Jim Allister

I agree and endorse what the hon. Member for Stoke-on-Trent Central (Gareth Snell) said. He makes logical and coherent points, and the Bill could be used as a vehicle for his suggestion. I therefore support his new clause 1 and new clause 4, which is of a similar ilk. However, aspects of the Bill are democratically dangerous, because it gifts to Government unbridled capacity to make regulations, with virtually no oversight from this elected House, on matters which touch on not just the sanctity of our product production, but the sovereignty of this nation. This Bill, with little attempt at subtlety, enables a Government, if so minded—this one, I fear, might be—to sabotage Brexit in many ways. I stand to be corrected, but I do not think a single member of this Government voted for Brexit, which was the settled and declared will of the people greatest number of people who ever participated in a democratic vote in this nation. Yet in the Bill, we have the capacity, particularly through clause 2(7), to dynamically align all our regulations with those of the EU, without having recourse to this House, at the whim of the Executive. Whatever the subject matter, that surely is a most unhealthy situation.