Devolved Administrations Debate

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Department: Cabinet Office
Thursday 16th September 2021

(3 years, 1 month ago)

Lords Chamber
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Lord True Portrait Lord True (Con)
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My Lords, again I reiterate the importance of respect. The kind of authoritative statement that my noble friend asks for is not something that I am going to venture in five seconds at the Dispatch Box—but I undertake to write to him on the matter.

Lord Moynihan Portrait Lord Moynihan (Con)
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Does the Minister agree that, in working constructively with the devolved Administrations, Westminster always needs to adopt a collaborative rather than a confrontational approach; that that approach to working constructively should be based not solely on the right to choose but on the right to an informed choice; and that that approach should be placed at the centre of new information-sharing protocols and never protocols built solely on the rhetoric of muscular unionism?

Lord True Portrait Lord True (Con)
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Well, I do agree with that; indeed, it has been implicit and explicit in the answers that I have sought to give your Lordships. I believe profoundly that the peoples of these islands have benefited extraordinarily from centuries of co-operation within our United Kingdom, and I hope and pray that that will continue. That must go with mutual respect—and that goes both ways—between the centre and the devolved Administrations. I think that is the devout wish of the whole of your Lordships’ House.