Yesterday the retained EU law Bill completed its Commons stages. The Opposition put up a barrage of absurd criticisms and false scares instead of debating the real issues. The government endlessly made clear it had no plans to revoke employment rights and environmental protections. It argued that the UK had often pioneered these laws before joining the EEC/EU, and had often gone beyond the minimum standards required by Brussels.
The main advance provided by the legislation is to take all retained EU law which was transferred en bloc on leaving as a separate category of UK law and to make it pure UK law through this measure. Once this is done the law falls to be interpreted by UK courts without reference to ECJ past judgements, and is in a form which allows amendment, improvement or repeal as Ministers and Parliament see fit. Ministers will not be able to do any of this without further Parliamentary processes. In practice any substantial change to a body of law is likely to need primary legislation in the UK Parliament.
The worry about the Bill should not be the wrong forecast that it will lead to wholesale cancellation of retained EU laws, but that it may not result in a thorough enough review of all this legislation followed by sensible amendment and repeal. We need a better debate on which of the many laws we opposed unsuccessfully at the time of their introduction should be revisited.
I wish to see early use of our powers to cancel VAT on energy, and to permanently remove it from green products. I wish to see greater use of our new powers in agriculture to promote more UK food production. I wish to see the Ports Directive repealed, the droit du suite removed to assist our art market, an improved Data Protection regime, strengthened controls against ultra large foreign trawlers in our fishing grounds, pro science rules to foster UK work in medical and pharmaceutical research, the suspension of emissions trading which is penalising our energy intensive industries at a time of high energy prices and strengthened policing of our borders amongst others.
I look forward to the government’s list and would be interested in your thoughts on improving the inherited law base.
January 19, 2023
Whilst empowering the Government the Bill does the same for the devolved administrations so we can suppose that even now the SNP is looking to exploit its provisions to cause trouble since it, clearly, does not wish to see the devolution settlement work. Is the UK Government alert to this danger?
January 19, 2023
Bill Cash was on top form; absolutely storming speech, including giving a schooling to the ‘young folk’ on the opposition front benches. Brilliant.
If only there were more such clear thinking in the PCP….. wishful thinking.
January 19, 2023
Bill Cash: Top Man!
January 20, 2023
Another Dickensian ghost of the ERG…
January 19, 2023
We voted leave the EU and won 7 years ago!! This sums up the treacherous Tory party that all links and subjugation still remains. Every obstacle and hurdle were created and put there byâŠ..Tory govt.!
Sunak and Hunt winding UK closer to EU and will hide behind Labour when Starmer gets even closer. The consocialists are joined at the hip and are in agreement for UK to remain in EU but name.
EU Trade agreement, ECHR, ECJ, territorial waters defined to return fishing rights to UK, N.Ireland protocol and PESCO should be scrapped today. No right minded person could believe these issues could or should remain if the UK wishes to be an independent sovereign nation. EU were surprised our treacherous govt. agreed to these. The fact JR is still debating these issues after 7 years shows his partyâs true intent to remain u dear EU control. This should have been resolved in 2016 or 2018 at the latest, we should have had a trade war and now back to normal relations by 2023!!
January 19, 2023
What was the ÂŁ3/4 billion spent on preparing UK to leave with no deal by Gove? Where are the contingency plans. All of this should have been considered years ago, we paid our taxes for the alleged plans and preparations. This is not an insignificant number. If Hove failed in his task why is he back in govt.?
January 19, 2023
@Hope +1
Unfortuantly we have a Parliment that is anti UK independance, it is above all anti Democracy. We voted leave and the Conservatives with their great majority refused, they lied when they said get Brexit done. They have ensured by every move possible that they the UK Parliament will do the bidding of their master in the EU and deny the right of the UK citizen to experience democracy.
January 19, 2023
Simply untrue. We left the EU three years ago. The terms are rubbish, Brexit is rubbish, but you were warned, you voted for it
January 20, 2023
@Gary Megson. You have that in reverse The terms are rubbish in that the BJ deal kept us under the EU yoke. Those that voted ‘leave’ wanted just that, to control thier own lives – the UK has never and will never be allowed to leave.
January 19, 2023
Did you see Hunt’s absurd & childish coffee inflation video what idiot thought this was a good idea politically. Poor people do not buy ÂŁ3 flat lates!
The reason the coffee cost more is because Sunak printed money to make you ÂŁ1s in salary worth more like 80p.
No Mr Hunt is it not caused by Putin nor Covid but your governments vast over reaction to Covid with the lockdown and endless government waste, test and trace, the Net Zero rip off energy agenda, high taxes, vested interests/corruption…
You say “until we developed the vaccines” well the government did not develop the vaccines any anyway the vaccine have clearly done net harm. We should surely be looking at legal actions against the surely negligent regulators. There was never any case at all to give them to the young. The vaccines & boosters should be stopped right now, the case is now totally overwhelming.
January 19, 2023
LL. Pathologists are concerned about the way the booster seems to be reaching to certain types of cancer so maybe not just the young will be affected. Richard Tice, leader of the Reform party says this all needs an independent study as it could be a very serious situation.
January 19, 2023
The governor of the BoE has said he expects inflation to fall quite rapidly this year; when it doesn’t, will he resign?
January 20, 2023
GM,
It is true we voted to leave 7 years ago. Fact. Cameron prevented/blocked civil service to prepare to leave. Cameron should have learned from his thin gruel negotiation with menace Merkel.
UK could have left straight away it did not have to negotiate a trade subjugation agreement. EU failed its responsibility to the treaty to act in good faith to be a good neighbour and act in the spirit intended for a departing country.
No one voted for the sell out treacherous May tried to implement. She betrayed the nation, her party and cabinet. No one voted for Johnsonâs sell out either. He made many false claims, particularly about N.Ireland and fishing. We the majority did not vote for treachery, partial Brexit or a sell out. We voted leave.
