My Lords, I thank the noble Baronesses, Lady Humphreys and Lady Randerson, for putting their names to a number of my amendments in this group. I thank the noble Lord, Lord Wigley, as well. His opening remarks summed up the thrust of group one, which is to ensure that the devolved Administrations are fully involved and engaged, and that there is parity of esteem for all the relevant legislatures. It set up the framework for this group of amendments rather well.
As we have heard, this is the first of several important debates on devolution, one of the major concerns about the Bill. As has been noted, at Second Reading the Minister outlined the number of meetings he had had with devolved officials—45, I think, 13 of them to talk about the regime itself. It is concerning that those meetings have taken place but we still find ourselves in a situation where there are unresolved issues with the Scottish Government and the Senedd.
My take on this is that it will not take a lot to move this on. In fact, as the noble Baroness, Lady Randerson, said, Amendment 20 is a very modest amendment, which would give the Secretary of State the power still to press ahead after a month if an agreement has not been reached. These are not tough amendments, especially following some of the debates in the Commons.
On that subject, I thank the department for releasing the guidance, but it is a bit bizarre that the Bill passed through the Commons stages without any of the guidance being published or being able to be read. There are still a lot of square brackets in the guidance and bits that needs to be filled in. As we will touch on later, the concerns that the DPRRC raised will, I hope, lead to some positive changes to the Bill.
A number of noble Lords spoke at Second Reading of their concerns and those of the devolved Administrations, many of which we shared and echoed. Amendments 13, 16 and 17 are intended to make it clear that the devolved authorities can make and modify streamlined subsidy schemes. As we are aware, at present the Bill reserves that power for the Secretary of State, although comments were made in the debates in the other place by the Commons Minister that this could be broadened out. It would be good to hear from the noble Baroness, when she responds on behalf of the noble Lord, Lord Callanan, whether we have seen any movement or development in broadening it out.
We also saw, throughout the Brexit process, which was touched on by a number of noble Lords, that when we got down to the detail in your Lordships’ House we were able to make changes and amendments.
The noble and learned Lord, Lord Hope, talked about some of those regarding the internal market Bill. It would be good if we did not have to take this as far or go through the same pain and difficulties that we did on that Bill, especially when the amendments we are looking to make fit into and sit alongside the same changes made there. With that, I will conclude. I look forward to the noble Baroness’s response.
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