Jacob Rees-Mogg's Brexit bill strikes of desperation - Yorkshire Post Letters

This government is desperate to prove to a worn out and struggling population that Brexit has all sorts of unseen benefits.

Before Jacob Rees-Mogg, a member of the taxpayer funded European Research Group, resigned his position in the doomed Liz Truss Cabinet, he tabled a Bill which seeks to get rid of all “unwanted” EU laws which are still on the UK statute book.

However, there is one major problem. He has put a time limit of December 31, 2023 into the Bill, during which time ministers and civil servants are meant to scrutinise 2,400 separate pieces of legislation before they are automatically removed by this self-imposed deadline.

There are presently not enough civil servants employed to do a timely job in looking at these laws.

The second reading of the Bill took place on October 25. Rees Mogg told Parliament that these laws are hampering businesses. They include employment rights, environmental protection, and airline safety, to name a few.

The desperation of this government to get rid of all influence and references to the EU is beyond childish and it almost seems as though they want to destroy any future relationship with our closest trading neighbours whilst we end up with less rights than we had when we were in the EU.

The government has been peddling this ideological nonsense since it was part of the Vote Leave team in 2016 and for years before that, where silly stories were made up about EU laws, aided and abetted by Boris Johnson in his role as a journalist.

This Bill would give ministers power to scrap or retain any of these laws without any parliamentary oversight. There was much talk of “taking back control” before and after the referendum in 2016 but it seems we have less control with the current administration.

The government has no appetite for compromise or sensible discussion. This “new” government under Rishi Sunak is the same old same old. Their attitude to the EU and blatant disregard for the lives of the people they are supposed to be serving is hopefully what will eventually end their time in office.

It had better come sooner rather than later. We need sensible, rational leadership, not a bunch of ideologues who are too busy fighting amongst themselves.