Marking of Retail Goods Regulations 2025

Baroness Hoey Excerpts

Monday 30th June 2025 Lords Chamber

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Baroness Hayman of Ullock) (Lab)]

My Lords, this instrument will help ensure the security of food supply to Northern Ireland and maintain consumer choice for the people of Northern Ireland. The purpose of this legislation is to deliver the UK Government’s long-standing public commitment to safeguard the supply of retail goods into Northern Ireland and protect the UK internal market, by providing for a contingency power to introduce “not for EU” labelling in Great Britain if required. It upholds commitments made under the Windsor Framework, reiterated in the Safeguarding the Union Command Paper, both of which commanded broad support across this House. It facilitates the movement of goods throughout the UK while also protecting the biosecurity of the island of Ireland.

I begin by setting out the background to this policy. The Windsor Framework, which replaced the original Northern Ireland protocol, was agreed between the United Kingdom and the European Union in February 2023. A key component of the Windsor Framework is the Northern Ireland retail movement scheme, which simplifies the movement of goods from Great Britain to Northern Ireland. It removes the costly certification and controls that were necessary under the original Northern Ireland protocol and allows for goods to be moved on the basis of UK food safety standards. To benefit from these arrangements, business operators must label retail goods in scope of the scheme “not for EU”, and these labelling requirements have been introduced in phases, with the final tranche of products coming into scope on 1 July—tomorrow. From this date, a much larger group of retail goods will need to be labelled to be eligible to be moved via the scheme from Great Britain to Northern Ireland.

Given the size of the retail market in Northern Ireland, which is approximately 3% of the entire UK market, certain businesses may decide that the cost of labelling their goods only to move them to Northern Ireland is too great. They may choose not to label, leading to product removal from the Northern Ireland market, known as delisting, if an alternate route to market is not available. This would negatively impact Northern Ireland citizens, since they would not have access to the same range and availability of food goods as the rest of the UK that they rightfully deserve. We do not believe that this is an acceptable outcome.

This brings me to the purpose of the regulations before us. The instrument provides a contingency power by which the Environment Secretary can issue a notice to require that a certain product be marked “not for EU” in order to be sold in Great Britain. Before doing so, the Secretary of State will consider a range of evidence. This includes intelligence from stakeholders and market monitoring data, the latter of which will highlight patterns in the distribution of retail goods throughout the UK internal market and highlight anomalies and changes as they arise.

By extending the labelling requirement for certain products to the much larger GB market, we will take away the incentive for businesses to remove products from Northern Ireland. It will use the size of the whole UK market as an economic incentive to label their goods. This ensures continued product availability and consumer choice in Northern Ireland and upholds the commitments we made in the Safeguarding the Union Command Paper.

In recognition of the fact that food labelling is a devolved matter, the Secretary of State will consult Scottish and Welsh Ministers before making a determination. He may also engage the Independent Monitoring Panel, established through the Safeguarding the Union Command Paper, for its views.

The timing of this instrument is critical. With the final phase of labelling requirements under the scheme commencing on 1 July, we must make this legislation now in order to provide a credible and timely mechanism to deter product delisting and to have the ability to act should a serious effect on availability look likely.

I will now set out the fundamental elements of these regulations. After making a determination that the supply of a specific retail good will be or is likely to be seriously adversely affected as a result of the “Not for EU” labelling requirement, the Secretary of State must issue a marking notice. This will specify which goods must be labelled in GB and from which date. The notice must also be published in the London and Edinburgh Gazettes, as well as a Written Statement setting out the rationale. We will support compliance by promoting and explaining the new requirement to businesses through various fora.

The new labelling obligation falls on the relevant business operator who first places the goods on the market in Great Britain. This is typically the manufacturer responsible for producing the product, who will have the greatest ability to affect its packaging. There will be exemptions that will apply to qualifying Northern Ireland goods, food for special medical purposes and small companies, which is in line with this Government's commitment to support growth. These regulations will also support our relationship with the European Union.

