission does to the European Parliament on the progress of negotiations. They have very reluctantly exposed to us some of their thinking on some of these points, which have been dragged out of them in different ways—and we have to go on doing that.

However, as we begin to get clearer sight of what the Government are doing, it becomes more and more curious because we observe that they are actually breaching some of what one had always thought were the golden rules of negotiation. They are behaving in a way that is clearly irrational. No normal person gives up an option unless he or she gets to the point when they have to. There is no point in giving up an option in advance so why did the Government state in advance they were not interested in becoming a part of EFTA and remaining in the single market on that basis?

Secondly, the Government have said that their priority is to prevent freedom of movement or stop freedom of movement in future so far as this country is concerned. We now hear from Mr Davis that he does not expect any significant reduction in immigration from the rest of the EU or anywhere else for the next few years. In other words, the benefit for which the Government are apparently prepared to pay this enormous economic cost is much less than it was always made out to be. That is very clear.

[Lord Forsyth of Drumlean (Con)]

On the subject of giving away an option in advance, is my memory playing a trick on me in recalling that the noble Lord and others on the remain side during the referendum campaign argued that membership of the EEA would be the worst possible option because we would be bound by all the rules but have no say?

[Lord Davies of Stamford]

The noble Lord is uncharacteristically inaccurate; he normally does his homework before intervening in this way. He is quite right that I and many on the remain side argued against the EEA being the right solution but he is quite wrong to suggest that any of us argued that it was the worst solution. On the contrary, throughout the campaign I always said while it was a very bad solution, it was the least bad solution of all those on offer. I am on record as saying that and probably said it in debates in which the noble Lord took part. Indeed, that is my strong view today and is the case I now argue.

I wish we could stay in the EU—period, as the Americans say, or full stop—but if we cannot we must try to mitigate the enormous damage. That is the argument I have been making. The way to do that is to try to find a way to stay in the single market, and one way we could certainly do that is to rejoin EFTA, as my noble friend Lord Lea set out. It is extraordinary that the Government have excluded that possibility and I now come to their extraordinary behaviour.

The Government have not only revealed that the benefit for which they are prepared to pay this high cost is nothing like as great as it was always made out to be, but not even considered negotiating on the single market regime provided by the EEA and using that as a basis for trying to get some concessions on freedom of movement. My two noble friends suggested a way forward that might be possible. I do not think that we on this side of the House will be able to take over these negotiations but we want to know—it is important that everybody in the country knows—why the Government did not even think it worthwhile to sit down with our European Union partners and say we would like to stay in the single market but we would also like to curb freedom of movement at least to some extent. We could have a negotiation on that basis.

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[Lord Forsyth of Drumlean]

My Lords, I hesitate to intervene on Irish matters but no one has spoken to Amendment 30, which is grouped with these amendments, or explained the thinking behind it. It has extraordinary implications for Scotland. It says that it should be a,

“priority in negotiations … for the Prime Minister to seek terms that would not give rise to any external impediment to the ability of the people of the island of Ireland to exercise the right, on the basis of the consent of the people of the Republic of Ireland and Northern Ireland, to bring about a united Ireland, to be treated as a European Union Member State”.

I assume—contrary to his position—that the noble Lord, Lord Hain, accepts the view that if people vote in a referendum that should be taken as the consent of the people. If so, that suggests—as the noble Lord, Lord Alderdice, pointed out—that it should be part of the Government’s negotiations to secure the right of Northern Ireland, if it voted in a referendum to become part of a united Ireland, to automatically become part of the European Union. If the Government were to embark upon such a negotiation, I would find it difficult to understand why that would not enable the Scottish nationalists to argue that what was good for the goose was good for the gander, or perhaps it is the other way round. The noble Lord, Lord Alderdice, said that it is completely different because this is part of the United Kingdom joining a state that is a member of the European Union, and not the other way round. I very much doubt if Nicola Sturgeon and Alex Salmond would present it that way.

