Fixed-term Parliaments Bill

We are, in fact, moving into very difficult and choppy waters. With respect to my hon. Friend the Member for North East Somerset (Jacob Rees-Mogg), I do not believe in the so-called constitutional statutes at all. They are an invention in the first instance by Lord Justice Laws. They have a certain spurious credibility, but it does not stack up. My concern is that we will need to use a range of ““notwithstanding”” arrangements in relation not only to the European Union but to the so-called constitutional enactments or Bills when we want to legislate in the House. We will also need to require the judiciary to give effect to the latest Westminster enactment in that field of endeavour and to state expressly what is intended to bypass this attempt to establish a completely new regime of codified legislation. That will simply become very difficult.