As I said, to give the Governments—plural—a time to decide and put in place a UK-wide framework.

Responding to me in this Chamber last week, the finance Secretary, Mark Drakeford, stated that Mr Lidington's speech

'did move a step forward in relation to our clause 11 concerns.'

Mr Drakeford then added,

'What we now need to do is to have a detailed discussion with the UK Government about some of the practical ways in which that would operate, and the key issue at stake remains that of consent'— we agree—that he will go to the next meeting of the Joint Ministerial Committee on EU negotiations with constructive proposals as to how those questions could be resolved, that his preferred course of action remains an agreed amendment that all three Governments could see put down at the House of Lords, that if an amendment cannot be agreed he will continue to pursue the amendments jointly laid with the Scottish Government in the House of Commons and will re-lay in the House of Lords, and that only if they don't succeed there, then they have to protect the position against the day when this National Assembly would not be prepared to give its legislative consent to the withdrawal Bill.

Having already achieved so much, it's therefore apparent that there's a will in both the UK and Welsh Governments to conclude an agreement that would allow the EU withdrawal Bill to go forward. I'm sure that a final push, combined with constructive engagement with Scotland, will enable this now to happen. Of course, we, the Welsh Conservative official opposition, fully recognise the constitutional principles at stake. We have consistently called for agreements on common frameworks between the Governments of the UK as a basis for a UK free trade agreement, and argued that there is no reason why the EU withdrawal Bill could not state that the restriction on devolved competency would end when common agreed frameworks come into force. We also welcome the finance Secretary's response to me in yesterday's meeting of the Assembly External Affairs and Additional Legislation Committee, to which he referred when he stated that

'very detailed work has gone on at official level', involving Welsh Government, UK Government and Scottish Government on the consent issue, and he added that there was

'more than one way in which those different positions could be bridged', and that Thursday's meeting of the Joint Ministerial Committee on EU negotiations will be focusing on practical ways that could be done, where all share the same ambition to get an agreed amendment. We also understand that discussions on this will go forward at a meeting attended by both the Prime Minister and the First Minister next week. In noting both this and the inappropriateness of introducing major constitutional legislation under emergency procedure, which would make necessary and effective scrutiny impossible, we must oppose these motions. In so doing, however, we recognise that the view of this Assembly, including ours, can be expressed by voting against the legislative consent motion if our collective concerns are not then addressed. The constitutional integrity of this Welsh Parliament must be protected, and the Welsh Conservative official opposition won't hesitate to vote down the legislative consent motion, alongside other parties, if that is compromised. Thank you.