Highlights of the EU Withdrawal Bill House of Lords Second Reading Debate: Day One

Highlights of the EU Withdrawal Bill House of Lords Second Reading Debate: Day One
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Conservative Leader of the House of Lords Baroness Evans of Bowes Park opens the Second Reading debate: “The Bill is about providing certainty and ensuring people’s rights are upheld… It is not about revisiting the arguments of the referendum or a vehicle for policy change”:

Labour Lord Adonis presents an amendment before quoting Lord Carrington: “The vision of a United Europe of France, Italy, Germany and Britain… must surely be something to stir the imagination of the most phlegmatic and placid”:

Labour Lords Leader Baroness Smith of Basildon of says she hopes the Minister will listen to the different points of view in the House of Lords:

Liberal Democrat Lords Leader Dick Newby insists the Lib Dems “have no intention of derailing” the EU Withdrawal Bill or “unnecessarily spinning out debate”:

Former EU Commissioner Lord Hill of Oareford warns his fellow Lords that “we will damage our reputation if we try to use this Bill to play politics, to slow the process down, or seek to undo commitments given in manifestos or Parliamentary votes”:

Lord Hill rejects ‘close alignment’ with the EU after Brexit, saying: “It makes no sense for a service-based economy like ours to be bound by rules over which we have no influence… We must surely place a greater priority on being able to shape our own future than on preserving the status quo”:

Former UKIP leader Lord Pearson of Rannoch hits out at the “dishonesty” of those who claim they want Parliament to have a say in Brexit but who “in truth want to reverse the referendum’s result”:

House of Cards author and Conservative peer Lord Dobbs warns his fellow Lords who have made “sad and unwise” comments about sabotaging Brexit that “they won’t sabotage Brexit but they might very well sabotage the credibility of this House”:

Former First Secretary of State and European Commissioner Lord Mandelson says he has changed his mind on respecting the referendum result: “Following the referendum I took the view that the result must be upheld – the Government should deliver Brexit and Parliament’s duty was to facilitate this. I no longer believe this to be axiomatic”:

Green Party peer Baroness Jones of Moulsecoomb says: “We can have a greener, fairer and healthier country by leaving the European Union”:

Migration Watch chairman and BrexitCentral contributor Lord Green of Deddington says: “Any impression that legal arguments were being used as a cover to frustrate the UK’s departure from the EU will be deeply damaging to the future of this House and perhaps our political system as a whole”:

Former Brexit Minister Lord Bridges of Headley says the Government must make the decision on what kind of Brexit it wants:

Lord Bilimoria says the “mantra of going global” and “sovereignty and taking back control” are a “lot of nonsense”, while quoting incorrect trade figures and referring to an EU-Japan trade deal which is yet to be ratified or implemented:

Lord Bilimoria ends his speech by comparing Brexit to the buildup to the First World War:

Matt Ridley warns that: “If, in this gilded, crimson echo-chamber of Remain… we indulge in wrecking the Bill, we won’t stop Brexit, but we might hurt Britain. The public reaction would be rightly severe”:

Matt Ridley compares the Treasury’s pre-referendum forecasts with the economic facts since the vote and finds a “clean sweep of failed predictions”, before pointing out that it has barely changed the models it used to come up with the new Brexit forecasts leaked yesterday:

Matt Ridley: “We are facing a thrilling century in a vibrant world. We can face it from behind the protectionist tariff walls and harmonised regulatory veils of the EU – a place where sluggish legislation is shaped by £1.5bn of crony capitalist lobbying every year – – or we can face it openly, adopting global standards and taking decisions that favour innovation, rather than retard it”:

Former Ulster Unionist Party leader Lord Empey warns against the Irish border issue being “weaponised” in the Brexit debate and says the scale of the problem has been “grossly exaggerated”:

Former Supreme Court Justice Lord Brown of Eaton-under-Heywood says he can see “no good reason” to retain the EU’s Charter of Fundamental Rights and that it would “needlessly complicate things for no good purpose” as it simply replicates rights already covered in the UK by the European Convention on Human Rights and the Human Rights Act:

“I hate referendums!” shouts former EU Commissioner Lord Patten of Barnes, but confirms he would vote against a second referendum:

Baroness Wheatcroft says that she agrees with Lord Patten of Barnes that “referenda should be avoided” but then indicates her support for a second referendum on the EU:

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