European Union (Amendment) Bill

My Lords, I am aware of the case in which the ECJ, somewhat to the surprise of the British Government, applied health and safety rules in order to impose legislation on this country. That is certainly true. However, I am in no way saying that that decision was in any way irrational. It seemed to me to be a perfectly rational decision. It was unexpected by the Government—perhaps they did not receive proper advice from their legal advisers at the time. However, there are, of course, varied circumstances. Anybody who has any practice in front of a court is well aware that decisions will be taken which they believe are wrong. That does not mean there is anything improper about that or anything that can, or should, be guarded against. The ECJ is no more perfect in its decisions than the House of Lords in this country, for instance. But that is an entirely different matter and it does not undermine the idea that member states of the EU should accept decisions whether they like them or not. I return to Amendment No. 28. It is less harmful than Amendment No. 27, but no more useful. The requirement is to lay before Parliament a report setting out the text of ECJ judgments on provisions of the treaty of Lisbon. It does not really deal with the problem that the noble Lord, Lord Kingsland, raised at the beginning of his speech. The reports and decisions of the ECJ would of course be available, without the necessity for a report by the Government, to anyone who wanted to read them. The amendment requires that the report will also contain an assessment of the impact of decisions on the United Kingdom. The United Kingdom is already awash with impact assessments from several different sources. Those who want to believe the Government will do so; those who do not want to believe them will not. The Government may well wish to lay an impact assessment before Parliament, but it is surely a waste of time and money to require that at annual intervals. The amendment ignores the ability of the EU Committee of your Lordships’ House and other Select Committees to carry out their own investigations which may be more highly regarded than something produced by the Government. Further, the amendment ignores one important fact which is that the treaty of Lisbon will, in effect, cease to exist the moment it comes into force because it consists entirely of amendments to existing treaties. The elements of the Lisbon treaty and of earlier treaties will, therefore, be merged. There are some aspects, such as the Charter of Fundamental Rights, which are plainly introduced by the Lisbon treaty. But in many cases, it will be difficult, if not impossible to decide whether an ECJ judgment is a judgment on amendments introduced by the Lisbon treaty, and civil servants will have to waste time considering that. The amendment goes further still and requires judgments of the European Court of Human Rights which affect provisions of the Lisbon treaty—not the treaty as a whole—to be set out in the report alongside the judgments of the ECJ. I cannot imagine what useful purpose could be served by putting that provision in the Bill. I cannot believe that the noble Lords whose names are on this amendment take it particularly seriously. It seems to be one which serves no useful purpose and should not be taken any further.