In Committee, we expressed our concerns about the extensive use of secondary legislation to bring in provisions under this Bill due to the Government’s insistence on taking a skeletal Bill through Parliament literally years before the all-important regulations appear.
We also expressed our concern, as did the Delegated Powers and Regulatory Reform Committee, about the Government’s intention, in respect of many regulations, that the affirmative procedure be used only for the first regulations and not for subsequent regulations under the same relevant section of the Bill, which would instead be covered by the negative procedure.
The Government said in Committee that the development of the first sets of regulations would be subject to a stakeholder engagement process over the coming months and that they would then issue a full and wide-ranging consultation on each initial draft statutory instrument prior to their being laid. They also said that if there were any material change to the original instruments, there would be further consultation.
Government Amendment 35 seeks to put some of those undertakings in the Bill. While it does not address the concern about the negative procedure being used for subsequent regulations after the affirmative procedure for the first regulations, it provides a statutory requirement for a public consultation before regulations are made to which Clause 67(6) applies and for a report to be made by the Secretary of State about the consultation when a draft of such regulations is laid before Parliament. To that extent, and it is not a minimal extent, the government amendment represents progress and we welcome it.