January 19, 2023
But of course the bill will never see royal assent because the unelected Lords will keep delaying it.
Labour and a good many faux conservatives wish to rejoin so they will fight tooth and nail to keep us in lockstep with the EU.
Fishy is too weak to use the parliament act.
January 19, 2023
What makes you think Sunak wants this Bill to pass?
The Westminster Uni-Party is going through an elaborate ritual of pretending that the Government wants to achieve something and the “Opposition” is trying to stop it.
What is actually happening is that the CONs are setting themselves up to argue at the next election that they delivered Brexit and did their best to repeal EU Laws and sort out the Protocol ….. but were prevented by the Opposition/House of Frauds. And Labour is setting itself up to argue that we need a closer trading arrangement with the EU and the House of Frauds needs to be abolished ….. in favour of the EU’s policy of regionalising England.
I expect that in due course, when the clock has been successfully run down by the Westminster Uni-Party and the House of Frauds and Starmer is PM, the creation of “Macron’s proposal” for a two-tier EU with the inner Eurozone and an outer tier of “associated nations” will be announced. I predict that the associated nations will include the EFTA nations; Ukraine, Turkey ….. and the UK.
And strangely enough, that is the proposal Cameron put to Merkel, which was rejected.
January 19, 2023
@Donna +1 so very, very true
January 19, 2023
And weâll pay more then than we did as a full member. To teach us a lesson our public school educated politicians will lap up. They love a good beating.
January 19, 2023
May 2012 “Voters have given a hefty thumbs-down to David Cameron’s drive to get more directly elected mayors in England. People in Manchester, Birmingham, Nottingham, Bradford, Coventry, Sheffield, Wakefield and Newcastle have voted against the idea in local referendums, with only Bristol voters bucking the trend and providing the prime minister with some comfort.”
“5 May 2021 â In the 2012 elections for PCCs, voter turnout averaged just 15%.”
It doesn’t matter what the People of England want! Just jobs for the inner clique.
January 20, 2023
We hire all of these commissioners, “The Labour party has blasted the Tories for failing to implement compulsory vetting standards for police officers. Shadow Home Secretary Yvette Cooper spoke on Robert Peston’s ITV politics show”
“Basic things that simply are not requirements, they don’t even have to get character checks on police applications, basic things that ought to take place.”
I just can’t believe what I read sometimes, how the heck is this Met Police getting flung back at the Tories, the Met Police are headed up by Khan, there are police commissioners.
Who is in charge of policing in London?
The Mayor
The Mayor’s Office for Policing and Crime (MOPAC) is headed by the Mayor, who has exercised unique legislative powers to appoint a statutory Deputy Mayor for Policing and Crime to take on day-to-day responsibility for the office. This means that the Mayor is directly accountable for policing performance in London.
January 19, 2023
@Ian wragg The first Law needed from the HoC is to get rid of the unelected unrepresented HoL its very being kicks democracy and decent folk in the teeth. But how does that scan with the likes of Boris Johnson creating jobs for the boys
January 19, 2023
Gets my vote
January 20, 2023
So you’ll be voting Labour then, Glen?
January 20, 2023
What happened with sewage pollution – that was the removal of over-the-heads-of-Government scope for enforcement by the European Union – on our ending of Transition will be repeated across all sectors.
You have voted repeatedly to ruin what was left of this country.
January 19, 2023
What a disaster the Blair Brown era was with its every more EU, the botched and grossly unfair to England devolution, the dire legal reforms, idiotic economic and idiotic benefit reforms, the climate change act and over regulation of almost everything.
Still some good news the appalling Jacinda Ardern the Lockdown Queen lefty dope of New Zealand is finally leaving office after her rule of terror.
January 19, 2023
If Trudeau goes as well I might break out a bottle of English Shampagne.
January 19, 2023
Equally as good as the French stuff Donna.
January 19, 2023
+1
LL, Tories had 13 years to sort out Lothian question they promised to deliver. A crumb given and taken back. Instead they are now implementing EU regionalisation of England!!
January 19, 2023
The Blair/Brown era now seems like halcyon days compared to the governments since 2010.
January 19, 2023
I can’t believe we’ve had a labour government since 1997 ….its about time for a Tory government
January 19, 2023
Love it !!
January 19, 2023
Poor Cindy! Iâm sure some globalist operation will have a sinecure for her. I mean she was definitely going to lose the election so she has stamped off in a little huff.
The Zelensky âregime changeâ blight strikes again. Seems only Putin is immune. Gee I wonder why, must be because he is mad and his people hate him – well that will make sense to the confused leaders of the collective west.
January 20, 2023
The stubbornness of political leaders in refusing to face the facts, even when it will be their undoing, is unbounded. Net zero Covid didn’t work on two geographically remote islands. The wonder is that Xi Jinping ever believed it would work in a large continental country. Now his position is weakened, after he had to give up the ridiculous net zero Covid policy in China. In this country, with an 80-seat majority which will not come again, Sunak has the opportunity to reverse our catastrophic net zero CO2 policy. It doesn’t have to be a big proclamation, just a subtle and gradually increasing shift of emphasis. There are tiny signs now that he might be edging towards retaining more fossil fuel energy. If he can put blue water between the Tories and Labour on maintaining our energy supply as a priority, not net zero, he might have a chance of winning the next GE. Or is that just fanciful?
January 19, 2023
The General Data Protection Regulation needs amending to eliminate such nonsense as the police not always being able (or willing!) to identify to victims the known perpetrators of crime.
January 19, 2023
That is important but is of rather low urgency in the context of the great mass of retained EU law.
