United Kingdom Internal Market Bill

Lord Hope of Craighead Excerpts

Consideration of Commons amendments & Ping Pong (Hansard) & Ping Pong (Hansard): House of Lords
Wednesday 9th December 2020 Lords Chamber

Moved by

[Lord Hope of Craighead]

At end insert “and do propose Amendments 1B, 1C and 1D in lieu—

1B: After Clause 1, insert the following new Clause—
“Common frameworks process
(1) The United Kingdom market access principles shall not apply to any statutory provision or requirement that gives effect to a decision to diverge from harmonised rules that has been agreed through the common frameworks process and states that its purpose is to give effect to that agreement.
(2) No regulations may be made by a Minister of the Crown with regard to a matter that is under consideration under the common frameworks process while that process in relation to that matter is still in progress.
(3) The common frameworks process is a means, established by the Joint Committee on European Negotiations, by which a measure of regulatory consistency to enable a functioning internal market within the United Kingdom may be mutually agreed between the United Kingdom and the devolved governments.”

1D: Clause 25, page 19, line 13, at end insert—
“( ) Section 22(2) does not apply if the provision has been agreed through the common frameworks process and it states that its purpose is to give effect to that agreement.””

[Lord Hope of Craighead (CB) [V]]

My Lords, I shall speak to Amendments 1B, 1C and 1D in lieu, which are in my name. The fact that the Commons have disagreed with your Lordships’ amendments about the common frameworks process is a matter for regret, but they were good enough to give us a clear and simple reason. They told us that these amendments

“will create legal uncertainty, which would be disruptive to business.”

I took this to be a reference to what the noble Lord, Lord True, said when we were considering these amendments on Report:

“No one could know for sure, until the question was determined in court, whether a regulation or requirement, or a combination of regulations or requirements, was giving effect to an agreement reached within a common framework. There would be uncertainty as to whether or not the market access principles applied”.—[Official Report, 18/11/20; col. 1466.]


I can well understand the point that he and the other House are making, but I do not believe that it is incapable of being met, so I have added some words of my own to each of my proposed amendments to suggest how this could be done.

To be given the benefit of exemption from the market access principles, the regulation or exemption would need to state that it was their purpose to give effect to an agreement that had been reached through the common frameworks process. It seems to me that, if this were to be stated in the relevant instrument, the problem that the noble Lord referred to on Report would be overcome: everyone would know what it was and why it was there. No doubt there are other and better ways of achieving this, but my point is that, if there really is a will on the Government’s part to make this system work, a solution can be found. There is surely room for further discussion on this issue; the door must be kept open—and I am encouraged by some of the points that the noble Lord, Lord True, made in opening this debate. I ask your Lordships to invite the Commons to think again, and I will be seeking the opinion of the House as to whether we should do so.

Of course, I appreciate that it is not as simple as that; there are important issues of principle too. The Parliamentary Under-Secretary, Paul Scully, said in the other place that to legislate the common frameworks into the Bill would,

“not sit well with the flexible and voluntary nature of the common frameworks programme.”—[Official Report, Commons, 7/12/20; col. 601.]

I appreciate, as has been stressed many times in your Lordships’ House, that the whole purpose of the market access principles is to enable traders to do business without internal barriers to trade across the UK. It is about

“a job, someone’s pay packet at the end of the week”,

as the Minister, Chloe Smith, said in evidence to the Common Frameworks Scrutiny Committee last week. But it all depends on how this is done.

It has to be said, too, that the issues about market access and the problems it may create are not all one way. Spare a thought for the trader in one of the devolved nations who has to have regard to the relevant requirements of all the other parts of the UK when considering whether a good which does not meet his own area’s requirements is something that he can properly market in his own area. It is not sunshine and roses for everyone.

Simply to say that the market access principles do not apply to an agreed decision, which is all that my amendments seek to do, does not seem to me to justify the concern that this would deprive the common frameworks process of its flexible and voluntary nature. Whether a given policy divergence really does create what amounts to a barrier, given its purpose, nature and effect, should be a matter for examination and assessment: that is what the common frameworks process is designed for. It is not about creating barriers, but about allowing for policy divergence in ways that are found, by agreement, to be consistent with the internal market.

--- Later in debate ---

But the certainty provided by this Bill, which has been sent to us by the other place, is what businesses and citizens across the United Kingdom need. I hope your Lordships’ House will come to agree that this is something we must provide.

[Lord Hope of Craighead (CB) [V]]

My Lords, I am grateful to all noble Lords who have contributed to this debate. I must say that I entirely agree with the noble Lord, Lord True, that we need to create and indeed preserve a coherent internal market. I do not think anything I said in my presentation, or anything in the aims I am seeking to achieve through my amendments, is in any way in conflict with that overriding aim. It is all a matter of finding a solution that is consistent with that and with the devolution system to which the noble Baroness, Lady Hayter, spoke so movingly this afternoon.

I think the noble Lord, Lord True, will agree that the noble Lord, Lord Adonis, did raise an interesting point about subsections (2) of my Amendments 1B and 1C. All I can say to the noble Lord is that I would rather not go into the details at this stage in the debate. It is, among all the things I have raised in my amendments, a subject for further consideration and discussion—if, as I hope, discussions will continue. It was with that aim that my amendment was framed for debate this afternoon.

I think we all know what the issues are; they have been thoroughly debated several times. It is time for a decision. With reference to Amendments 1B, 1C and 1D, I wish to test the opinion of the House.