Member

My second point concerns the integrity of the process. My noble friend, who was a member of the Secondary Legislation Scrutiny Committee, was struck by the sheer inadequacy of the Explanatory Memorandum for this SI, which other Members have also highlighted. The Committee’s report was polite, but its underlying message was damning. It regretted that the Government’s own Explanatory Memorandum did not state that the decision to cancel the postponement of the election was made in response to new legal advice. “Regret” is the dignified parliamentary term; in plain English the Explanatory Memorandum was farcical. It omitted the single most crucial fact—that the Government realised that their previous position was legally untenable. As the noble Baroness, Lady Scott, noted in February,