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Legislative and Regulatory Reform Bill

I am not sure that my noble friend’s main purpose in moving his amendment was to give publicity to my amendment but it is a useful trailer. It is not exactly a paving amendment but it directs the Committee’s attention to Amendment No. 30, which, put in the simplest terms, would provide a machinery, if Parliament so willed it, to reverse provisions which had become law because of the operation of Section 2 of the 1972 Act. It is absolutely certain, as I hope every noble Lord in this Chamber will agree, that a deregulatory measure which does not recognise that most of the burdens on business originate in Europe is mere window-dressing. I remind the Committee of certain remarks made by the noble Lord, Lord Bassam, at Second Reading on 13 June. He said, as if it were a matter for congratulation: "““The Commission has dropped more than 65 proposed pieces of legislation and has undertaken to simplify up to 1,400 individual pieces of Community legislation ””.—[Official Report, 13/06/06; col. 123.]" He said that as a sort of puff for the Commission, suggesting that its heart was in deregulation. But that form of words was deliberately created to conceal the truth. If you read the words carefully, you will see that the Commission is in fact saying that it has not reversed one single provision which has become law since it was invented and that it has not the slightest intention of reversing one single piece of law which it has created since it was invented. It is saying only that it has scrapped some of the nonsense which was in the pipeline and that it is prepared to see whether it can simplify certain other measures. It is a denial of any intention by the Commission to deregulate, and people had better recognise that. The Bill currently does not provide the power to deal with regulatory burdens imposed on business by operation of the 1972 Act. If there had been such a provision in law, if Parliament had so willed and if it had been prepared to face the consequences—because there would have been consequences—it could have dealt with the situation mentioned earlier by my noble friend Lord Tebbit. It could, if it so willed, have said, ““We will not have those provisions applied to the Armed Forces and, using the provision invented by the noble Lord, Lord Waddington””—in fact, not invented by him at all but adopted by him after it had been invented by Mr Cash in the House of Commons—““we will reverse what otherwise would have been of effect as a result of Section 2 of the 1972 Act””. To remove the mass of burdens on industry, Parliament needs the sort of provision contained in Amendment No. 30. We will come to that later. I need say no more, but that would give meaning to the expression of will contained in my noble friend’s amendment, which I heartedly support.