The measures in the Bill are wholly necessary and greatly welcome. The retention of EU law after our departure from the European Union was certainly necessary in order to maintain temporary legal equilibrium and avoid gaps in the UK’s statute book. However, as time has passed, it has become increasingly anomalous for the United Kingdom to have a large body of foreign-derived legislation that is accorded supremacy over our own domestic law.
After almost half a century of EU membership, the United Kingdom has automatically absorbed a vast amount of EU legislation, which was either directly imposed or created by domestic subordinate legislation. Much of that legislation is probably obsolete. It was telling that around 1,400 items of EU law that everyone had apparently forgotten about were recently discovered in the National Archives. It seems self-evident that those pieces of legislation could not possibly have been of much practical utility if everybody had forgotten about them, but despite the fact that those items of law had been forgotten, they continue to have special status in our domestic legal system. Not only do they have
supremacy over our domestic legislation, but they are interpreted in accordance with the general principles of EU law, rather than those of our own indigenous systems. They are a kind of EU cuckoo in the nest of the common law and Scots law.
It appears there are in total about 3,800 items of retained EU law, and the Government are entirely right to have decided to review them as quickly as possible and remove or assimilate them as appropriate. Furthermore, the Government are right to set out an ambitious timetable for the completion of that exercise through the sunset provisions of clause 1. Amendment 36 would hamper that process. The sunset provisions of clause 1 are of course intended to encourage and incentivise Government Departments to press on quickly with the exercise of identifying and reviewing individual items of retained EU law that affect them. Those Departments will then make a decision as to whether those items of law should be revoked, pursuant to clause 1, or assimilated into the domestic legal system, pursuant to clause 6. That is an entirely sensible process, which will ensure that those items of retained EU law that are not revoked pursuant to clause 1 become subject to the ordinary processes of the domestic legal system. That will be beneficial to businesses and citizens in that the well-understood principles of common law or Scots law, with their nimbleness and certainty, will apply to assimilated law rather than the unpredictable purposive approach of the EU legal system.
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The proponents of amendment 36 suggest that the clause 1 sunset procedures would somehow diminish the role of this House. However, the exercise of reviewing retained EU law, which will precede the automatic revocation through the clause 1 provisions, will be carried out by Ministers who are responsible and answerable to the House; it will not be a clandestine exercise carried out in secret. The Government dashboard contains a catalogue of retained EU law and will be constantly updated. There will therefore always be a visible, readily available snapshot of what law is to be subject to the sunset provisions. Those provisions are absolutely necessary for the proper functioning of the Bill. Without them, the process of regularising the domestic statute book would be significantly impeded. I am sure that is not what the amendment intends.
It is also important to note that the sunset provisions do not affect primary legislation implementing EU directives; they affect only direct EU law, which of course was imposed without any input from the House, and secondary legislation.
In the last few days, many hon. Members will have received campaign emails suggesting that valuable rights acquired under EU law will somehow be jeopardised by the Bill. The suggestion appears to be that they will be swept away under the sunset provisions as a consequence of the lack of intervention by ill-intentioned Ministers. That completely ignores the fact that, as many hon. Members have said, many rights enjoyed in this country, including those relating to employment, equality or the environment, are the product of domestic law, which exceed the provisions of EU law. It also ignores the fact that Ministers are always answerable to the House, and I have no doubt that Mr Speaker would be quick to allow urgent questions if there were real concern that
important rights were to be prejudiced by the application of the sunset provisions. Of course, we have heard the undertakings that my hon. Friend the Minister has given from the Dispatch Box.
In short, clause 1 is an important provision that will restore the integrity of the domestic legal system. The sunset provisions will ensure that that happens swiftly and efficiently. Amendment 36 would significantly impede the process established by the clause and should therefore be rejected.