The UK Govtâs current economic objectives are the highest priority in being able to solve many of our existing consequential problems. Inherited EU laws restricting any of the actions we need to take in fulfilling those objectives will be among those needing earliest remedy.
January 19, 2023
Has the introduction of GDPRs actually reduce data fraud ?
This government(s) is fast to enact new laws & regulations, but does anybody measure their effectiveness
January 19, 2023
I do believe as said that we have indeed led the way in the past in many areas for better standards, from social to product safety.
To read, or listen to some of the commentary you could be forgiven for thinking we’ll be returning to shoving our children up the chimneys ‘gov’ without the benevolent guiding hand of the EU.
Problem we have here now in the courts is the same as all other institutions, the political slant of those interpreting the laws.
January 19, 2023
Agree Michelle, UK has a history of leading on legislation in many areas. I gather the EU human rights legislation was drafted by the Brits!
Here’s an idea, how much of the legislation can simply be scrapped? How many laws do we have that are not needed? A prize for the MP that gets the most struck off.
January 19, 2023
The ECHR is nothing to do with the EU. It was created out of the “Congress of Europe” in 1948 (there was an address by Churchill) and in 1951, the UK was the first country to ratify it.
The Treaty of Rome wasn’t signed until 1957.
January 20, 2023
Amplified and concentrated legally by numerous treaties.
Come on Peter.
You know this surely
January 19, 2023
Indeed it is about interpretation. In secondary and primary care when we start talking a patients needs we write ” To rule out ” This is widely used medicalese. We look at the worst case scenario to ensure we don’t omit. It doesn’t in any shape or form mean that we think every patient has a worst case scenario but to be safe we examine and investigate. This is more important when there are non English speaking patients who cannot describe their symptoms however some are jumping on the term to say that the worst ase scenario was suspected. This is not the case and again demonstrates the communication / interpretation difficulties the NHS is facing with the cultural mix. When it comes to documentation much now needs to be left out so it will not be misinterpreted.
January 19, 2023
Yes, Margaret, I remember the EU sycophants claiming that the UK would lower food standards after leaving the EU. It was the EU that lowered THEIR food standards, but we still allow those products to be sold into the UK. Have we lowered (aligned) our food standards to match the EU?
January 19, 2023
@Shirley M +1
A lot of short memories out there
January 19, 2023
Not to mention lower water standards. Nobody on the continent understood why our mixer taps have two separate spouts for hot and cold water. It was because the cold tap water was drinking quality.
Nobody on the continent can even envisage such a high standard.
Letâs go back to that! Iâm sick of foul water from the tap and having to buy in plastic/glass bottles, simple drinking water! Itâs âunsustainableâ and ânot authenticâ and âwill kill the planetâ.
VAT off energy please as a major priority please JR. Threaten the âLordsâ with the consequences of very high energy bills should they tarry.
January 19, 2023
Please scrap all VAT
January 19, 2023
I never got why anybody would call it ‘Value’ added? Why not State Tax Added (STA)?
January 20, 2023
ECT = Extra Customer Tax
January 20, 2023
Uh oh? You donât seem to know or realise that your two water taps have nothing to do with the quality of water. One is for the water tank generally set up in the loft and is usually linked to the water heating system, the other (for cold water) is directly from the mains. If the quality of the mains is poor, you get poor water quality. As for the water in the tank, its quality can be anything: when I moved house, an inspection of the water tank showed a rather disgusting level of deposits at the bottom of the tank, not directly entering the flow as the outlet inside the tank was about one inch from the bottom, but hardly appetising.
In my neighbourhood, recent (and repeated) work by Thames Water usually gives âcolouredâ water from the cold water tap for a few minutes at the end of such period of work.
Finally in the Thames Valley an even larger proportion of the water will come from retreatment plants (guardian, 12/01/2023 âRecycling plan aims to replace water from the Thames with treated sewageâ). (There is a public enquiry/survey going on. The plan is to have on average 123 l of water per person per day, with a potential 50% reduced demand by 2050. The information in this survey is rather âinterestingâ).
Give me everyday water naturally filtered through the porous limestone layers like in the South of Massif Central, please.
January 19, 2023
Personally I’m all for throwing out all EU law since they have infiltrated the British way of life so cunningly through the ECJ. We have enough anti-democratic members in the HC and Upper house who are frustrating Brexit anyway they can. I suspect most of the Remain faction are gaining pecuniary benefit from the EU and wish to keep the status quo?
January 19, 2023
@AncientPopeye +1
All democrates are kept in a box
January 19, 2023
âThoughts on improving the inherited law baseâ?
How would we have any idea which laws are EU laws we adopted and which laws are our own? Is there a list?
January 19, 2023
Itâs only the specific 4,000 EU laws we âput in escrowâ being removed.
But we have a list of all the EU laws we opposed and were defeated on – we were subsequently compelled to incorporate that body of law into U.K. law. Those should be repealed en bloc next.
Then we need to sift through the rest – too many laws, too specific laws, we need the old style generalities which catch all âthou shalt not killâ rather than âdonât kill childrenâ donât beat womenâ etc etc etc.
The whole population need to know what the law is to keep within it. It is entrapment to have such complex laws that even Judges canât fathom what they mean.
January 19, 2023
Strange how you Brexiters say you know what you voted for, then you ask a question like this which shows you donât know the first thing about what being in the EU meant
January 19, 2023
All your suggestions sound very sensible.
Often (as in the case of Grenfell Tower) the UK provisions are actually better than the EU ones. In no way is this an excuse for cutting corners.
But a lot of the EU regulations ere part of international deals. What Dr Richard North, one of the leading experts on the EU, calls “the double coffin lid”. You escape one coffin and find that you are in a bigger one!
I would like to add that a lot of the people who want us to get back in stand to gain a lot of perks if we did. It really is a corrupt gravy train, and always has been.
