House of Lords
Housing Benefit
(13 years, 7 months ago)
Lords ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
Lord Kennedy of Southwark
To ask Her Majesty’s Government what are the implications of housing benefit reform for the geographic distribution of low-income families.
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department for Work and Pensions (Lord Freud)
My Lords, our published impact documents specify average losses by local authority. We expect that a very small proportion of people may have to move as a result of the housing benefit reforms, with a minimal impact on the geographic distribution of low-income families. My department has commissioned a consortium of leading research organisations to comprehensively evaluate the effects of recent local housing allowance changes. Further information on that will be available from the Library today.
Lord Kennedy of Southwark
I thank the Minister for his response. Does he agree with me that the success of UK cities is that people from all walks of life live and work together and that introducing a policy that forces low-income families to move to the suburbs, as happened in Paris, would lead to alienation and social unrest and contradict the Government’s belief in the big society?
Lord Freud
My Lords, the comparison of London with Paris, which has been made quite widely, is very misleading. The structure of London is very different from that of Paris. London is made up of a collection of villages and is quite unlike the doughnut of Paris. I would not agree with that assertion.
Baroness Gardner of Parkes
My Lords, is the Minister aware of the aggravation in London caused in the past couple of years, particularly under the previous Government, when people received letters from councils stating that they could have much higher rents than those that they were receiving and that the council would pay for them? That pushed rents up artificially. I know personally of two cases that were directly affected. Now landlords are unwilling to take rents that previously they thought were very fair.
Lord Freud
My Lords, there seems to be some evidence that landlords were able to benefit from the local housing allowance regime in that we saw its rates go up rather faster than rents for non-housing benefit recipients.
Lord Best
May I underline the thanks of everybody who is worried about the impact of housing benefit cuts for the Minister’s action in setting up this independent and rigorous review of the housing benefit consequences? Will he tell the House when it will start, who will be carrying out the review and whether it will include not just people who have to leave because they are evicted or cannot afford the new rent but those who stay put and may face considerable hardship finding the rent from their other benefits and allowances?
Lord Freud
My Lords, I am pleased that we have a stunning consortium to do this work. It is led by Ian Cole from the Centre for Regional Economic and Social Research at Sheffield Hallam University, with other key team members being Peter Kemp of the Oxford Institute of Social Policy, Carl Emmerson of the Institute for Fiscal Studies and Ben Marshall from IPSO Mori. It is a stunning group and is going to build an understanding of the impacts of the housing benefit changes right the way through from people who move to those who stay—the noble Lord was concerned about them—at national and local levels, and it will integrate that with wider housing and labour-market evidence. A lot of this will be econometric analysis. The group will report the findings to me finally, as agreed, in spring 2013, but there will be interim reports next year.
Lord German
My Lords, I congratulate the Minister on such a comprehensive independent review. Will he indicate the geographic spread of areas which will be covered? Will it include hard-to-let difficult areas as well as rural and urban areas in the whole of the country?
Lord Freud
My Lords, I am really pleased that we will have a lot of review for the amount of money that we have. We will cover no fewer than 19 carefully selected case study areas, which will include three each in Scotland and Wales, and 13 in England. Clearly, there will be a concentration on the key area of London and the south-east but we will cover representative areas right through the country.
Lord Knight of Weymouth
My Lords, the Government’s change of heart on cutting housing benefit for the long-term unemployed was most welcome. It reflects the possibility that the Minister is compassionate and listening. In that spirit, will he now listen to my noble friends Lord Kennedy and Lord Best, and to the University of Cambridge research which estimates that within five years almost the whole of inner London will be unaffordable to those in receipt of benefits? Will he even listen to the Mayor of London who described these reforms most colourfully as Kosovo-style ethnic cleansing? If the consortium finds that it is right and that he is wrong, what will he do?
Lord Freud
I assure the noble Lord that I am very pleased to be a listening Minister. Some of the forecasts clearly are misrepresented in the sense that the Mayor of London most certainly did not mean that he expected Kosovo-style cleansing. He actually said that we would not see such cleansing—and we will not see such cleansing. But we now will have a review to establish exactly what is happening. Clearly, we will watch what is happening very closely and take any steps that we need to if we find things happening that should not be.
Lord Boswell of Aynho
My Lords, we all welcome the review. Is it not important that it should also take account of long-term factors in conjunction with the other aspects of benefit reform? This is not merely a snapshot for now, trying to allay the apprehensions that some noble Lords have expressed. It is also very important to keep a continuing handle on the changing social balance and whether it is being influenced by the benefits system.
Lord Freud
My Lords, the key principle behind these housing benefit reforms is that people who are benefit recipients should experience the same kind of pressures as everyone else. That is the way to integrate them back into the world of work, which is one of the fundamentals of our whole welfare reform strategy.
The Earl of Listowel
Is the Minister aware that there is a concern that some families may be moved to different areas, which will put additional pressure on children’s services? Is there a mechanism to give additional support to local authorities if there is an additional burden on those services?
Lord Freud
My Lords, yes, the system works so that, as families move to different areas, funding follows those families. There may however be lags, which clearly is an issue of some concern. The fundamental principle is that funding follows the requirement.
Economy: Personal Debt
Lord Haskel
To ask Her Majesty’s Government what action they intend to take regarding levels of personal debt.
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department for Business, Innovation and Skills (Baroness Wilcox)
My Lords, it is unsustainable debt coupled with irresponsible lending that most concerns this Government. We will take action where necessary, which is why we launched our review of consumer credit and personal insolvency. We will make an announcement on the next steps before the Summer Recess.
Lord Haskel
Did the Minister see today’s report that household income is set to fall yet again? With personal debt at an all-time high, inflation at more than 4 per cent and no growth in the economy, does the Minister share my concern that the steps that the Government are taking to reduce public debt will simply transfer the public debt to the personal debt as people are forced to borrow more money just to keep afloat?
Baroness Wilcox
My Lords, we can thank the Labour Government for allowing public borrowing to spiral out of control. This Government are facing some very difficult decisions in order to bring us back into line. No one likes the idea of putting our people in debt any more than they absolutely have to be. The noble Lord can be assured that we are looking at every possible way to stop interest rates spiralling out of control, otherwise we will find ourselves exactly where the Labour Government found themselves: out of control.
Baroness Coussins
My Lords, in the light of the OBR’s forecast on household debt, which it states will have increased substantially by 2015, how will the Government ensure that debt advice which is both free and independent continues to be accessible to the people who most need it? I declare an interest as president of the Money Advice Trust.
Baroness Wilcox
On 12 February, the Government announced continued funding of £27 million this year to maintain the service for debt advice in citizens advice bureaux and other independent advice agencies in England and Wales. We are working to put the future provision of debt advice on to a more sustainable footing, ensuring that consumers can access the support they need easily, and that the debt-advice services deliver the best possible value for money. Good advice is worth every penny we can possibly spend on it.
Baroness Kramer
My Lords, following the comment from the noble Baroness, Lady Coussins, the noble Baroness will be aware that, because of workload and financial pressures, many citizens advice bureaux are no longer giving face-to-face advice, other than on an exceptional basis, and are directing people to what is euphemistically called a self-help system of publications and websites. Is her department monitoring how many people switch from talking to the CAB to the commercial websites which, frankly, are frequently honey pots that get them into a worse financial mess? If there is a major switch, will she consider providing additional resources to enhance face-to-face advice?
Baroness Wilcox
My noble friend is reflecting worries that we must always have when changing from one system to another. We are of course protecting the core funding for Citizens Advice and Citizens Advice Scotland, and we have directed £470 million over the spending review to support the voluntary sector. As my noble friend knows, we propose to streamline the consumer landscape, but during this time we are obviously keeping a weather eye on what is happening. I am grateful to my noble friend for bringing this to the attention of the House.
The Lord Bishop of Liverpool
My Lords, when a similar Question was recently put, I asked the Minister whether the Government were aware of the Commission on Personal Debt that was chaired by the noble Lord, Lord Griffiths of Fforestfach. The noble Lord, Lord Sassoon, responded by saying that he would look at that commission report. Can the Minister say whether the Government have now read the report and whether they are prepared to implement some of its recommendations?
Baroness Wilcox
The right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Liverpool is right to remind us that he did ask that question of, I believe, my noble friend Lord Sassoon. I think he is referring to the report published by the noble Lord, Lord Griffiths of Fforestfach, which I have read. At the moment we are doing the consumer credit review. I will check this with my colleague, but I think that that report has gone in as evidence to the consumer credit review. When that review reports in the summer, no doubt it will refer to the report of the noble Lord, Lord Griffiths of Fforestfach.
Baroness Lister of Burtersett
My Lords, will the Minister comment on fears that a number of provisions in the Welfare Reform Bill could increase the level of personal debt? I am thinking of, for example, the effective abolition of the Social Fund and the suggestion that universal credit might be paid on a monthly basis, making even more difficult the juggling act of trying to get by on a low income.
Baroness Wilcox
I am afraid that I cannot answer the noble Baroness’s question because it is not my department, but I will come back to her in writing.
Lord Myners
My Lords, setting aside the Minister’s comments that the Government seek to influence interest rates, can she explain how a reduction of the public deficit over the next five years of 6.9 per cent of cyclically adjusted GDP makes sense when private sector debt, which is already at a high level, as the noble Lord, Lord Haskel, pointed out, is due to increase to 9.1 per cent? Where is the logic about unsustainable debt, to which the Minister spoke?
Baroness Wilcox
I am not inclined to be able to answer that question right now, off the cuff. However, I remind the noble Lord, who is sitting on the Labour Benches, that it is his party which got us into this mess in the first place.
NHS: Waiting Times
(13 years, 7 months ago)
Lords ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
Baroness McDonagh
To ask Her Majesty’s Government what are the waiting times for accident and emergency treatment and operations since the abolition of targets.
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department of Health (Earl Howe)
My Lords, the four-hour A&E waiting time standard was replaced by a set of clinical quality indicators, incorporating measures of timeliness, in April 2011. The proportion of patients waiting for less than four hours during the four weeks up to 24 April 2011 was 96.7 per cent compared to 98.3 per cent in April 2010. The average median referral-to-treatment waiting time for admitted patients was nine weeks in February 2011 and 8.4 weeks in May 2010.
Baroness McDonagh
I thank the noble Earl for that Answer. It would be clearer to the House to explain that waiting times for in-patients are at a three-year, all-time high since the 18-week target was set and that A&E waits are rising sharply. I am sure the Minister accepts the evidence that longer waits for treatment cost more per patient and clinical outcomes are worse. Can he tell the House how much on average it is costing per additional patient for those waiting over the 18-week target, which amounts to tens of thousands of patients each month?
Earl Howe
My Lords, first, referral-to-treatment times fluctuate. Having looked at how the figures have moved over the past year or two, my advice is that they are broadly stable. The figures to which the noble Baroness referred were struck at a particularly pressurised time for the NHS. As she knows, there are all kinds of reasons why during the winter referral-to-treatment times tend to lengthen. However, the right in the NHS constitution to be treated within 18 weeks remains. On accident and emergency waiting times, our clear advice from clinicians was that the four-hour target should be adjusted to reflect the clinical case mix and clinical priorities.
Lord Kakkar
My Lords, I am sure the noble Earl is aware of the recent report from the Royal College of Surgeons on emergency surgical standards. Does he share its concerns about the potential detrimental impact of waiting list targets for elective procedures on clinical outcomes for patients requiring emergency operations? In asking the question, I declare an interest as a practising surgeon and professor of surgery.
Earl Howe
My Lords, we are quite clear that timeliness remains an important ingredient in the care of patients. However, we are also clear that it is not the only measure of quality. On emergency surgery, there is no reason to expect that patients will be treated any less urgently in the future than they have been in the past. What matters is clinical priorities being set correctly.
Baroness Sharples
Is my noble friend aware that very recently I was in A&E on a trolley at St Thomas’s for just under five hours waiting for a bed?
Earl Howe
My Lords, that does concern me. I do not think anyone could endorse the practice of patients remaining on trolleys. I hope my noble friend was seen and tended to in a timely manner, but what she describes does not sound to me as though it conforms with good clinical practice. However, I stress to her that the figures I have show that nationally hospitals as a whole are adhering to the new standards that have been set.
Baroness Finlay of Llandaff
My Lords, do the Government recognise that, until the shortfall of 1,280 A&E consultants is met, the quality indicators will not be met because they require consultant sign-off? They must not be interpreted as rigid targets because of the variability of clinical scenarios that present. Indeed, the Primary Care Foundation report showed that this consultant shortfall must be met because only 15 to 25 per cent of attendances could be seen by co-located primary care. That figure is much lower than other people had previously estimated.
Baroness Hussein-Ece
My Lords, attendance at A&E has steadily gone up by more than 1.3 million over the past five years. How much is this the result of the lack of access to GP out-of-hours services? Is it not the case that too many people are presenting at A&E who should be seen at a primary care setting?
Earl Howe
My Lords, I agree with my noble friend completely. That is why we are quite clear that general practitioners have to take much greater direct responsibility for out-of-hours care. At the moment they can, if they choose, divorce themselves from that responsibility and I think that was a retrograde move. Equally, we are clear that we should encourage general practitioners to look at ways of avoiding unplanned emergency admissions to hospital in the first place. That will reduce pressure on A&E.
Lord Reid of Cardowan
My Lords, I declare an interest as the person who introduced the 18-week target and limit. Clinical outcomes and efficiency are important but equally important are the pain and distress of the patients—and often their families—in waiting a long time. The Minister refers to things being no worse than in the past but in the past the waiting time after diagnosis—not counting the first consultation with a consultant or GP—to operation was two years and three years for the whole patient journey. That has now been reduced to 18 weeks and six weeks after diagnosis. Does the Minister accept that it would be a tragedy, inflicting huge pain and distress on many people, if that was now to be abandoned?
Earl Howe
My Lords, I agree with much of what the noble Lord said. There is no doubt that great strides were made under the previous Government to reduce waiting times. That is entirely to the advantage of patients. However, the noble Lord will know that, as I mentioned earlier, the NHS constitution still retains the right for treatment within 18 weeks and the contracts between commissioners and providers still retain the financial penalties if the 18-week target is broken.
Baroness Wall of New Barnet
My Lords, will the Minister reflect on the discussion that he and I have had in the past around how important waiting times are to patients? Despite the new six-week “more quality” input into how the analysis is done and the processes to which my noble friend Lady Finlay has just referred, there is still an issue when people leave hospital. They say they waited longer. We need to rethink what that really means. In the context of waiting lists, if we separate elective and A&E, as my husband is proposing, then we will do away with all of that.
Earl Howe
My Lords, the central point that the noble Baroness makes is absolutely right. We have to look at quality in the round. There is more to quality than simply timeliness, although, as I have said, timeliness of treatment is important. We need to develop indicators that show the full range of the level of care and service that patients receive. We are doing that.
