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Trade Bill

My Lords, I am pleased to support the Trade Bill today and to welcome my noble friend the Minister to the Dispatch Box. I am an

unapologetic free trade enthusiast. Free trade is a foundation stone of a prosperous economy, which in turn is a precondition for sustainable reductions in poverty and inequality. At the end of the day, fetters on free trade and protectionism are GDP destructive and we should always seek to avoid them.

I did not take part in the deliberations on the trade Bill introduced in the last Parliament. At that time, Parliament was barely functioning, and the Bill was sabotaged in your Lordships’ House with various amendments that meant that it could not proceed further. Many of the same arguments were rehearsed in another place when this Bill was considered, and the other place, by large majorities, rejected the proposed amendments. There is of course nothing to stop your Lordships’ House asking the other place to think again, but noble Lords must know that the chances of a different outcome are vanishingly small. I hope noble Lords will want to avoid creating an impression in the country at large that our House is simply out of touch with political realities.

In addition, I hope noble Lords will recognise that amendments that seek to constrain imports of agricultural goods and impose restrictions on free trade agreements in relation to the NHS have not only been rejected in the other place but are completely unnecessary. The Government’s policy on both areas is clear and, in the case of agriculture, is backed up by the new Trade and Agriculture Commission.

In Grand Committee yesterday, we debated the role of Parliament in treaty scrutiny, and it is clear from today’s debate that there will be attempts to change this Bill to give Parliament more powers, as your Lordships sought to do in the last trade Bill. Leaving aside the facts that this Bill modestly covers only continuity treaties, and that our existing, long-standing scrutiny processes have served us well enough in the past, I remind the House that this too was defeated in the other place.

While I am a big fan of the Government’s trade policies, I am going to sound one note of caution about the Bill’s information powers, of which I am instinctively wary. I shall want to explore in Committee whether the provision of information to HMRC under Clause 7 really is voluntary, as the Minister in the other place has claimed, and whether the information disclosure provisions are proportionate. However, I have no intention of spoiling my noble friend the Minister’s day, and I reiterate my support for this Bill.

6.06 pm