Clause 17 - Section 16: supplementary
European Parliament (Representation) Bill
4:30 pm
Mr William Cash (Stone, Conservative)
I am delighted to hear that, as on a previous occasion, despite our political differences, we
agree on such an important matter. It is not important in the way that some parts of the Bill affecting Gibraltar could be described as lying on tectonic plates, but it is an extraordinary procedural aberration to make the provisions subject to annulment.
The Government have a huge majority in the House of Commons. If they get their act together and apply the constructive dialogue that we have asked for, sometimes perhaps a little abrasively, but, in general, in a good-humoured and constructive fashion, they will get the centre of gravity in the Bill right. They must not go down this colonial route, which should stir some thoughts in the minds of Labour Members. To say on top of that that these order-making powers should be subject to the annulment procedure is quite extraordinary.
I think that I understand the reasoning behind the provision. Many of the regulations will contain provisions that could give rise to the hybrid instrument procedure—I trust that the Minister's advisers are listening—which is applicable only to statutory instruments. I happen to know a little about it. That affects the extent to which the provision would operate in practice. It is therefore part and parcel of my objections to clause 12(8).
Clause 17(1) states:
''This section applies to regulations under section 16.''
Therefore, the hybrid instrument procedure may not be excluded for the purposes of clause 12, and we need to look into that further. Having said that, I stand by my general comments about the need to ensure that all the statutory instruments in clause 16 are subject to affirmative resolution, not only those containing regulations under the European Parliamentary Elections Act 2002, which, as clause 17 says,
''are subject to approval in draft under section 13(2) of that Act''..
I have made my point. If I have been a little vehement about it, it is because I cannot imagine that the regulations could go so far in procedural terms as to exclude the affirmative resolution. I simply do not believe what I read.