6. Statement by the Counsel General and Minister for European Transition: The UK Internal Market Bill

Part of the debate – in the Senedd at 6:32 pm on 15 September 2020.

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Photo of Jeremy Miles Jeremy Miles Labour 6:32, 15 September 2020

Jenny Rathbone is right to point to the innovations that we've achieved in this Senedd in many of the examples that she gave. We are proud of those standards here in Wales, and people in Wales are proud of being able to rely on them. Whether it's minimum alcohol pricing or hormone beef and labelling for that, whether it's single-use plastics, housing standards, the regulation of landlords, all of these policy areas where we are ambitious in our reach as a Senedd are in question as a consequence of aspects of this Bill. And we are working through each clause of the Bill to ascertain exactly the level of challenge that some of its provisions make to our ambitions.

I just want to say this one thing: we have managed very successfully to be able to diverge in different parts of the UK in areas where we wish to do so to reflect the priorities of our different countries. We have done that very successfully in a way that gives people pride in those standards in different parts of the UK, and also enables the business community, producers and manufacturers to understand the floor of standards on which these things are built. The proposals that we have put forward as an alternative to this Bill build on that history of 20 years of divergence and certainty, and it is not too late for the UK Government to look again at that set of proposals and to overhaul this Bill, effectively, to put those agreed mechanisms, that process of agreement, at the heart of the internal market.