Chapter 4: The impact of our work
Influencing the debate
125.Our primary aim in our Brexit work has been to “stimulate informed debate in the House and beyond”.56 We adopted that aim against the backdrop of the Government’s repeated refusal to give a ‘running commentary’ on its approach to Brexit, so a supporting aim of our work was to probe and cast light on the Government’s analysis of the key issues, thereby influencing its approach to the negotiations themselves.
126.Judged against those aims, we believe that our work has been largely successful. It was vital, in the aftermath of the referendum, and within the context of continuing controversy over Parliament’s role in authorising the notification of UK withdrawal under Article 50 TEU, and in approving any withdrawal agreement, that Parliament should also engage with the substance of Brexit, exposing the Government’s thinking to rigorous scrutiny, and giving stakeholders an opportunity to put their views on the record. Our inquiries and reports exemplify that parliamentary engagement, and have set a benchmark for committees of both Houses.
127.We have sought in particular to promote debate internally, within Parliament. With events moving so quickly, we suspended our normal practice of waiting up to two months for the Government to respond to a report before tabling a motion for debate. Instead we tabled motions immediately upon publication, and sought early debates, while offering as much flexibility as possible in the timing or organisation of those debates. For instance, we debated our report on Brexit: parliamentary scrutiny jointly with the Constitution Committee’s report on The invoking of Article 50,57 while we used a Question for Short Debate to secure an early debate on our report on Brexit: Gibraltar.
128.Table 3 sets out the report debates that took place during the 2016–17 Session, including on reports published during the 2015–16 Session. In total, there were nine debates on EU Committee Brexit-related reports in the last session, with a further seven debates on other EU Committee reports. Debates lasted over two-and-a-half hours on average, with a total of 240 speeches from across the House. The percentage of speakers who were not members of the relevant EU Committee was over 63%.
Report |
Date of debate |
Total members participating 58 |
Members of the relevant committee |
Other members of the House |
Length of debate |
|
Europe in the world: Towards a more effective EU foreign and security strategy |
7 June 2016 |
17 |
6 |
11 |
3 hours |
|
EU energy governance |
13 June 2016 |
9 |
5 |
4 |
2 hours 32 minutes |
|
The EU referendum and EU reform/ The process of withdrawing from the European Union |
15 June 2016 |
31 |
6 |
25 |
4 hours 48 minutes |
|
The EU action plan against migrant smuggling/ Operation Sophia, the EU’s naval mission in the Mediterranean: an impossible challenge |
15 June 2016 |
20 |
11 |
9 |
2 hours 42 minutes |
|
Children in crisis: unaccompanied migrant children in the EU |
1 November 2017 |
13 |
5 |
8 |
2 hours 24 minutes |
|
Completing Europe’s Economic and Monetary Union |
9 November 2016 |
10 |
4 |
6 |
1 hour 34 minutes |
|
Online platforms and the Digital Single Market |
9 November 2016 |
6 |
3 |
3 |
1 hour 14 minutes |
|
Brexit: parliamentary scrutiny 59 |
22 November 2017 |
22 |
4 |
18 |
3 hours 40 minutes |
|
Responding to price volatility: creating a more resilient agricultural sector |
22 November 2016 |
9 |
4 |
5 |
1 hour 37 minutes |
|
Brexit: fisheries |
16 January 2017 |
13 |
7 |
6 |
2 hours 8 minutes |
|
Brexit: future UK-EU police and security cooperation |
7 February 2017 |
16 |
3 |
13 |
3 hours 24 minutes |
|
Brexit: financial services |
9 February 2017 |
10 |
4 |
6 |
1 hour 41 minutes |
|
Brexit: the options for trade |
2 March 2017 |
18 |
13 |
5 |
3 hours 17 minutes |
|
Brexit: Gibraltar |
21 March 2017 |
18 |
3 |
15 |
1 hour 27 minutes |
|
Brexit: environment and climate change |
23 March 2017 |
14 |
4 |
10 |
2 hours 28 minutes |
|
Brexit and the EU budget |
6 April 2017 |
14 |
6 |
8 |
2 hours 35 minutes |
Average |
15 |
5.5 |
9.5 |
2 hours 32 minutes |
129.More broadly, while the Government’s consultations on Brexit have been conducted, for perhaps understandable reasons, largely in private, our inquiries have been a transparent process, allowing stakeholders in sectors as diverse as fisheries, law enforcement, aviation, manufacturing and financial services an opportunity to put their priorities and concerns on the public record. Even though time has been short, so that committees have not been able to publish formal calls for evidence, the response rate has been impressive. A total of 663 witnesses have responded to our Brexit-related inquiries, and 84 public meetings have been held to take evidence, at which 312 witnesses have appeared in person.
