Welsh Conservative Spokesperson for Europe, Mark Isherwood AM , has this week questioned the Counsel General over Welsh Government plans to seek representation at the Appeal into the High Court decision that Parliament must vote on the process to take the UK out of the European Union .
In a written Statement by the Counsel General on Friday, he said that the matter raised important questions over wider constitutional arrangements and the legal framework for devolution.
This week he made a Statement in the Chamber on ‘Article 50 Intervention’.
Responding to that, Mr Isherwood emphasised that the matters raised by the Counsel General are outside Article 50 negotiations with the European Union on EU withdrawal, and instead a matter for negotiations with the UK Government and the other home nations.
He said:
“The Great Repeal Bill, which I think is at the essence of the actions you now propose, seeks to end the European Union’s legal supremacy in the UK by converting all EU requirements to British law as soon as Britain, or, should I say, the UK, exits the block. It will pass through Parliament at the same time as negotiations with Brussels and will activate the end of the authority of the European Communities Act 1972 in the UK on day one of EU exit. Critically, the process will be separate from article 50 negotiations, which will activate the formal mechanism to leave the EU.
“Given that your written statement to Members last Friday, when you first announced your intention to make an application to be granted permission to intervene in the proposed Appeal before the Supreme Court, listed the reasons you gave for that, based on the judgments by the High Court and the High Court of Justice in Northern Ireland, and that the matters you raise will be subject to bilateral or quadrilateral negotiation between the Welsh and UK Government or the four UK home nations, and not Article 50 negotiations, does that not invalidate your involvement in a legal case that applies to whether or not the UK Government can invoke Article 50 negotiations, a separate matter, without having parliamentary approval?
“The existing convention between the Welsh and UK Government is detailed in ‘Devolution Guidance Note 9: Parliamentary and Assembly Primary Legislation Affecting Wales’. It says: ‘The UK Government would not normally bring forward or support proposals to legislate in relation to Wales on subjects in which the Assembly has legislative competence without the Assembly’s consent. If the UK Government agrees to include provisions which are within the Assembly’s legislative competence in a Parliamentary Bill, Welsh Ministers will need to gain the consent of the Assembly via a Legislative Consent Motion.’
“How, therefore, do you respond to the statement to the External Affairs Committee yesterday by Professor Michael Keating that, in evidence to a Committee in Scotland, the Secretary of State for Scotland said the Great Repeal Bill would not be an opportunity to roll back on devolved powers? Professor Keating expressed his view that the UK Government were very unlikely to do this.”