I would say to the noble Baroness that our elected counterparts in the other place were able to scrutinise this Bill in detail. The Government were transparent in what they were doing when they brought forward the amendment that passed without a Division. Indeed, it was for Members of that place to raise objection to the way in which the amendments were structured, and I understand that no such objections arose—and at the end of the day, it passed without a Division.
Let me deal with the substantive point raised by the noble Baroness. I was trying to explain that if we accept the principle, as the House appears to, that we need this corrective provision to let us deal with deficiencies on withdrawal, the Government are trying to ensure that there is a flexibility. I made it clear in responding to the noble Baroness, Lady Hayter, that this is about having the powers to do what we need to do, but being conscious that we do not want these powers to enable Governments to do too much. It is equally important that they are empowered to do what they need to do and that the powers do not restrict them so that they are only able to do too little.
Part of the difficulty with the complexity of what confronts the statute book is that there is a degree of unpredictability in the events with which we are dealing. We do not know quite what difficulties may arise. That is why there is a desire to build in the flexibility created by Clause 7(3). I did endeavour, in responding to the point raised by the noble Lord, Lord Beith, to give an example of the kind of things that are not in Clause 7(2) but would actually be covered by subsection (3). There is no further comment I can make to the noble Baroness, other than to repeat my reassurance that the Government are anxious to work with this House in trying to make sure that this clause is responsible, but also workmanlike
and capable of managing the difficult situations that may arise, so that action can be taken to correct deficiencies without harm being caused because the power does not exist to do that.