We and the EU, through our common understanding that was published on 19 May following the UK-EU summit, have confirmed that we will jointly take forward a range of measures as part of our reset in relations, including a UK-EU SPS agreement. Once finalised, this will remove a broad and wide-ranging set of SPS and agri-food requirements for goods and plants moving from Great Britain to Northern Ireland. We also expect that this may remove the need for businesses to label the majority of their goods as “Not for EU” when moving them into Northern Ireland.

However, achieving such benefits relies on the UK being a reliable partner that delivers on its existing commitments. To that end, we are clear that we must implement the arrangements for the Windsor Framework in a full and faithful way, even where our ambition is that those arrangements may not be needed in the future. Therefore, this SI is vital to maximise compliance with labelling requirements in the meantime, meeting the expectations of the EU and also encouraging the movement of goods into Northern Ireland.

To conclude, our approach to this statutory instrument is a pragmatic and proportionate response to a genuine risk. This legislation will help protect consumer choice in Northern Ireland. It will support the continued flow of goods throughout the United Kingdom. It delivers on our commitments under the Windsor Framework agreement and, most importantly, safeguards Northern Ireland’s place in the United Kingdom.

[Baroness Hoey (Non-Afl)]

My Lords, I thank the Minister for laying out the regulations in detail. She will not be surprised that she has not convinced me. I hope that the short debate that we have tonight—even though there is not much interest on the Labour Back Benches or even the Conservative Back Benches—will get down in Hansard and people might read why many of us will be opposing these regulations.

One of the critical problems arising from the Northern Ireland protocol was the way in which—apart from the democratic aspect of disenfranchising people in 300 areas of law—it threatened Northern Ireland’s supply chain. This was said by many people, including noble Lords in this House, from the beginning. The Windsor Framework was supposed to fix that, but the regulations before us today come with Explanatory Notes that recognise that the Windsor Framework green lane “Not for EU” labour provisions, which come into effect tomorrow—in just a few hours’ time—threaten Northern Ireland’s supply chain.

Paragraph 5.11 of the Explanatory Memorandum states:

“A much greater range of products will be brought into scope of labelling requirements in July 2025, increasing the potential risk of product delisting. Therefore, the government requires a means of intervention to manage this risk and deter businesses from delisting products by providing a credible threat of enforcement”.


That all sounds very good. The chief executive officer of Marks & Spencer has described the labelling as “madness”. This madness is particularly pronounced in Northern Ireland, which those of us who live there can appreciate much better than those living in Great Britain.

The rationale for the application of “Not for EU” labels was to help protect the integrity of the EU single market, preventing goods produced in Great Britain crossing the border into the Republic of Ireland, the EU territory. The problem is, however, that these labels, which generate huge costs to the UK economy both in terms of packaging and threatening our supply chains, are completely useless.

--- Later in debate ---

I would like to conclude—

[Baroness Hoey (Non-Afl)]

I thank the noble Baroness for her very comprehensive responses, but could she just say something about the issue raised by a number of us about the ridiculousness of protecting the EU’s internal market with the “Not for EU” labels? Hundreds of people are coming over every weekend buying “Not for EU” labelled goods in Northern Ireland and taking them into the Republic. It is a nonsense.

[Baroness Hayman of Ullock (Lab)]

As I mentioned, we are currently in discussions regarding an SPS agreement in order, I hope, to be able to remove many of the requirements, if discussions meet our ambitions. But the EU has made it quite clear that we are expected to meet our obligations under the Windsor Framework until the outcomes are known. At the moment, we do not know what those outcomes are and this falls under those obligations.

As I was saying, I would really like to say that I am committed to common sense whenever possible; I think a lot of people are. I find the regular meetings with our Northern Ireland colleagues extremely useful. Although I make it clear that we believe this instrument is making an important contribution to safeguarding Northern Ireland’s place in the union, which we are very deeply committed to as a Government, we need to continue to try to move together forward constructively. The EU reset is going to make big changes, and it is important that those of us who have an interest in Northern Ireland understand the implications for Northern Ireland and that we can work together as we move forward. I know we will never agree on everything, but that is an important—