No mandate to break international law
THE past few months have been trying to say the least – for many of us it has created changes in our lives that we hadn’t seen coming. Covid-19 for example we had hoped would have been a short term problem, yet it looks like we have to contend with it a while longer.
On that note, I would just like to reassure members that our staff and officials are still here for you – working remotely and within government guidelines to keep everyone safe. The offices might be closed to the public, but we are only ever a phone call or email away.
An area of work that has kept us busy for over four years and is going to keep us on our toes for some time to come is Brexit. We have been fully engaged with the process from the very beginning and are doing everything in our power to ensure that the farmers of Wales are no worse off because of our exit from the EU.
We therefore called on MPS to ensure the UK Government is prevented from introducing proposed changes to law which would breach the EU withdrawal agreement and break international law.
The demand came following Northern Ireland Secretary Brandon Lewis’s confirmation that a UK Internal Market Bill the UK Government plans to introduce to Parliament would break international law by overriding the section of the EU Withdrawal Agreement relating to Northern Ireland.
Responding to a question in the house of commons on September 8, Mr Lewis admitted to MPS that the change to the international treaty signed just seven months ago would “...break international law in a specific and limited way.”
To propose legislation which would breach an international treaty signed just months ago puts us in the same category as countries that are generally considered to be backwards and untrustworthy, and to do this at a time when we are negotiating trade deals with a long list of countries beggars belief.
It is essential that Members of Parliament from all parties stand in the way of such a humiliating move that would undermine the UK’S standing on the world stage at such a critical time.
The government plan led to legal department permanent secretary Sir Jonathan Jones announcing his resignation, while former prime minister Theresa May asked the Northern Ireland secretary: “How can the government reassure future international partners that the UK can be trusted to abide by the legal obligations of the agreements it signs?” if it went ahead with the plans.
The current government campaigned in the 2019 election on a platform supporting the signing of the Withdrawal Agreement treaty, which it did as soon as it came to power.
As such, and however much the Government now disagrees with sections of it, they do not have a mandate to make such a U-turn, and they certainly do not have a mandate to break international law in a way that would cause such damage to our international reputation.
It is essential that our Members of Parliament from across the political spectrum prevent the government from progressing with such a short-sighted, humiliating and damaging move.