Meeting of the Parliament (Hybrid) 22 December 2020
I would not want Mr Lockhart’s remarks to imply that the bill does not have wide support among stakeholders. It does. Any bill will have criticisms of small parts of it; those are things that a Government should listen to, and many of those have been addressed in the process that has been referred to and that we have gone through. However, the bill has very widespread support, and indeed the only support that it does not have is from the Conservative Party and one independent member, who is sitting in the gallery. The bill has the support of the Parliament, as I hope we will prove later today.
It has support because it relates to the issue of the high European standards that we have and how we manage to continue to observe those. I would be very happy if we were in there making rules, and in the ideal situation, we will be in there making rules. However, when we are being dragged out of Europe against our will, which the chamber has—[Interruption.]—A member says “Yawn, yawn.” The reality of the situation is that we are being dragged out against our will. There are no ifs or buts. If anybody today thinks that that is a good idea, they should go and look at the queues of lorries in Kent.
I would have thought that even the most hardened Conservative might blush a little at the chaos that is already taking place.
16:00The bill, proportionately and carefully, with the agreement of the Parliament—[Interruption.] All the Conservatives can do is scream and shout, because they certainly cannot deliver a functioning country. We clearly do not have that at the moment. [Interruption.] No, I will not give way—we hear too much from Brexiteers. They have created chaos and I am not prepared to listen to them for a moment longer.
Let us now focus on what the amendments in group 2 do. Extraordinarily, the Tories are even going to vote against those amendments. That is astonishing. They are going to vote against amendment 7, which was agreed among the parties to improve the bill in the light of concerns about scrutiny.
Amendment 7 allows ministers to take account of new circumstances and to propose what is in the best interests of the people of Scotland, but it gives the Parliament, quite clearly, a whip hand in making sure that that is done properly and proportionately.
Amendment 7 provides a clear steer on the use of the power—ministers “must have due regard” to the purpose stated in the amendment. It will be open to ministers to use the power in other ways to benefit Scotland, just as it will be open to ministers to use powers other than in section 1(1) to contribute to the purpose.