Diolch eto, Llywydd. It's great to welcome the former Chair of the Legislation, Justice and Constitution Committee in his current role here today. I note the remarks he's made in opening that the Government is not minded to give consent to this LCM, but some of the remarks that I'm going to make are pertinent in case that position should indeed change subsequently.

Our report on memorandum No. 2 on the Professional Qualifications Bill was the twentieth report our committee has produced on consent memoranda, and it followed our report on the original memorandum, which was published in September, which was our committee's second LCM report. Even at that very early stage, we noted that what we perceived to be some unfortunate trends were emerging, which I'll turn to in a moment. It doesn't give us any great joy to stand here again saying that we see these trends continuing. Those worrying signals are there.

We're being presented, as I mentioned earlier on this afternoon, with UK Bills that include, as the Minister and Counsel General has just said, concurrent powers—powers that may be exercised by the Welsh Ministers or the Secretary of State in relation to Wales. And while we understand that the Minister, indeed, as he said today, is equally concerned by such powers, our most recent report on the Bill again highlights that the Welsh Government’s preferred mechanism for resolving this problem is to provide the Welsh Ministers with a consenting role when such regulations are to be made by the Secretary of State. But, Llywydd, we would argue that this, yet again, bypasses the role of the Senedd as the legislature in Wales. We, as Senedd Members, are therefore being denied a role in directly affecting the detail of primary legislation on devolved matters, and also, subsequently, in carrying out our role in scrutinising secondary legislation that will become law in Wales.

An additional and worrying trend is the combined effect of concurrent and Henry VIII powers that would enable UK Government Ministers to amend the Government of Wales Act 2006—there's a common theme here this afternoon—our principal devolution statute, without the consent of this Senedd. I sound like a broken record, but this record will keep on playing as long as this keeps coming up. The Minister agreed to our recommendation in our first report and he has indeed sought an amendment to the Bill to prevent the 2006 Act from being amended by such means. In our second report, we asked the Minister to provide an update on discussions he has had with the UK Government on this matter, and we're really grateful to the Minister for responding to our most recent report at the end of last week.

On this matter, the Minister appears to have pursued extensive discussions with the UK Government, and that's really to be welcomed. That necessary changes to the Bill have not subsequently been made is therefore even more regrettable. As things stand, regulation-making powers in this Bill, if and once enacted, could, as I've said, be used to amend the 2006 Act, and we cannot take this lightly. So, the committee decided to use this memorandum, Llywydd, and this Bill as an example case when we recently wrote to the Rt Hon Michael Gove MP in his capacity as Minister for Intergovernmental Relations. We highlighted a range of common matters, such as those I have just outlined, and asked him, given his responsibilities in this area, to give consideration from a UK Government perspective to the issues we raised. We are taking this very, very seriously.

Before closing, I will briefly mention the second recommendation in our report on memorandum No. 2. In the original memorandum, the Minister highlighted a restriction in what is now clause 16 of the Bill that he described as 'unique to the Welsh Ministers' powers'. This clause effectively imports restrictions set out in the 2006 Act relevant to the making of primary legislation by this Senedd into the regulation-making process of the Welsh Ministers. This, we would say, is not only an unusual but an unwelcome power to be taking. The Minister is of the view that assurances given by the UK Government mean that some concerns have been addressed. However, no information is provided in memorandum No. 2 as to the nature of these assurances. As far as we are aware, no changes have been made to the face of the Bill. As such, and as this proceeds, we would ask for that detail to be provided.

In his response to our report, the Minister also noted that there were concerns that the UK Government had assumed that UK Bills that confer regulation-making powers on the Welsh Ministers should always be drafted in a way that ensures that the legislative competence of the Senedd and the Executive competence of the Welsh Ministers align, and that, given that the UK Government now agrees that there are instances where such competences do not align, the Minister is satisfied with the outcome. But, Minister, we're still unclear as to how the clause does not represent a limitation to Welsh Ministers’ powers. I am aware that you have shared relevant correspondence on this with the Economy, Trade and Rural Affairs Committee and, whilst I'd welcome you saying more this afternoon, perhaps I could ask that you commit to providing a further written explanation to our committee as well as soon as possible. Diolch, Llywydd.