Draft Human Fertilisation and Embryology (Amendment) (EU Exit) Regulations 2019 Draft Quality and Safety of Organs Intended for Transplantation (Amendment) (EU Exit) Regulations 2019 Draft Human Tissue (Quality and Safety for Human Application) (Amendment) (EU Exit) Regulations 2019

Maria Eagle Excerpts

Wednesday 19th December 2018 General Committees

[Maria Eagle (Garston and Halewood) (Lab)]

May I say what a pleasure it is to be here this morning serving under your chairmanship, Mr Stringer? I concur with the questions and remarks of my hon. Friend the Member for Washington and Sunderland West, and with the question from the hon. Member for Linlithgow and East Falkirk.

I have one or two questions for the Minister about some of what I have seen in the draft regulations and the explanatory memorandum. She rightly says that only a small number of organs are shared between EU and non-EU countries, with fewer than 30 organs imported or exported on average. However, the draft regulations will come into force in a no-deal scenario, in which there will be no transition period and all the borders will go up. Only a small number of organs might come and go, but they are vital; many are a matter of life and death for the individual who will receive them. What arrangements has her Department made to make sure that those organs can get through?

The Government’s own preparedness documents suggest that there are going to be queues at borders. It is very easy to see how this kind of time-critical matter could get caught up in bureaucracy at borders. I know that the regulations are just about making arrangements, but I did not find anything in the Minister’s remarks or the explanatory memorandum to say what contingency arrangements the Government were making to ensure that the organs get through. That time-critical matter is often one of life and death. I would be grateful if the Minister said something about that.

There is no impact assessment because the Government have taken the view that the financial impact is lower than the £5 million threshold for which such documents are prepared. It would be helpful to have some idea of the extra cost that the arrangements provided for by these instruments would impose on the authorities that take on the job currently done by the Commission. Do the Government intend to reimburse them the extra money that that will cost? A six-month period is provided in the instruments for the new administrative arrangements, if necessary, to be made, but there is no reference—and the Minister did not make one—to whether the Government intend to reimburse those authorities for the extra work.

A small number of organisations import and export human tissue and organs, but I do not know how many there are. Can the Minister tell us and have the Government been talking in detail with them about precisely what they will need to do? There is the six-month period, but what precisely will those organisations have to do? I would be grateful for a little more detail from the Minister before we take a view on these instruments.