Elections: Alternative Vote System
(13 years, 7 months ago)
Lords ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
Lord Willis of Knaresborough
To ask Her Majesty’s Government what they estimate will be the cost of a general election held under the alternative vote system.
The Minister of State, Ministry of Justice (Lord McNally)
My Lords, the features and associated costs of holding a general election using the alternative vote system would broadly be the same as under the existing system. A notable exception to this is the count, which, depending on the extent of preferences expressed by voters, could take longer and lead to some additional costs.
Lord Willis of Knaresborough
I am grateful to my noble friend for that interesting Answer. There is undoubtedly a polarised debate about the future of our voting system. However, does my noble friend agree that it behoves politicians in both Houses of Parliament, particularly Ministers, when making statements to base them on facts and not simply make them up to further an argument? Will he state quite clearly today that there is no requirement in the legislation and no estimate in the Government's plans for any additional costs for electronic voting or electronic counting? Can he bury that argument?
Lord McNally
My Lords, reading very carefully, I say that we have no current plans to introduce electronic counting for the Westminster parliamentary elections. The Government have made no estimate of the costs of electronic counting for them.
Lord Campbell-Savours
Will the Minister confirm that the Scottish Government have introduced an electronic counting system for local government elections in Scotland, at a cost of £5 million next year—the contract has gone to a firm called Logica, which will be counting votes under STV and AV in by-elections—and that there is an electronic counting system operating in the London mayoral elections under SV, which is again a variation on the AV system? Is not electronic counting effectively inevitable in the end?
Lord McNally
My Lords, whether it is inevitable in the end I simply do not know. As to the other information that the noble Lord imparted to the House, I am sure that it will, as ever, be accurate.
Lord Cormack
My Lords, is not the Minister correct and the noble Lord opposite also correct? There are no current plans but it is inevitable.
Lord McNally
Nothing is inevitable, including the outcome of the AV referendum.
Lord Kinnock
Will the Minister confirm that in 90 years of using alternative voting in Australia, no one has ever proposed or used machines for voting or counting under such a system? Will he also confirm that if there were alternative voting in a general election in this country, there is no proposal from anyone, no provision and no finance allocated for the introduction of machine voting? Will he advise people on both sides of this argument that it is disreputable as well as misleading to the electorate to make repeated claims, as some have, that it is necessary and inevitable that machines are used in AV voting systems?
Lord McNally
Gosh, we are getting a lot of information today. This is all extremely useful for the electorate. In less than 48 hours, the power will pass to them. I have always been one of those politicians who trusts the people and I will wait to find out what they say. As to the earlier point on the Australian experience, the noble Lord is perfectly right.
Lord Howarth of Newport
As the noble Lord has just acknowledged, the reality is that under AV the count would take longer. Will it not be the case that if we were to have an AV system, people would expect to know the result of the general election quickly, as they are accustomed to do? For that reason, is the Minister not absolutely right that if we were to have AV it would be inevitable that we would have to invest in counting machines?
Lord McNally
I think we have already had at least three questions on that to which the answer was no. As the noble Lord will know from his experience on the AV Bill, the Government are remaining aloof from the debate itself. However, I found it interesting that a Political Studies Association author at the University of Reading thought that the introduction of AV would imply an annual cost across a five-year electoral cycle of around only 30p per person. That sounds to me like a bargain.
Baroness Liddell of Coatdyke
My Lords, is the Minister aware that in Australia, in certain tightly fought constituencies, it can take two weeks to declare the result? Is that acceptable?
Lord McNally
I often think that getting the right result is better than getting quick results. Even if it takes the Australians two weeks to get the right result, that is still the right way to do it.
Lord Peston
My Lords, is the Minister aware that electronic voting system machinery is irrelevant because elections under AV, which I sincerely hope we do not have, would not be decided by the electoral process at all? They would be decided in smoke-filled rooms. The equipment required would be the equipment needed to fumigate those rooms.
Lord McNally
The interest of this House in voting systems never fails to fascinate me, particularly from Members who will run a mile from voting for this House.
Standing Orders (Public Business)
(13 years, 7 months ago)
Lords ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
Lord Strathclyde
That the standing orders relating to public business be amended as follows:
Companies Act 2006 (Consequential Amendments and Transitional Provisions) Order 2011
Lord De Mauley
That the draft order laid before the House on 3 March be approved.
Relevant document: 18th Report from the Joint Committee on Statutory Instruments, considered in Grand Committee on 27 April.
Civil Contingencies Act 2004 (Amendment of List of Responders) Order 2011
Lord Taylor of Holbeach
That the draft order laid before the House on 28 February be approved.
Relevant document: 17th Report from the Joint Committee on Statutory Instruments, considered in Grand Committee on 27 April.
European Union Bill
Baroness Anelay of St Johns
My Lords, we are about to enter the Committee stage of the Bill. I know that the House will wish to help the noble Lord, Lord Stoddart. Will those leaving please do so quietly?
Clause 4 : Cases where treaty or Article 48(6) decision attracts a referendum
Amendment 20A
Lord Stoddart of Swindon
“( ) the accession of a new member State”
Lord Stoddart of Swindon
I thank the noble Baroness. It may be convenient for the House if I speak also to Amendment 23A.
It is extraordinary that the Bill should explicitly exclude a referendum on new accessions to the European Union. So far, many contributions to the debate have been concerned with minor changes, and that of course is correct. However, the issue of new countries joining the EU is surely a major matter of constitutional importance, as well as having policy implications.
The amendments would require a referendum to be held before the accession of any new country or group of new countries. Noble Lords will recall that in 1973 the United Kingdom joined a European Economic Community—it was then described as a common market—of six member countries. The electorate was told at that time that there would be no essential loss of sovereignty. At the subsequent referendum on whether the country would remain in the community it was told the same thing. The then Government of Harold Wilson assured the people that the veto protected Britain’s sovereignty, and that economic and monetary union had been specifically ruled out. We now know, of course, that it was not specifically ruled out, because it has since been ruled in.
The electorate certainly were not warned at that time that the EEC would grow into the European Union, with a threefold increase in membership, but there it is—the original six countries increased to nine and then to 12, and by increments the membership has now reached 27 members. The British electorate have had no say in these increases, and there has been only cursory examination, if I may say so, by Parliament. Yet the implications for Britain—financial, economic, social and political—have been profound. Many of the newly admitted countries have been poor and often backward, causing transfers of finance to be made between richer and poorer countries, to which the United Kingdom has had to make a very large contribution which the taxpayer has to meet. This year, that contribution will amount to £9.3 billion, and it will go on increasing over future years.
Then, of course, Britain’s influence in the EU is diluted as the number of member states and the total population grows due to the system of qualified majority voting, as well as social stresses and additional social costs arising from increased immigration. Noble Lords will also recall that during the most recent accessions, the Government gave assurances that immigration would be limited to about 12,000, but in the event it turned out to be hundreds of thousands.
Furthermore, experience has shown that as the EU has grown larger, additional significant new powers are demanded for the institutions of the Union on the basis that these are needed to cope with the additional size and complexity of the enlarged Union. Indeed, every new treaty has extended the power and influence of the European Union, especially the Single European Act, the TEU—the Maastricht treaty—Nice and Amsterdam, culminating, of course, in the Lisbon treaty which, according to Monsieur Valéry Giscard d’Estaing, incorporated everything, except for a few minor items, that was in the European constitution, which he masterminded.
So the issue of new accessions is of vital importance, and it is ongoing. There are at present four candidate countries—Croatia, the former republic of Macedonia, Turkey and Iceland. There are also five potential candidate countries—Albania, Bosnia-Herzegovina, Kosovo, Montenegro and Serbia. They are all poorer countries; one of them is near-bankrupt and in danger of defaulting on its debts. Their combined population is nearly 100 million. Ninety per cent of Turkey, by far the largest of the applicants by population, is geographically in Asia, so the European Union would in my view—and in anyone else’s view, I imagine—be transformed by Turkey’s admission into a Eurasian union.
Lord Waddington
My Lords, I want Turkey and other states to accede but, like many others, I worry about whether a referendum would yield a yes vote. However, I must not emulate certain others and come down against referendums in this area for fear of the result. That indeed would be sinful. I want convincing arguments as to why referendums on accession treaties should be excluded, and I am worried about the strength of the arguments advanced so far. In particular, what about immigration? Do we not, when we agree to an accession treaty, cede more power to control immigration into this country? That is what worries me. I would just like an answer from my noble friend on that point.
Lord Pearson of Rannoch
My Lords, my name is to the amendment. I support it and congratulate the noble Lord, Lord Stoddart, on how he introduced it. In doing so, I put on record some of the background to new countries joining the EU, which will apply to any new country joining in the future.
One of the arguments put forward by those who support the project of undemocratic European integration is that all those eastern European countries voted for it and signed for it, Turkey and Croatia want to join, and so there cannot be anything wrong with it, can there? This argument avoids two essential ingredients in the story of what actually happened in those countries before they joined. The first was that the yes campaigns—the campaigns in favour of the country in question joining the EU—were massively better funded than the no campaigns. For instance, in Estonia, where I went once or twice in an attempt to help the no campaign, it was estimated that the yes campaign spent 60 times as much as the no campaign could afford and Brussels felt free to dispense taxpayers’ largesse on a large scale to the applicant nations’ yes campaigns. In Estonia, I regret to report that our Foreign Office funded a yes campaign battle bus, which distributed chocolate and whisky to happy Estonians. I saw that—it did happen, but I did not get any chocolate or whisky.
The second ingredient was less easy to spot and has received virtually no comment, which is that many of the political class in the applicant nations were keen for their countries to join the EU because they wanted jobs in Brussels, or at home, on the Brussels pay scale. The Polish ambassador in London at the time told me twice that 1,400 Poles got jobs in Brussels or Poland at a minimum of 10 times their previous salaries. Most of us would do quite a lot for 10 times our present income and so one cannot blame the politicians and bureaucrats in question in those countries for seeing EU membership as a very rosy project indeed. Whether it turns out to be so in the long term for the people whom they deceived remains to be seen. That is another of the powerful hidden factors at work with all those former communist countries and their desire to join the EU, and they will apply to any newcomers.
How does it look from our end? My noble friend Lord Stoddart has mentioned the 12,000 or 13,000 people who were estimated to come into this country after the applicant nations joined. I think that the final figure was more like 1 million. I hope that the Minister will give us an estimate of the number of people who came here. The Poles are wonderful people and I admire them tremendously. They are one of the greatest people on earth but I am not sure how the general influx from the new European countries affected our UK labour force. We had Mr Brown’s mendacious promise of British jobs for British workers, which never looked like being a starter while we remained in the EU and were unable to control our borders. More widely, we now know that our borders were deliberately taken down by the Blair Government. We are told by a civil servant who was involved at the time that they did so,
“to rub the noses of the right in diversity”.
What they may have done, in fact, is to condemn a great many of our working people to unemployment. I cannot believe that the present Government want to follow that route, so I would have thought that they would support this amendment.
Finally, we come to Turkey, to which my noble friend Lord Stoddart referred. I cannot see how the Government can say that they want to limit immigration to tens of thousands per annum and in the same breath say that they want Turkey to join the EU. I have to put another specific question to the Minister: if Turkey is admitted, will there be some long-term ban on Turkish immigration to this country? Will the right to free movement of persons be withheld from Turkey for a long period? Is that in the Government’s thinking when they say that they want Turkey to be in the EU, or are the Government saying simply that, “The project of European integration is wonderful; the more the merrier; and let’s have Turkey in”? One then has to ask, if there is to be such a hold on Turkish immigration, whether the Turkish people themselves will want to join the EU if they cannot come here—particularly here, given our generous welfare system. I look forward to the noble Lord’s answers. I support the amendment.
Baroness Brinton
My Lords, fascinating though the discussion about chocolate and whisky has been, I should like to return to the substance of the amendment and begin by mentioning the concerns over the figures relating to QMV. We perhaps overegg matters relating to the percentage change to the UK’s influence over further accessions. The UK currently has 12.33 per cent of the EU population. If Turkey, Croatia, Iceland and the western Balkans all joined the EU, the UK’s population would represent 10.33 per cent. Would a shift from 12.3 per cent to 10.3 per cent really warrant a referendum? Accession does not mean that we are losing our veto.
This provision is not needed in the Bill, because accession treaties do not transfer power or competence from the UK to Brussels; rather, that is relevant for the country that is joining. When a country wants to join, an Act of Parliament is required, as is required for all treaty changes. As an aside, I should say that accession of a country does not lead to the loss of the British veto in any area. We covered that at length earlier in Committee.
If the issue of a country joining were to be extremely sensitive, then of course a referendum could be called as part of the Act being passed by this Parliament. The referendum is there as a back-up on a particular issue, should our Parliament call upon it, but such a provision is not needed in the Bill.
Lord Dubs
My Lords, I remember the day some years ago when the A8 countries joined the EU. A celebration at Dublin Castle that I saw on television was a momentous occasion. Eight countries that had been under communism had opted for membership of the EU, a body that embraced democratic values. It demonstrated that those countries were turning their backs on their communist past and moving forward to join a Europe that was democratic and free. I was emotionally moved by watching that. I do not welcome much in the Bill, but I welcome the fact that the Government have sought not to require a referendum on the accession of new countries. That was a proper decision.
We have heard comments about some of the countries that would like to join. We have heard words such as, “the EU mopping up”, as if seeking to join was not the choice of those countries, but the EU demanding more members. We have heard expressions such as “polyglot” and “Eurasian”. They do not take the argument one jot further. The issue is surely whether it is appropriate to have a referendum, or whether decisions about accession should rightly be made by the British Parliament. I of course believe that they should be made by the British Parliament, which is a better place to make decisions, rather than by holding a referendum.
It is a lot easier when knocking on doors to say “Vote Labour for your local council” than it is to argue for the alternative vote, which I happen to favour. However, if one were to knock on doors and say to people, “Good afternoon; what do you think about Macedonia joining the European Union”, they would say, “Come off it, mate. What are you on about?” I cannot see the process happening or making any sense.
Turkey has been the subject of much discussion, and I hope that one day it will qualify to join the EU by meeting the standards of human rights, democracy, the rule of law, relative freedom from corruption, and so on. All of these will be positive assets and, in contrast to what has been said about Turkey being a mainly Muslim, albeit secular Muslim, country, its membership of the EU will be a positive source of strength to Europe, rather than a source of weakness. However, that is not the subject of this debate.
Decisions about future accession should be made by Parliament. They are not appropriate for referendums, and I hope that the Bill will continue to reflect that.
Lord Hannay of Chiswick
I speak briefly against the amendment, pointing out two or three things. First, it is often overlooked that the founding treaty stated that any European country that fulfilled the criteria has the right to request membership. The supporters of the amendment appear to be moving it in order to be able to campaign against the accession of a European country which has been judged by all the members to be fulfilling the criteria. This will probably not worry them unduly as they want this country to leave the European Union, but they are going against a fundamental precept in the treaty.
