Baroness Andrews: My Lords, we have received the Government’s response to the report from the Adult Social Care Committee and we are grateful for it. Is the Minister aware that in that report we recommended that carer’s allowance be reviewed in the next year? We recommended that the threshold for the hours of caring be reduced so that people could access carer’s allowance more easily, and that the...
Baroness Andrews: I am grateful to the noble Lord. It is a measure of the speed with which the Bill has gone through every stage that these questions should be raised in the first place, but I leave it to the Government to reply. I also wish to pick up the point made by the noble Lord, Lord Pearson, about whose fault it is that this process has been so slow. I was appalled by the comments of a previous leader...
Baroness Andrews: I am out of date already. That is excellent; I am very grateful and withdraw my question. I am delighted the Government have been so responsive. My final point is on parliamentary control. I will certainly be supporting the amendment in the name of the noble and learned Lord, Lord Hope. It identifies two key risks. The Government have agreed in principle to a sifting mechanism, and it makes...
Baroness Andrews: My Lords, in following on from what the noble Lord, Lord Pearson, said, let me say that we had that debate at Second Reading; it was exhaustive and the noble Lord’s argument was, I think, properly demolished. I welcome the Government’s amendment. The Minister will know that I have been a fairly regular critic of the Government. I am afraid that I have to quote back to him now a letter...
Baroness Andrews: My Lords, this is an important group of amendments, and I have great pleasure in supporting them all. I have two amendments in my name, which reflect a particular interest that the Victorian Society has in the demolition of non-listed buildings. I am very grateful to the Victorian Society for marshalling support for these amendments. I would also say that these are amendments that sit the...
Baroness Andrews: My Lords, I am very grateful to the Minister for his response, for the compassion he shows and for the shared values we clearly hold across the Chamber. He had a difficult job trying to sum up and satisfy the consensus of opinion and expertise across the House while not being able to tell us what the national plan will contain. We regret that it will be published in the Recess. We would like...
Baroness Andrews: My Lords, I am extremely grateful for this opportunity to introduce a debate which has a particular resonance in this House and a real urgency. I am very pleased that so many Members of the House have been able to take part today, particularly members of the Adult Social Care Committee. I am delighted to share the debate with the Church, alongside the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of...
Baroness Andrews: To ask His Majesty's Government how many Retained EU Law statutory instruments are relevant to Common Frameworks; and what proportion of all Retained EU Law statutory instruments this number represents.
Baroness Andrews: To ask His Majesty's Government what estimate they have made of the number of items of legislation on the Retained EU Law Dashboard that will be retained, broken down by department numerically and as a percentage of the total to be retained; and if they are currently unable to provide this information, whether they plan to publish it before Report Stage of the Retained EU Law (Revocation and...
Baroness Andrews: To ask His Majesty's Government what are the criteria for determining which items on the Retained EU Law Dashboard are to be retained.
Baroness Andrews: To ask His Majesty's Government what estimate they have made of the rate of Virus Yellows in sugar beet.
Baroness Andrews: If that is the case, the logic is that all the common frameworks could be exempt. Is that not the case? If we can exempt one SI on animal welfare, there are 50 SIs on animal welfare; what would stop us exempting the whole of that tranche of SIs?
Baroness Andrews: Does the noble Baroness think that common frameworks will be a specific category?
Baroness Andrews: I am asking whether there is the power to exempt a whole category, because we have not heard that before. Would not common frameworks, because they are discrete and have an integrity of their own, serving specific purposes, constitute a specific category?
Baroness Andrews: I support Amendments 34 and 55 in the name of my noble friend Lord Murphy, who cannot be in his place, and Amendment 35, tabled by the noble Baroness, Lady McIntosh. I declare my interest as chair of the Common Frameworks Scrutiny Committee. I start by saying how much I support Amendment 29. The noble Baroness made a powerful and explicit speech about the real, practical concerns that are now...
Baroness Andrews: I support the amendment in the name of the noble and learned Lord, Lord Hope, and Amendment 26. The point about consultation is extremely important, especially as it seems obvious that a lot more SIs will not fit easily into the dispose or retain buckets, and arrangements have to be made for that. One thing that has struck me forcefully as we have gone through this process so far is the...
Baroness Andrews: The noble Lord, Lord Benyon, is a good Minister who is genuinely doing his best, but we have a fundamental contradiction here. He has said that his department’s default position is to retain; the Bill says it is to revoke. What is the Government’s position on this?
Baroness Andrews: I am terribly sorry to noble Lords, I really am. We have not heard the expression “retain by default”. Does the Minister sitting beside the noble Lord, Lord Benyon, agree with “retain by default”? We did not hear anything like that in the first day of Committee. This is news to us and it seems to turn the Bill on its head.
Baroness Andrews: We have been searching for some clue as to the criteria for what will be retained and what will be revoked, but we have not had any clarity—hence these hours of debate on safety of seat belts and so on. The Minister used the term “unnecessary” regulations and, in the famous letter, we have the line: “For example, through removing unnecessary or unsuitable regulations or consolidating...
