United Kingdom Internal Market Bill

Debate between Robin Walker and Edward Leigh

Monday 21st September 2020 Commons Chamber

[Sir Edward Leigh (Gainsborough) (Con)]

The objection seems to be that we may have to act in this way, but we do not want to break international law. Has my hon. Friend noted my amendment 45, which shows a way through? Under the Vienna convention, which is already mentioned through the conditional interpretative declaration, if another party is acting in bad faith, we can use the declaration to escape from an impossible situation. Will the Minister at least look at that amendment?

[Mr Walker]

I will look at my hon. Friend’s amendment. I will come to amendments shortly—I realise that I need to make some more progress in addressing the many amendments we face. We do not consider necessarily that a unilateral interpretative declaration would be required, although as I said, we will use all the tools at our disposal to resolve the issue within the terms of the protocol before using the powers in the Bill. If that is one that we considered would help, we would not hesitate to use it, but we do not see the need for the amendment in that respect.

For the avoidance of doubt, let me confirm again that we are of course committed to implementing the withdrawal agreement and the Northern Ireland protocol, and have already taken many practical steps to do that. However, as a responsible Government, we cannot allow the gains of the peace process or the economic integrity of the UK’s internal market to be compromised inadvertently by unintended consequences and harmful legal defaults suggested by some interpretations of the protocol.

Finally, clause 50 disapplies certain provisions of the UK Internal Market Bill in the scenario that Northern Ireland’s representatives resolve, under the protocol’s consent mechanism, that articles 5 to 10 of the protocol should cease to apply. This is a practical step to account for and respect the principle of consent enshrined in the protocol. The protocol itself is not codified as a permanent solution for Northern Ireland, and neither should it be in the domestic legislation that implements it. Taken together, these clauses deliver on our commitments to Northern Ireland.

I want to address the amendments as briefly as I can, so I will have to be limited in the number of interventions I will take.