The main point I want to make is that this is a Bill about firing the starting gun for Article 50. There are many issues, and there is great sympathy in the House for the position of Northern Ireland. The Prime Minister has said, in the clearest possible terms, what the Government’s policy is. Frankly, some of these amendments and speeches do not seem to be prepared to take yes for an answer. The idea that we have to amend the Bill in order to hold the Government’s feet to the fire for their policy on something as important as this is pretty extraordinary. We go back to the fundamental point: the President of the Commission, the leader of the Opposition and the then Prime Minister all wanted to implement Article 50 immediately. The Prime Minister is anxious to get on with the negotiations; these issues will have to be considered. The noble Baroness, Lady Harris, said, “We accept that, but we want to know how you are going to do it”. The very worst thing you can do in any negotiation is announce in advance how are you going to negotiate, because then you are committed to that position and the people on the other side will make it very difficult for you, so I worry about Amendment 30 in particular. It illustrates how foolish it would be to amend this Bill—which is after all starting the process. I have no doubt there will be many happy hours for us to discuss those issues of the border between Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland in the future, and the implications for Scotland, the EEA and everything else. But I venture to suggest that this is not the Bill in which to do so.

[Lord Dubs (Lab)]

My Lords, I remember that at the time of the negotiations leading up to the agreement in Belfast, the EU was there in the forefront being supportive, and indeed EU finance developed cross-border projects and played a significant part in the process.

I want to make two points. First, whatever we think, we know that the Irish Government are deeply concerned about this issue. We are belittling their concerns if we say, “We don’t need to bother about this amendment because it’ll be all right in the end”. We all know that the previous Taoiseach, the present one and many other people are very concerned. We owe it to them at least to show that we are concerned about the situation.

My key point is that I think it would be right to have the amendment in the Bill if for no other reason than that it would send a signal to Brussels. It is all right saying that the Prime Minister will do her best in the negotiations, but I would have thought that in her position she would be much better off if we had the amendment in the Bill; it would strengthen her resolve and she could say, “The British Parliament is so concerned about it that we have put it on the face of the Bill”. That is why we should move forward with the amendment.

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[Baroness Wheatcroft (Con)]

My Lords, “the will of the people” is a phrase much bandied around in the wake of the referendum and it has taken on a totemic significance. Anyone who suggests that the country should not now blindly leap off the cliff into the unknown that is hard Brexit risks being accused of trying to defy the will of the people. When the Supreme Court judges examined the Government’s plans to ride roughshod over the principle of the sovereignty of Parliament, they met with a disgraceful headline labelling them “Enemies of the people”. Their determination to stand up for the rule of law rather than the rule of the mob was seen as defying the will of the people.

I do not wish to defy the will of the people. Amendment 3, introduced so persuasively by the noble Lord, Lord Newby, proposes the opposite of defying the will of the people. It is about upholding democracy, not denying it. It simply proposes that once the terms of our withdrawal from the EU are clear, the public should be given the final say on whether to accept them. As I said at Second Reading, I cannot understand why even the most devoted Brexiteers would not wish to give the public the final say on the terms of such a momentous decision unless they feared that the terms might not be acceptable.

The process would demand simply that Parliament should approve the terms by a resolution of both Houses. In answer to the noble Lord, Lord Grocott, it would be the vote of the Commons that was decisive; we know our place in this Chamber. If there is no deal, however, and the Government simply decide to withdraw from the EU, this too should be the subject of a resolution of both Houses. I will support a later amendment that calls for that procedure. I believe it to be absolutely crucial that, if the Government think that they have secured a good deal for this country, that deal should be put to the public in a referendum.

We are a proudly democratic country. We hold elections and we abide by the results even if the majority is wafer thin. The party with the largest number of MPs gets to govern. But the difference between a general election and the referendum is that a few years down the line the country has a chance to change its mind and to think again. People judge the efforts of those whom they have elected and, if they are not satisfied, they throw them out. A Parliament is not for life. However, when the country is now embarking on one of the most momentous decisions ever, a decision that will affect our children and our children’s children, there seems to be a perverse determination to insist that the people have made their bed and that, no matter how uncomfortable it may be, they are jolly well going to lie in it in perpetuity.