January 19, 2023
Yes, but the difference this time is that the government has no one to blame and, when we enter negotiations we do so on our own behalf like all other non-EU countries and do not have to sit outside the room while the Commission does the deal for and on our behalf.
January 19, 2023
Woke fascism not the EU is by far the greater threat to our nation. Your party has embraced both and you do it behind our backs
January 19, 2023
+++++1000
Oh..BUTâŠI think âwokeâ is now a forbidden word ( according to the govt.âs âAcceptable Language
Guideâ) Ooo Er! đ«ą
I still agree with you 10000%.
January 19, 2023
The only language this government deserves is definitely ‘unacceptable’. Some of it may show up soon on spoilt ballot papers, methinks.
January 19, 2023
“woke”? I still don’t know what it means – wasn’t in my language growing up!
January 19, 2023
‘Woke’ Otherwise known as ‘My Way or the Highway’.
January 19, 2023
replace woke with joke …much more descriptive.
January 19, 2023
In fear of being arrested by the woke police âŠI agree with your comments âmateyâ
January 19, 2023
Certainly all laws should be under UK statute if they are going to be upheld in some way.
May I suggest there are tens of thousands of laws which are on the UK Statute books at present, which are never likely to be used or upheld, until some bright spark decides to do so.
Face facts John, Parliament is never likely to spend money and time on scrapping laws which are even at the moment unfit/unsuitable for use, or where they are now not relevant at all to modern day living.
But then we had quoted to us something about Henry 5th Acts back in the day’s of the endless constitutional Brexit arguments.
No wonder our legal system is so expensive and confusing, and where sometimes you only get justice if you can afford it !
January 19, 2023
@Berkshire Alan
We could just scrap all Laws and Rules handed down from the EU and then just retrospectivly reintroduce them at some time in the future should they get parliment approval.
January 19, 2023
The best being that it is still a requirement for males to undertake 2 hours of longbow practice a week. If unrepealed still after all this can we have another Agincourt please?
January 19, 2023
‘I wish to see the Ports Directive repealed …’ Still not done? Wasn’t that one of the easiest of ‘quick wins’? I am appalled by the government’s lack of energy.
January 19, 2023
lack of energy, or lack of intent?
January 19, 2023
So we voted to leave on 23 June 2016 over six years ago. Any sensible government & civil service would have prepared for both outcomes and had EU lar deregulation plans even before a leave outcome.
Instead the dire Cameron just abandoned ship like a petulant child. Then went of to make a fortune from lobbying for companies like Greensill. Then we suffered dithering “net zero”, modern slavery Act dope May (thanks to Gove knifing Boris), then Boris, then Truss (who was never given a chance by the Tory MPs) and then Sunak the cause of all the current economic issues.
Well done Conservatives!
January 19, 2023
James Dyson is exactly right in the Telegraph today: Stupid, short-sighted policies holding back economy. Growth is now a dirty word in NoâŻ10, says businessman as he tells Britain to cut red tape to escape Covid inertia.
January 19, 2023
Correct Ashley and then we have Labour in the wings waiting to add more misery to ordinary hardworking people.
January 19, 2023
+1 worse still it is Labour/SNP/Libdim
January 19, 2023
+many
Make one wonder. Fancy behaving like that.
Probably eat the wrong breakfast cereal.
Gives them hallucinations.
Canât beat eggs and bacon..lines the stomach.
January 19, 2023
@Ashley
They did prepare, they prepared to remain under the thumb of the unelected unaccountable masters they were used to. At one stage a spokesman for EU declared democracy inconvenient
January 19, 2023
Ashley
If ever there was a Prime Minister to disappoint, it was Cameron, who we found out too late had no backbone !.
January 19, 2023
@Ashley
Indeed. You couldnât make it up.
January 19, 2023
Now the House of Frauds will move into top gear and do its level best to stop the Bill from progressing.
January 19, 2023
Almost certainly.
January 19, 2023
The principle is not a bad one given we have left the EU. But this would be going much better with the public if there was a clear explanation of which key eu laws we wish to get rid of or change and why. At the moment it looks like an ideological gesture policy designed to create a wedge. As we see in the opinion polls, what the voters care about is what practical effect on their lives and livelihoods policies have.
January 19, 2023
Mr Sunak told us his top five priorities not so long ago.
Pareto suggests that 20% of EU law on our books has 80% of the impact on our ability to act in our own interests – and you would probably find that there are just handful that are really disadvantagous to us. So why not pick out the top five ‘E-laws’ and prioritise them through the HoC? Make a start and when you’ve finished those, choose another five.
January 19, 2023
But our MPs will use the pareto 80/20 rule in reverse, therefore theyâll retain 80% of EU laws and scarp just 20%
January 19, 2023
Any laws where the ECJ have ruled against the UK Govt would signal those which need improvement to suit us.
January 19, 2023
Time for Parliament to stop digging. The hole is deep enough. Put away the spades, pick up the shovels and start filling in the massive grave that they have dug for this Country.
I am genuinely ashamed of the wilful act(s) of destruction of our Constitution and our manufacturing sector, amongst others, particularly in the last three decades.
I hope the Electorate show the courage and determination that they demonstrated in 2016 and 2019 to send this tired and ineffective Parliament and Civil Service a message that it never forgets.
The People of this Country have been very badly served.
January 19, 2023
Good morning.
It never fails to amaze me how quickly the government can move when it wants to (eg The SCAMDEMIC) and how slowly when it does not. Six and a half years later we are finally seeing a chink of light ahead of the EU tunnel.
Sorry, not good enough !
January 19, 2023
that chink of light can only be detected via the James Webb Space Telescope!
January 19, 2023
The issue of the revocation of the many EU laws that the Brexit purists wish to dispose of should, clearly, be left to the incoming Labour government after the next GE.