The second point is that everyone is meant to be concerned about public expenditure nowadays, but if the noble Lord, Lord Stoddart, is correct—I think he is roughly correct—that there are about eight candidates, he has just happily thrown away about £640 million, which is what it would cost to organise the eight referendums in this country, judging by the cost of the AV referendum. That seems a trifle feckless, if I may say so.
The third point, which is also relevant, is that if we were to have a referendum requirement for an accession, we would be saying that a British Government who had gone to whatever capital it was to sign the accession treaty which admitted country A would run the risk of being denied and having to go back to explain that country A could not become a member of the European Union because the referendum had come out negatively. That is an order of magnitude in damage to Britain's foreign policy rather greater than anything we have been discussing so far. Surely no one believes that our relationship with country A would ever be the same again after we had prevented it joining, following ourselves signing an accession treaty admitting them—that is the treaty in which all British interests, such as immigration, cost and so on would be taken into account, if the British Government of the day were worth their salt. That would be a really serious matter. I hope that the Government will not entertain the amendment.
Lord Willoughby de Broke
My Lords, I support the amendment of the noble Lord, Lord Stoddart, and encourage him. There are respectable precedents for referendums on accession of members in the EU. Indeed, in 2005, Mr Chirac promised the French electorate a referendum on accession of any new member into the European Union. I believe that that has been negatived by the French Senate but, knowing French politics, it could easily come back. That does not square with what the noble Lord, Lord Hannay, said: that the amendment is against the words of the founding treaty. If the French can offer their people a referendum, surely we could do the same. I understand that Bulgaria has, under a citizens' initiative, now raised sufficient signatures to propose a referendum to their Government on the membership of Turkey, in particular, which may affect Bulgaria more than some other countries.
I hope that this modest amendment will be acceptable to the Government. The noble Baroness, Lady Brinton, said that no powers are given away by further members acceding to the EU. That is not quite accurate. The more individual members there are, the more powers we are giving away on immigration, for example, because we no longer control our borders, as the noble Lord, Lord Stoddart, said, in his opening remarks. There are also financial implications, depending on the financial situation of the countries involved. We are definitely in danger of giving away powers by allowing new members in, without the British people having any say whatsoever on whether they want to give those powers away or not.
Lord Tomlinson
My Lords, in some of the things that have been said so far on this amendment—an amendment to which I am opposed—there has been an implication that every application for accession has been from a poor country coming along with its begging bowl. Since we became a member, Sweden, Austria and Finland have all joined the Community; it has not been a magnet attracting just poor countries. We have had the incredible spectacle of almost every country in Europe wanting to join the European Union not on the basis of what they can put into it or get out of it—one thinks of the famous Thatcher question, “Can we get our money back?”—but because they see it as an important political structure and believe that they will be weakened if they are not part of it.
The other small point that I want to make is that there has been some rather derogatory insinuation about countries such as Turkey. I seem to recall that just over 50 years ago Turkey was one of the founder members of the Council of Europe, and it has played an active role as a member of the Council of Europe throughout our time as a member. So successful has its engagement with the Council of Europe been that at present the Committee of Ministers is chaired by Turkey—a position that we will be taking over later in the year. Turkey currently holds the presidency of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe and has been elected by the membership covering every European country except Belarus, which has been excluded on the grounds of its incapacity to fulfil the requirements of democracy and, in particular, to abolish capital punishment. Turkey plays a very active, involved, respected and well regarded role, and it is rewarded in terms of the power and authority given to some of our participants. Therefore, I hope that in future we can absolve ourselves from making cheap and snide remarks about countries which are in fact our allies, not only in the Council of Europe but in NATO.
Lord Ahmad of Wimbledon
My Lords, I wish to make three basic points. First, the whole essence of the European Union Bill concerns the transfer of powers and competences. As has clearly been stated by noble Lords before, the amendment does not relate to a transfer of power or competence and so remains firmly outside the scope of the Bill. Secondly, as has been made clear, the amendment, which is on the subject of accession, does not dilute the importance of the British veto, so again in my view it should not be taken forward. Thirdly, I align myself with the point made by the noble Lord, Lord Dubs, on the question that you pose about accession. He gave Macedonia as an example but what if several countries were joining and, having knocked on doors, you found that two people liked one country and one did not like another? What kind of response would you get to that? Therefore, let us put this issue into context. The European Union Bill is important but the amendment should certainly not constitute a key part of it.
Lord Richard
I should like to make one or two brief points. I have listened with great care, as I always do, to the noble Lord, Lord Stoddart, and the noble Lords on the back row behind me. They have an argument. Within the logic of the Bill, it is perfectly legitimate to argue that, if you are to have a referendum on the powers of the European public prosecutor, it is logical—indeed, it is perhaps more logical—to have a referendum on new entrants to the European Union. I can see that argument, although it does not take us very far because you then have to look at the logic of the Bill. As my view is very firmly that the Bill is pretty illogical however you look at it, that the way in which it is set out is absurd and that its demands of the country in terms of referenda is ludicrous, I cannot possibly support the amendment.
Lord Maclennan of Rogart
My Lords, the argument advanced in favour of a referendum appears to be based on the fear of European Union enlargement. It seems to me that to cite the circumstances in which a referendum were held in the days of Harold Wilson is to talk about a history that is, practically speaking, irrelevant to the present. That referendum was caused not so much by the issues which were in front of the British people, but by the recognition that the elected Government were drawing upon very divided views and did not have a coherent, united position to put before the British people. It seems to me that that was an exceptional circumstance and not one which should require us to have an automatic response built into legislation for circumstances which will be very different.
The fear of enlargement seems to be entirely misplaced. In a world in which decisions are increasingly being taken by economic superpowers—China, India, Brazil and the United States—surely it is very important for the protection of British trading and economic interests that we should come together to seek to exercise influence on the shape of global decision-making. Not to do something about that seems to me to be much more of a potential threat than the possibility of a number of people coming into this country to work, particularly when, for the most part, those who come here are either highly skilled and therefore add to the collective skills of the country, or carry out work which it is quite difficult to persuade other British people to do. Candidly, it seems to me that the prospects for the European Union will be considerably greater if we recognise that, in due course, Turkey and the other countries mentioned will add to our total influence and wealth as well as broaden our cultural base. That is not in any way to belittle the individuality of the nations of the United Kingdom; the Union is already a multi-ethnic body, which is concerned for its own defence, and which is concerned to influence the standard of living in other parts of the world and to bring to bear a beneficent concern for global matters. That is far beyond the original intentions. Of course, that is a natural development of a civilised continent.
In passing, I say that the greatest change in the well-being of the countries of Europe came about after the collapse of the Roman empire. If anyone doubts that, I suggest they should read the excellent book by Bryan Ward-Perkins on The Fall of Rome and the End of Civilization. North Africa had provided very considerably for the elevation of the standard of living of those who lived in Britain. It manufactured the china which was exported right around the Mediterranean. The concept that our standard of life or the employment of our people are at risk of being dragged down by enlarging the influence of the Union seems to me to be entirely unhistorical and misconceived.
Osama bin Laden
(13 years, 7 months ago)
Lords ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
The Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster (Lord Strathclyde)
My Lords, I hope that this is a convenient moment to repeat a Statement made by the Prime Minister in another place on the death of Osama bin Laden and counterterrorism.
“Mr Speaker, the death of Osama bin Laden will have important consequences for the security of our people at home and abroad and for our foreign policy, including our partnership with Pakistan, our military action in Afghanistan and the wider fight against terrorism across the world. Last night, I chaired a meeting of COBRA to begin to address some of these issues, the National Security Council has met this morning, and I wanted to come to the House this afternoon to take the first opportunity to address these consequences directly and answer honourable Members' questions.
At 3 am yesterday, I received a call from President Obama. He informed me that US special forces had successfully mounted a targeted operation against a compound in Abbottabad, Pakistan. Osama bin Laden had been killed, along with four others: bin Laden's son, two others linked to him and a female member of his family entourage. There was a ferocious firefight and a US helicopter had to be destroyed, but there was no loss of American life.
I am sure that the whole House will join me in congratulating President Obama and praising the courage and skill of the American special forces who carried out this operation. It is a strike at the heart of international terrorism and a great achievement for America and for all who have joined in the long struggle to defeat al-Qaeda. We should remember today in particular the brave British service men and women who have given their lives in the fight against terrorism across the world, and we should pay tribute especially to those British forces who have played their part over the past decade in the hunt for bin Laden. He was the man responsible for 9/11, which was not only an horrific killing of Americans but remains to this day the largest loss of British life in any terrorist attack: a man who inspired further atrocities, including in Bali, Madrid, Istanbul and of course here in London on 7/7; and, let us remember, a man who posed as a leader of Muslims but was actually a mass murderer of Muslims all over the world—indeed, he killed more Muslims than people of any other faith.
Nothing will bring back the loved ones who have been lost, and of course no punishment at our disposal can remotely fit the many appalling crimes for which he was responsible; but I hope that, at least for the victims' families, there is now a sense of justice being served as a long, dark chapter in their lives is finally closed. As the head of a family group for United Airlines Flight 93 put it, we are,
‘raised, obviously, never to hope for someone's death’,
but we are,
‘willing to make an exception in this case ... He was evil personified, and our world is a better place without him’.
Britain was with America from the first day of the struggle to defeat al-Qaeda. Our resolve today is as strong as it was then. There can be no impunity and no safe refuge for those who kill in the name of this poisonous ideology. Our first focus must be on our own security. While bin Laden is gone, the threat of al-Qaeda remains. Clearly there is a risk that al-Qaeda and its affiliates in places such as Yemen and the Maghreb will want to demonstrate that they are able to operate effectively; and, of course, there is always the risk of a radicalised individual acting alone—a so-called lone-wolf attack. So we must be more vigilant than ever, and we must maintain that vigilance for some time to come.
The terrorist threat level in the UK is already at severe, which is as high as it can go without intelligence of a specific threat. We will keep that threat level under review, working closely with the intelligence agencies and the police.
In terms of people travelling overseas, we have updated our advice and encourage British nationals to monitor the media carefully for local reactions, remain vigilant, exercise caution in public places and avoid demonstrations. We have ordered our embassies across the world to review their security.
Let me turn next to Pakistan. The fact that bin Laden was living in a large house in a populated area suggests that he must have had a support network in Pakistan. We do not currently know the extent of that network, so it is right that we ask searching questions about it, and we will. But let us start with what we do know.
Pakistan has suffered more from terrorism than any other country in the world. As President Zardari and Prime Minister Gilani said to me when I spoke to them yesterday, as many as 30,000 innocent civilians have been killed. More Pakistani soldiers and security forces have died fighting extremism than have international forces killed in Afghanistan. Osama bin Laden was an enemy of Pakistan. He had declared war against the Pakistani people, and he had ordered attacks against them.
President Obama said in his statement that,
‘counterterrorism cooperation with Pakistan helped lead us to bin Laden and the compound where he was hiding’.
Continued co-operation will be just as important in the days ahead. I believe that it is in Britain's national interest to recognise that we share the same struggle against terrorism. That is why we will continue to work with our Pakistani counterparts on intelligence gathering, tracing plots and taking action to stop them. That is why we will continue to honour our aid promises, including our support for education as a critical way of helping the next generation of Pakistanis to turn their back on extremism and look forward to a brighter and more prosperous future. Above all, it is why we were one of the founder members of the Friends of Democratic Pakistan, because it is by working with the democrats in Pakistan that we can make sure the whole country shares the same determination to fight terror.
I also spoke yesterday to President Karzai in Afghanistan. We both agreed that the death of bin Laden provides a new opportunity for Afghanistan and Pakistan to work together to achieve stability on both sides of the border. Our strategy towards Afghanistan is straightforward and has not changed. We want an Afghanistan capable of looking after its own security without the help of foreign forces. We should take this opportunity to send a clear message to the Taliban; now is the time for them to separate themselves from al-Qaeda and participate in a peaceful political process.
The myth of bin Laden was one of a freedom fighter, living in austerity and risking his life for the cause as he moved around in the hills and mountainous caverns of the tribal areas. The reality of bin Laden was very different: a man who encouraged others to make the ultimate sacrifice while he himself hid in the comfort of a large, expensive villa in Pakistan, experiencing none of the hardship he expected his supporters to endure.
Finally, let me briefly update the House on Libya. In recent weeks we have stepped up our air campaign to protect the civilian population. Every element of Gaddafi's war machine has been degraded. Over the last few days alone, NATO aircraft have struck 35 targets including tanks and armoured personnel carriers, as well as bunkers and ammunition storage facilities. We have also made strikes against his command and control centres, which direct his operations against civilians. Over the weekend there were reports that in one of those strikes Colonel Gaddafi’s son, Saif al-Arab Gaddafi, was killed. All the targets chosen were clearly within the boundaries set by UN Resolutions 1970 and 1973. These resolutions permit all necessary measures to protect civilian life, including attacks on command and control bases.
This weekend also saw attacks on the British and Italian embassies. We utterly deplore this. The Gaddafi regime is in clear beach of the Vienna convention to protect diplomatic missions. We hold it fully to account, and we have already expelled the Libyan ambassador from London. The British embassy was looted as well as destroyed, the World War Two memorial was desecrated, and the UN has felt obliged to pull its people out for fear of attack. Gaddafi made much of his call for a ceasefire, but at the very moment Gaddafi claimed he wanted to talk he had in fact been laying mines in Misrata harbour to stop humanitarian aid getting in and continuing his attacks on civilians, including attacks across the border in neighbouring Tunisia. We must continue to enforce the UN resolutions fully until such a time as they are completely complied with, and that means continuing the NATO mission until there is an end to all attacks on and threats to civilians.
Bin Laden and Gaddafi were said to have hated each other, but there was a common thread running between them. They both feared the idea that democracy and civil rights could take hold in the Arab world. While we should continue to degrade, dismantle and defeat the terrorist networks, a big part of the long-term answer is the success of democracy in the Middle East and the conclusion of the Arab-Israeli peace process. For 20 years, bin Laden claimed that the future of the Muslim world would be his, but what Libya has shown, as Egypt and Tunisia showed before it, is that people are rejecting everything that bin Laden stood for. Instead of replacing dictatorship with his extremist totalitarianism, they are choosing democracy.
Ten years on from the terrible tragedy of 9/11, with the end of bin Laden and the democratic awakening across the Arab world, we must seize this unique opportunity to deliver a decisive break with the forces of al-Qaeda and its poisonous ideology, which has caused so much suffering for so many years. I commend this Statement to the House”.