[Lord Forsyth of Drumlean]

While we are on the subject of being uncomfortable, is my noble friend comfortable with the many press reports following the referendum of her saying that she would use her position in the House of Lords to prevent and reverse the decision taken by the people? Is she comfortable with the idea of unelected Members of this House using procedure to try to frustrate the result of the referendum?

[Baroness Wheatcroft]

My Lords, I have just said that I have no intention of defying the will of the people; I am giving the people a chance to exercise their will, which some noble Lords may not wish to do. I do not believe that we should not give the people the final say.

When a majority of those voting voted to leave the EU, they had different visions of what that would entail. In answer to my noble friend Lord Lamont, I do not think that the original referendum was, with the benefit of hindsight, drafted as well as it might have been, because I think that people were voting for different things. Some might have favoured an arrangement that continued to give us strong trading links with Europe while others might have voted with a view that we could remain very close to the single market. Some might have hoped that our students would be able to continue their education throughout Europe while others, particularly those in the financial services sector, would almost certainly have been hoping that what they were voting for was an arrangement that would allow their products to be passported into Europe so that they could continue doing business as they do now. That looks increasingly unlikely to happen, with dire consequences for our Exchequer. The one thing on which most voters would surely have agreed is, as others have suggested in this debate, that they were not voting to get poorer.

The most logical solution is that, once the terms of departure are clear, the public should be able to weigh them up and decide whether they want them. Do those who oppose such a suggestion not believe that the British electorate are capable of examining a deal and judging it on its merits? To take that view certainly would be to show contempt for the electorate and I do not. I am not a fan of government by referenda, but nevertheless once one has embarked on that route, it seems that only a referendum can complete the process. This is about listening to the will of the people, not defying it.

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[Lord Ashdown of Norton-sub-Hamdon (LD)]

My Lords, the noble Lord has made the central case for the amendment: do noble Lords trust the Government and the way that they have used the vote on the Brexit referendum or not? Frankly, we do not, for very good reasons that I shall seek to explain in a moment. That is not to say that we challenge the fundamental decision made in that referendum. Since I have been substantially misquoted on many occasions, let me say what I said on the night of the referendum, because government Ministers have been frequently using this as though somehow or other we had behaved in a way inconsistent with these words:

“I will forgive no-one who does not respect the sovereign voice of the British people once it has spoken. Whether it is a majority of 1% or 20%, when the British people have spoken, you do what they command. Either you believe in democracy or you don’t”.


Those are my words and I stand by them because we do believe in democracy on these Benches. We accept the sovereign voice of the British people.

Noble Lords may laugh but that is the fundamental question: do we challenge the “yes” or “no” outcome of that referendum? No, we do not, and this amendment does not in any way. We accept the decision that has been taken, and the decision is that we should leave. We are naturally bitter and sad about that, but whatever our personal feelings the judgment of the British people has spoken. However, to say we leave is not the same as the British people providing a mandate unto the solution that the Government choose in order to leave. The Government have actually taken what they claim to be a mandate to leave—which we concede the Government have, of course—and turned it into a mandate for the most brutal form of leaving possible.

I ask noble Lords to look back to the conduct of that referendum, in which many of us took part. I had a number of interesting debates with the noble Lord, Lord Forsyth, and very good they were too. On every single occasion during that referendum, we asked those who proposed Brexit to say what kind of Brexit. Did it mean leaving the single market? Did it mean a complete ban on immigration? Never were we given an answer. I have Mr Hannan, a well-known lion on the Brexit debate, on the record many times: there is nothing about this that says we must leave the single market. If I recall, in the meeting that I had with the noble Lord, Lord Forsyth—I do not think I am wrong—he too said that it was not necessary to leave the single market.

[Lord Forsyth of Drumlean]

What I said, as the noble Lord will recall, was that there was a difference between being a member of the single market and having access to the single market and that those who were arguing for remain were deliberately deceiving the people.

