I fear that I may disappoint my hon. Friend. Although the principles may be welcome, we are talking about creating legislation that will put duties on Ministers. There is a lack of clarity about what is meant. For example, it is not clear how far the Bill would require the Secretary of State to go. In the case of  a declaration of compatibility with the European convention, which is the comparison we have used, the convention exists and there is extensive case law so that we know with what the Bill is compatible. All we have here are the words in the Bill.

Would the Secretary of State, for example, be fulfilling the principles of legislative territorial clarity if he or she set out in legislation the legal and financial effect, as required in clause 1 and interpreted in clause 2? If that is the case—if including the extent clauses detailing the extent of the legal effect of legislation is required to fulfil the principles of legislative territorial clarity—clauses 3 and 4 are unnecessary. The Bill would do what it needs to do without them. If the clauses mean something else and the Minister has to go further, it is not clear what the Secretary of State would have to do to comply with them. Would a Bill, for example, have to detail the effect on citizens and on Members’ constituents, or would that detail have to be in the explanatory notes?

The Bill applies only to draft legislation, which is almost always accompanied by a White Paper and is often subject to pre-legislative scrutiny. Those mechanisms, which are already used by the House, are useful for providing extra detail on the impact of legislation such as why Ministers are bringing it forward and why the Government think it is a good idea. I think those mechanisms are more effective than including many more words in legislation.

It would be a significant change if, rather than a Bill only containing the wording of the provisions that change the law, we started including descriptions of the effect that those changes would have. I am not clear—and I am not sure that draftsmen, Ministers and Members of Parliament are clear—about how people would comply with the requirements in clauses 3 and 4. That lack of clarity might risk creating a new ground on which people could challenge primary legislation in the courts, either on the basis that there had been no declaration or that a declaration was one that no reasonable Secretary of State would make.

The clause either does not add anything to the Bill or it is not clear. After listening to my hon. Friend’s description I was not any clearer about what the Secretary of State would be certifying in his or her statement on a Bill’s compatibility. I am not clear about the processes and steps that officials and Ministers would have to take to be able to make such a declaration. When Ministers make the existing declaration about compatibility with the Human Rights Act 1998 they make that statement personally. The Minister has to take responsibility for that, because it is legally challengeable. Ministers consider it seriously before issuing such a certification.