I am quite cross, really. With all respect to the Minister, that is a disrespectful response. Twenty-one months after the referendum, there was not even as much detail in the Minister’s reply as there was in the Prime Minister’s Munich speech. For instance, the Minister said that a new treaty will require respect for legal sovereignty. As I mentioned to him, the Prime Minister said:
“when participating in EU agencies the UK will respect the remit of the European Court of Justice”.
What does that mean? The Minister has enlightened me not a jot on that, nor on the follow-up phrase about,
“our unique status as a third country with our own sovereign legal order”,
which was the only one he talked about.
It is farcical that the Prime Minister can make a speech containing more detail than the Minister is prepared to give in response to an amendment in this House. We are being treated as of no account whatever. The way in which Ministers are responding on this is disrespectful. It is obvious that there are major challenges in getting a UK-EU security treaty. Many commentators are writing about it, with various opinions and insights, but the Government are not among them, at least when it comes to telling us in Parliament. Even though we are the unelected House—I am not aware that they are telling the elected House in any more detail either—it
seems poor that this is what we have become and have been reduced to when we seek knowledge about how Parliament will take back control of our future relationship with the EU post Brexit.
We will have to reflect on another way in which to take this issue forward. I hope the Minister will understand that his reply was not worth the paper it was written on. That said, I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.