[Lord Ashdown of Norton-sub-Hamdon]

As I recall, the conclusion that I and the audience reached—but we probably cannot go over this now—was that the noble Lord would leave but it was not necessary not to continue with access to the single market. However, that is what the Government have now said. We accept that the Government have a mandate to leave the European Union, but what mandate do they have to leave the single market or the customs union? None. The Conservative Party manifesto at the last general election committed the party, as a manifesto promise, to continue to stay in the single market. They have taken the British people’s votes—

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[Lord Newby]

My Lords, the Minister is entitled not to wish to answer the question—and I can understand why. I will make just three points. First, I am sorry to the noble Lord, Lord Grocott, that I was so hard on him earlier on. I should have welcomed—and indeed do now welcome—his intervention because he has given me some very helpful drafting advice for the amendment that I will be bringing before your Lordships on Report.

Secondly, I have never heard the noble Lord, Lord Rooker, sound so defeatist. If this House took the view that the House of Commons might not accept an amendment that we passed, we would hardly ever pass any amendments. We would certainly not have passed the amendment on tax credits. Therefore, I urge him to take that as a precedent and think that, so impressed by the quality of our arguments, those 20 Conservative Back-Benchers might change their minds in an instant on reading Hansard and that we would get our victory when it went to the other place.

Thirdly, in response to the noble Lord, Lord Empey—a number of noble Lords spoke about the parallels with or differences from Scotland—this is a completely different situation from that which obtains in Scotland. The SNP wants a second bite at the same cherry. We want a vote of the people on a firm proposition, rather than the vote which did take place on 57 varieties of proposition that were assiduously and separately propounded by different people on the leave side. So it is a completely inapt parallel and I cannot accept it.

[Lord Forsyth of Drumlean]

The noble Lord says that the Scottish situation is completely different. The Scottish nationalists argue that people did not know what they were voting for because of project fear. Surely that is precisely the same argument that is being used by the noble Lord.

[Lord Newby]

I have the greatest respect for the noble Lord but I am afraid that that argument simply does not hold water. The principle that we are putting forward in this amendment is straightforward: who decides at the end of a process initiated by the people? Our view is that the people should decide and nothing that any noble Lord has said this afternoon has made me question that principle in any regard. For today, I will withdraw the amendment.

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[Lord Blencathra]

If the leave campaign tried that early on in the campaign, it was certainly shot down by the Government, the Treasury and all their spokesmen very early on.

[Lord Forsyth of Drumlean]

Is not the point a very simple one which the noble Lord does not appear to appreciate—that every country in the world has access to the single market? The issue was whether one was a member of the single market, which would mean that all businesses—that is, 90% of the businesses in this country—would be bound by these rules and regulations, which would apply to exporters. That was the distinction made.

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[Baroness Jones of Moulsecoomb (GP)]

My Lords, I rise to speak finally to the three amendments in this group tabled in my name, Amendments 13, 14 and 15. These are not about the negotiations or begging the EU for a decent Brexit, they are about the things we have to do here in the UK to make sure we have enough environmental protection for the future.

Amendment 13 would ensure that, in relation to EU-derived environmental protections, the UK judicial system would be ready, following departure from the EU, to perform effectively the enforcement functions currently undertaken by the institutions of the EU. As has been noted by many Members of the Committee, the environmental protections currently guaranteed by our membership of the European Union rely on an established and robust system of monitoring and enforcement provided by EU institutions and agencies. We must make sure that we replace them with something. The most important part of the system has been the strong pressure to implement the law, and to do so within a specified timescale. This incentive to adhere to the law arises from the monitoring role of the EU agencies and the Commission acting as the guardian of the law and responding to legitimate complaints. If the Government are serious in their ambition to be the first to leave the environment in a better condition than that in which they found it, Ministers must give details on how this complex and robust system of legal enforcement will be replaced here in the UK.

