Northern Ireland Protocol Bill

Stephen Kinnock Excerpts

Committee stage
Wednesday 20th July 2022 Commons Chamber

[Stephen Doughty]

It is a pleasure to serve with you in the Chair today, Dame Eleanor, as we enter the third day of Committee on the Bill. As we do so, it is evident that instead of working to fix the genuine challenges that the protocol poses, the Government continue to push forward with a Bill that disregards the UK’s international legal obligations and threatens to throw Britain’s global reputation into disrepute, and which also—we shall discuss this today—gives them sweeping powers without restriction. Tearing up binding agreements, threatening to break international law and walking away from the table are not the composites of a good negotiating strategy; they are the hallmarks of a zombie Government, out of steam—a Government who have constantly put their own party squabbles and obsessions before the interests of the people of the UK, and indeed the people of Northern Ireland.

Tragically, they also risk dividing the UK and the European Union when we should be standing shoulder to shoulder in opposing Putin’s barbaric war in Ukraine, and in finding ways to make Brexit work in a spirit of trust and co-operation. This is not how a responsible Government should behave, and many Members across the House know that. What we need is cool heads, statesmanlike behaviour and a search for long-term solutions.

On the Opposition Benches, we feel that the Bill is counterproductive, but that solutions are there if the Government are prepared to seek them. That requires compromise, hard work, and flexibility on all sides, including of course the EU, not knee-jerk reactions. I have listened to the very many genuine concerns that have been voiced about the functioning of the protocol. I have the pleasure of being a member of the British-Irish Parliamentary Assembly in addition to my shadow Front Bench role. I have listened to businesses. I have been in Dublin and Belfast. I have listened to people on all sides and have heard genuine concerns, including from those in the Unionist community.

For months, Labour has called on the Government to do the responsible thing—get back around the table to do what we have always done, and what any Government worth its salt would do, which is to negotiate, in the interests of finding workable, practical and technocratic solutions that command the consent and support of all communities in Northern Ireland, and have the means to bring back power sharing in a meaningful and lasting way. In that spirit, we have offered amendments to the Bill today in good faith, to begin to correct the issues that are manifest across this legislation—starting today with the Henry VIII clauses that we have heard about, and which the amendment that we have tabled in this group address.

As the shadow Foreign Secretary, my right hon. Friend the Member for Tottenham (Mr Lammy), set out during Second Reading, 15 of the 26 clauses included in the Bill confer powers directly on UK Ministers. Those include the power to use secondary legislation to amend or modify Acts of Parliament—Acts that have been subject to the full scrutiny of this House. As the Bingham Centre for the Rule of Law sets out, the Henry VIII powers given to Ministers in the Bill

“are numerous, extensive and subject to very low hurdles before those powers may be exercised.”

Indeed, Professor Catherine Barnard of Cambridge University has called these powers “eye wateringly broad”. The Hansard Society, deeply respected on both sides of the House, describes them as “breath-taking”. And we should not just take their word for it. The Chair of the Justice Select Committee, the hon. Member for Bromley and Chislehurst (Sir Robert Neill), last week put it perfectly when he said,

“there are Henry VIII powers and Henry VIII powers; and this is Henry VIII, the six wives, Cardinal Wolsey and Thomas Cromwell all thrown in together.”

He went on to describe the Henry VIII powers as

“almost Shakespearean or Wagnerian in their scope and breadth.”—[Official Report, 13 July 2022; Vol. 718, c. 370.]

Awarding Ministers these enormous powers is not a strategy, and the people of Northern Ireland will see it for what it is—a blatant power grab.

The hon. Member for Bromley and Chislehurst identified one of the key problems with these powers when he explained that the test that Ministers must meet before using these powers is “extraordinarily low”. I agree. As the Bill currently stands, in many cases Ministers may use these powers merely if they consider it “appropriate” to do so. That is simply not good enough. Not only is that a woefully low threshold, but it lacks any kind of objectivity. We cannot have a situation where Ministers can make sweeping changes that are not necessarily in the interests of all communities of Northern Ireland, and without proper scrutiny and process; and those of us on the Opposition Benches are extremely concerned about what Ministers may deem appropriate in the future.

[Stephen Kinnock (Aberavon) (Lab)]

My hon. Friend is making an excellent speech. I have just one point to add. Does he agree that there is a certain irony in the fact that probably large numbers of the 52% who voted for Brexit voted to strengthen, solidify and consolidate parliamentary sovereignty, but these Henry VIII powers are strengthening the hand of Government and weakening the hand of Parliament? Does not that seem to run directly counter to what many people who voted for Brexit were voting for?

[Stephen Doughty]

I completely agree with my hon. Friend. Indeed the Bill not only takes powers away from this place, but takes on powers without the consent of the Northern Ireland Assembly.