Baroness Royall of Blaisdon
My Lords, I am grateful to the Leader of the House for repeating the Statement made by the Prime Minister in another place. I join him in strongly endorsing the sentiments expressed by President Obama yesterday. This side of the House wholeheartedly supports the action taken by the United States to bring Osama bin Laden to justice. We are grateful to President Obama for taking the decision and to the US Special Forces who carried it out. At this time, we remember the harrowing scenes of death and destruction on 9/11 and we remember too all the other atrocities carried out by al-Qaeda before 9/11 and since, including in Nairobi, Dar es Salaam, Bali, Istanbul, Madrid, Amman and, of course, the 7/7 bombings here in London.
So, my Lords, the world is a safer and better place without bin Laden commanding or inciting acts of terror and we should never fall for the idea that he somehow stood for a particular community of faith. In each case, the objective was the same: to kill and maim as many innocent men, women and children as possible of all faiths and all backgrounds. Our response now must be to seek to use this moment not to claim premature victory in the fight against terrorists but to heal the divisions that he sought to create. We should do that by rooting out the perpetrators of terror, by reaching out to all those willing to accept the path of peace and at the same time by ensuring continuing vigilance here at home.
All sides of the House will welcome the co-operative and calm response of the Pakistani Government over the past 48 hours, but there remains, of course, a great deal of uncertainty about who was aware of bin Laden’s presence and location in Pakistan, especially given his proximity to Pakistani military bases. As the Leader of the House said, it is right that we ask searching questions, but it is also right that we continue our aid promises. Can the noble Lord shed any light on how long it is believed that bin Laden was based in Abbottabad and who contributed to the support network that allowed him to hide there? Pakistan’s leaders continue to take a brave stance against terrorism. Will the Leader of the House say whether, when the Prime Minister talked to President Zardari and Prime Minister Gilani, he discussed the need to ensure that the security apparatus fully supports Pakistan’s anti-terrorist efforts?
The developments of this weekend remind us of why we took military action in Afghanistan, which under the Taliban gave shelter to bin Laden and al-Qaeda. But they should also reinforce the need for a lasting political settlement in Afghanistan as the only long-term guarantee of peace and security. Does the Leader of the House agree that we need a greater urgency in the search for a political solution and that we should engage with those parts of the Taliban that are ready to renounce violence? Will he tell the House whether he thinks that there are ways in which we can sharpen the choice facing the Taliban, including by deepening the political process in Afghanistan?
Turning to Yemen and al-Qaeda’s remaining strongholds, we must do everything we can to combat terrorism and increase pressure on their supporters. We must also support movements that make it less likely that terrorism will take root. It is clear that the most effective long-term answer to al-Qaeda’s ideology of hatred is being provided by the peoples of North Africa and the Middle East. During the Arab spring they have not been turning to an ideology of hate but are demanding the right to control their own destinies with democratic reform and economic progress. We welcome that wholeheartedly.
I should be grateful if the Leader of the House could update the House on progress that has been made in consolidating the democratic gains in Egypt and Tunisia. Will he also say what is being done to ensure that those Arab leaders who have promised reform stick to their commitments and to force those still resorting to violence and repression, as in Syria, to stop?
Where Libya is concerned, it is clear that we cannot abandon the Libyan people to Colonel Gaddafi’s revenge. Will the Leader of the House take this opportunity to reassure the House that in our words as well as our actions it will be clear that in all steps we take we are acting within the terms of UN Security Council Resolution 1973? Does the noble Lord agree that doing so is right in principle and essential to maintaining regional support for action to enforce the will of the UN Security Council?
Turning to Israel-Palestine, does the noble Lord agree that the reaction of Hamas calling the killing of bin Laden an example of American oppression is deeply regrettable? Does he agree that we should continue to make efforts to restart the Middle East peace process with those willing to endorse the quartet principles? Will he say what discussions the Government have had with President Obama and the other leaders on this important area?
Finally, I support the call made in the Prime Minister’s Statement for UK citizens to show increased vigilance at this time. Al-Qaeda has suffered a serious blow but it remains a threat. I therefore offer thanks to the police and the security services which work tirelessly in public and behind the scenes to keep us safe.
My Lords, 9/11 was one of the most horrific events of our generation. For the victims and their families, including in this country, nothing can remove the pain. But the death of Osama bin Laden sends out a clear message that in the face of terrorist acts the world will not rest until justice is done.
Lord Strathclyde
My Lords, I thank the Leader of the Opposition for what she has said. Over the past 10 years, there has been much agreement between the Government, the Opposition and both sides of the House—if I can put it like that. That support, which the noble Baroness gave today, does not stop the Opposition from offering effective scrutiny of the Government and their actions. I welcome the strong support she gave for the Statement and her fulsome support for the presence of the United States and American Special Forces with their particular courage and clearly very careful planning of this extraordinary operation.
The noble Baroness was also right to remember 9/11, which was almost 10 years ago, and so many of the other atrocities that took place, very often in the name of bin Laden and organised by al-Qaeda. It is equally right that all sides of the House have welcomed the calm response of the Pakistani Government to what has happened. Naturally there is still uncertainty about who knew what and when about bin Laden’s presence in what is, by all accounts, a well-to-do area in Pakistan not far from one of its key military academies. The noble Baroness asked how long bin Laden was present in his villa. We do not as yet know exactly when he arrived there but there is real speculation that he could have been there living in Pakistan for some years.
The noble Baroness also asked whether Pakistan, and particularly its security forces, fully supported the counter-terrorism effort. Unequivocally the answer is yes. There is a great deal of realisation about the harm and damage that terrorism has inflicted on the people of Pakistan. There is a real desire across the Government, working with the army and the internal security forces, to achieve a solution. The removal of bin Laden from the equation will be of substantial support in reaching that conclusion.
The noble Baroness was also right to say that there needs to be a political solution to the problems of Afghanistan. We have never believed that the problems of Afghanistan could be dealt with purely by the military. Indeed, the fundamental reason why we are in Afghanistan is to safeguard our national security. Our involvement in the ISAF mission is helping to deny terrorists a safe haven from which to plan attacks against us. We want the Afghanistan Government to be in control of their own security and there is now an opportunity for the Taliban to divorce itself from the work of al-Qaeda and to work towards a political goal and a political dialogue with the Afghanistan Government for the long-term interests of their people.
The noble Baroness also asked about Yemen. It is a sign, in all of the countries she mentioned, of just how much the “Arab spring”, as it is increasingly called, has spread right across North Africa and the Middle East. We welcome the Gulf Co-operation Council initiative in Yemen and we encourage the Government and the Opposition to seize the opportunity and to work hard towards finalising an agreement. The UK Government are ready to support a comprehensive national dialogue which would allow for a peaceful transition of power. We support the sovereignty of Yemen and the unity and democracy which its Government have built up in the past 30 years. Now is the time for real and credible change and the creation of a more open political system.
The noble Baroness asked whether I would confirm that everything that is being done in Libya is in accordance with UN Security Council Resolution 1973. I can confirm to her that that is our complete understanding of everything that has been done. Military command and control centres have been targeted and all loss of life is to be regretted. However, we cannot be responsible for those who put themselves in harm’s way. We are trying to defend and protect the interests of the civilian population in Misrata, who are being attacked by Gaddafi’s forces.
The noble Baroness asked about an Arab-Israeli resolution. She is aware of how hard in recent years all Governments have been working to try to reach a resolution to this conflict. With the death of bin Laden and the uprisings in Syria and other countries in the Middle East, it may well be that instability may also paradoxically create the right conditions to seek a more peaceful solution. We are all working together with the United States and other countries to bring that about.
Finally, the noble Baroness asked about increased vigilance. She is right: if there is one message to take out of this Statement it is that, even with the death of bin Laden, we have not defeated terrorism. Terrorism will continue and there may well be those inside al-Qaeda or other terrorist organisations who will see this as an opportunity to demonstrate that they are still active and have the ability to react in an appalling way. Vigilance will be key. I join the noble Baroness in congratulating British police and security forces on the work that they do, very often unsung, for the protections that have already taken place. I very much hope that they will succeed in doing so in the future.
Baroness Falkner of Margravine
My Lords, from these Benches I join the Leader of the Opposition in congratulating President Obama and US special forces on closing the chapter that started on 11 September 2001. That chapter shook the Muslim world to its very core, as well as obviously affecting the United States and other countries. We need to recall that Pakistan is an extremely fragile state. As its friend, we may not wish to question its commitment to countering terrorism but we must be clear about its capability to do so. In that context, I am extremely pleased to hear in the Statement that we will resist siren calls in the media today about maintaining our aid, practical assistance, intelligence co-operation and so on. I hope the Government will continue to be steadfast in that aim.
We must not allow friendship to withhold candid conversations about the role of the ISI and defence intelligence. My father was a member of that community, so I well know that it would have been pretty impossible for Mr bin Laden to live there undetected for as long as he did. We must also work to improve relations between Pakistan and Afghanistan. Peace in Afghanistan will not come if al-Qaeda or the Taliban are simply displaced to Pakistan. I hope that our Government will continue their efforts to bring the two countries into a constructive working relationship. Can my noble friend tell me if we are also working towards a resumption of dialogue between Pakistan and India? All three countries are essential if regional peace and security is to be secured in that most dangerous region.
Lord Strathclyde
My Lords, I thank my noble friend for her intelligent and thoughtful observations and questions. She is right that Pakistan is a fragile state. It also needs a great deal of support. With that support, there is no reason why in the long term Pakistan should not become a more stable and prosperous country in what has been a difficult part of the world for some years. The noble Baroness is also right that we firmly reject any siren calls about cutting our aid to Pakistan. If anything, this makes our aid programme even more important and significant. It is aimed largely at education and we believe that one way at least to improve governance and quality for people in Pakistan is to raise the standards and quality of education. Many hundreds of millions of pounds are being spent on that.
There is another reason: links between Pakistan and the United Kingdom are extremely strong. There are family groups extending between Pakistan and the United Kingdom. Thirdly, there is the whole problem of what we have seen in the past as radicalisation and the growth of home-grown terrorism in the United Kingdom. All these reasons lead us to believe that aid to Pakistan is extremely justified. I also agree with the point about India. The answer to that question is, yes, we are actively involved in trying to improve relations between India and Pakistan. Anybody who knows anything about world affairs over the past 50 years will recognise just how difficult that is but there are some causes for optimism, which I hope will grow.
Lord Clinton-Davis
Would the noble Lord indicate in outline the instructions which have been given to the police, especially the Metropolitan Police? A great deal of uncertainty exists at present about the review which the Government propose to carry out into the numbers of the police. Do they not have an especial duty at present and is it not right that the review should be curtailed, because interference with their duties is a dereliction of duty to us?
Lord Strathclyde
My Lords, I do not follow the noble Lord at all. It is true that the police have a number of challenges to face up to. They will always have those but I am extremely confident that they are able to carry out their duties. We carried out a strategic defence and security review to set out our security priorities in full; the resources allocated to the UK’s security and intelligence agencies reflect that assessment of priorities. That includes the work by the police, most importantly the Metropolitan Police.
Lord Thomas of Swynnerton
My Lords, it is difficult to think of a precedent for this action, carried out so successfully and competently by the American special services; I suppose there was Entebbe, carried out by the Israelis so many years ago. Bearing that in mind, were there to be similar circumstances in future with the desire to finish off an enemy in a foreign country, as there well may be, would the Government support the idea of capturing the person concerned and keeping him to be tried and brought to justice in a different way, as has happened with some war criminals in the past?
Lord Strathclyde
My Lords, the noble Lord, Lord Thomas of Swynnerton, raises an entirely legitimate question which many people will ask, particularly on the precedent for this. My view is that this was a brilliantly planned and executed operation and my understanding at this stage—no doubt we will get more information—is that there was an opportunity to surrender. It is not always possible to capture people alive. Notwithstanding that, there is of course the whole question of jurisdiction, a place of trial, et cetera. In the event, what the noble Lord suggested is not what happened and we have to live in the world as we find it. No doubt there will be questions of legality for the United States, but those are between the Pakistani authorities and the United States and I am not in a position to comment.
Lord Anderson of Swansea
The Leader is right that we should rejoice at this great achievement but the focus has perhaps now moved to the Yemen. What is our view about the role of al-Qaeda in the overthrow of President Saleh and the likely degree of co-operation that we shall receive from any successor regime in the fight against it? On Libya, France has already recognised formally the new authority in Benghazi. Are we and other EU countries considering that same action? Finally, on the Palestine-Israel question, the noble Lord will know that Palestinian statehood and recognition is very much on the agenda and will reach the General Assembly of the UN in September. What preliminary consideration are we giving of our position at that time?
Lord Strathclyde
On that last question, my Lords, no doubt there will be much debate and discussion internally and at the Foreign Office about what our position should be in the debate that takes place in September. However, we have been an integral part of the process for many years now; it is something to which the British Government attach great importance. We wish to see a resolution, and there is an opportunity for such a resolution. The United Kingdom Government will leave no stone unturned in playing a full part in the dialogue.
The noble Lord was also interested in the question of Yemen. The UK Government are fully committed to a united Yemen with a stable and prosperous future. We continue to encourage the international community to focus its attention there. Indeed, we are one of the largest bilateral donors to Yemen and in August 2007 we signed a 10-year partnership agreement to try to help to improve the quality of life within that country.
We are deeply concerned about the growth of al-Qaeda in Yemen. The Government of Yemen have committed publicly to combating terrorism, both inside and outside Yemen, and have conducted successful operations, including against members of al-Qaeda in Yemen. We must do everything that we can to encourage that process and that success, because it is an extremely dangerous part of the world and al-Qaeda there has almost succeeded in inflicting terrorist outrages outside Yemen.
Lord Ahmad of Wimbledon
My Lords, I thank my noble friend for repeating the Statement. Like many in this House and beyond, I welcome the removal of an individual who preached hate and promoted the taking of innocent lives by hijacking a noble faith. I think Muslims around the world welcome his removal from the face of the earth.
I ask my noble friend to reflect and perhaps comment further on the point that, while the Pakistani nation—indeed, the Pakistani Government themselves—has taken steps to address terrorism and the breeding of terrorism, our Government must implore that it continues to take more stringent steps to stop those terrorist camps, including those that allegedly go under the guise of educational institutions, nurturing further terrorists who then breed not just discontent but terror around the world, indeed the kind of terror that we ourselves suffered from in this very country on 7/7.
Lord Strathclyde
I thank my noble friend for what he has said. I agree with his words about Osama bin Laden and al-Qaeda promoting hate. I also agree with his comment that the Government of Pakistan need to be encouraged to take all steps to deal with terrorism, terrorist education and terrorist camps. Above all, the Pakistani Government are aware of the damage that terrorism has inflicted on their own country and on their own people—their civilians and their armed forces—who have worked extremely hard over the past few years and have suffered terribly.
There is an opportunity today and in the next few months for the Pakistani Government to use the death of Osama bin Laden to turn the page on the past, redouble their steps to eradicate terrorism and co-operate with international organisations and with neighbouring countries to remove this scourge from the region.