Amendment 14 concerns environmental regulators and would ensure that, following withdrawal from the EU, the UK’s environmental regulators and enforcement agencies—that is, the Environment Agency, Natural England and the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs—are adequately funded and authorised to perform effectively the regulatory functions currently undertaken by EU institutions. Again, effective and robust environmental protection relies on well funded and staffed institutions to monitor compliance with environmental law. It also needs powerful regulators and courts to ensure that breaches of the law are challenged.

For the past 40 years this system of environmental enforcement in the UK has been grounded in the institutions of the European Union, the European Commission and the European Court of Justice. So far, we have had only a few offhand comments from Ministers and one line in the White Paper giving no detail about how this important system of checks, balances and safeguards will function once we are out of the EU. The Government are basically asking us to vote blindly and without caveat for a major upheaval in the way our countryside, wildlife and natural environment are protected. We still do not know whether the Government intend to rely on existing regulators to fill the gap after we leave the EU. It is time to be very clear about what we are going to do, because millions of people care about this.

Amendment 15 concerns access to justice relating to environmental legislation, so that the UK Government would remain committed to providing access to justice on environmental issues for citizens of the UK following withdrawal from the EU. The enforcement mechanisms established by the EU legal framework have been sophisticated. If a member state is deemed non-complaint with EU environmental law, the European Commission can bring infringement proceedings that can ultimately lead to large fines. This independent accountability mechanism has proved quite effective and the risk of penalties for non-compliance has been particularly important in motivating Governments to act, albeit rather slowly at times. But there has been little indication so far of what institutional mechanisms would perform this role. Many of us are concerned that there will be no mechanism at all.

I have listened to most of the debate in this House, either in the Chamber or from my office. I want to combat something I heard earlier. Somebody on the Benches opposite said something about the will of people being that the Bill passes unamended. That is complete nonsense. It is a Bill dreamed up by the Government. Although I understand exactly why the Government have made it this simple, it is our duty to amend it because it simply is not enough.

Somebody else mentioned how it is quite anti-European to be talking in these terms. Personally, I am very pro-European. I can manage to get by in two European languages—three if you count English—and I have many friends who are from the European mainland. I want to dispel the myth that what we are doing from these Benches in trying to amend the Bill is in any sense against the will of the people.

[Lord Forsyth of Drumlean]

My Lords, it most certainly is against the will of the people. The noble Baroness is quite wrong. The Bill is about firing the starting gun to bring forward what the people voted for, which is our withdrawal from the European Union. The mechanism the Government have chosen is the use of Article 50. I have some sympathy with some of the amendments, including hers, but these are matters that will become the responsibility of the United Kingdom’s Parliament. An amendment I should like to make is to the Long Title of the so-called great repeal Bill. As a name, I can think of nothing more inappropriate—

[A noble Lord]

The Short Title.

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[Lord Forsyth of Drumlean]

Yes, the Short Title; I have been corrected. The Bill’s name is misleading, because it will enable us to bring into UK law all kinds of measures, under the jurisdiction of this Parliament. May I ask the noble Baroness a question: is there any aspect of European environmental regulation that she dislikes?

[Baroness Jones of Moulsecoomb]

I thank the noble Lord for the opportunity. Yes, there is quite a lot I dislike, but that is not for now. There are parts of the common agricultural policy and the common fisheries policy that I dislike very much.

[Baroness Jones of Moulsecoomb]

My point is that we have to make sure our standards do not drop, because we as a nation have got used to very high standards. We need not only to transfer the decent things, but to make them even better.

[Lord Forsyth of Drumlean]

I have the opportunity to kill two birds with one stone. The noble Baroness has very honestly answered on the things that she would like to see changed. The great news is that, as a result of this, she will be able to persuade this Parliament to do so. Currently, she can make many speeches in this House, as can people in the other place, but we do not have the power to change these matters. That is the great breakthrough. I am surprised that the noble Baroness is tabling amendments to a Bill that is simply starting the process that will enable her to make the kinds of changes that she wants, provided she can persuade a group here. The other bird that can be killed came from a sedentary position. As we heard from the Liberal Benches, the noble Baroness is a leaver. We are all leavers now.

[Noble Lords]

No!

