European Communities (Employment in the Civil Service) Order 2007

My Lords, I thank the Minister for explaining the order so thoroughly—and at such speed. We support in principle what is being done here. One of the main provisos is that we need to be satisfied that there are adequate safeguards of the important national interests of security, trade and diplomacy. I will return to those in a moment. I note from Monday’s debate in another place that the Minister there failed to answer any of the questions posed by my honourable friend the Member for North-West Norfolk, I think because the latter had said at the outset that he was unlikely to be able to stay for very long because he needed to be elsewhere, and the Minister’s civil servants had perhaps assumed that they could therefore subsequently produce answers for him in writing. To refresh the Minister’s memory, the questions concerned the following issues. First, the number of Irish nationals prevented, as the Minister said, from joining our Civil Service since 1996, about which the noble Lord, Lord Trimble asked a related question recently in your Lordships’ House. Secondly the number of Turkish nationals affected by the Ankara agreement. Thirdly, the extent of the problem referred to in the Explanatory Memorandum of the recruitment of staff to reserved posts, causing difficulty for the efficient running of the Civil Service. Fourthly, the consultations that had taken place with the Civil Service unions. Finally, the stated proportion of the 5 per cent of posts reserved for UK nationals that was to be in particularly sensitive areas. I would be grateful to the Minister for answers on those points, since he has now had a couple of days’ notice of them. I am sure noble Lords would agree that we have to be sure that our nationals are representing us on key issues. Will the Minister outline the safeguards that will be put in place to ensure that foreign nationals, employed in the Civil Service quite properly within the spirit and letter of the order, will not be able to get into a position such that they come into possession of information which, if disclosed without authority or otherwise misused, might damage the interests of national security? Expanding upon the question of my honourable friend in the other place, to which I referred earlier, will the Minister list the particular roles that will remain reserved, or, alternatively, explain who will determine whether a post is reserved or not? The Explanatory Notes say that consultation on the order within the Civil Service showed that there were ““no significant objections””. That rather implies that there were objections, but that the drafter considered them to have been insignificant. What objections to the order were made during the consultation within the Civil Service? How many foreign nationals, if any, will be employed by the Immigration and Nationality Directorate? If there are to be any, what will their roles be? Can the Minister confirm that no foreign national working in the Civil Service has, within the past 10 years, been disciplined for allegedly acting in a way that would risk harming the interests of the UK or its citizens? Finally, and importantly, what reciprocal arrangements do the Government propose should be made to ensure that UK citizens are similarly enabled to work in the civil services of other EU states?