I would support removing VAT from all energy usage and all green products. However, whilst I too would like to see more domestic food produced from agriculture, not at the expense of our precious environment.
January 19, 2023
Assuming the Ukranian war will continue for some time, food production should be a very high priority. We may not have bombs raining down on us but our energy and food security are clearly threatened. A primary role of any Government is to protect it’s citizens. We should be doing everything in our power to be self sufficient in both food and energy. Whatever the truth of Climate Change, the fact is that “we” cannot make any practical difference to what will happen to global temperatures. What we can do is try to protect ourselves from any harms and try to benefit from any upside. It seems to me that the largest threat in this country is from water – both drought and flood. Instead of pursuing Net Zero – perhaps we should start worrying a lot more about Zero Food, Zero Water and Zero Growth.
January 19, 2023
Better to just ditch the net zero expensive intermittent energy insanity. This particularly as the World is not currently heating up at all measured by the best method sattelite measurements.
Did you see the Cambridge study that showed extra insulation in practice did not save gas as people adjusted to the lower cost of heating their house by heating more of their house or having the houses hotter using about the same. This even before you consider all the energy that goes into manufacturing and fitting the insulation. It also often caused condensation and ventilation issues.
January 19, 2023
Did the study discuss the 2 reasons for adding insulation? First the people who can’t afford the increasing bills so try to manage by reducing heat loss, and second the comfortably off Eco warriors who wear the insulation badge as a medal but don’t attempt to reduce bills?
January 19, 2023
So the usual false narrative from the Brexiteers:
– A majority of voters now favour Remain. Business, unions, charities and many professional bodies oppose the wholesale change this Bill will bring, without clear rules many industries will be floundering and have said so. Look at this weekâs Britishvolt fiasco.
– We will struggle to do business with our nearest neighbours while trying to concoct deals with those far away. And the deals we do, eg Australia are worse than the EU partnerships.
– Most of the so called wins could be done within the EU. For example- free ports, sanitary product taxes, energy taxes. Many commentators state the EU regulations are a minimum standard so why move away from this.
I despair of the opportunities lost by the view that we can return to the great past of Britain in the 1950âs while the rest of the world looks to the future.
I am hopeful that this government or a change will get us back on track.
Reply Remain is not an option. The people you cite are not arguing for us to rejoin
January 19, 2023
Paul
It’s all a mess because we have not properly left, so we never got Brexit.
The eventual bodge up complicated agreement (which still has not been truly settled in Northern Ireland or indeed Gibralter) was made because Remainer MP’s wanted to preserve all things EU, and refused to allow a clean cut walk away deal.
Thus we now have the worst of both Worlds.
January 19, 2023
++++ agree
Just remember when it is voting time!
January 19, 2023
Lack of energy? No! They are energetically lining up whatâs next after 2024.
January 19, 2023
What about the single market / Customs Union / Norway Switzerland option that we were offered by Gove, Farage et al as the best of both worlds. Our future was sold down the river by 35% of the voting public and then by 170000 Tory members who voted for the disastrous Ms Truss.
January 19, 2023
Our future was sold down the river by Truss!
Are you actually kidding? She was weak, but it certainly wasn’t her who sold the UK down the river.
Truss was in power for a very short time and dealt with our Queen’s death in most of that time whilst the BoE, the OBR and others brought her down ‘oh dear!’.
Her energy package isn’t as expensive as was claimed.
The gilts have recovered in price.
The interest rates went up before KK announced his mini budget that he was rushed into because of the energy crisis.
I could go on.
January 19, 2023
What ARE you on about? This â1950sâ nonsense is a figment of Remainersâ imaginations. I have never heard a Leaver rambling on about the 1950s.
January 19, 2023
I think the ‘Swinging Sixties’ was partly a glorious freedom to rebel and behave riotously, after a miserable postwar decade – the 1950s. At least that’s how I saw it !
January 19, 2023
You are entirely wrong in fact. For instance the U.K. did remove the VAT on sanitary products – I.e it went through the House, but it could not be implemented because the EU had VAT competence and we could only increase VAT, NOT reduce it.
Every other point is wrong too. If you donât know the facts then that is possibly an excuse for your Remain preference. Once you know the facts you will develop into a rational Brexiteer too.
January 19, 2023
Itâs all too late, Starmerâs coming
January 19, 2023
Just make sure you don’t say that name three times
January 19, 2023
The desire of many in Parliament and much of the civil service to retain this vast block of legislation is not its content but the fact that it is the foundation block for our return to the EU. Getting rid of it makes return more difficult. At least it highlights the hypocrisy of Labour and many eurphile conservatives.
January 19, 2023
agricola, no I don’t believe the plan is ‘for our return’. It is for total capitulation so the remainers can concede, they want us hog tied. Our money is stopping since October 2022. The divorce bill is paid, ÂŁ40bn more spent on the NHS this year than in 2016 and still, people can’t get an ambulance it appears from what Starmer says every week. Why when so much more per week is spent in 2023. Where is the investigation on the failing trusts, why aren’t their bosses on our tv news answering for their failure to us their customers and funders?
January 19, 2023
Once this is done the law falls to be interpreted by UK courts without reference to ECJ past judgements
Is this a “careful what you wish for” moment? Delighted to see past and future EU judgements no longer determining outcomes but am chilled by our own judiciary’s left wing bias.
January 19, 2023
Surely it would be prudent to classify the laws first. High, medium & low priority. High to include all laws that restrict the UK while Remainers by advantageous to EU. Would suggest the best people to help do this would be the MEPs, who attended many of the debates.
Sadly there are too many Rejoiners in Westminster. Who are still focused on thwarting the democratic leave vote!
I for one has not forgiven their treachery & know their allegiance stays with EU. They will not get my vote at the next GE!
