Andrew Griffith

Let me move on. The biggest flaw of many in this Bill is that, as the hon. Member for Blackley and Middleton South (Graham Stringer) and my right hon. Friend the Member for Beverley and Holderness (Graham Stuart) have both identified, it hands over too much power with too little accountability. There is “a real need to consider the balance between primary and secondary legislation, which in recent years has weighed too heavily in favour of delegated powers…excessive reliance on delegated powers, Henry VIII clauses, or skeleton legislation—” such as this Bill— “upsets the proper balance between Parliament and the executive.” Those are not my words, but those of the Attorney General. They are taken from a speech that he made in October, while in government, about the importance of restoring parliamentary sovereignty. No one who considered that speech could fail to agree. The Lords’ Delegated Powers and Regulatory Reform Committee has slammed the Bill not once, not twice, but three times, including after the Government’s changes were made. To put this into context, the wide powers contained in this 15-page Bill will allow Ministers unilaterally to amend product safety regulation, impose obligations on online marketplaces, meddle with standards for weights and measures or entirely align British regulatory standards with the European Union, posing a threat to the integrity of the UK internal market. It is 15 pages of the most egregious Whitehall overreach.