UK government presses on with power grab

For all the honeyed words of the noble Lord Gardiner of Kimble about preserving harmony in the British family, the Government yesterday recklessly brushed aside the constitutional concerns of two Crown Dependencies.

Heartfelt warnings from the islands’ friends in the House of Lords – including Conservative, Labour, Crossbench and Liberal Democrat peers – about the dangerous course being taken by newly-appointed DEFRA minister Victoria Prentis were to no avail.

A promise to set up a committee to talk further with the islands about fisheries offers little more than a talking shop. The Government will have its ‘safety valve’ come what may, or they would have given way yesterday in the face of fierce opposition.

There were echoes here of the Northern Ireland Brexit debacle as Lord Gardiner admitted that the Government has no intention of using the permissive extent clause.

It is a ‘backstop’ – and we know what happens to them.

So it was not enough that the islands have always paid scrupulous attention to their international obligations – unlike the UK. Nor was it accepted that the PEC would have no authority in law unless the islands’ Assemblies agree to it.

The two Bailiwicks must now decide how to react. Not because independent control of CI fisheries is of paramount importance but because a principle is at stake.

If the UK can unilaterally decide that fisheries falls within international relations and it can impose its will without consent what is to stop the same being said of a finance matter, or one of security, or trade?

This unilateral power grab has, as Lord Anderson of Ipswich said, sown discord where there was harmony. There was no compelling reason for the Government to use such a sledgehammer solution for a hypothetical problem.

And yet it did.

In the face of such a constitutional assault it is crucial that Guernsey and Jersey stand together and work towards rebuilding the defences of a proud independence which the island have jealously guarded for centuries.