Retained EU Law (Revocation and Reform) Bill (First sitting)

Stella Creasy Excerpts

Committee stage
Tuesday 8th November 2022 Public Bill Committees

[The Chair]

There is time for one quick question, if anyone is bursting to ask one. Ah! I call Stella Creasy.

[Stella Creasy (Walthamstow) (Lab/Co-op)]

Q Thank you, Chair. I apologise; I am afraid a very grumpy toddler would not let me come in. On the subject of grumpy toddlers, our witness has just suggested that the Bill will allow for scrutiny of laws in “a parliamentary forum”. Can he explain how statutory instruments introduced by Ministers allow for appropriate parliamentary scrutiny? Is that not giving a lot of power to Ministers, rather than Parliament taking back control ?

[The Chair]

You have 30 seconds, Sir Stephen.

Sir Stephen Laws: It is possible to underestimate the influence Parliament has, even if the procedures are relatively formal. In the last six years, we have seen that Governments who try to do things that do not have the approval of Parliament get themselves into a lot of trouble. By now, they have probably learned the lesson—indeed, I think they have always known the lesson— that Governments do not propose things to Parliament that they know Parliament will not, in the end, want to agree to.

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[Peter Grant]

Thank you.

[Stella Creasy]

Q We have talked a little bit about the content, but could we talk a little about the process? You have just highlighted that there are actually another 1,400 pieces of legislation affected. The process then gives ministerial—not parliamentary—control about what happens next. Could you give us your reflections on that process and the scrutiny of it, and some of the practicalities? For example, which Ministers will retain responsibility for which pieces of legislation?

It would be quite helpful to know, with the extra 1,400, who has drawn the short straw? Are they all in one particular Department or across the Departments? A previous witness claimed that there would be adequate parliamentary scrutiny, and if Parliament did not like what Ministers were doing, it would intervene. What would this process mean for our ability to influence the content produced as a result of the Bill?

Professor Barnard: On the first point, as you rightly point out, there are provisions in the Bill to allow Ministers, by regulations, to keep retained EU law, which will eventually be called assimilated law, but what is not at all clear is the process by which the Minister decides to engage in that process. Remember, if the Minister decides to sit on his or her hands, the default kicks in, which is that those all those provisions will go. In reality, we understand that Government Departments have a reasonable idea of the law in their area, and civil servants will need to go through that law statutory instrument by statutory instrument.

There is a real issue about capacity in Government Departments. Jacob Rees-Mogg himself said that his own Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy had identified that it needed 400 civil servants to be working on the 300 or so pieces of legislation that had then been identified. Presumably, now they have discovered an extra 1,400 that number will increase. It is a huge amount of civil service time. The issue is even more acute in the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, which is the Department most affected by retained EU law. The question is, what is the internal process? Even if the Secretary of State in DEFRA decides that he or she wants to retain all the legislation because it is so important in different forms, what happens? Does it go to the Cabinet? Is there some sort of star chamber that looks at what is being proposed by the Departments? We know none of that, and we know none of the detail about whether there will be any consultation with external stakeholders, which is particularly important in the field of agriculture, where a large number of stakeholders are affected.

[Stella Creasy]

Professor Young, do you want to add anything?

Professor Young: We also have to think about how ministerial Departments will liaise with each other, because those different Departments might be looking at the same statutory instrument that might regulate bits that fall within the ambit of their respective Departments. Something will also be required in Government to keep track of that and to work out what the process should be.

With regard to parliamentary scrutiny, under the Bill the default position would be the negative resolution procedure. Obviously, there are some exceptions, for example, if a measure is used to modify primary legislation, to create a power to enact subordinate legislation or to create a criminal offence in certain circumstances. There is an ability to bump that up to the affirmative resolution procedure, but it will be very difficult for Parliament necessarily to keep track of all this, because so much is coming through. As I am sure you are all aware, it is very difficult for either of the Houses to actually pass a resolution to say that they disagree with a particular provision. Because of the demands on parliamentary time, it will be even more difficult when you have so many provisions coming through. Although there is a process for parliamentary oversight, it will be difficult in the timeframe to ensure that that oversight can be exercised in a manner that enables Parliament properly to scrutinise the measures as they come through.

[Stella Creasy]

Q We know that the last time the Commons overturned a negative statutory instrument was in 1979, and that the Lords has not done so since 2000.

Professor Young: Exactly.

[Stella Creasy]

In your opinion, then, the ability of parliamentarians, as opposed to Ministers, to influence what laws come next, if they are enacted at all, is limited. Can you suggest, or are there examples from your experience, how parliamentary scrutiny could be strengthened in this Bill?