January 19, 2023
A shrewd politician would select a few laws that had the best return – both in freeing us of unneccessary burdens but also in terms of their popularity with the ordinary voter. Do we have any shrewd politicians these days?
January 19, 2023
I think the govt. may be too busy with its âAcceptable Language Guideâ to deal with repealing laws.
Or has that sage work been completed?
January 19, 2023
ââhas that sage work been completed?ââ
Select and highlight every word âeuropean unionâ, copy & paste the word âunited kingdomâ âŠ.job done âmateyâ
January 19, 2023
My general view on this is the same now as it was on July 25 2017:
http://johnredwoodsdiary.com/2017/07/25/what-the-german-car-industry-wants/#comment-880962
“Iâve said in the past that in twenty yearsâ time we may still have the odd EU-derived law unchanged on the statute book simply because so far there had been no pressing need to amend or repeal it. That is the situation in a post-colonial country like India, where after seven decades of independence they are still sorting out remnants of the legacy of the British Raj. There is no need to worry about it, provided that the most important of the EU-derived laws are dealt with in the early years after we leave.”
But of course I now have to make an exception which I had not expected at that time, that notwithstanding this UK-wide legislation about retained EU laws Northern Ireland will still have to remain in dynamic alignment with real live EU laws in 300 areas:
http://www.niassembly.gov.uk/assembly-business/research-and-information-service-raise/eu-exit-hub/protocol/dynamic-alignment/
“The Protocol specifies, largely in a series of annexes, those EU laws with which Northern Ireland law must remain aligned. As EU law is constantly evolving, the UK government is required to keep Northern Ireland aligned with amended or changed legislation which falls within the scope of the Protocol. This is referred to as dynamic alignment, and just over 300 regulations or directives apply to Northern Ireland in this way.”
Which brings me to my submission yesterday suggesting how we might very carefully pick our way out of this predicament with the Northern Ireland protocol, which you declined to publish, JR, but which I will repeat today because nobody else seems to have any sensible proposal for a way forward. If they have a better idea I would be happy to hear it, even if the government would prefer to sort the problem out by crushing the unionists.
January 19, 2023
So what is your plan to get us out of the protocol predicament?
January 19, 2023
There isnât one Denis. You have been fooled. How does it feel?
January 20, 2023
How do you know that I was fooled?
January 19, 2023
Dennis
I see it is being reported that the Gibraltar talks are supposed to be nearing an end, I wonder what that deal will be like, and who will be in charge, Spain, the EU or GB. ?
January 19, 2023
For whatever reasons ( many personal I suspect) large chunks of our govt. did not want to leave the EU.
Those people have put EU membership before the safety and welfare of the country.
And have failed hugely in the first true test of our much vaunted âdemocracyâ.
January 19, 2023
This bill will surely be a test of how effective and how honest the government is – If they cannot rid us of the bad EU laws then they will have missed one more chance to show their mettle.
Labour always come out with that sorry excuse for working against reform, that it will reduce employment rights – Why can’t they be constructive, ever!
January 19, 2023
Why aren’t they asked which particular ’employment rights’ the working time directive? What were other EU employment rights forced on the UK? In fact, the WTD was forced it was an opt-out, and Blair signed up; who has said they will sign out of it?
January 19, 2023
More delusion. This is a political stunt to assuage the Spartans and pretend to especially the Red Wall, that you are serious about Brexit. One Nation Tories can vote for it because they know nothing will happen.
You have had zero strategy from day one and running out of political time desperation is driving you to appear to be doing something.
This at the same time as James Dyson. the head of the CBI and drug companies eviscerate you over excessive bureaucracy , regulation, lack of any kind of growth strategy, uncompetitive taxes, the list goes on. We also read that non doms and other wealth are leaving reducing our tax take further.
Utter shambles.
January 19, 2023
Nigl – going before Labour come to power and tax them. Threatening people with money for a couple of years gives them adequate notice to make alternative arrangements, so who is going to pay for Starmer then>?
January 19, 2023
John, you must repeal the Climate Change Act. It will ruin us to no effect on the climate. CO2 is not the climate control knob. Since COP1 in 1995 it has risen unchecked at 2ppm a year and nothing we do will change that. (ocean outgassing mainly). Read it up or take five minutes to chat with one of the Global Warming Policy Foundation scientists.
January 19, 2023
Changing the Freon gas in fridges â no effect
Changing light blubs â no effect
Speed bumps â no effect
Ban on coal â no effect
Deindustrialisation â no effect
Insulation grants since 1980 â no effect
Higher environment taxes â no effect
Ban smoking â no effect
Introduction of cycle lanes â no effect
Catalytic converters â no effect
Plastic bag taxes â no effect
Etc etc etc
Nothing will satisfy the climate crusaders âŠthere will always be something else to ban or tax without measuring the results. If none of the above has made any difference, well what was the point
January 19, 2023
I am slowly warming to Rishi Sunak’s leadership, I just wish he would take effective steps to stop illegal immigration which is set to increase dramatically in 2023 if we don’t take control of our borders.
January 19, 2023
a bit like warming the frog in the pan?
January 19, 2023
So do I. the Government should get on with it, this is what we voted for!
January 19, 2023
If you want to improve the inherited laws, you must have clear principles guiding their retention:
Firstly there must be a clear definition of the problem each regulation means to solve. Solid research and data should confirm the impact. The study is essential as the problem might have gone away since the creation of the regulation. The nature of problems should focus on health, safety and the environment impacting others.
The regulations, wherever possible, must be non-prescriptive. So they should focus on outcomes instead of telling people how to do things. There should be no ‘gold plating’.
Wherever possible, create guidelines as opposed to laws. Please do not punish the majority who do the right thing to try to catch the poor actors who will ignore them anyway.
