United Kingdom Internal Market Bill — House of Lords, 2020-10-28
Topic: Domestic Commerce
Olivia Bloomfield (Conservative, Centre-right): My Lords, I understand that the purpose of this amendment from my noble friend Lady McIntosh is to probe the meaning of "actual or hypothetical goods" in the Bill, which has foxed a number of other noble Lords. I am very happy to provide further information on that. The inclusion of actual and hypothetical goods in this clause is critical, as it means the provisions work effectively in scenarios that could arise where there are no actual local goods against which impacts on incoming goods can be compared If a company has a product which is subject to a patent, it can therefore be made by only one company in the UK. If an authority were to regulate against that product because of where it is produced, there could not possibly be a local good to compare it against to determine relative disadvantage. Being able to compare it to a hypothetical good addresses this and allows the rules against direct discrimination to operate properly and protect all businesses across the UK Let us take as an example a new technology which takes an innovative approach to food processing, cutting production times by half. The technology may be completely unique, novel and unlike other technologies for food processing on the market. Without being able to compare this against a hypothetical good, it would be very challenging to deem whether any new measures taken by Administrations were discriminatory or not. Equally, as a further example, if a Scottish company patented a technological breakthrough in quantum computing, this same technology would not be present on the English market and we would therefore need a hypothetical good to be able to compare this innovation to in order to determine whether new English regulations discriminated against this Scottish technology and otherwise created an unfair disadvantage The existing wording is also important to deal with situations where arguments could be posited that a local good is similar to, but not the same as, an incoming good, and therefore would not be a good comparator in determining whether discrimination exists. Being able to compare a hypothetical good that is the same as the incoming good, save for location, enables that determination to take place I was also asked who determines what a hypothetical good actually is. Ultimately, it would be the courts, but a business would bring forward the challenge and claim discrimination I turn to the stand part debate on Clause 7, which sets out the test for direct discrimination. Direct discrimination is where a requirement applies explicitly differently to local goods and goods from elsewhere in the UK and that difference results in disadvantage for the goods from elsewhere. This means, for example, that a Scottish regulator cannot impose additional licensing requirements for Welsh goods unless it does the same for Scottish goods. As another example, take a scenario where Scotland regulated that only Scottish whisky could be sold in pubs; this would be directly discriminatory against the very fine Penderyn whisky produced in Wales, as they would have a clear disadvantage against similar goods on the Scottish market—I see that meets with approval "Disadvantage" simply means that it is more difficult or less attractive for those incoming goods to be bought or sold. In this example, any additional licensing requirements on Welsh goods may impose additional costs and potentially increase the price of the Welsh good, meaning it would be less attractive to buy. To be clear, the goods that we are comparing here are the local equivalents of the incoming goods that are materially the same, or materially share the same characteristics, but do not have the same connection to the originating part of the UK. For example, a potato produced in Wales is compared with a potato produced in Scotland. This clause will ensure that directly discriminatory barriers cannot be created by rules that aim at the way in which a good is sold to circumvent the effect of mutual recognition. For example, if English butchers were banned from selling Welsh lamb, this would be directly discriminatory It is worth noting that Schedule 1 to the Bill allows for direct discrimination where a requirement discriminates in a reasonable way, as a response to a public health emergency, ensuring that the rules leave scope to react to such situations. I ask my noble friend to withdraw her amendment.