European Union Bill

Perhaps the noble Lord will allow me to intervene. I ought to have been more courteous in my portrayal of our partnership in a form that he would prefer to support. The reason that I was impelled in the Scottish direction was in order to underline the importance of the 1972 Act. The noble Lord, Lord Armstrong, is right to argue that we do not need the clause. However, it can do no harm to have the overriding importance of the 1972 Act being manifest, and to remove the ambiguity of the original Clause 18 and move beyond the removal of the offending clause to underline the proposition and lay it further beyond doubt. That is why I am inclined to prefer to move in that direction. However, I do so with apologies to my erstwhile partner.