United Kingdom Internal Market Bill — House of Commons, 2020-12-10
Topic: Government Operations
Andrew Egan Henderson Hendry (Scottish National Party, Centre-left): I am not going to take interventions. We are very short on time, so I am going to press on; sorry Lords amendments 8B to 8L, 13A and 56A require the Secretary of State to seek the consent of the devolved Administrations before exercising the powers, setting a time limit for that and a process if consent is withheld. Lord Stevenson said: "The purpose of our amendment is to preserve the potential for managed policy divergence that is central to the devolution settlement." Again, the UK Government just ignore that. Lord Stevenson also noted: "The Government have failed to explain properly why their list of exceptions is so much more restrictive than that of the EU—well, we can probably work that one out". —[Official Report, House of Lords, 9 December 2020; Vol. 808, c. 1268-69.] Let us not forget that this covers a huge range of effects for people in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland: "environmental standards and protection…animal welfare…consumer standards, including digital and artificial intelligence privacy rights…employment rights and protections…health and life of humans, animals or plants…protection of public health…equality entitlements, rights and protections." It has a massive impact on Scottish public society Lords amendments 1B, 1C and 1D seek to protect the role of the common frameworks in the Bill. The Minister thanked Lord Hope, but he was the one who pointed out that "if there really is a will on the Government’s part to make this system work, a solution can be found." He also said: "Traders from other parts of the UK who had no regard for the higher standard could simply ignore it, irrespective of how simple and easy it was to comply with. That is not where we should be going." He concluded: "A balance needs to be struck here, if devolution is to be respected."—[Official Report, House of Lords, 9 December 2020; Vol. 808, c. 1249-50.] Time after time after time, Members of the Lords pointed out the massive disrespect and contempt the Government have for the devolution settlement. Baroness Hayter of Kentish Town warned the Government "to be very careful about clawing back decisions from our now quite long-established devolved settlements."—[Official Report, House of Lords, 9 December 2020; Vol. 808, c. 1256.] The Scottish Government, by the way, remain fully committed to the common frameworks process, as this Minister knows. I cannot use the language I would like to use in this House about what the Minister repeated, but he knows that the Scottish Government have remained 100% committed to the agreement that was set up to take the process through, and he should correct the record This Bill is unwanted and unwarranted and unashamedly undermines devolution. It is an attack on the democratically elected Scottish Parliament and the vast majority of the Scottish public who value it. Since 2014, promises to them have been routinely broken in this place. Their votes and their views have been ignored over Brexit. Now, Scotland will be the only country not to get what it voted for in that referendum. They will in the next one. They know that. The only way to protect their rights and their Parliament is for them to take the next logical step and for Scotland to become an independent nation.