European Union Bill

Baroness Falkner of Margravine: The noble Lord, Lord Hannay, does not particularly care for other people putting words into his mouth. I suggest that he apply the same principle to others. I was not at all proposing that those controls are not being suggested. What I was talking about was a disconnect between the British people and their institutions, whether it is in their relationship to the United Kingdom Parliament or the European institutions. The tone of the debate makes it rather difficult to take what the noble Lord says with the seriousness with which it is intended. This is the only amendment to the Bill that I have tabled, and I should therefore be most grateful if I could continue to address the principles behind my amendment. Somewhat in anticipation of what the Minister might say in response to the other two amendments, let me speak to the amendment in my own name and in that of my noble friend Lady Brinton, Amendment 64. Sunset clauses in legislation are increasingly becoming part of the framework of our constitutional arrangements. We have seen them in a spate of Bills over the past decade or so. It was only earlier today that a sunset clause was reprieved and put on a permanent footing in the Debt Relief (Developing Countries) Act 2010. That also happened to the Anti-terrorism, Crime and Security Act 2001. This House voted again and again to insert such a provision into the Prevention of Terrorism Act 2005. A host of other Acts attracted such clauses, including the Finance Act 2001, the Income Tax Act 2007 and the Climate Change and Sustainable Energy Act 2006. The list goes on and on. Why are sunset clauses there? Among the reasons is concern about the unintended consequences of the relevant legislation. There was concern that new structures and processes were being installed without clarity on how exactly they might work in certain circumstances that could not be foreseen when the legislation was passed. In other words, they cannot be foreseen here and now. On that basis, there is no Bill, once enacted, more suitable for post-hoc review and the possibility of repeal than this one. Its aims are clear and I have reiterated our support for them. What is unclear is the effect of the measures on decision-making in the future. Several noble Lords have mentioned the need that might arise when decisions are taken in urgent situations. Others have spoken of the need for flexibility. Yet others have spoken of the level of complexity in EU legislation. All sides of the House share a central concern—that UK interests should not be put at risk due to its adoption of the complicated procedures in place in the Bill. Therefore, a sunset clause, if accompanied by a straightforward sunrise clause, would seem to be ideally suited here. I turn briefly to Amendment 62 in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Kerr of Kinlochard. There is little that one would fault with it, other than the proposal that the Bill should sunset at the end of this Parliament. Several noble Lords have suggested that there is no point in the Bill because the coalition has already declared—not today but at other times during the passage of the Bill—that there will be no further transfers of powers or competences. In other words, we do not need this legislation because there has been a declaratory statement of what the purpose of the Bill will be for the rest of this Parliament. That misses the point that we are intending to legislate for the future. I turn to the issue of whether a Parliament can bind a future Parliament in this manner. I agree with the European Scrutiny Committee in the other place which said that Parliaments by necessity bind the other, as all legislation is directed at the future, rather than the past. I quote from the report: "““Laws passed by one Parliament do not contain a sunset clause at the Dissolution””." All can be repealed by a future Parliament, if it so chooses and if that Executive can muster support. However, I recognise the political difficulties that repeal can attract, hence the simplicity of Amendment 64. First, the fact that the sunset would not take place until three years into the next Parliament would mean that a new Government would have sufficient time to see how the provisions played out in reality. Their Ministers would be able to see for themselves that their negotiating positions were not as inflexible as the Bill might appear to suggest, and that that they did not go to Brussels with one hand tied behind their back. In other words the provisions should actually work in practice. We would have sufficient time to assess whether we needed regular referendums, as the four remaining years of this Parliament plus three in the next would allow for a reasonable time span over which to make a judgment. Finally, my amendment would also allow for an evaluation of how the judicial review provisions work. The process of judicial review can be, as we know, fairly drawn out, and we will have been able to make an assessment of whether the dire predictions of the frequency of judicial review will really bear out. My Amendment 64 would put in place the possibility of evaluating how things will play out. This evaluation period would be sufficiently long to test the workings of the Act. The process would be straightforward: the Act will lapse if the Government think that it is not in the national interest to retain it, but if the Government of the day wish to retain it, again, all that will be needed will be an order resurrecting it—a sunrise. It will not absorb political capital or indeed take up precious legislative time. This clause is intended to be a pragmatic, evidence-based solution to ameliorate uncertainty. While I may be probing today as to the Minister’s objections, I suggest that in future years he may look back at this amendment, if accepted at Report, with some relief if he is caught in an unwelcome bind that was not evident on a glorious, sunny day in May.