130.The impact of our reports upon Government is more difficult to assess, particularly given ministers’ continuing reticence to reveal their negotiating strategy and objectives. It is clear, though, from the number of comments by ministers on our reports, that our reports have been read across Government. For instance, a range of ministers, including the Chancellor of the Exchequer and ministers at the Department for Exiting the EU, commented on our report on Brexit and the EU budget.60
Media coverage
131.The 2016–17 Session also saw a significant increase in media coverage for the Committee’s Brexit reports, with our first ‘wave’ of six Brexit reports, which were published on successive days in the week beginning 12 December 2016, having a particularly dramatic impact.
132.It is important at the outset to underline the quality of media coverage of our Brexit reports, which showed that they were stimulating and influencing debate rather than merely generating headlines. For example, The Guardian created a bespoke (and unprecedented) ‘Lords Brexit reports’ online section, bringing together commentary on our reports, and thereby demonstrating the value of our cross-cutting and comprehensive programme of Brexit-themed inquiries.61 Moreover, the first report to appear, the Select Committee’s report on Brexit: UK-Irish relations, was launched simultaneously in London and Dublin, and was the subject of editorials on both sides of the Irish Sea.62 Richard Curran in the Irish Independent described it as signalling a “sea change in Anglo-Irish relations”, and there can be no doubt that it contributed to putting the future of UK-Irish relations firmly at the centre of Brexit negotiations.
133.As for the quantity of media coverage, the total number of articles about the EU Committees increased from 413 in 2015–16 to 1,861 in 2016–17. The number of positive articles increased from 390 to 1,851 in the same period.
134.Figure 2 shows the incidence and sentiment of media coverage in 2016–17, broken down by Committee, while Figure 3 shows the level of coverage for each Committee compared with 2015–16. All committee activity is included, not just Brexit work—though that work is the largest component.
Figure 2: Media coverage by Committee and sentiment of that coverage for 2016–17 Session
Source: House of Lords Press Office
Figure 3: Media coverage by Committee for 2015–16 and 2016–17 Sessions
Source: House of Lords Press Office
135.Breaking down total coverage by media type shows that the 2016–17 Session saw particularly significant increases in broadcast and regional coverage. This is shown in Figure 4.
Figure 4: Committee coverage by media type for 2015–16 and 2016–17 Sessions
Source: House of Lords Press Office
136.Figure 5 shows the media outlets with the most incidence of coverage of all Lords EU Committees.
Figure 5: Leading sources of national coverage
Source: House of Lords Press Office
Social media coverage
137.In October 2014 a dedicated Twitter account for the Lords EU Committee was launched, with the handle @LordsEUCom. The account is maintained by Committee staff, and is used to communicate our scrutiny and inquiry work, as well as events such as international conferences, debates in the House and other relevant news. The two main aims of the account are:
- To raise awareness of the Committee and its work among those with an interest in EU issues, particularly individual members of the public; and
- To enable the staff of the Committee to promote the Committee’s work more directly to non-UK, particularly Brussels-based, organisations who might be unlikely to follow the existing House of Lords corporate Twitter account.