Lord Hannay of Chiswick
My Lords, will the Minister accept my welcome for the Statement, which indicates that there could be an opportunity now to bring the Taliban into a political process, which will be valuable for all concerned in Afghanistan? In that context, will he give some study to a panel report from Mr Brahimi— he helped to set up the present Government of Afghanistan—and Ambassador Thomas Pickering, which was submitted in the United States a few weeks ago? It suggested that a key element in a political process could be appointing a facilitator who was not NATO, the US military or President Karzai, and who could help to move the process forward, perhaps under the aegis of the United Nations. I think that that is a genuinely sensible idea; it is one which Mr David Miliband has supported on a number of occasions. I hope that the Government will give that some consideration in the phase ahead.
Lord Strathclyde
My Lords, I have not read this report, but I am sure that my colleagues in the Foreign Office have. I agree with the noble Lord that there is an opportunity facing the region to use this point in time to do things differently. It is particularly an opportunity for the Taliban to cast itself away from the programme of violence of al-Qaeda and to involve itself in a political process.
The report that the noble Lord mentioned strikes me as having a very sensible objective. I shall make sure that the Foreign Office examines it.
Lord Cormack
My Lords, reverting to the very reasonable point made by the noble Lord, Lord Thomas, does my noble friend not agree that Osama bin Laden in prison could have been an even greater danger than Osama bin Laden in hiding? Is it not entirely right, and a great relief, that he has been killed, and that he was buried in such a seemly manner so that his body cannot be the centre of a shrine?
Lord Strathclyde
Given that there was not much time to plan these events, I entirely agree with what my noble friend says about the burial of bin Laden’s body. It was done, I understand, fully in accordance with the teachings of Islam, and it was done quickly and effectively. As my noble friend pointed out, there is the added advantage that there is no shrine to visit for those who regard bin Laden as a leader.
Baroness Symons of Vernham Dean
My Lords, can the Leader of the House add to the Statement in relation to Syria? The Statement did not, I think, refer to Syria, where over the weekend there have been some very alarming reports not only about the targeting of unarmed civilians on the streets of its towns but also, just as alarming, about the arrest of young men between the ages of 15 and 40 who seem to have been taken away and put in places without their families being given any information about what has happened to them.
Lord Strathclyde
My Lords, I welcome the question of the noble Baroness, Lady Symons of Vernham Dean. She is right to mention Syria, where there is an immensely serious and developing situation. We call for an immediate end to attacks against civilians by the Syrian security forces. The Syrian authorities and their forces should comply with their obligations under international law, international humanitarian law and human rights law, including protecting civilians and meeting their basic needs. We ask President Assad to order his authorities to show restraint and to respond to the legitimate demands of his people with immediate and genuine reform, not with brutal repression. We really do want to see acts of genuine reform and not repression. We are keeping a very close eye on developments in what is clearly a fast-moving picture. There is every opportunity, and time, for President Assad to change the direction of his forces and try to seek an opportunity for genuine reform in Syria, which is an extremely important country.
Lord Maples
My Lords, I agree with my noble friend that our aid programme and friendly relationship with Pakistan must continue. However, these events will alter that relationship and that of the United States with Pakistan, which is perhaps more important. First, I suspect there will be turmoil in Pakistan over what has happened and the death of Osama bin Laden, which may well lead to the fall of the Government.
Secondly, and perhaps more importantly from an American or British point of view, my noble friend said that we will get to the bottom of what happened. However, it seems inconceivable that, without at least the tacit approval of some elements of the Pakistani state, Osama bin Laden could have survived for so long, living in the way that he did in a town less than 100 miles from Islamabad. When we get to the bottom of that, it will almost certainly confirm what many of us have suspected for ages—that elements of the Pakistani state are extremely friendly to the Afghan Taliban. They may want to fight the Taliban operating in Pakistan, but they make a distinction for the Afghan Taliban and are more friendly to it. This will be caught red-handed. Pakistan, whatever its Government, must now be confronted with this problem if we are to continue our friendly relationship with it in an effort to exterminate terrorism from that part of the world and from our own.
Lord Strathclyde
My Lords, because of the problems that my noble friend pointed out, it is vital for the United Kingdom to maintain and increase the closeness of the relationship between our country and Pakistan. After all, this is a shared fight—a fight against global terrorism in which Pakistan finds itself on the front line. It is right to record that the Government of Pakistan have formally welcomed the news of the death of bin Laden. The question of who knew what will unfold over the next few weeks and months. With that clarity, no doubt different people will take different views. What does not change is that Pakistan needs a great deal of support, which the United Kingdom is happy to give.
European Union Bill
(13 years, 7 months ago)
Lords ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
Lord Radice
Before my noble friend gets up, I rise to oppose both the tone and the principle of Amendment 20A. I oppose the tone because, as several noble Lords have pointed out, enlargement has been exceptionally good not only for the European Union but for Britain’s interests. As my noble friend Lord Tomlinson pointed out, some jolly rich countries have joined and have been our allies in some of our negotiations over such issues as the budget and the reform of the CAP. The so-called poorer countries are mostly former members of the Soviet bloc, nearly all of which have joined. They have become more prosperous as a result of being members of the European Union, particularly Poland, which is one of the great success stories. This is not just about Polish plumbers coming to France and Britain; it is also about the standard of living and growth rate in Poland increasing considerably. It is a big success story. Let us hear more about it from the Ministers. I hope to hear the Minister say something about enlargement, as it is a good thing.
Enlargement also buttresses democracy in these countries. To be a member of the European Union a country must be a democracy. This is a tremendous weapon that we and the European Union have in changing and underwriting the whole issue of democracy in Europe. Therefore, I oppose the tone of what we heard from the noble Lord, Lord Stoddart. I also oppose this amendment.
Lord Radice
I am going to say something nice about the noble Lords if the noble Lord, Lord Pearson, will be quiet. I oppose the principle of the amendment because I do not believe that it should be written in the Bill that we ought to have referendums when countries join. That is not only a question of practicality; Parliament should decide this issue. The French have referendums if the Government and Parliament decide that something is not part of their constitution. Here I come to my compliment. In an odd way the noble Lords, Lord Stoddart and Lord Pearson, have done the House a service as they have once again highlighted the very curious nature of this Bill. On the one hand we have 56 policy areas that trigger referendums, and we have all had great fun pointing out that some of them are rather minor issues. On the other hand, on the big European issues of enlargement and membership of the European Union itself it is not written in the Bill that if we want to leave the European Union we have to have a referendum. I would have thought that a Eurosceptic Government might be interested in that but the Government have very sensibly not gone down that road, perhaps because they are in a coalition with the Liberal Democrats. I do not support this amendment, but its movers, my old friend Lord Stoddart and the noble Lord, Lord Pearson of Rannoch, have done the House a service as they have reminded us once again of the gross inadequacy of this Bill.
Lord Pearson of Rannoch
We are in Committee and I do not think that I even have to say, “Before the noble Lord sits down”. I was going to thank the noble Lord for the compliment that he paid my noble friend and me, but is he aware of one of the very few jokes about the European Union that is going about in Eurosceptic circles? I ask this given that he extolled the virtues of democracy which the EU brings to its new members. The joke is that if the EU were to apply to itself to join the EU it would fail on the grounds of its total lack of democracy, its bureaucracy with its monopoly on proposing new legislation—what body that pretends to be vaguely democratic can do that?—and, as we know, the secret process with COREPER, the Council and so on. How can he extol the virtues of the EU’s democracy, given that background?
Lord Lamont of Lerwick
My Lords, I frequently agree with some, but not all, the views put forward by the noble Lord, Lord Stoddart. However, on this occasion I agree more with some of the points made by the noble Lords, Lord Radice and Lord Richard. I agree that enlargement has been a positive development. Indeed, if you have an organisation called the European Union, it is unthinkable that you should exclude from it countries that before the advent of communism in Europe were part of the European family of nations, many of which had living standards and political systems similar to those in western Europe.
Some years ago I took part in a debate on the European Union with my noble friend Lord Brittan, who I am pleased to see sitting beside me. I think that the debate took place in 1993 or 1994, and I remember that my noble friend attacked me because I had not said a single positive thing about the European Union in my speech. I could not think of a single positive thing to say about the European Union at that time. However, if I took part in another such debate with my noble friend, I would say that enlargement is a considerable development that has been advantageous to the countries that have joined and to Europe generally.
If I may say so, the noble Lord, Lord Richard, made a good point that slightly bothered me. I support the Bill, but he said that within the logic of what he called this “crazy Bill” there surely ought to be a referendum on enlargement, given that we might have a referendum on altering the procedures for the appointment of a public prosecutor and other matters that the noble Lord regards as rather marginal. I was bothered about that question, and I have been sitting here for 20 minutes trying to think of an answer. It is that in those areas where they say there should be a referendum—including matters such as altering the procedures or powers on the appointment of a public prosecutor—the Government do not actually intend there to be a referendum, because they do not intend that such propositions should advance further at all. The Government are trying to put a lock on the issue and to stop it happening. They are drawing a red line on legislation for the immediate future, whereas they are in favour of enlargement, and that is why they have not applied the lock or the referendum provision to enlargement.
Lord Richard
My Lords, I am terribly sorry that I gave the noble Lord 20 minutes’ thought. Nevertheless, may I put a question to him? If the Government have no intention of using these powers—which is what he is saying—why on earth are they in the Bill? What is the point?
Lord Lamont of Lerwick
It is not a question of not using the powers; they are there to serve a purpose. The Government have indicated that they will not move further forward in any of these areas and they are enshrining in legislation obstacles to this ever happening in the future. Given the competence creep and the way in which power has seeped directly and indirectly, openly and less openly, to Brussels, I totally support the Government’s objective, and I have given the best answer that I can think of to the noble Lord.
Lord Taverne
If my noble friend is saying that the present Government are not going to use these powers, the conclusion is surely that the Bill is intended to affect not the present Parliament but a future Parliament. Is that not totally unprecedented?
Lord Lamont of Lerwick
I do not accept that. I agree that it is designed to have an impact on the future and to prevent the creep of powers to Brussels. That is wholly right, because we have seen again and again how power has gone to Brussels, sometimes by indirect means and sometimes by means that some of us regard as questionable. We have seen again and again how referenda results have sometimes been rejected, and questions have been put again and again to the people of other countries until we had the right answer. This Bill is trying to say that we should not have a further transfer of powers, that we have had enough of those transfers, that there are plenty of powers to deal with problems that arise, and that we do not need any more powers as all the tasks of the European Union can be addressed through existing powers. We are therefore drawing a line in the sand, as long as there is a Conservative Government or a Conservative-Liberal Government. Future Governments can, of course, choose to repeal this legislation if they want to. That is their prerogative. We will, no doubt, address the sunset clauses later, but I do not go along with them. It is perfectly legitimate to state, “We are passing this legislation now and we intend it to remain”.
Lord Lamont of Lerwick
I am anxious to sit down, but I will give way to the noble Lord.
Lord Tomlinson
Perhaps the noble Lord can help me. He explained that in a number of areas power had gone to Brussels by what he described as fairly dubious means. I have not had the benefit of 20 minutes’ thought about that, but I cannot, offhand, think of any such example. Can he give me a couple of examples of what is worrying him about the dubious means?
Lord Wallace of Saltaire
The noble Lord is speaking from the Gangway and is therefore not in order.
Lord Lamont of Lerwick
I would say that the setting up of the European financial stability mechanism using Article 122 of the TFEU is extremely questionable. I am deeply puzzled how that can be regarded as in accordance with the treaty, but I am sure that that matter will be raised at some point later during our proceedings.
Lord Dykes
My Lords, I suggest that my noble friend Lord Lamont was doing himself down when he referred to 1998 and possibly earlier periods when on the debates that were always going on about Europe he had not given any illustration of being in favour of much to do with the European Union. I remember that in the 1970s, he, like others of us, was an enthusiastic European. I cannot remember the exact years, but I believe that that was the case. He was doing himself down, because I vividly remember—I stand to be corrected, but I believe that my memory is pretty safe on this and I am happy to look at the Hansard reference as soon as I have the chance—that in the early 1990s, when he was Chancellor of the Exchequer, at one stage he said, “Of course, when you are a member of a club, you have occasionally to do what the other members want as well”. I thought that that was a rather impressive way of saying that he was in favour of some aspects of not only international co-operation in general, but the international co-operation that comes from the mechanisms—the integrated parts of the structure and the sovereign government parts of the structure—of what was then the European Community and is now the European Union, enlarged and with Lisbon as its basic fundament.
That is a phenomenon that we witness in the case of the present Foreign Secretary and others who were viciously anti-European in all sorts of aspects. We remember the role of William Hague when he was leader of the Conservative Party in opposition: his “10 days to save the pound” campaign and his attitudes then. Inevitably, in government, his attitudes have become more modulated as a result of both the basic requirement of working with colleagues, partners, fellow Ministers from other countries in all the European Union mechanisms and the logic and common sense of always garnering general support from the public. The idea that there is huge anxiety in this country about competence creep, mission creep, the European Union taking over too much or the Commission becoming overmighty is to my mind grossly exaggerated. There is very little evidence of that. As we said on Second Reading, it is a campaign that has been got up in the press and by a small number of very anti-European politicians of all kinds, mainly in the Conservative Party and UKIP, but also politicians outside Parliament. We think of the BNP and other rather dubious organisations in that context as well.
If we could gauge the attitude of the public, it is one of general acceptance of all these matters. This debate has been going on for some time both in the Commons and here, and it is interesting to note that there has been no public reaction of support for the Government. I do not think that Ministers could cite messages that they have received from the public saying, “Thank you very much. You’ve done a wonderful job. We are so glad that you are resisting the encroachments of the Commission”. I do not want to upset the Minister by going too much into Second Reading points, because this point was made then by several speakers, but can we get away from that canard?
The Commission remains in number of both officials and senior officials a very modest sized body, despite enlargement. It gets the general support of the European Council and the Council of Ministers, because it does a very good job with all the difficulties built in of blending 27 national cultures of public finance and administration. That is a complicated task and it takes time to get habits to coalesce in joint working. None the less, there is no sense that the Commission is exceeding its powers or has done too much in any way with either the connivance or the resistance of the member Governments. Indeed, apart from its own delegated powers, which are either from the treaty or from the exhortations and requests of the various ministerial Councils, the Commission is a modest part of the total.
The main panoply and structure of the European Union remains the sovereign member Governments in the European Council and the Council of Ministers making their sovereign decisions collectively, enhancing both the individual sovereignty of every member state participating automatically and the general sovereignty of the European Union itself. That is why common sense among the public accepts that as a natural process.
Lord Clinton-Davis
When I was a Commissioner, we made it imperative to listen to the many people who had views about Europe, and I think that that continues today. Is that not an expression of faith in the democratic process by the European Commission?