Professor Young: Obviously we have elements that we saw under the European Union (Withdrawal) Act 2018, which allowed for aspects of enhanced scrutiny in certain circumstances as well as the ability to exercise the affirmative resolution procedures. There can be procedures that you can use whereby you put forward drafts of delegated legislation and allow parliamentarians to scrutinise them. Obviously it is difficult to set that up and to have the time to do so.

I think we need to think about two issues. First, we need to think about what is the appropriate procedure that enables parliamentarians to have adequate scrutiny and we also need to think about how we ensure that parliamentarians have sufficient time to perform that scrutiny. That is why you accurately quoted the information relating to the last time that either the House of Commons or the House of Lords voted against a particular resolution. Perhaps that shows the very great difficulty of actually achieving the time to get that on the parliamentary agenda.

[Stella Creasy]

Q To clarify that point, obviously all of that requires a Minister to bring forward a proposal for any parliamentary scrutiny.

Professor Young: Yes.

[Stella Creasy]

Q So in your reading of the legislation, to confirm our reading of it, if a Minister chooses not to bring forward a replacement to a piece of legislation, there is no parliamentary scrutiny of that decision in and of itself at all?

Professor Young: That’s it; absolutely. The only way perhaps to get around that would be to ensure that different departmental Select Committees could go away and look at the area of their law, and perhaps write reports to propose that there should be changes or provisions should be retained or revoked. Obviously, that would only be a report and not necessarily something that a Minister would have to follow in any way, shape or form.

Professor Barnard: If I may just put a footnote to your questions, of course if Parliament did decide to vote by resolution against a statutory instrument, that risks running out of time. Therefore the default kicks in and the sunset kicks in, so you lose a measure all together.

[The Chair]

Thank you. I call Alex Sobel.

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[The Chair]

Thank you. Colleagues, any further questions? Stella Creasy.

[Stella Creasy]

Q I just want to follow up on that. Clause 15(5) specifies that no replacement legislation can increase the burden on businesses. That looks very much like it is locking in lower standards as one can only secure either parity or something reduced. Is that a correct interpretation or could burden be rewritten to allow us to have the higher standards that we were promised if we left the European Union because we could set our own standards? Professor Young, you looked like the one who was nodding most vociferously.

Professor Young: The problem with that particular provision is that it is that element of not reducing burdens, which includes elements of administrative inconvenience, as well as obstacles to trade or innovations or obstacles to efficiency, productivity or profitability. The difficulty is what would or would not be increasing burdens in these circumstances. On the one hand, you are right; this is incentivising a reduction in these burdens and the potential follow-on we would see is a reduction in standards, particularly because it is looking at obstacles to trade or obstacles to efficiency, productivity and profitability. Another way of potentially reading it is to say that if I take a number of earlier burdens, turn them into one burden with a higher standard, that is also not increasing the burden. The difficulty is that the clause could be quite ambiguous, which could, in some senses, perhaps alleviate some of the risk that that might incentivise towards removing burdens. However, that is going to leave these particular measures open to potential legal challenges because people will argue “This has increased my burden in these circumstances.” That, in turn, could add to legal uncertainty.

[Stella Creasy]

Q That is where the lawyers make their millions. In your interpretation of burdens, the TCA talks about us not using changes in our regulatory processes to undercut each other. So is there a risk in that interpretation that we may affect the TCA itself? How do you feel that this legislation interacts with those other forms of legislation?

Professor Barnard: Yes, you are absolutely right. That is one of the reasons we proposed carving out, for example, environmental law and employment law, because those are the two areas that are subject to the so-called level playing field provisions in the trade and co-operation agreement. We are free to lower our standards—that is our choice—but if we do and, depending on the provision, that materially affects trade between the UK and the EU, the EU can start the dispute mechanism in the TCA. In respect of the so-called rebalancing dimension in the level playing field, the retaliation is brutal, quick and immediate.

[The Chair]

Final question to Justin Madders.

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[Peter Grant]

Q Does that not mean there is significantly less opportunity for parliamentary scrutiny if all that Parliament is allowed is: we do this or we do not do it? Does that not mean that, almost by definition, there is less opportunity for parliamentary scrutiny with secondary legislation than there would be with a Bill?

Martin Howe: Indeed. By its nature, there is much less opportunity than with a Bill, which you go through line by line, but all the legislation that is within the scope of the Bill to be potentially corrected, changed or left out by secondary legislation was introduced by secondary legislation. The primary legislation is not covered by the powers.

Tom Sharpe: Remember what we are discussing. I think it is very unlikely that there will be a wholesale slash and burn—to use the academic term that we heard earlier—of all EU retained legislation or assimilated legislation; a good deal of it will remain. I do not recognise the gloomy picture of businesspeople clawing their way to the bottom. I understand the theory, but in the course of a year I advise dozens of CEOs and chairmen, and not one has said: “We have a terrific opportunity to make extra money out of the consumer.”