138.Success on social media can be measured in many ways. The simplest measure is total following. As Figure 6 shows, this rose consistently through the session. The rate of increase slowed after the dissolution of Parliament (at which point activity on the account was suspended), though there was a new influx of followers shortly before the State Opening of Parliament on 21 June (not reflected on this graph), taking the total following above 7,500.
Figure 6: Number of Twitter followers
Source: House of Lords Press Office
139.Total following only tells part of the story: within the overall increase in followers, the Twitter account has continued to gain followers from EU institutions (including Commissioners and MEPs), other national parliaments, think-tanks, commentators, commercial organisations, and members of the general public—many of whom engage actively with our output.
140.The number of followers rose particularly rapidly during ‘Brexit week’ in December 2016, during which the EU Committee Twitter account posted 179 tweets and retweets, using in the process a more diverse range of images and graphics. These tweets were in turn retweeted 3,578 times.
141.Figures 7 and 8 illustrate the reach of the Twitter account.
Figure 7: Number of Twitter mentions (by month)
Source: House of Lords Press Office
Figure 8: Number of retweets, replies and mentions
Source: House of Lords Press Office
Interparliamentary cooperation
142.The Committee has also intensified its ongoing interparliamentary engagement, in particular in the context of Brexit. The Committee was represented at EU-level interparliamentary conferences, such as the Conference of European Affairs Committees of National Parliaments of the EU (COSAC), which was held in The Hague in June 2016 and in Bratislava in November, and bilateral meetings were held, both in London and in other capitals, with colleagues from the French Sénat, the German Bundesrat, the Dutch Tweede Kamer, the Irish Oireachtas, the Latvian Saeima, the Danish Folketing and the Portuguese Assembleia. The Committee has continued to engage with members of the European Parliament, including in a visit to Strasbourg, and in other fora.
143.The Committee also focused on intra-UK interparliamentary relations, with the Select Committee making visits in the course of the session to Belfast, Cardiff and Edinburgh in the context of its inquiries into the implications of Brexit for UK-Irish relations and for devolution.
144.The European Chairs UK (ECUK) forum is an opportunity for the chairs of the EU scrutiny committees in the House of Lords, the House of Commons, the National Assembly for Wales, the Scottish Parliament, and the Northern Ireland Assembly to come together. The importance of this forum has been amplified in the context of Brexit. During the 2016–17 Session, the ECUK forum met in Cardiff in November 2016, and in March 2017 in a meeting hosted by the House of Lords. Together with the other members of the forum, we are investigating ways in which the work of the ECUK can be intensified during the Brexit negotiations.
145.Tripartite meetings bring together members of our Committee, members of the European Scrutiny and Exiting the EU Committees in the Commons, and UK MEPs. Members of the Committee attended a Tripartite meeting in Brussels in November, where Brexit was top of the agenda. The next Tripartite, to be hosted by the House of Lords, was scheduled for June 2017, but was postponed because of the general election, and will now take place in the autumn.
146.Members of the Committee also attended plenary and committee meetings of the British-Irish Parliamentary Assembly, in the context of that Assembly’s own inquiries into the implications of Brexit for British-Irish relations.
147.Appendix 5 sets out in full the Committee’s interparliamentary engagement during the 2016–17 Session.
56 European Union Committee, Scrutinising Brexit: the role of Parliament (1st Report, Session 2016–17, HL Paper 33), para 36
57 Constitution Committee, The invoking of Article 50 (4th Report, Session 2016–17, HL Paper 44)
58 In the form of substantive speeches
59 Debate held jointly on this report and the Constitution Committee report on The Invoking of Article 50.
60 See for instance the Chancellor of the Exchequer’s comments on the Today programme, 29 March 2017
61 ‘Lords Brexit reports’, The Guardian: https://www.theguardian.com/politics/lords-brexit-reports [accessed 23 May 2017]
62 In The Guardian, The Financial Times, The Irish Times, and the Irish edition of The Times.