Lord Dykes
I am grateful to the noble Lord for that intervention because it reminds me of the series of visits by individuals and groups—schools, universities, students, blue-collar workers, white-collar workers, business community groups, trade unions and all sorts of public and private institutions—not only to the European Parliament but to the Commission to see how they work. Taking Eurosceptic and anti-European individuals from the British Parliament on their first visit to Brussels, I have had the personal pleasure of witnessing how they change their mind when they see how it works. It is in no way a threat to our country.
Lord Flight
I thank the noble Lord for giving way. In view of his assessment of public opinion, is he therefore a supporter of having a referendum on staying in or not staying in so as to resolve the issue once and for all?
Lord Dykes
I assume that my noble friend was present during the Second Reading of the Bill.
Lord Dykes
If my noble friend looks at the report of the Second Reading in Hansard, he will see that that point came out a lot. Many speeches on this side of the House, as well as on the opposition and Cross Benches, were very much against the referendum concept, particularly in the Bill but also in general. There is widespread anxiety about it in this country, which I share. The noble Lord, Lord Garel-Jones, recently said publicly that he was against referenda of all kinds. He is not here today—he is abroad this week—but he told me that he is very sceptical about referenda and their misuse. The whole of Parliament has been undermined by this obsession—this referendumitis—and it is therefore essential to try to get away from it or to have referenda only on crucial occasions. That is what I consider to be the very respectable reserve position of the Liberal Democrat Party. I believe that some members of the opposition Benches and some Cross-Benchers share the view that we should have referenda only on crucial existential occasions and not on other things.
I must not tax the Minister’s patience—he is a very patient person—by making too many general points but they do take us back to the amendment of the noble Lord, Lord Stoddart. The best way to undermine Parliament is to say that we are going to badger the British public all the time and ask them about these minor points. Of course, accession is not a minor point but we discussed minor points in previous Committee sittings. Accession is a more major matter and therefore the noble Lord, Lord Stoddart, is correct to say that it is illogical not to include it as an item on which a referendum should be held. However, I am glad that on this occasion, in their wisdom, the British Government have decided that it should not be on the list of such items. I only wish that they would kindly consider a lot of the other matters that we have been discussing—particularly the Article 48(6) list of items under Clause 4.
We will find that Clause 6 is even more obnoxious in its menacing effect on Parliament, even though Parliament will still be involved in the decisions. Of course, if there were an accession matter to be decided, under the existing suggestions Parliament would have the right to hold a referendum if it thought that it was correct to do so. However, I hope that that will not be the case, and I think that a lot of people will now have second thoughts about this referendumitis.
We should remember that huge, earth-shattering decisions have been made by this Parliament—one of the greatest Parliaments in the world—on matters ranging from the Second World War, joining NATO, the atom bomb, the formation of the UN and, before that, the League of Nations and the First World War. All those matters were decided by Parliament, as is the British tradition. It is not the British way to say, “Dear hapless members of the public, we want you to make a referendum decision on whether we should have more passerelles and what you would like to be included in those passerelles”. That would be the big society gone mad in European terms and I hope that we will get away from that.
I think that sometimes the noble Lords, Lord Stoddart and Lord Pearson, are unfairly attacked in this House. They are entitled to their views, although I think it is sad that they persist in wanting this country to be on its own and not be a member of the European Union. That is very sad for them personally, as well as being a matter of policy and viewpoint; none the less, in all the amendments that they will be putting forward from now on, they deserve to have a proper and respectful hearing in this House.
Lord Triesman
My Lords, I express my appreciation to all noble Lords who have spoken in the debate so far. I suppose I should apologise for having risen too early to make this intervention. I would have denied myself some 20 minutes of edifying discussion.
I start by making it clear that we oppose the amendment. It is entirely possible, as my noble friend Lord Richard, and the noble Lord, Lord Lamont, have said, to see exactly why it has been moved. The credibility of the amendment rests in large part on the worst provisions in the Bill. In many respects, the Bill is illogical and intrinsically foolish. Many of the 56 or so bases for holding a referendum would be almost incredible in any mature democracy and those provisions litter the Bill. I understand its function in placating some of the harsher critics of Europe. I suppose I take a little comfort from the view of the noble Lord, Lord Lamont, that many of the provisions would never be used even if they were carried, but I think that it is hard to fathom the Government’s intentions on the lock, as with much else in the Bill. The provisions have been made, if I may say so, without any sensible notion of proportionality or practicability and, as I have no doubt further debates in the House will illustrate, they would remove or abandon, in many instances without good or sufficient reason, the full and proper role of Parliament in the kinds of discussions that we would normally expect to have on such provisions. Yet on the issue which might have very significant implications —my noble friend Lord Richard made the point a while ago—the use of a referendum is specifically excluded.
When I thought about what should be said at this stage in the debate, I also went back to the founding treaty, as the noble Lord, Lord Hannay, did, and to the provisions that it made and the rights which it introduced for enlargement. Like him, I thought hard about the consequences on our international relations were we to exercise some form of veto as a systematic way of undermining the founding treaty. The founding treaty is far more eloquent and far more reliable than President Chirac's view of it, which was known to change from time to time.
I want to dwell, as others have, on the value of accession. The economic advantages, the anti-corruption measures, the rule-of-law measures, the role of civil-law measures, the development of courts and proper civil-law coding and the democratic principles have all been absolutely fundamental in all countries seeking to join the European Union. As my noble friend Lord Tomlinson said, by no means all of them fall backward in the economic area—many of them are wealthy and very successful countries—but some of them, without question, have fallen backward and have a chequered history because of the political regimes within which they have been forced to live for so many years.
A fundamental point which was made by my noble friends Lord Radice and Lord Dubs is absolutely right: enlargement has been a huge success. The process undertaken before countries join the European Union has driven consistently for better outcomes and for outcomes which have been more willingly embraced. Old enemies and ancient antagonisms have largely been removed. Going back a couple of years, I can remember thinking hard about the ways in which a war-torn Europe—most of its history it has been war torn—has been moved significantly into a peaceful Europe of nations which co-operate with each other and which have a great deal of mutual interest in each other's economic, political and social success.
As the noble Lord, Lord Stoddart, correctly listed the countries that are seeking membership, I thought of the names of many of those countries and remembered that it was not that long ago that we read about those countries largely because of the wars that were taking place, for example in the former Yugoslavia, and the continual history of appalling violence and degradation of human rights. Broadly speaking, we do not talk about those countries in that way any more. We have seen development to a point where they are more concerned with the acquis than with killing each other. That has been a fundamental change in one of the most difficult and troubled regions of Europe, and an enormous success. The process has policed, assessed and evaluated progress.
Lord Dykes
I will be brief. The noble Lord referred to the acquis. Would he not say how ironic, interesting and bizarre it has been that many anti-Europeans in this country welcomed artificial enlargement as a way of loosening and widening rather than further integrating the Union, and yet all the applicant countries accept enthusiastically both the concept of the acquis and that of future integration?
Lord Triesman
My Lords, the observation is completely accurate and adds weight to the point that I make, namely that it is in these areas where people are trying to work through the provision of stable legal systems and better democratic systems that we have seen the replacement in many cases of conflict between those states. That is a huge success.
Of course, we have supported accessions from their initiation through to full EU membership. Major parties on all sides of the House have done so, despite the inconveniences that have sometimes occurred but which were minor in the overall context. I say to the noble Lord, Lord Pearson, that not all these gains can be washed away by tales of cynicism, whisky, chocolates or anything else. By and large, in my experience, people have sought the gains because they have wanted a better and more peaceful life, and have wanted their children to enjoy a better future.
Lord Pearson of Rannoch
My Lords, can the noble Lord name a single European country that would have gone to war with another since 1945 in the absence of the project of European integration?
Lord Triesman
My Lords, I was going to go through one or two. Certainly Serbia will serve the purpose. A number of countries in the region, for one reason or another, went to war. It was only when a different kind of future was offered to them that they began to think about the alternative future that their children might enjoy which did not involve shooting each other.
I understand, in debating the amendment, that the issues that I have raised are not supported everywhere or by everyone. I take the point of the noble Lord, Lord Stoddart: I regard the movement of labour in a free market as broadly beneficial, but I know that not everybody thinks so. Many people have expressed anxieties about it. This has been one issue that has come out of part of the accession. I believe that, broadly speaking, it has been economically advantageous to Europe rather than the contrary. However, I accept that many people who expressed anxieties were dismissed in a trivial way or saw their anxieties given grudging attention. Probably that did not serve the argument well.
Some people may have felt that changes of that kind were sufficiently profound that they wanted a say in the decision through a referendum. More than that, I suspect that they felt the need for some sort of shout about the overall size of the EU. For all that, were they to contrast the prospect of having a referendum on those questions with the ideas in the Bill about having a referendum on many minute, technocratic and in many instances unintelligible provisions, probably they would think that some of the issues raised by the noble Lord, Lord Stoddart, were more important than others. It would be foolish of us not to recognise that.
I suspect that some of the same arguments could happen with the Turkish accession. Let me be clear that we—certainly I do—totally support it. I welcome the dynamism that it represents. I also have no hankering for a Europe that is built around a single religious tradition—a view which has been expressed by many of the Eurosceptics and, indeed, in some European capitals. It would be a huge gain to see Turkey as a full member of Europe. It is absolutely right, as the noble Lord, Lord Tomlinson, said, that it has always played a fundamental role in the Council of Europe. This would be a huge gain for Europe in a much more profound sense—a Europe that is welcoming and able not only to cope with, which is probably too derisory a way to put it, but to embrace a major secular but also Islamic nation with a capability of bridging the interests of Europe, the Middle East and the Caucasus and bringing a great deal to stabilising the discussion right around the southern and eastern flank of Europe.
Whatever the merits that I might express about it, I know that those merits have been accepted by all recent United Kingdom Governments. However, there remain people—it has been something of a cause in France and Poland, for example—who believe that Turkish accession would have a major impact on the style and culture of the European Union. I think that the noble Lord, Lord Stoddart, described it as the ethos of the European Union. I look forward to these evolutionary changes regardless of whether others have expressed doubts. However, among those who have expressed doubts, some will probably feel that there will be an impact on them—a greater impact than some of the things that will be subject to referenda under the Bill’s provisions—and that they are not being asked their opinion.
The Minister will probably want to explain to the House the difference in approach and the apparent irrationality of the circumstances in which people will be asked for their view as between the different kinds of categories of issues at stake. The amendment draws the wrong conclusion. However, it cannot be said that the issue that it raises is inconsequential. Nevertheless, as I said at the beginning, we are opposed in principle, and we are. It would be better to remove the requirements for so many of these trigger clauses for referenda without providing any compelling definitions of issues of major constitutional importance and without an independent means of confirming the compelling nature of the decision.
It would be very helpful if the Minister could also comment on the point made by the noble Lord, Lord Ahmad, about what would happen were there to be a number of countries seeking accession at the same time. I will not invite him, however, to develop a new theory of AV which might allow for multiple voting—an outcome which probably everybody would fail to understand.
I can also see one other great risk in the kind of referenda that this amendment calls for, and that is in the area of producing campaigns which could very well be xenophobic and draw out the worst in relations between those seeking entry to the European Union and the domestic community of the United Kingdom, not least because many of those communities already in the United Kingdom are dynamic and vigorous parts of the society of the United Kingdom. The tensions that could be produced by that kind of approach would be quite unacceptable.
I also believe that accession does not transfer powers from the United Kingdom and that the House would do itself a considerable favour by recognising the beneficial characteristics of the growth that we have seen, a benefit which will unquestionably continue. As we look across the whole of the achievement of a peaceful European Union, I suspect that that will be seen historically to be one of the better departing points in our history.
The Minister of State, Foreign and Commonwealth Office (Lord Howell of Guildford)
My Lords, I begin by welcoming the noble Lord, Lord Triesman, to the forefront of the Opposition's concerns about this Bill. I think that he and I exchanged views from the Dispatch Box during the passage of the Lisbon treaty. We covered a great deal of ground then, and I think that we learnt a great deal from that process. Indeed, the British people learnt a great deal from the Lisbon treaty process, as did the whole of Europe. I look forward to lively debates with him in the future.
I have to say in parenthesis that should this Bill become law, the future will not be at all as the noble Lord describes it. The picture of a dribble of referenda on small issues completely misunderstands the way in which the European process works now or will work in the future, whether this Bill is on our statute book or not. I have obviously explained that insufficiently because the message has not got over, but as we continue our debates I hope to be able to make clear that the pattern will not be dissimilar to the pattern of the big treaty packages in the past, the difference being that if they contain matters that might look small but could be highly significant for this nation because they involve a transfer of competence or powers beyond the level of insignificance, that certainly requires consulting the British people. That is a very widespread view which this Government believe is important to satisfy in order to build a better consensus for the European Union than we have today from the British public.
However, that is for other debates: debates that we have already had and debates in the future. On this issue, we have had a very elegant exchange on the two sides of the argument. It is a debate in which the Government’s position is quite clear, as I shall make plain in a few moments. I find that when your Lordships tackle this sort of issue we put up a superb performance and all sorts of aspects are developed that do not necessarily emerge in the pattern of debates in the other place.
The amendments would alter Clause 4 to create an automatic requirement for a referendum in the UK to approve the accession of a new member state to the European Union. As your Lordships know, the UK has never required a referendum on accession treaties in the past, and this Government have been clear that there should be no referendum requirement merely for the accession of any new member state. That was the position also taken by the previous Government, of which the noble Lord, Lord Triesman, was a member. Why is that so? The simple point is this: the accession of a new member state alone does not constitute a transfer of competence or power from the UK to the EU. The transfer of powers or competence to the EU would be from the member state joining the European Union, not from the UK. Of course, there are some effects, possibly including a change in bilateral relations if a country becomes a member of the European Union. No one disputes that, but we are not really talking about effects or impact; we are talking about the transfer of powers and competences.
I apologise if that sounds narrow, but that is the limitation of the provisions of the Bill. Of course, we are aware of the need to avoid providing a loophole in our referendum provisions in case there is a proposal to use an accession treaty to transfer power or competence from member states other than the acceding state. That could occur, so this Bill provides for a clear requirement for a Ministerial Statement to be laid before Parliament about whether an accession treaty constituted a transfer of competence or power from the UK to the EU in accordance with Clause 4. If the Minister decided that such a transfer was proposed, a referendum would then be required, but if there was no such transfer no referendum would be required. I hope that reinforces the point that I was making earlier.
Lord Hannay of Chiswick
My Lords, as the Minister has touched on this point so clearly, will he make it quite categorical that if a Croatian treaty of accession in the next year or two is brought before Parliament and it contains the provisions on Ireland and the Czech Republic that were agreed as part of the ratification process of Lisbon, in which it was stated, by us as well, that they will be included in a future accession treaty, that will not give rise to a referendum requirement?
