I should like to develop my argument. The real mischief in this proposed new clause lies in subsection (4). As the noble Lord, Lord Pannick, effectively conceded, without subsection 4 there is a possible reconciliation with his original thesis, since without subsection (4), Parliament would be faced simply with the decision of whether to approve the agreement that the Government had putatively reached with the European Union. As the noble and learned Lord, Lord Hope, and one or two others, have already pointed out, the Government have pledged to put this before Parliament when the time comes.
The Government might, for example, have agreed to pay the Barnier ransom demand which our own European Union Committee has recently confirmed that we are under no legal obligation to pay. In that case, Parliament might have found that unacceptable. However, if, for whatever reason, Parliament refused to approve the agreement that the Government had reached with the EU, that would not prevent Brexit. It would mean simply that we would leave the European Union without an agreement—and, as I explained at Second Reading, that is nothing to be scared of. Far from jumping off a non-existent cliff into the unknown, trading under WTO rules is the very satisfactory basis of most of the trade that we do throughout the world today. I give way.