Baroness Lawlor (Con)

My Lords, this is another statutory instrument to update EU law enforcement on plant health, seeds, seed potatoes and plant propagating material so that it operates effectively in Northern Ireland. It therefore aligns the operation of Northern Ireland’s agri-food sector with EU laws. The measures do not take account of the geographical, climatic and agricultural conditions of Northern Ireland, which are different from those of mainland Europe. The House of Commons Environment, Food and Rural Affairs Committee concluded in its assessment of the SPS for GB that the “full adoption of EU rules in this area would risk embedding regulatory decisions that are inappropriate for GB production systems”. I ask the Minister: is it right that we should have statutory instruments to enforce regulatory decisions that may not suit the very different conditions in Northern Ireland? Worse, the regulations violate the constitutional integrity of the United Kingdom and rupture our internal market. They mean divergent laws to govern the agri-food sectors under the Windsor Framework. That framework, as we know, accepted as permanent the EU’s power to regulate goods in Ireland, including the agri-food sector, whereas the settlement under the Northern Ireland protocol of the withdrawal agreement was recognised by the parties at the time as temporary, pending “best endeavours” to find a more lasting solution. As long as we have the current arrangements, Northern Ireland will thus be an economic vassal of Brussels, governed autocratically with laws made for the people but not by the people.