Member

Why do I say all this about Clause 51? It is because I hope that I have demonstrated that there is a substantive argument about what the national scheme of delegation should say. It is not purely a technical issue. The delegated powers memorandum states that regulations about the national scheme of delegation should be made by the negative procedure. It seems evident that these are substantive issues that should be governed by the affirmative procedure—and making it the affirmative procedure is the purpose of Amendment 105 in my name. The Minister might well argue that there may be a number of changes to the national scheme of delegation over the years ahead. I agree, but they may well be relatively technical. I therefore put it to the Minister that, if she recognises any merit in my arguments, we might compromise on the thought that, as we do sometimes with legislation, the first use of these powers should be by an affirmative procedure, but not subsequently. Perhaps we might return to that, after a conversation, on Report.