Retained EU Law (Revocation and Reform) Bill

Debate between Simon Hoare and Bim Afolami

Consideration of Lords amendments
Wednesday 24th May 2023 Commons Chamber

[Bim Afolami]

The hon. Gentleman is entirely right. It is a good example of our parliamentary democracy working well that there has been dialogue, both open and private, between Members of this House and the Government to get to a right point on amendments; to say that we will support the Government in broad terms, but that there is a need and a desire for more reporting and explicit signalling of where the Government are going. We must ensure that Whitehall as a whole continues with this agenda and does not feel that it has got the Bill done and will just leave it all for years to come. I understand exactly what he says.

Let me remark on the Lords amendments. I would say that I am impatient. I do not know if that is common to all politicians, but I am a very impatient person.

[Simon Hoare]

You are.

[Bim Afolami]

I thank my hon. Friend for confirming that to the House. I have talked a lot in the last few months about strengthening and improving our regulatory system, and getting more scrutiny for our regulators when they take decisions, and more ability for the House to scrutinise the decisions taken in our name. I am impatient that we are not doing more of that, faster. But I also recognise that we need to do that in a way that looks not just at the EU law—my hon. Friend the Member for Stone (Sir William Cash) talked earlier about the danger of having one set of EU regulations and the rest of law in another set. It is so important that, as we deal with European-derived law, we incorporate it into our full body of law in a strategically sensible way that improves our regulatory system—not just a cut and paste job, as may have happened.

I fear that a lot of the Lords amendments are about finding ways to delay the process that the Government have rightly strategically and politically committed to. My hon. Friend the Member for Orpington (Gareth Bacon) made that point very well and I will not repeat it.

I would like to talk a little about Lords amendment 15, which relates to various environmental issues. I have many problems with it—first, the notion that it is always clear whether one is reducing or increasing what the amendment claims to be the “level of environmental protection” or level of “protection of consumers”. That is very hard to do. It deliberately adds a huge amount of delay and bureaucracy to the entire process and it elevates the Office of Environmental Protection, which, if I remember rightly—I am sure that someone will correct me if not—is meant to be an advisory body, not a body to impose regulations on this House or anywhere else. It is elevating the Office for Environmental Protection to do a job that it was not designed to do. That is a good example of the sort of regulatory creep that we continually see and that I campaign and fight against in this House. The amendment is very dangerous for that reason.

My right hon. Friend the Member for Chelmsford (Vicky Ford) and my hon. Friend the Member for North Dorset spoke accurately and amusingly about the political insanity of weakening things that the public want and that are completely contrary to the broad direction of our policy. Biodiversity net gain, the Environment Act 2021, the Agriculture Act 2020 and the Fisheries Act 2020 are all the things that we have done as a Government over the last few years. It would be insane to go back on all the things that we have done in relation to particular regulations. The Bill is not a clear and present danger to our environment.

Let me finish by saying that I have a feeling, like my right hon. Friend the Member for Chelmsford, that the amendment is not really about what it says on the tin. It is really about trying to create wedge points that can be used to generate emails by 38 Degrees, or to create Facebook ads or clips to somehow suggest that Conservative Members are not in favour of environmental protection. That is dangerous, and the House should not be used in that way. I have seen this practice grow in my time in Parliament, particularly among Labour and the Liberal Democrats. We should not allow the House to be a place where people put down motions to—incorrectly—embarrass Members by suggesting they are not in favour of something they are in favour of. I make that point before I sit down, and I will support the Government in all the Divisions today.

Royal Assent