Draft Invasive Non-native Species (Amendment etc.) (EU Exit) Regulations 2019

Sarah Champion Excerpts

Tuesday 29th January 2019 General Committees

[Sarah Champion (Rotherham) (Lab)]

It is, as ever, a pleasure to serve under your wise chairmanship, Mr Evans.

I listened to the Minister’s speech intently, and I have three specific questions to ask for the record. She talked about the scrutiny committees. Will she clarify whether they will be independent, and what weight they will have when their recommendations come to the Government? Secondly, will the UK have continued access to the EU invasive alien species information system? Thirdly, will the Government continue their commitment to ensure that UK invasive species legislation and public policy aligns with the Bern convention, the convention on biological diversity and the UN sustainable development goals?

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[Dr Coffey]

It is a pleasure to respond to the questions that have been raised. In answer to the hon. Member for Rotherham, the independent bodies are already in place, and they will continue to be in place. On access to notification and intelligence sharing, the system enables critical information to be shared quickly between member states and the Commission. We have developed contingency plans to mitigate the impact of losing access to the system; I will not say at this point that an agreement has been made that we can continue to access it, but I assure her that there is an obligation for Ministers to co-operate with one another. I expect that obligation to be upheld, especially with reference to treaties of which we are full members, such as the Bern convention and the convention on biological diversity.

I remind the Committee that it is not just from the European Union that diseases can enter. As someone who represents a port constituency, I know the level of detail that authorities go into when checking that things like pallets do not have the bugs and beetles that can sometimes invade unduly. A lot of work also goes on, under a risk-based approach, to inspect the importation of trees and so on, for similar reasons. There is no reason for any of that to change, and the advice from the independent bodies will still be there.

The sustainable development goals are not strictly treaties, although they have been agreed worldwide. They tend to be quite broad, but of course the United Kingdom Government have signed up to them, and we will continue to work on the outcomes that we have signed up to.

To reply briefly to the right hon. Member for Exeter, the point of the draft regulations is set out in the European Union (Withdrawal) Act; they are not about the status of EU nationals or other issues to which he referred. He asked whether the regulations are fit for purpose—yes, they are. I have confidence in the legal advice that was given to my noble Friend Lord Gardiner, who is the Minister responsible for this portfolio and who has signed a transparency statement to the effect that the regulations are to make the system operable and no more than that—they do not seek to get into other issues.

The hon. Member for Stroud raised several points about what more we could do on biosecurity policy. The point is that we are active in this space. I think it was last year that the Secretary of State wrote to the Commission to ask it to take greater action against the spread of Xylella fastidiosa. While ash dieback affects one species, at least 50 species would be affected by Xylella fastidiosa, so we were very keen for the Commission to step up its actions. There are a number of ways in which we are already active; that relationship will continue, although I accept that we will not be part of the European Union.

I have not read the article by my former right hon. Friend Ben Gummer, so I am not sure what he was referring to. I appreciate that he may have some doubt about the primary legislation that may be needed, but I have every confidence that the statutory instruments drafted by the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs and by the devolved Administrations will mean that we will be ready for exit day as decreed.

I cannot remember how many SIs we have got through so far; this is my third affirmative SI, but a number of negative SIs have already been through the sifting Committee. There is another way in which the drafting of such statutory instruments is checked: the peers and hon. Members on the Joint Committee on Statutory Instruments, and the lawyers who advise it, scrutinise them to ensure that the drafting procedure is suitable. That Committee noted that the draft regulations have not been referred to the House; it is happy with them as drafted, in legal terms.

[Sarah Champion]

I hear what the Minister says. We do not doubt the skill of those who advise the Department, but a Treasury Minister confirmed to me before Christmas that 800 pieces of secondary legislation would need to be passed by 29 March in the event of no deal. The draft regulations are not particularly contentious, but we have been here for 35 minutes. Does the Minister genuinely believe that we can get through the outstanding pieces of legislation in two months? There are probably 700.

[Dr Coffey]

Within DEFRA, we have taken an approach of bringing several SIs into one, for instance when amending references to EU law and EU obligations so that they refer to retained EU law and retained EU obligations. For example, a statutory instrument that we debated yesterday will change several primary Acts—four, I think—and make three cross-cutting environmental amendments. We are grouping operability changes that commonly require several SIs within one SI. Those instruments often relate to one directive. The draft instrument covers one directive in its own right, which is why we are only discussing invasive species.

I appreciate the hon. Member for Stroud’s concerns about the draft instrument. As I say, it has been through the JCSI. It was laid in the first week of December, and prior to that, DEFRA opened it up to a group of stakeholders to look at, so that they could talk it through with our officials and raise any questions. So far, that has only happened to one other SI, to which he referred: the Conservation of Habitats and Species (Amendment) (EU Exit) Regulations 2019.

Unfortunately, before that draft instrument made its way through the JCSI process, and in response to feedback from the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds, the Secretary of State took the decision to change it. I thought my noble Friend Lord Gardiner answered questions on that rather well. The draft instrument was again laid before Parliament last night and will come back before the House in due course. I do not have a date for its return. That shows how, via stakeholders coming to the Government with suggested changes, we have been able to effectively consider the draft instrument before reaching the Committee.

On the hon. Gentleman’s wider points, I fully understand the biosecurity threats.