Senedd votes to refuse consent for Retained EU Law Bill
The Senedd has formally refused consent for the UK Government’s controversial Retained EU Law Bill in a vote this evening (Tuesday 28th March).
Mick Antoniw, the Welsh Government’s Counsel General and Minister for the Constitution, said the proposed legislation threatens food standards, environmental protections, workers’ rights, and business and consumer certainty.
The Retained EU Law Bill seeks to repeal or replace more than 2,400 pieces of former EU law that were converted into domestic legislation as part of the EU exit process. The plans in the Bill would lead to most of these laws dropping off the UK statute book by the end of this year if no action is taken.
Withdrawn
Speaking after the vote, Mick Antoniw said: “Today the Senedd sent a loud and clear message – the Retained EU Law Bill is bad for Wales and should be withdrawn by the UK Government.
“The Bill would change a raft of legal standards without any clear idea of the implications of doing so. This is a reckless and irresponsible approach to vital standards that improve people’s quality of life.
“It would also give UK Government Ministers authority to legislate in devolved areas. Both the Senedd and the Scottish Parliament have both been clear that this is an unacceptable encroachment on the democratically established devolution settlement.
“I welcome the result of this vote and will continue to stand up for Wales by opposing this legislation.”
Legislative Consent Motion votes are held when the UK Government wishes to legislate on a subject matter which is devolved. Constitutional convention requires the Senedd to give consent to the legislation before it can be passed in Westminster. The Senedd has joined the Scottish Parliament in voting to withhold consent for the Retained EU Law Bill.
The Bill is currently at report stage in the House of Lords as part of the scrutiny process.
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The REUL bill has already died over the EU reducing levels of arsenic in baby food. Westminster insisted that the UK standards would remain the same with the original higher arsenic levels but the manufacturers rebelled. With one voice they told the Tories not to be so daft and they would ignore the “taking back control” rubbish and produce to the new EU standards.
I was as worried as anyone about the lowering of standards but it seems that the government of the UK is now so irrelevant they are being ignored.
Its time to stand up for Cymru.
What did people think “Vote Leave to Cut Red Tape” meant? De-regulation was held up as a big Brexit prize and Wales voted for it. Scotland and NI had more sense of course and knew better than to trust Tory ERG propagandists. Don’t like it? Too bad, you voted for it when you voted to leave the protection of the EU and hand the country over to a bunch of right-wing isolationist extremists. Brexit – all pain, no gain. Enjoy.
Kiss goodbye to all your rights
And the French rebel for just increasing the retirement age, no wonder this Tory government can ride roughshod over the people in the uk, we must be the laughing stock of any country with backbone
Although this bill is symbolic the English Conservatives will like a bull in a china shop steamroller our human & workers rights. Good examples are the recent bypassing the Senedd when they, (the Tories) placed 300 migrants in a mothballed army barracks in Pembrokeshire during the height of the Covid pandemic with no adequate PPE, this without consulting the Welsh Government, and the final insult was to charge the council tax payers of Pembroke to cost of housing them. The recent dissolving of Welsh Law protecting striking workers, The taking away of Welsh Government power to administrate our once EU… Read more »
Quote:
“I know it’s an inconvenient truth that you don’t like to remember, but the majority of people in Wales voted to leave the EU”
Darren Millar, Conservative MS..
This is getting old. Playing the support the UK government or your against democracy narrative. Will your party please respect the referendum result of 2011 in which Wales voted for greater devolution. This is another Bill that takes power away from the Senedd.
The likes of Millar need to take into account that the small majority of Welsh voters who elected to leave the EU did so partly in response to the EU’s failure to deal effectively with its migrant crisis, partly through a false promise that Wales would have the same funding levels after leaving, and partly for Wales to gain greater control of of its own affairs. They were not voting for a whittling down of devolution and the side-lining of the Senedd by the UK Government.
Hmmm, the people stupidly voted (not me !!) to leave the EU not to have their living standards trashed by reckless ideology. What is happening is this right wing government is using the vote as an excuse for all sorts of dubious action. What will undoubtedly happen is the Welsh and Scottish Governments will be ignored, as usual, and the law will be pushed through anyway. Our only way to stop this rubbish is through independence.
It won’t get any better under a UK Labour government.
The one mistake is that the Welsh Labour government should have refused to implement the holding of the 2016 referendum within Wales as doing so was not in the interests of the Welsh people. The people of Wales were happy to leave this economic, legal and technical decision to the Welsh government. Overall, Wales was happy with membership of the EU and European single market. and was benefiting the Welsh economy. The 2016 referendum was a fraud on Wales and Scotland as both sides of the argument was organised by the UK regime without local or expert opinions with interest… Read more »