[Lord Forsyth of Drumlean]

Oh, apparently we are not. Well, I have been listening to speeches from the Liberal Benches telling us that they accept and respect the results of the referendum.

[Baroness Ludford]

Does the noble Lord accept that there is a difference between accepting the result of the referendum and changing one’s own personal, passionate convictions?

[Lord Forsyth of Drumlean]

I do not think we are particularly interested in the noble Baroness’s personal conviction when, in the other place, more than 300 elected Members of Parliament put aside their personal conviction and voted for the Bill to come here to enact the will of the people. We had a very revealing glimpse there of how the Liberals are trying to refight the referendum campaign when we should be following the lead of the amendments put down by the noble Baroness, Lady Jones, and others, and thinking about what our policy should be in the future. However, this is a completely inappropriate place to do it. There will be weeks and months ahead when we can debate these matters.

I want to ask the noble Baroness, Lady Quin, a question. Perhaps I am a bit stupid, but I cannot for the life of me imagine how the Government could possibly do an impact assessment without knowing the results of the negotiation and starting that process. Noble Lords on the Liberal Benches say, “Absolutely”. If they think that it is impossible to do an impact assessment, why are they putting down amendments asking for the Government to do impact assessments? The answer is: because this is a wrecking measure—another attempt to delay the Bill and prevent it going forward. For example, Amendment 9 in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Shipley, lists all the regions—

[Baroness Quin]

My Lords, I said at the outset that my amendment was a probing amendment to raise various issues that I thought it was important to bring to the Government’s attention. I cannot see the inappropriateness of doing that in this debate.

[Lord Forsyth of Drumlean]

I am most grateful to the noble Baroness. I suppose then that she will be withdrawing Amendment 6 and I do not need to argue against it any further. As she has always been a doughty champion for the north-east, I completely understand why that should concern her. I simply point out that this is not the Bill in which to make that argument. I have no doubt that there will be an opportunity to discuss these matters when we get the great repeal Bill, as well as in the intervening period. There is nothing to stop people putting down Motions in either of the Houses of Parliament and pressing the Government on any of these matters.

Amendment 9, in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Shipley, lists every region of the United Kingdom and asks what the impact of withdrawing from the European Union will be. Every penny of regional aid for any of these regions is our money. It is money that we have given to the European Union that comes back. That money is not going to disappear. I remember as Secretary of State being forced into supporting projects that were not priorities for us because we had to get agreement that they were additional and that they represented the prevailing policy at the time of the European Union. The difference will be that we are actually able in this Parliament to decide how our money is spent on our priorities in each of the regions. That is a great step forward. I do not, for the life of me, understand how the noble Lord could expect the Government to come up with an impact assessment of that. It will depend on the negotiations, on how much of our money we get back, and on a whole range of issues.

[Lord Shipley]

The noble Lord said two things that I do not accept. First, he said that the money that comes from the European Union is not going to disappear. There is a real danger that it will disappear because the country is going to be poorer and the Government’s tax income is going to be less. There is no evidence at all that all the money that is currently used in structural funds is going to carry on in the same volume. I do not accept that the money will simply be there and will be redirected again by the UK Government.

The noble Lord also asked who would do the impact assessments. Impact assessments are being done for London, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland because there are governance structures in place that can do so. The Government have regular meetings with all those bodies. My point has been that the rest of England is being left out from that process. That is the problem and I hope that the Minister can alleviate my concerns later.

[Lord Forsyth of Drumlean]

I am sure that the Minister in his excellent way will respond to these particular details. I am looking at this amendment, which says that we cannot start the process of leaving the European Union until we have,

“Her Majesty’s Government’s negotiating strategy for withdrawal on the economy, investment and regional funding of”,

all these regions. That is ridiculous—absurd. Perhaps the noble Lord put down the amendment just to have a debate and is not proposing to press the matter, but to say to the Government, “You cannot implement what the people voted for until you have done a set of calculations that are impossible to do until you start the negotiations”, looks to me like a circular argument and yet another device from those Benches to prevent us from getting on with what people voted for.

