Clause 2
Crown Employment (Nationality) Bill
11:15 am
Christopher Chope (Christchurch, Conservative)
Then why are we putting forward a proposal that would allow the European Union to dictate the terms on which our royal household can employ its staff? That is another example where the consequences that flow from the provisions of clause 2—they may be intended, as far as the hon. Gentleman is concerned—are unintended and undesirable.
I think—my right hon. Friend the Member for East Yorkshire has made this point—that subsections (4)(a) and (b) go far too far in giving unfettered power to exempt a person of one description from the rules. Returning to my earlier point, that reinforces the fact that unless a rule change were to introduce an exemption for existing employees, they would not be protected against the retrospective loss of their jobs and their right to be employed in a particular position. Rather than having the exemption clause in subsection (4)(a), it would be better to alter subsection (1) in the way in which I suggested earlier to make it clear that such changes could apply only at the beginning of somebody’s employment, and that it could not be used to remove them from employment after the event. I would have thought that that would be against the European convention on human rights, but it seems implicit in the way in which this has been drafted that it would not be at odds with the convention.