---

European Union (Amendment) Bill

The Leader of the House is always extraordinarily accommodating, courteous and helpful in Committee. That has been my experience. My reference to railroading was about an intervention on the noble Lord, Lord Pearson, who has tabled a number of amendments to the Bill and who is putting across a point of view that I know the Government do not share. When the noble Lord, Lord Bach, intervened, the noble Lord, Lord Pearson, was making a very important point—it is not often that we have an opportunity to speak to someone who was at the European Court. I felt that, if we pressed on—perhaps people felt that enough time had gone by—an important issue would be railroaded. I apologise to the noble Baroness if she felt that that was a criticism of her general conduct in relation to the Bill, but the Front Bench was being a little bit unfair to the noble Lord, Lord Pearson, in trying to hurry him on when he was making an extremely important point.