European Union (Withdrawal) Bill

My Lords, I had not intended to speak in this debate, which is way above my pay grade, but in answer to the question asked by the noble and learned Lord, Lord Judge—which I invite the Minister to get briefed on—about how this has been allowed to happen and when, I say that it would not have happened in David Renton’s time. He was the Member for Huntingdonshire in the other place and was still active here at 92, taking parliamentary draftsmen apart on a weekly basis, under the Government of whom I had the privilege to be a member. I am sure the noble Lord, Lord Lisvane, recalls this. He was meticulous. He chaired a report in the other place in the late 1970s on the drafting of legislation. It was his life’s work. He could pick apart these issues. No one is doing that these days and it is allowing slipshod work by parliamentary draftspeople to get on to the statute book, and it is about time we did more about it.