Lord Howell of Guildford
If one is talking about declarations or derogations within existing treaties and competences, that would not give rise to a referendum. If it was an occasion on which a whole range of new proposals were put forward, including some of those which noble Lords describe as minor or even trivial but which could in fact have highly significant effects on the powers, potentials, freedoms and obligations of this country, that would be a different matter. The kind of changes suggested by the noble Lord would not give rise to a referendum.
In line with all other treaty changes, an Act of Parliament would—
Lord Davies of Stamford
I am very grateful to the noble Lord for allowing me to interrupt him. This is a very important point. If the Bill is passed in its present form with its text unamended, is he confident that it could not subsequently be argued—if there are going to be judicial reviews of ministerial decisions on this matter—during the accession of a new member state that the mere fact of accession reduces the powers of this country because it dilutes our voting strength in the European Union under QMV and for other purposes?
Lord Howell of Guildford
It does not dilute our power to veto. Our power to veto is there unless it is removed by other transfers, which of course would trigger a referendum. However, if the power to veto is there, there is no dilution. We have heard from noble Lords who have spoken in this debate of the small but undoubted change in the proportion of the population of the total European Union that would result in this country if a number of other countries acceded. That is true, but the veto remains. There has been no transfer of power of any description or kind, which is what this Bill is concerned with.
I also wanted to say that any accession treaty provides Parliament with the full power and the opportunity to scrutinise the accession treaty, which we have done in the past. If it was so minded—a point that meets the concerns of the noble Lord, Lord Stoddart—a Parliament could legislate for a referendum. It remains the power of Parliament to do so. It is perfectly free to say, “Here is an issue on which we think there should be a referendum”.
Lord Taverne
Is the point made by the noble Lord, Lord Davies, not correct? If an accession reduces the voting power under majority voting procedure of the UK, that must mean a decline in power of the UK Parliament.
Lord Howell of Guildford
It does not alter the fact that the United Kingdom will continue to have a veto, as other countries will, unless we surrender positions of unanimity by abandoning our veto. That would be the position. It is perfectly true that there would be very marginal and small changes in the pattern of weighting, but there is no particular reason why they should involve a loss of power or a transfer of competence. They do not do so. The noble Lord, who is very experienced in these things, was talking about patterns in which all sorts of alliances are formed or not formed. All sorts of gatherings and countings of votes take place when Ministers go into these negotiations. That will continue as before. The accession of another country does not alter that pattern in any way.
The noble Lord, Lord Pearson, asked about the ways in which immigration or financial regulations might be affected by the arrival in the European Union of a new member state. He will recall that when Bulgaria and Romania joined the EU, we put transitional arrangements in place. We had the perfect power and legislative opportunity to do so, and we can do so again. Nothing in the treaty of accession prevents us from doing so and nothing has prevented us from doing so in the past.
I emphasise, as the noble Lord, Lord Triesman, and other noble Lords have asked me to, that, as with all previous Governments regardless of their political composition, we are strong supporters of future enlargement. Like some noble Lords, I remember the considerable uplift in spirits when first there was the fall of the Berlin wall and the Soviet empire and then when the processes of enlargement embraced one after another of its former satellite countries. We all worked, planned and hoped for these things. Some of us thought that we would never see them in our lifetime, but they did occur.
EU enlargement helps to create stability, security and prosperity across Europe—we have never disputed that—and serves to spread democracy, human rights, the rule of law and fair rules for workers and businesses. These standards are high although they are not always achieved. I am grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Pearson, for reminding us of a joke—which, frankly, I had heard before—about the standards of the EU itself. The EU is not, of course, a country; it is a vast confederal structure. It is a unique institution in the 20th and 21st centuries but it is not a country, and perhaps it is a little distorting to suggest that it should be judged in the same way as a nation state. However, that we favour enlargement in the way in which it has come about so far—and in the way in which it might come about in the future—should not raise one iota of doubt for a single minute.
Whenever a candidate country meets the EU accession criteria and it is decided that it is ready to join the EU, we will support its entry. The Government will present its case to Parliament through the introduction of a Bill that will be debated in both Houses and passed or not passed into an Act according to the will of Parliament.
I have little to add to the strong points that have been put by a number of noble Lords as to the fact that transfers of powers and competencies do not arise in the precise form in which we are dealing with them in the Bill; there is no competence or power transfer. The commitment in the coalition government programme for government is to have a referendum on treaties that change a power or competence from the UK to the EU. Treaties that merely allow a new country to accede do not meet this requirement. On that basis, I urge noble Lords to consider what I have said on this matter and to withdraw the amendment.
Lord Stoddart of Swindon
I thank all noble Lords who have taken part in the debate, particularly those who supported the amendment—the noble Lords, Lord Pearson and Lord Willoughby de Broke. I confess that I did not think there would be a debate of nearly an hour and a half on my amendments; I thought they would be dealt with very swiftly. I am pleased that I tabled the amendments because we have had a well considered and authoritative debate on the subject, whatever opinion we hold. That has been altogether good. I would like to reply to all the points that have been made but, including my own speech, there have been 15 speakers—the equivalent of the number of speakers in normal short debates that are two and a half hours long—and I am sure that the House would not welcome a long speech from me in these concluding remarks.
I say to the noble Lord, Lord Pearson, that I was interested in the way in which the Estonians were bribed, so to speak, to vote in the referendum with whisky and chocolates. I am sure that the Scots would be pleased that their product was being used in that way. I visited Estonia shortly after the referendum. It seemed, from the general view of the population, that they regretted the decision that they had made and wished that they could go back on it. That is by the by.
It has been a good debate with some important issues raised. Although the noble Lord, Lord Richard, does not support the amendment, he made a valid point that if we are going to have referendums on some rather less important things—public prosecutors and what have you—there is little merit in raising the question of having referendums on more major matters. That was taken up by several other noble Lords. It is clearly important that we realise that the Bill is deficient in many respects.
On the question of referendums, there appears to be a lot of opposition to referendums per se. That opposition is perhaps on the basis that those who do not want them believe that they cannot win them. That is a big mistake. We have referendums on all sorts of things such as mayors. The objective of having them is to give people a say on major items. I stress that it is on major items. We should not rule them out of our decision-making process.
Another point was raised by the noble Lord, Lord Triesman. I, too, welcome him to his new post on the opposition Front Bench. He may well be right to claim that the European Union has given us nothing but benefits. The noble Lord, Lord Pearson, and I have asked repeatedly for a cost-benefit analysis of our membership of the European Union. I hope that the noble Lord, Lord Triesman, might support the next Bill which asks for a referendum.
Another point was made by the noble Lord, Lord Howell, who suggested that we should not have referendums on the accession of new members because there are no new competencies. As I pointed out in my opening speech, the accession of new members has often if not mostly been the reason for new treaties transferring competencies to the European Union. In that respect, new accessions may well result in new competencies being given to the European Union and its institutions.
I again thank noble Lords for contributing to a good and essential debate. I do not intend to press the matter to a Division this afternoon but, after reading all the contributions to the debate, I might wish to bring the matter forward again on Report and perhaps even put it to a vote. In the mean time, I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
Lord Liddle
Lord Liddle
My Lords, I readily confess that in the annals of arcaneness this is a very arcane subject for an amendment but it is not the fault of noble Lords on this side of the Committee. The fact is that this is an extremely arcane Bill with provisions of mind-boggling complexity. Therefore, if we are to address it with proper scrutiny we will inevitably end up moving arcane amendments.
In simple terms the purpose of Ministers is, we have been told in this legislation, to detail every possible transfer of power to Brussels and bind it in the form of some indestructible referendum lock, which will last at least for this Parliament and probably a long way beyond. Their argument is that this is necessary to restore public trust in the European Union. This proposition is made without any real evidence being offered that this is an effective means of restoring trust in Europe. I could argue with equal force that a more effective European Union would be a better way to address this problem. In making the argument that we need these multiple referenda, the Government are launching the greatest attack on the sovereignty of Parliament that we have seen in recent times. The noble Lord, Lord Stoddart, argues that those of us on this side of the Committee who find the multiple referenda proposed in the Bill objectionable do so because we are frightened of losing. We are not frightened of losing but we stand for parliamentary sovereignty and representative democracy, and this Bill is a denial of those principles.
The second point is that the situation in which this Government intend to put their Ministers is profoundly against the national interest in dealings in the European Union, because it denies Ministers the pragmatic flexibility to agree to passerelles in the Lisbon treaty or to small changes which will enable Europe to be more effective and to win back that trust. The consequence will be not to stop things happening but that the rest of the European Union, if it thinks the issue sufficiently important, will go ahead without Britain being involved. For good reason or ill, the United Kingdom is already out of the euro and out of Schengen. We on this side of the Committee believe that the consequence of the Bill will be to put us out of virtually all areas of expanding EU activity. It will marginalise Britain in Europe and deny the British Government the power to tackle problems that the nation state on its own cannot tackle. This is not just a matter of applying a lock to change; it is also throwing away the key.
On previous days in Committee, we have argued that this extreme position that the Government have adopted on the referendum lock can at least be modified in a number of ways. In our previous day in Committee, we argued from this side that where changes need to be made on grounds of urgency they should be permitted. We also argued that the significance test, which is included in the Bill and which allows Ministers to decide that—
Lord Howell of Guildford
I certainly do not want to make a habit of too many interruptions, as we all know that debate in this place goes more smoothly without, but the noble Lord has made a number of statements which jar so strongly with the reality that I have to ask him what he means by them. He says that the passerelle and other arrangements in the Lisbon treaty would enable rapid changes to be made but we all know that any treaty, including the one now going through, takes 21 months. How can 21 months possibly be described as rapid? Furthermore, he seems to assume that the efficient and effective operation of the European Union demands all kinds of new treaties and to ignore the fact that within the vast range of competences that it has, a great deal can, must and will be done. Countries throughout the European Union are extremely reluctant to embark upon the complex, long process of European treaty change. These are all facts and they contrast completely with what the noble Lord has said in the past five minutes.
Lord Liddle
The Minister has misunderstood what I have been trying to say. I apologise to the Committee if I have been giving a false impression but this amendment’s subject encapsulates fully the point that I am trying to make. What concerns us is: why tie up all the flexibilities that are within the existing, ratified structure of the Lisbon treaty, which were discussed in this House in the previous Parliament? Why tie all of those up in referendum locks that could have a very negative effect on Britain's power to act in its own interests within the European Union? That is the point and this amendment looks at one of those specific and unnecessary locks. Let me try and explain its point.
Clause 4(1)(m), which we debated last week, requires an automatic referendum if any amendment is moved to the Lisbon treaty, as it could be within the terms of that treaty, to alter the right of member states to ensure suspension of the legislative procedure. In Euro-speak, this is called the emergency brake and covers three areas of EU activity: social security, judicial co-operation and cross-border crime. It is the right of a member state to refer a matter where legislation is proposed in those areas to the European Council before the legislation can proceed any further. Britain supported emergency brakes in these areas in the passage of the Lisbon treaty. It did so because the previous Government thought that as regards social security, judicial co-operation and cross-border crime there might well be an argument in principle for more Europe. Indeed, there were compelling arguments for more Europe in this area but as a safeguard, just in case we did not like the look of the way things were going, we wanted to see how it worked. Therefore there was a need for an emergency brake.
The logic of this very pragmatic position is that if we find in future years that the European Community is doing a good job in these fields, we will be prepared to rid ourselves of that emergency brake provision. Those who are disposed by nature to see everything that the EU does as a threat will never believe that anything can work, but those of us who think that it can be an opportunity should be open-minded about the possibility of the changes that are provided for in the Lisbon treaty.
I argue that these three areas are issues that are not of the highest national importance, like whether we join the euro, but are of significant importance where change might be necessary in processes that the Government might want to agree to. However, the Bill will require an automatic referendum. Look at them: first, social security legislation, which, as we know, is tied up with the right to work, study, and settle for retirement wherever you want in the EU, which is one of its most appealing citizenship rights; secondly, judicial co-operation, which is essential if we are going to effectively tackle the terrorist threats of the kind that the noble Lord, Lord Strathclyde, talked about earlier in his Statement on Osama bin Laden; and thirdly, cross-border crime, in terms of which we are all aware of the increasing problems of criminal gangs operated from outside the EU but often on its borders, in countries like Russia and some parts of the Balkans.
Surely we want to retain the flexibility to make Europe effective in those areas. That may require changes in these so-called emergency-brake provisions but, on a narrow but significant point, the Government are saying, “Oh no, we can’t do anything for at least seven years or so because we have to have a referendum and we are certainly not going to do anything about that this Parliament”. The argument from this side of the House is a different one: let us not tie ourselves up in these knots but have the confidence that in a representative democracy Parliament should deal with these questions; there is no place for a referendum on them.
Lord Blackwell
My Lords, I must apologise to the House and the Minister for having been unable to contribute to the debate on the Bill so far. I feel compelled to contribute at this point by the extraordinary speech of the noble Lord, Lord Liddle.
When the Government of the day brought the Lisbon treaty to this House, one of their proud claims was that they had protected the red lines that they had set out, including the red lines on areas such as social security and judicial co-operation, through the introduction of these emergency brakes. If legislation was brought forward in the European Union that was seen to be against our national interest in these areas, or against things that we could tolerate, we had the right to say, “We will not go along with this. We don’t think this should be applied to the UK”. Effectively, we have a veto. The other member states can proceed without us if they wish, but it gives us a cast-iron guarantee that in these very sensitive areas the EU cannot override the UK Parliament and the UK people in legislating in what are regarded as areas of national importance. For the noble Lord to say that we should now throw these emergency brakes away—
Lord Liddle
I am not saying that at all. I am saying that we should not tie ourselves up indefinitely in the need to have a referendum to make this change. That does not mean that I am in favour of immediate change in these things; I am not. But I want to hold open the possibility of flexibility in order that we can meet new circumstances if necessary.
Lord Blackwell
I am grateful to the noble Lord for his clarification. However, he talks about trust, and I have to say to him that the reason why the British people have lost trust in politicians to represent them in Europe is that over many years they have seen politicians stand up and say, “Minor changes. These won’t affect you”, but cumulatively those changes have added up to a huge shift in powers.
These brakes were put in the treaty, which was agreed by Parliament. The noble Lord may not want to remove them this year, but when does he want to do it? If he wants to do it at some time, that would be a substantial weakening of the current treaties. In the spirit of the Bill, which I wholly support, I regard anything that removes a veto or anything akin to one as a major change to the treaty that should not be carried through by Government without the provisions of the Bill requiring that as a major change it should be put to the people in a referendum.