The regulations should not discriminate against individual companies and groups. In particular, no discrimination against new firms or the introduction of innovative ideas.
Finally, they need costing to measure their impact on the economy.
Without clear guidance, the likely result is most regulations end up retained for spurious reasons.
January 19, 2023
Sir John
The same old response from me. I wish to live in a democracy, I may not like the result but at least I can respect it.
In a Democracy the People through their elected representatives get to make, amend and repeal the laws and rules that affect their lives within their domain. That is the only version of Democracy that most of us know.
Laws handed down to the UK from the EU in that respect should not be valid. They were dictated to the UK, the UK Parliament had to accept them, even in the so-called European Parliament while they could debate they had to accept the rulings coming from their masters.
January 19, 2023
The UK Parliament is out of practice in its purpose and still hanging to the coat tails of their masters in the EU. 40 years of declining Democracy. For most in Parliament they have never understood that their powers come from the people of their constituency, the UK and not by orders from some unelected, unaccountable committee.
The members of the UK Parliament need to freshen up on the meaning of Democracy. An interpreted EU version is not Democracy. Roughly Government for the People by the People is the only path a UK Parliament should be following.
January 19, 2023
Sir John
Reading through your wish list today it would suggest you wish the UK Parliament was there working for the UK and its people.
It might come as a surprise to some in the HoC that’s exactly why the have been empowered by their constituents to do and that is exactly what they are paid for.
January 19, 2023
In the words of Hefner from yesterday: [There is no such thing as EU maternity rights, a-tracy, each EU27 country has its own standard. The same applies to the number of statutory minimum vacation days. I know that the Brexiteers are unable to consider the individual 27 countries in the EU and are keen on considering the EU as a block governed by the dreaded Commission but this is far from reflecting the actual situation.]
SO whats the problem we have our own standards.
January 23, 2023
Yes, the UK has its own standards, therefore there might not be any reason to be harping on about what the EU27 do or do not do. Or will we have to continue for evermore to contrast what is done in the UK with what is done âin the EUâ?
Now may be the time to consider how sunlit Johnsonâs uplands actually are, or how much JR-Mâs ânew era of revitalisationâ has progressed since 1 February 2020, donât you think?
January 19, 2023
Droite de suite? Yes, that should go. Make a sale and you lose ownership.
‘Once this is done the law falls to be interpreted by UK courts …’ Good – but I favour legislation being crafted with enough care by Parliament so the ‘interpretation’ task on our courts is kept at a minimum. (I remember reading a comment, by Isabel Hardman, that Bill committees, in the Commons, are rather lazy about their work. And that, by comparison, the Lords does a better job at it!)
January 19, 2023
Sir John
It doesnât matter which way one wants to shake things out, we have now had 12 years of dithering and fudges by Conservative Governments refusing to get a grip and do what the people have empowered them to do.
On the EU just as with the opposition they are majority âremainâ. That also means they are unable to think and do things that matter to the UK â they need to be told what to do by their unelected masters.
For you Sir John and a few(very few) like minded soles that see being an MP as a calling and your efforts âa dutyâ, the aim to do right by the people you serve and the Country. You are all lonely voices that are not kowtowing to the principle if you keep quite you will be rewarded with âa job for the boysâ secure future
January 19, 2023
I predict today that this bill will have a slow passage through parliament and the end of live clauses will never be enacted but extended by every government âŠnothing to see here, nothing will change âŠrock on brino
January 19, 2023
We are the UK and no longer a subordinate state of the EU . The Government must govern with its own priorities – those that are tested and supported by UK citizens . There are many common ideologies with the EU that make sense – all very understandable and supported by a diplomatic relationship but , the buck stops there . The way the votes went in the House yesterday I fully support .
I am concerned at the stance Sunak/Hunt have taken on their hints that further taxation must always put the control of inflation at the top of their list . We , and the other public of the major economies have to be assured that there is a path out of the present black hole and that it has an equal value .
January 19, 2023
It is disgraceful and undemocratic that it has taken SIX years before we are at last showing signs of freeing ourselves from the EU. However it is understandable, as too many current members of both Houses are career MPs or young second rate lawyers who have given up the law. Prior to July 2016 they had a ‘career path’ on to the ‘gravy train’ in Brussels but that was cut off overnight. So it is not surprising that there is a determined group attempting to reverse, destroy and at the very least delay anything that moves us away from the clutches of the EU.
The NI Protocol was a classic when our best negotiator got the EU to the brink and Boris chickened out and Lord Frost quite rightly left it for him to get on with picking up the pieces.
Our present PM is very good at making encouraging announcements and then doing absolutely nothing. Brexit has to be implemented properly and the only person who could do that is Liz Truss.
January 19, 2023
George – brexit will never be implemented properly as you put it – I fear now all will go into cold storage pending a return to ‘normality’ in relations between UK and EU – and you know what that means – well first of all it means kick the can down the road – but then wait until other times to seek an associate membership of the big club – most politicians including DUP and ERG types know this too well that this can come about more easily if we do not diversify away too much – well speaking for myself I don’t see anything else happening right now and I don’t think progress with the US on trade matters or anything else will improve until we first of all have better working with the EU and clear up these lose ends like protocol – as night follows day
January 19, 2023
The focus should be on removing EU-derived legislation that constrains legitimate economic activity not
on trivial changes to VAT. The most egregious piece of such legislation is the Climate Change Act which must be urgently repealed. Remove ICES interference from our Exclusive Economic Zone. Abolish the Environment department: local rather than national management of the landscape is essential; repeal all save the planet obligations and resolve to increase substantially and incrementally the contribution of farming and fishing to our GDP. Give our fishermen absolute vetoes over sea-based wind farms and treat them at least as well as farmers with regard to tax on diesel.
