European Union (Amendment) Bill

I hesitate to intervene. I assure the Committee that I shall intervene very rarely in the Committee and other stages of the Bill, and I hope that I stick by that. The report of your Lordships’ Select Committee seems to be something of a Cinderella in the debate. By consensus, we reached some conclusions which I think the Committee may want to recall. If I may, I shall mention one in particular, and I do so in no partisan spirit—I am neither for nor against the amendment. I am simply recalling what the all-party committee agreed by consensus as a conclusion on the question of the European Parliament being part of the co-decision procedure on compulsory expenditure—in particular, in relation to the common agricultural policy. Therefore, perhaps your Lordships will forgive me if I quote from paragraph 10.39 on page 230 of our report, which I hope will be helpful to the Committee: "““The future policy impact of the move to co-decision is not clear. Much depends on the European Parliament itself, but the weight of the evidence suggests that the agriculture and fisheries committees of the European Parliament will in future represent, and be closely overseen by, a wider range of interests than the narrow producer interests that have historically dominated those committees. For these reasons, we expect that the change is likely to assist rather than impede further reform of both the common agricultural and fisheries policies””." That was a consensus conclusion.