What is missing here is public scrutiny and reputation, and we have to be balanced and less shrill about this: not everything will change; not everything will change at once; and some things will be changed—in particular under clause 15(3) where, respectfully, the real issues arise for parliamentary scrutiny. There, as you heard, some will be determined by affirmative resolution and others will go through the sifting procedure, which requires the Minister to come to Parliament to justify the choice of a negative procedure. You will have an opportunity to deal with that.

[Stella Creasy]

Q Martin, I was interested to hear you talk about how you were happy with the scrutiny mechanism in the Bill, because I note that in your evidence to the European Scrutiny Committee you argued for the need to have a delegated power to revise retained law and then suggested a commission to propose what should be done. That would be much more scrutiny than you are talking about now. What made you change your mind about the requirement for scrutiny that you previously advocated? I thought that the argument you made before was compelling.

Martin Howe: The argument I was putting forward was for a practical way to speed up the process. Frankly, it was a suggestion that I floated, a possible—

[Stella Creasy]

Q Are you disappointed that there is no scrutiny mechanism in the legislation, as you floated?

Martin Howe: What I was then proposing was not so much a scrutiny mechanism as a sort of motor to get the process going—

[Stella Creasy]

Q You made quite a strong argument, did you not, that there was a case for being able to look? You were advocating the superfluity of some of this legislation, but now the Bill contains none of that. Are you disappointed?

Martin Howe: No, because the main thing—the important thing—is to get the job done. What I am disappointed about is that I published a paper in July 2016, a month after the referendum, arguing that we should start a systematic process of review of European Union laws. I naively suggested that that would be with a view to revising what we needed to revise by the time of exit two and a half years later—

[Stella Creasy]

Q You felt it was naive to know what we were revising.

Martin Howe: No. I was naive to think that the process of revision would be started. I share Tom’s view that it would have been better had this process been started earlier, but it does need to be done.

[Stella Creasy]

Q You also said that there were limited respects—and gave two examples from your own practice—where you thought it was a good idea to retain EU law over pre-Brexit legislation. Do you accept that there might be other areas of law where it might be a good idea to retain some of those laws? In which case, would that not be helpful to us as parliamentarians? Your colleague dismissed the idea that the Bill will lead to slash and burn, but it has slash-and-burn powers within it. Surely it would be good practice—as you have argued—to know what it is that we are slashing and burning, and to have some process of exploring that as parliamentarians, if we are to be taking back control for this House?

Martin Howe: Well, it is a matter for Parliament as to what you press Ministers on with regards to their plans and intentions.

[Stella Creasy]

Q But we do not have powers to press them; we only have a negative resolution procedure. You made such a compelling case and argued in your previous evidence for several areas of law where you think we should retain. What has changed now?

Martin Howe: To be clear, I was not suggesting that they be retained in the long term. Those areas need revising and converting into coherent UK-based law. Elements of EU law should not be retained into the indefinite future.

[Stella Creasy]

Q You make a case for being able to change your mind yourself and having a process for changing your view on this legislation. Would it not be beneficial for this place to have powers to change the minds of Ministers? Like you, Ministers may make decisions that they come to regret.

Martin Howe: Sorry, I have not changed my mind on the relationship between retained EU treaty law and other EU law. The point is that that should be converted into domestic law, but our domestic legal system can cope with the question of precedence of one law over the other. I have never been in favour of indefinite retention.

[Stella Creasy]

Apologies, but you did propose—

[The Chair]

Stella, you have asked a lot of questions. We are moving on, and we will come back to you if there is time.

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[Stella Creasy]

Q I will just say that we are all free to take advice from competing lawyers, but I do not think we are free in this place to treat our witnesses with contempt, regardless of whether we agree or disagree with what they have written.

All the lawyers have talked this morning about the approach of working with businesses and whether a regulatory burden could be created, which clause 15(5) is designed to avoid. We do not have any business witnesses coming forward, but we have heard that businesses are talking about risk being a drag on growth. Can you give us some examples of where you have worked with businesses with legal uncertainty? You have all talked about uncertainty, but can you explain what it could do to your clients?

[The Chair]

I am afraid we have 40 seconds left.

Mark Fenhalls: In 10 seconds, an organisation such as TheCityUK, which represents a range of financial services, accountancy, law and consultancy firms, will tell you that all its international clients are saying, “We don’t know what the rules are going to be; therefore, we are troubled.” There are business organisations out there from which you may choose to try to take evidence, and they may be useful to the Committee.

Eleonor Duhs: That is exactly what I am hearing too. They want to invest, but you cannot invest if you do not know what the law is going to be.

George Peretz: This is not my area of practice, but colleagues of mine at the Bar have made that point. If you are involved in a large development project—