[Lord Shipley]

Amendment 9 is a probing amendment and I think that the other amendments in this group are similar. There is an issue about whether the Government are prepared to guarantee the levels of funding post-2019 and again post-2020. I very much hope that the Minister will assure this House that the levels of funding will not disappear.

[Lord Forsyth of Drumlean]

That is not what the noble Lord’s amendment says. It is an interesting argument. When he says that the money is going to disappear because we will be poorer, that brings me to the extraordinary Amendment 22, which appears to be supported by a former Cabinet Secretary. It asks for,

“any existing impact assessments or economic forecasts relating to the United Kingdom’s future trading relationship with the European Union conducted by HM Treasury, the Department for Exiting the European Union, the Department for International Trade or the Office for Budget Responsibility”.

As my noble friend Lord Blencathra pointed out, the Treasury and the Office for Budget Responsibility told us that we would have a recession and limited growth and that unemployment, interest rates and mortgages would go up, all of which has not happened. We have turned out to be the most successful economy in the G7. This continuing running down of our economy and telling people that we will be worse off is not good for confidence or for the Government and it flies in the face of what people voted for. They listened to all these impact assessments and decided not to believe them, which is why they voted to leave the European Union.

[Lord Bilimoria]

Is the noble Lord finishing?

[Lord Forsyth of Drumlean]

Is the noble Lord wishing to intervene? The noble Lord, Lord Berkeley, wants to intervene.

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[Lord Hannay of Chiswick]

To be absolutely fair, I spoke to Amendment 22 earlier in the name of the others. I am sure that my noble friend Lord Kerslake will now manage to deal with the aspersions cast upon him.

[Lord Forsyth of Drumlean]

Except that I have not finished. Finally, on Amendment 22, there is an interesting idea in subsection (2). Ministers have been extremely active in engaging with Select Committees and both Houses of Parliament. My noble friend Lord Bridges has done an outstanding job in talking and engaging with everyone. There is an interesting idea that perhaps it is possible as we go forward with the Bill to find some way of operating with committees of Parliament with some degree of confidentiality, although experience tells me that dealing with Parliament with some degree of confidentiality is not always easy to achieve. I am just about to sit down but I give way to the noble Lord, now that he is awake.

[Lord Foulkes of Cumnock]

The noble Lord is giving former MPs in this House a bad name.

[Lord Forsyth of Drumlean]

I just say to the noble Lord that at least I am not asleep.

[Lord Bilimoria (CB)]

My Lords, I intend to build on the comments made by the right reverend Prelate in relation to universities and to link that subject into the whole debate about leaving the single market. The Indian Finance Minister is in the country and he was asked a question today about free trade agreements between the UK and India. He made it clear that free trade agreements are not just about tariffs and goods; they are about goods and services and people. He specifically mentioned students and the ability of Indian students to study over here.

A report came out on 23 February saying that almost a third of university academics are from outside the UK. If you look at certain areas—engineering and technology—non-UK academics account for 42% of the staff. In maths, physics and biology, 38% of staff are non-UK and most of them are from EU countries. Then you have the statistic—I declare my interest as chair of the advisory board of the Cambridge Judge Business School and Chancellor of the University of Birmingham—provided by Professor Catherine Barnard from the University of Cambridge, who told MPs that her university had seen a 14% drop in applications this year from EU students. There is, therefore, already a worry about the future of EU students and EU academics.

You cannot just say, “We don’t do impact assessments”. That would be foolish in business: if I make a forecast and I get that forecast wrong, does that mean that I stop forecasting in future? I would be foolish not to forecast. You have to keep trying to forecast, even though you might not always get it right. Impact assessments are absolutely essential. It is wrong to keep going on about the will of the people and saying that we therefore do not need to do anything, or to say that the forecasts were all wrong so we can ignore forecasts and experts. We are going to start sounding like Donald Trump complaining about the elites and ignoring the experts. No, we must continue to forecast and have impact assessments. We must look at the concerns of our universities, our academics and our students and at the potential loss of EU students and academics in the future.