January 19, 2023
It seems to me the government is faffing about, instead of getting the job done while it has a good majority.
Which, of course, is what the Con government has repeatedly done ever since Johnson got that majority.
Why can’t we have ‘wholesale cancellation of retained EU law’?
Isn’t that one of the main purposes of LEAVING the EU?
That is – what we voted for in the Referendum?
The things you list as what you want to see, Sir John, are fair enough but when, if ever, will we see them?
January 19, 2023
PB – “Why canât we have âwholesale cancellation of retained EU law”?
SPOT ON. I do not trust any of the establishment Lawyers/Judges. They are TOO set in their EU ways. Similar with the Civil Service. In their eyes the people are irrelevant. Follow the MONEY.
January 19, 2023
Like our King today, could I request that HMRC use my tax to rebuild potholes
January 19, 2023
This seems to be the T. May approach – transcribing all EU law into UK law. That was proposed back before 2016, why has it taken so long?
Does the govt believe this is the only way to get it done politically? Do they hope that the pro-EU people won’t notice a change to a UK law which used to be an EU law?
Possible, but it seems unlikely. It may be a way of putting these changes up as a conspicuous target for the remoaners to shoot down, while they claim that they tried. I’m quite sure May wanted to do it this way because it would then be conspicuous which laws were being changed by Parliament.
And… they’ve had 7 years since the referendum to do it the other way, which would be to decide which laws to retain and only enshrine those into UK law. Those would be guaranteed to pass through both Houses, since the remoaners won’t vote against an EU law becoming UK law, so they would never get the chance to actually vote against anything.
I agree with the author’s list of laws that should be changed/repealed. We certainly need to find ways to do things better e.g. should rail travel be subject to VAT? If it is, isn’t that effectively a subsidy of the railways?
January 19, 2023
It really is disappointing to see the important issues raised in your last paragraph not being dealt with urgently by your Ministerial colleagues? Many of these were commitments made by the Johnson administration and itâs this lack of determination to get these issues fulfilled that causes conservatives voters (and you no doubt), so much frustration?
January 19, 2023
I would like all VAT to go, not just on energy and green products. One example of its bad effects: the VAT levied on building works on old houses. This amounts to a huge sum and discourages people from maintaining old property. We have no need of VAT now we don’t have to pay it to the Commission as its income.
January 19, 2023
What a shocking performance that was in the House of Commons by the opposition parties. They are still hell bent on overturning our democracy. A preamble to the antics in the Lords.
I was pleased that Bill Cash pointed out that such people never have any idea of how the EU actually works.
January 19, 2023
Chancellor of the Exchequer Jeremy Hunt MP yesterday instructed the populace in the contributors to inflation using coffee cups, however he failed to mention the Quantitative Easing (QE) ÂŁ895 billion âŠ.SirJ could you have a word
January 19, 2023
They’ll keep talking and debating but they will in practice change nothing much. Action after Brexit with the pretenders currently in government will be procedural only, and they will believe that is marvellous because they don’t have to do anything difficult.
We will be deceived in this as we were in the Brexit arrangement, having caved in to the EU in all manners. This is I think significantly because EU companies own dangerous control over us through their ownership of much of our fixed infastructure and businesses.
All part of the Tories Open for Business prostititon policies which means Britain is For Sale particularly England, the nation which is allowed no economic or democratic identity.
January 19, 2023
John,
For me, the issue was to reduce the cost and burden of doing Business!
The hope is that we can get on with Supply-side reforms and deregulation, with the aim of increasing Productivity!
As an example; When can we reform the Operators License and Truck regulations, for owner drivers. allowing Owner Drivers a chance to innovate. In the case of Steel Haulage, owner drivers could gain a higher added value by offering to carrier heavier loads. 15 tonne coils are what the factory’s in the EU use, so allowing owner drivers that carry coils should be allowed to carry three coils, so 3×15 tonne = 45 tonne NET! Currently, we carry 9 tonne coils. Tractor/Trailer Technology has moved on, many years ago!
BR
RDM.
January 20, 2023
and our roads continue to get destroyed…
January 20, 2023
Agree – and stop the system of foreign multi ‘cabotage’
January 20, 2023
Nobody could reasonably object to any of the repeals Sir John has suggested. But at the root of the government’s havering over this bill is a lack of political will that has marked the leadership of and direction of every Conservative government since Margaret Thatcher resigned. Instead of doing what is needed – facing down the Blairite, EU-riddled House of Lords, ‘Conservative-in-name-only’ PMs now take the line of least resistance, as all have their eye on their lucrative post-PM future.
Repeal and careful legislation in the interest of the people of the nation demands actual governance skills that are well beyond most ministers, most MPs. We can see from the lazy answers ministerial appointees pass on from their cynical civil service bosses just how clueless the whole political establishment is. ‘All PPEs and no knickers,’ one might say.
January 20, 2023
*leadership and direction of*
January 21, 2023
In response to the cost of living crisis the Spanish Government recently reduced VAT on food items and fuels for “professional uses” which means trucks, taxis etc. Spain is in the EU.
The UK is not in the EU but sees itself as unable to reduce VAT?
Lord Mandelsohn once said that Britains problem was not with the EU but the “Gold Plater’s” of EU laws residing in Whitehall. Spain does not have a psychofantic relationship with the EU instead it negotiates down and away laws from Brussels usually only accepting after some cash has passed to pay for some project or other.
Ian Duncan Smith went on at length explaining the difference between Common law and Napoleonic law where on the one hand you can do anything unless there is a law against it and on the other you cannot do anything unless there is a law allowing it.
The “gold platers” are still with us protecting their current jobs and their career paths to greater glory when they join the 400,000 civil servants in Brussels who continue to draft and fine tune even more Nanny state laws.
Socialist Britain would clearly need EU laws but a Conservative Britain should not.