My Lords, I am grateful to both noble Lords for their comments. As the noble Lord, Lord Grantchester, rightly said, this is possibly the first of many statutory instruments that will come before the House, possibly as negative orders. He will remember that, if I have this right, I wrote to him and to the noble Lord, Lord Teverson—or if I did not, I copied a letter that my right honourable friend Claire Perry sent to colleagues in another place—about these orders back in August of this year. I will double check whether I did. All I know is that she wrote on 14 August; I thought that I had copied that letter but if not, I will make sure that I have.
The reason why I mentioned it is that I have given a commitment to write to noble Lords as other orders come forward. As I made clear in my introductory remarks, these orders merely give certain powers to the Secretary of State to make powers that previously existed with the EU. Obviously, those powers are to make further orders that will come forward. It is, one might say, quite a complicated landscape and—both noble Lords will have heard the discussions on earlier orders—we might have found it easier and speedier if I had written to them in advance. I thought that I had.
7 pm
Further orders will come forward and I will write to noble Lords. Some of the orders will be affirmative and some will be negative. All will go to the appropriate committees, which might suggest that some that we had thought were possibly negative should be treated as affirmative. If that is the case, Her Majesty’s Government will obviously take that on board and deal with them as appropriate as they come before this House. As I said, I will make sure that I write on those.
The noble Lord, Lord Teverson, asked whether this instrument would still be needed in a deal scenario as opposed to a no-deal scenario. These regulations are a deal/no-deal instrument. The powers will be needed in all scenarios. In a deal scenario, they could be used to keep pace with EU amendments to the network code. We need them whatever happens.
Let me deal with some of the other points. First, what effect will EU exit have on the interconnectors? The Government and Ofgem are already working with the interconnectors to ensure that new access rules, which set the terms and conditions for trade, can be approved by Great Britain by 29 March 2019. We understand that the interconnectors are already engaging with EU member state regulators, who will need to approve the access rules to the same timeframe.
Will the single electricity market in the island of Ireland still function after EU exit? Negotiations have already made good progress on legal provision to underpin the single electricity market in the withdrawal agreement. The UK will work with Ireland and the EU in an effort to ensure that the SEM is maintained in any future scenario, including the unlikely event that we do not reach a deal. Given the benefits to consumers and the economy of a more efficient shared market, it is strongly in the interests of all parties to agree to a means to ensure the continuation of the SEM. We have long-standing and ongoing bilateral relations with Irish energy officials.
I accept that these regulations are pretty technical and that further SIs will come forward in due course. The noble Lord, Lord Teverson, invited me to take a more strategic approach and view the whole of the negotiations in the round, but I do not think that this would be the time or the place to do that. We will continue with our negotiations and I am sure that they will have the appropriate outcome in due course. Meanwhile, it is necessary to get these regulations on the book so that we are in a position to make the appropriate changes and to take the appropriate powers at the right time. I commend the regulations to the Committee.