Background

At its meeting on 28 January 2019, the External Affairs and Additional Legislation Committee agreed to undertake an inquiry into UK international agreements and their implications for Wales.

An explainer video on international agreements can be viewed below.

YouTube-Here https://www.youtube.com/embed/VIVlSMDWn2U

Reporting

The process of how the Committee scrutinised each agreement can be viewed below.

The Committee began its consideration of international agreements and their implications for Wales at its meeting on 4 March 2019.

At that meeting, the Committee agreed to report to the Senedd on any agreements for which a substantive point of scrutiny is to be addressed, and to draw these reports to the attention of the:

• relevant Welsh Minister;
• relevant UK Minister;
• relevant committees in the UK Parliament, Scottish Parliament and the Northern Ireland Assembly.

The agreements considered and actions taken since 4 March 2019 have been summarised in a table (PDF, 80KB).

Of the ten agreements considered at its meeting on 4 March 2019, the Committee agreed to report on three in order to highlight concerns that were raised around consultation with the devolved governments.

At its meeting on 18 March 2019 the Committee considered seven agreements and agreed to report on three.

On Friday 24 May, the Committee published its third report on international agreements: Report on the agreement on trade in goods between Iceland, Norway and the UK.

At its meeting on 16 September 2019 the Committee considered eight agreements and agreed to report on two. On 17 September 2019, the Committee published its fourth report on international agreements.

On 31 October 2019 the Chair wrote (PDF, 164KB) to Lord Kinnoull, Chair of the European Union Committee at the House of Lords regarding the UK/Korea: Free Trade Agreement.

Information on the Committee’s scrutiny of the UK’s trade policy and its implications for Wales can be found here.

The Committee published its report on UK international agreements after Brexit: a role for the Assembly, on 18 December 2019. The report provides an outline approach for Senedd engagement with, and scrutiny of, significant future UK international agreements. The Welsh Government responded to the report on 5 February 2020.

On 3 June 2020 the Committee provided a written submission (PDF, 207KB) to the House of Lords EU International Agreements Sub-Committee inquiry into how Parliament scrutinises treaties [cover letter] (PDF, 138KB).