The hon. Member for Wells (James Heappey) mentioned consensus, and the Prime Minister said in the summer that she sought a greater degree of consensus about Brexit. I gently say to the Government that it would have been helpful if we had seen more signs of that in our debate and consideration so far. It does not help, as we heard yesterday, when a new amendment is tabled and Members who attempt to vote against it are told:
“We will not tolerate attempts from any quarter to use the process of amendments to this Bill…to try to block the democratic wishes of the British people”.
That does not help to create consensus. The front page of The Daily Telegraph does not help to create consensus. After all, MPs are simply seeking to do their job in scrutinising the legislation, and we would not be doing our job if we did not.
I want briefly to refer to new clause 67, the precautionary principle and article 191 of the treaty. The Minister argued that the precautionary principle is carried forward in some of the EU legislation that we are bringing across. That is correct, but it is not a sufficient answer to the argument that article 191 should be included in the illustrative list that is contained in the explanatory notes. If the Government think, and they do, that article 120 of the treaty—it begins:
“Member States shall conduct their economic policies with a view to contributing to the achievement of the objectives of the Union”—
contains directly effective rights that would be converted into domestic law as a result of clause 4, why on earth is article 191 missing from the illustrative list?
9.45 pm
I take the point that the Minister made when he argued that he does not want inadvertently to give the impression that it is a definitive list, so I am not trying to impinge on his desire to keep the list illustrative. To remind hon. Members, the principles are the precautionary principle, preventive action, rectification of damage and the polluter pays, on which I suspect there is consensus in the Committee. If those principles are important and the Government are prepared to put all the other items into the illustrative list, why have they deliberately decided not to include article 191?
This problem can be remedied very simply: either Ministers can indicate that they will now add article 191 to the illustrative list, or we can vote for new clause 67 when we get a chance in a few minutes’ time.