Customs (Amendment) (EU Exit) Regulations 2022

Robert Neill Excerpts

Monday 14th March 2022 General Committees

[Sir Robert Neill (Bromley and Chislehurst) (Con)]

There are strong feelings about the protocol and the nature of the Brexit that we had. Today is not the day for those, frankly. This is a technical statutory instrument, which is there to achieve a specific purpose that, it seemed to me, the Minister set out well. Sensible points were made by the shadow Minister, which I am sure that the Minister will deal with, but we all agree that it is necessary to have the measure in place. At the end of the day, it is manifestly in the interests of business that goods should be able to be released from customs control and that there should be a means thereby of doing that through the receipt of a security. That is what the regulations do.

There may be broader concerns, and we might well have sympathy with them, but this is not a debate about that. I therefore submit that the sensible thing is to have those debates in the right place—that is not here—and to pass the regulations, which are necessary to ensure better business continuity and are to the advantage economically of people in Northern Ireland. The bigger picture is that that debate is not for now, on a technical statutory instrument.

Ordered, That the debate be now adjourned.—(Alan Mak.)