Part of 2. Questions to the Counsel General and Minister for the Constitution – in the Senedd at 2:19 pm on 9 November 2022.
Counsel General, Luke Fletcher MS and I have just returned from attending the second meeting of the UK-EU Parliamentary Partnership Assembly in London. It was good to attend that; Alun Davies and colleagues—Sam—have attended before, and it's an emerging feast of a body, and it's growing more muscular as well. But one of the themes within that is the need for this—regardless of the systems in place—regular engagement, routine engagement, between Ministers at a UK level and at an EU level, particularly in this post-Brexit scenario. We've got the Northern Ireland Protocol Bill—we don't know what's happening quite with that at the moment. We've got the EU retained law—we're not quite sure what's happening with that. We've got the Bill of Rights Bill and the impact on citizens' rights, let alone the wider panoply of legislation coming down the line. In a different context, the First Minister once used that phrase, 'the regular, reliable rhythm of meetings', how important that is. So, does he share my hopes that, with the new Government and the new Prime Minister, but all those new Ministers, that this will now become the norm that there are regular, routine, reliable meetings between Ministers, so that we can deal with some of these pressing issues?