DRAFT ANIMALS AND ANIMAL HEALTH, FEED AND FOOD, PLANTS AND PLANT HEALTH (AMENDMENT) REGULATIONS 2022 DRAFT TRADE IN ANIMALS AND RELATED PRODUCTS (AMENDMENT AND LEGISLATIVE FUNCTIONS) REGULATIONS 2022

Steven Bonnar Excerpts

Monday 5th December 2022 General Committees

[Steven Bonnar (Coatbridge, Chryston and Bellshill) (SNP)]

It is a pleasure to see you in the Chair, Mr Hosie. I thank the Minister for laying out the reasoning behind both SIs. I agree with much of what the hon. Member for Cambridge had to say, so I will keep my contribution short. As we have heard, a legislative consent motion was granted by the Scottish Government, and the measure has been agreed by the Rural Affairs, Islands and Natural Environment Committee sitting at Holyrood.

The EU has higher health and welfare standards than the United Kingdom. We in the SNP encourage the Government not to renege on any of those commitments, but to retain alignment with the EU’s Animal Health Law regulations. This is nothing more than another patch-up job due to Brexit legislation gaps and errors. Six years since the vote and two years into implementation, we are still here implementing these types of SIs to patch legislative errors and gaps as a result of Brexit.

The Retained EU Law (Revocation and Reform) Bill is set to repeal thousands more laws and ensure much more of our valuable parliamentary time is taken up patching up holes, just as we are doing here. Far too much time has been taken up with post-Brexit patches or fixes, because the Tory Government and their “make Brexit work” partners in the Labour party refuse to realise just how silly and futile all of this actually is.