Conclusion
7.The Committee has considered carefully the case put forward, and agrees that a select committee on Northern Ireland scrutiny should be established. The terms of reference of the new committee should be similar to the remit of the Windsor Framework Sub-Committee in the last Parliament. This would allow the Committee to conduct inquiries relevant to the Windsor Framework, in addition to its focused scrutiny work.
8.Importantly, a Northern Ireland Scrutiny Committee would be complementary to the work of other parliamentary committees. The Northern Ireland Assembly now appoints a Windsor Framework Democratic Scrutiny Committee which plays an important role but which has a statutorily defined remit focused on new or replacement EU acts. A House of Lords committee with a broader remit would complement the work of this Committee, including by scrutinising EU delegated or implementing legislation (which can be significant in effect); examining the decisions and operation of the bodies and governance structures set up under the various agreements; reviewing the impact of proposed UK legislation on Northern Ireland; and assessing the UK-wide impact of the new Internal Market Scheme. All of these matters are outside the remit of the Northern Ireland Assembly Committee. We would, of course, expect the Lords Committee to liaise closely and constructively with the Committee of the Northern Ireland Assembly, as the predecessor Sub-Committee had already started to do.
9.We consider that a scrutiny-focused Lords Committee would also complement the rather different remit and role of the House of Commons Northern Ireland Affairs Committee. Again, we would expect constructive engagement between the two committees to avoid duplication of effort, as we regularly see in action across a wide range of House of Lords and House of Commons committee work.
10.The institutional framework between the UK, including Northern Ireland, and the EU, continues to bed in, and its systems and processes continue to evolve. We therefore conclude that the new Committee should be reviewed after two years, at the end of 2026, to ensure that it continues to hold a distinctive and valuable remit and role. We will also, of course, keep under review any major change in the political and institutional context which might reduce or alter that distinctive role. We do not propose that this Committee should be appointed as a sessional committee of the House.