European Union Bill

My Lords, I have looked at this section and tried to construe and understand it, which was difficult. If I may say so, we are making rather heavy weather of the phrase ““or otherwise support””. There is only one issue that the House ought to consider—is the legislation clear as presently drafted? If it is, then of course a lot of this argument is negated. If it is not clear as drafted, someone—almost certainly the Government—ought to put it right. I am doing my best with this phrase, "““or otherwise support a decision””," but I am finding it difficult to understand what it means. I do not know what ““otherwise support”” means. Does ““otherwise”” refer back to the original approval, or to something less than the approval that you are minded to support? This is an extremely difficult concept to grasp. In short, is it clear? The answer to that is no. Should it be amended? The answer to that is yes. Who should do the amending? It should, on the whole, be the parliamentary draftsman. If ever there was a case in which the Government should say, ““Right; we agree there is something here that we can look at again””, this is one.