Retained EU Law (Revocation and Reform) Bill

Richard Graham Excerpts

2nd reading
Tuesday 25th October 2022 Commons Chamber

[Mr Jacob Rees-Mogg (North East Somerset) (Con)]

May I say what a pleasure it is that normal service can be resumed, and that I am now able to speak slightly more freely than I may have done when I sat in a different place? I congratulate my hon. Friend the Minister on his particularly brilliant speech. I think it was particularly brilliant because I was involved in writing it; I may therefore be a rather prejudiced audience, but I thought it was delivered with panache and verve. He took so many interventions and put the case brilliantly.

I know that it is not orderly to mention people in the Galleries, but I do not know whether the officials’ Box counts for that purpose. Nevertheless, I would like to thank the officials who have been involved with the Bill. They have done a terrific amount of work to get it ready in a short time. I confess to the House that when I was Leader of the House, I thought that getting the Bill ready for Second Reading by this date would not be possible, but the work that has been done is absolutely terrific. Let me reassure those who may think that I have sometimes criticised the civil service that in this instance it is worthy of paeans of praise.

The Bill is of fundamental constitutional importance because it removes the supremacy of EU law. We have heard arguments about certainty. Certainty, certainty—everyone always wants certainty. In an uncertain world, I am not sure that certainty is ever possible, but in a legal context the Bill provides more certainty than the alternative, which would be to retain two different legal systems in these islands of ours that would apply in different circumstances. I know that we have Scottish law, English and Welsh law and Northern Ireland law, but we would have a separate law applying differently in each of those three jurisdictions. We are now removing that, so the law made and voted for by people in this country will be the supreme law. That is surely right.

The issue of supremacy is of constitutional importance. Anybody who opposes the removal of the supremacy of EU law is fighting the Brexit battle over again, saying, “We didn’t really leave after all. We’d like to pretend we’re still there. Isn’t it nice to allow this alien law to continue to tell us what we ought to do?” No, it would not be nice to do that. Let us clarify the law. Let us get as close to certainty as humanly possible, so that we have a sensible, intelligent and well-formulated statute book.

[Richard Graham (Gloucester) (Con)]

For some of us, the point is not the constitutional argument about which laws should be sovereign, which we may well happily accept, but the practical issue of how we convert literally hundreds of laws, for DEFRA and so on, within the timescale imagined. Does my right hon. Friend understand the severe doubts that many people have about the practicality of what is on offer?

[Mr Rees-Mogg]

I am afraid that my hon. Friend has never liked the decision to leave the European Union, and everything he says must be taken in that context. Otherwise, he would not have intervened—

[Richard Graham]

rose—

[Mr Rees-Mogg]

I am not giving way again. Otherwise, my hon. Friend would not have intervened at this stage, because I was setting out the issue of supremacy before coming to the crucial point about why the Bill is now necessary and how it works in practice.

[Mr Rees-Mogg]

I give way to my right hon. Friend.

[Richard Graham]

On a point of order, Madam Deputy Speaker. [Interruption.]

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Dame Eleanor Laing)]

Order. This is a point of order. It would have been simpler had the hon. Gentleman been facing the Chair in the first place, because while he was addressing the right hon. Member for North East Somerset (Mr Rees-Mogg) I could not see him, and it was therefore difficult for me to hear what he was saying. When I ask Members to face the Chair, it is not out of some kind of vanity; it is because if everyone faces in this direction, everyone can be heard.

[Richard Graham]

This is a very simple point of order, Madam Deputy Speaker. My right hon. Friend the Member for North East Somerset (Mr Rees-Mogg) just said that I have never accepted the decision of this country to leave the European Union. That is a quite extraordinary and entirely untrue observation, and I would ask him to withdraw it.

[Madam Deputy Speaker]

I appreciate the sensitivities. The hon. Gentleman knows that the content of the right hon. Gentleman’s speech is not a matter for the Chair, and not one on which I will comment, but he has made his point.

Retained EU Law (Revocation and Reform) Bill

Richard Graham Excerpts

Report stage
Wednesday 18th January 2023 Commons Chamber

[Justin Madders]

My hon. Friend articulates well why her constituents and indeed many people across all sectors of society are concerned about the impact of the Bill. It is not about Parliament taking back control. The Delegated Powers and Regulatory Reform Committee has said that the

“abuse of delegated powers is in effect an abuse of Parliament and an abuse of democracy”.

As the former Secretary of State, the right hon. Member for North East Somerset (Mr Rees-Mogg) is here, I will quote his response, when he was Leader of the House, to the Committee’s report on the frequent use of skeleton Bills. He said that it did not necessarily provide

“a model example of how Parliament would like to see legislation brought forward.”,

and that he would be encouraging Secretaries of State

“to minimise the use of delegated powers where possible.”

For once, I agree with him; I am sorry he does not agree with himself any more.

[Richard Graham (Gloucester) (Con)]

The shadow Minister has implied that the whole country is very concerned about what is going to happen to the current bulk of EU retained law, but he would have heard the Minister saying that all those laws that come under DEFRA—as he knows, that is probably three quarters of the total EU retained law—will be either retained or improved. Now that the Environment Act 2021 brings them under the remit of the Office for Environmental Protection, the watchdog that is there to make sure that they are enhanced, surely he will accept that that gives huge numbers of people and organisations, particularly in the environmental sector, a lot of reassurance.

[Justin Madders]

I think we would be reassured if that was what the Bill did, but the Bill does not give Ministers the power to improve the situation: specifically, as we have heard, it prevents burdens from being increased so—