In his speech, the noble Lord attempted to confuse the House by suggesting that the referendum would make it difficult for the UK to use these powers. I should make it clear—the Minister can correct me if I am wrong—that nothing in the Bill requires a referendum for the UK to use, or not to use, the emergency brake. The Bill is entirely silent about the use of Articles 48, 82 and 83. It simply says that if the EU seeks to amend the terms of the treaties under which we can use those emergency brakes, that will require a referendum. Whether or not the use of the emergency brakes itself required a referendum would depend on the substance of the matter that was contemplated being brought forward under those provisions, which would fall under other aspects of the Bill.
Removing the subsection, as the noble Lord is attempting to do, would mean that at some point in time a future Government could give away these vetoes without requiring that to be brought back to the people. That is exactly the kind of action that has led to the loss of trust of people in politicians and, unfortunately, in this Parliament, to protect them in this matter.
Lord Hannay of Chiswick
I am sorry that the noble Lord’s absence from earlier debates has not enabled him to catch up with where this debate has got to. Some of us were attempting to reduce sharply the number of provisions that require a referendum, for a number of reasons that are not the ones that the noble Lord, Lord Stoddart, gave but are related, as the noble Lord, Lord Liddle, said, to whether or not you believe in representative parliamentary democracy and the powers of Parliament. A number of us who have done so have put forward amendments that would effectively leave in the Bill the strengthening from the ratification of Lisbon powers, which means simply that if these changes were to be made there would need to be a resolution in both Houses, but would leave intact in the Bill a requirement for primary legislation before Britain could agree to that. That would be a strengthening of parliamentary authority in areas such as this, which in any case require unanimity. The idea that there is not a lock there is completely aberrant. What there is not, if you follow the amendments, is a lock plus a referendum, and that is for principled reasons that I have briefly attempted to explain. I am sorry to interrupt the noble Lord, but really and truly the situation is not quite as he suggests. Those of us who are trying to reduce the number of referendums are not trying to weaken the power of Parliament but to strengthen it.
Lord Blackwell
I thank the noble Lord for his intervention. Actually, I am fully aware of the nature of these amendments, all of which attempt to undermine the purpose of the Bill, which is to require a referendum if there is a major change to the treaties or a major shift in power. That is a principle that I fully support and which the noble Lord is attempting to undermine.
I hope that there will never be a referendum under the Bill because I hope that no Government will ever seek to transfer further power to the European Union in a way that would require the referendum requirement to be enacted. In hoping that we will never have such a referendum, I probably agree with the noble Lord. However, if we are going to restore the trust of the people of this country in the EU, we have to give them the cast-iron guarantees that the Bill provides and not undermine it in the way that the noble Lord, Lord Liddle, seeks to do.
Baroness Falkner of Margravine
I seek some clarification on the amendment of the noble Lord, Lord Liddle. It seems to wish to get rid of three emergency brakes but leave in place the one that includes the common foreign and security policy. That seems somewhat inconsistent; the noble Lord has mentioned several areas of co-operation where he believes it would be important, if the EU were to proceed in a manner that would be conducive to our interests, for us to do so. I suggest that the common foreign and security policy would be one area in which we have rather more expansive interests than in those of social security, judicial co-operation and cross-border crime.
Since the noble Lord gave a few examples, may I caution him on, for example, judicial co-operation? He thought that it may well be essential to have improved judicial co-operation if we are to tackle terrorist threats. That is an important point, but I also urge caution regarding the other direction. It is not that long ago that in this House the former independent reviewer of terrorism legislation, my noble friend Lord Carlile, warned us regarding the proposals for 60 days’ detention without charge that the previous Government wished to introduce. We must not go in the direction of the French legal system, for example, under which people have been interned for several years without charge. It cuts both ways: we may want enhanced co-operation but we may well not want it.
The previous Government negotiated the treaty and put in the emergency brakes. It is unclear what these moves would achieve and why that change of position has come about. Will the noble Lord reassure me on my understanding, which is that the Bill does not require a referendum before the EU can act in areas where the emergency brake exists? Co-operation is a good thing which can benefit the UK, but I thought that this was about making it clear to the British people that a referendum would be required if there is a move to abandon these important safeguards. Can the noble Lord explain what has caused this quite significant change in thinking?
Lord Pearson of Rannoch
There has been much support in our debates so far against referendums for all but the most important issues such as the euro, and the noble Lord, Lord Liddle, echoed that in his speech. The speech of the noble Lord, Lord Deben, comes to mind, and many others. As this is a theme running through so much of our debate, I felt that I should make just one comment.
To put it mildly, we, the political class, are not particularly popular. I fear I detect a feeling out there among the people, in many discussions and in many fora, that our system of representative parliamentary democracy has, to some extent, broken down, or at least that it is not the great instrument it was before, the one which was exported all over the world. I think that there is now greater support for more of a plebiscitary democracy. Our system of representative parliamentary democracy worked very well in the 17th, 18th, 19th and even early 20th centuries, when many, if not most, people could not read and often led lives of endless drudgery and when better educated people were elected to Parliament to take their decisions for them. But now the people can read and, on the whole, are just as good and capable as their politicians. I believe that something like the Swiss democratic system, with its referendums—not, perhaps, going quite as far as the Californian system, with its difficulties over tax and the rest of it—really is now the only way in which to restore their democracy to the people. To those of the political class who laugh at this and decry such a prospect, I merely say, “They would, wouldn’t they?”.
Lord Flight
My Lords, it seems to me that the three areas where the noble Lord, Lord Liddle, is suggesting the lock-in of the referendum should be removed are fundamental to the argument about needing to have the requirement for referenda to lock in the position as it now is. They are about our common law system, our criminal justice system and our social security provisions. These are crucial areas and, as others have pointed out, because of their importance we negotiated, and were satisfied to get, the emergency brakes at Lisbon.
Some may not agree or be comfortable with the use of required referenda to act as a lock-in to the position that we are in; that is their view. But the whole point of the Bill is to protect citizens against UK Governments, as they have done over the past 20 years, gradually ceding more and more powers without any form of consent from the electorate or from changes in Europe to which the Government are not necessarily a party having the same effect. It would be completely illogical for the Government, having decided to embark upon this Bill, suddenly to say, “We are quite happy after all not to have the lock-in on the crucial area where we have emergency brakes”. The amendment is rather, dare I say, a waste of time, because it goes to the heart of what the Bill is about.
Lord Williamson of Horton
I pose a question to the Minister and not just to join side 1 or side 2, which is a feature of Committee. We are dealing with Clause 4, which is headed, “Cases where treaty or Article 48(6) decision attracts a referendum”. The purpose of the amendment is to remove some elements from that requirement. We will soon discuss a whole series of amendments—Amendments 23B to 23M—which relate to different subjects but have the same single purpose. They identify areas where, if a proposed decision is considered beneficial to the UK, it could be decided by Parliament without a national referendum. That is what we are talking about on this amendment and will be talking about on many more amendments, which will probably take us right up to dinner time.
Of course, some of these questions could probably be decided in any case under existing powers without any treaty change—that is quite possible in many cases—or any decision under Article 48(6). However, areas such as cross-border crime, which is the subject of a couple of amendments, might require such a decision. For this reason, I pose this question. I emphasise that it is a question, not a statement of opinion. If the Government, or more importantly Parliament, consider a small change that would require the operation of, for example, Clause 4(1) or Clause 6(5), and they thought that it was advantageous to the United Kingdom to do so, can the Minister envisage any circumstance in which it could be adopted without a referendum? I exclude from the question codification, which we will come to; measures applying to other member states but not to the UK; and accession treaties covered by Clause 4(4). That last point might be disputed, as it was earlier in the Committee. However, I pose my question. It is important for the further consideration of the Bill that we should know whether future decisions that are favourable to the UK but that would require these changes can ever be decided without a referendum.
Lord Wallace of Saltaire
My Lords, we have had a series of rather general debates, some of which relate to the amendment under consideration. However, I fear that several speeches have not referred at all to the amendment that we are discussing.
I first answer the broad and appropriate question that the noble Lord, Lord Williamson, posed. The Government’s case is that, under the terms of the Lisbon treaty, we now have considerable flexibility to do a great deal more within the current competencies of the European Union, some of which will be of definite advantage to this country, without needing further treaty change. The amendment seems to be based on an assumption that there is very little flexibility in the treaties, and that Britain is being pushed to the margins, stands alone, and will somehow be trapped by this. The coalition Government are making the case that we wish to make the best of our position in the European Union, but there is now a good deal of headroom and we are not cramped by current conditions. We are, as we will come to later, taking part in at least one exercise in what might become enhanced co-operation on the EU patent. The EU and Britain can work together within existing competencies for some considerable time to come.
On the previous day in Committee, I quoted David Miliband as saying clearly that, with the acceptance of the Lisbon treaty, we should now be entering a stage of consolidation in which we do not need further treaty change for some five to 10 years. If that turns out not to be the case, we will all have to deal with the situation as it then comes.
Lord Lea of Crondall
This is the most important point in the Bill. Are the Government now saying that if the Lisbon treaty says X, Y and Z, none of these clauses can in any way undermine it?
Lord Wallace of Saltaire
I was not aware that any of these clauses in any way undermined the Lisbon treaty. The noble Lord, Lord Kerr, who was much involved in the EU convention, is not here. Those of us who have read, as I have, a certain amount on the EU convention and the Lisbon treaty, which followed it, are well aware that the clauses on the emergency brake and passerelle were agreed after hard negotiations, in which it was not the United Kingdom versus all the others. Several member Governments in this now rather large and complex European Union wanted some reassurance that, as they touched on such sensitive areas as national sovereignty, law, finance and welfare provision—some of the issues covered by these emergency brake provisions—they would have, at the back, the ability to say, “No, we are not happy with what is proceeding”. That is what the emergency brake is about. It is not the case that Britain stands alone against 26 other member states that are determined to integrate further and sweep more powers into Brussels.
The United Kingdom and several others are pushing for further co-operation in a range of areas. Coalitions across the European Union differ according to each subject on which we negotiate. The noble Lord, Lord Liddle, knows better than me what it looks like once you are inside government. The emergency brakes are there to reassure member states—their public and their Governments—and those who care not just about the peculiarities of English criminal law and justice but about those of Polish and Romanian criminal law and justice. I have read what the then Foreign Secretary, Jack Straw, said about this when he gave evidence to the House of Commons European Scrutiny Committee on the Lisbon treaty. He said that the Government hoped that the emergency brake would never have to be used, but that it was there as a reassurance to national Governments. I emphasise “Governments”; this was not just about the British.
Jack Straw went on to say to the House of Lords European Union Committee:
“So it is an additional protection and I think really rather an important one”.
Perhaps the noble Lord, Lord Liddle, drafted this. Jack Straw then said:
“Again, it is quite a paradoxical point but I think the effect of it may be to provide greater confidence to British Government to get involved in opting into instruments, which is actually in principle what we want to do, and having done that then some additional surety which will get a satisfactory answer so that we do not have to apply the emergency brake”.
The noble Lord, Lord Liddle, said that sometimes the arguments around all this are arcane and of mind-boggling complexity. That sentence was not the easiest to read. However, the whole purpose of the emergency brakes is precisely to reassure national Governments on sensitive issues. It is not intended that they should be regularly used. It is highly unlikely that any Government will wish to remove them in the foreseeable future. Therefore, I suggest humbly that this amendment is one of the least useful that we have to consider.
Lord Liddle
I think the noble Lord, Lord Wallace, is trying to distort the position that I have put forward. I am not in favour of removing the emergency brakes. I am saying that the flexibility is there in the Lisbon treaty to do this. Those of us who have doubts about the Government’s Bill are saying that since this flexibility could be exercised only by Act of Parliament, why does it have to be done through a referendum? That is fundamentally the point. We heard the argument about what the former Foreign Secretary, David Miliband, said about the Lisbon treaty late at night in the previous session of the Committee. The point is that David Miliband recommended the Lisbon treaty to the other place on the basis of the flexibilities that it contains. However, the problem with the Bill is that it tries to tie up all those flexibilities with its wretched referendum lock.
The noble Lord, Lord Wallace, is trying to cover up the fact that his party is allowing the Conservative Party a second bite at the cherry on the referendum on the Lisbon treaty that it failed to secure. That is what much of the Bill is about. It is to my great regret that the British party that has been the strongest supporter of Britain’s membership of the European Union has gone along with what the Conservatives are asking for in this case. They are after a re-run of Lisbon. The amendments that we on this side of the Committee have put forward say, “Let us take the Lisbon treaty as it is and accept that the flexibilities within it do not require referenda”.
Lord Wallace of Saltaire
It is my great regret that for 13 years under the previous Labour Government the balance of public opinion in this country became steadily more sceptical about the European Union and that the Government of Tony Blair and then of Gordon Brown failed to make a positive case for European Union engagement. That has left us with a very sceptical public and a deeply sceptical and antagonistic press. That is the problem with which this Bill deals. It is another problem that we have inherited from a succession of previous Governments. The noble Lord, Lord Liddle, might well have tried to do something about that at the time from inside government, but unfortunately he did not succeed.
Lord Liddle
We can have academic debates about these questions in other places, and I do not want to delay the Committee. However, on the facts, there has been no great swing of British public opinion against the European Union over the past 15 years or so. It has fluctuated with circumstances over time. The Eurosceptic press was not created by the previous Government; unfortunately, it has been with us for a lot longer than that.
We on this side fundamentally object to the idea that plebiscitary democracy is the way to restore public trust. I am surprised that the noble Lord, Lord Wallace, is going along with this. I do not know what the noble Lord’s views are on the current referendum campaign, but there does not seem to be a high quality of public debate on referenda, given the way in which some of the people involved in the referendum campaign have argued that we are missing out by not having these issues decided in Parliament, where there would at least be a more balanced consideration of them.
I will, of course, withdraw this amendment. However, we on this side have moved several amendments on these lines, and we see no give whatever on the Government’s part. On subsequent Committee days I will refer to the question asked by the noble Lord, Lord Williamson, to which the Government must face up: namely, if they think that something has to be done in the national interest, would it still require a referendum, and what would be their position on that? That question is highly relevant.
Lord Lamont of Lerwick
What sort of policy proposals would the noble Lord want the emergency brake lifted for? Given that the emergency brake is there purely as a defensive mechanism, to be used rarely on occasions of national interest as a negative power, what circumstances can he envisage in which he would want to get rid of it? In all the areas that he has mentioned on which there might be co-operation, we can agree to co-operate anyway.
Lord Liddle
The noble Lord is right, of course, but it seems to me that on judicial co-operation, for instance, we had established the confidence that the former Foreign Secretary Jack Straw talked about and that Europe was important and effective in these areas. We might wish at some stage—I am not saying that we would but we might—to see some change in the processes. After all, it might be not only us who want to apply the emergency brake. Other member states might wish to do so, and that might be detrimental to the possibility of getting agreement on these questions. If we look back to Maastricht, we see that justice and home affairs were included in the European treaties for the first time on the basis of unanimity. However, by the time we got round to Lisbon there was an overwhelming consensus among member states that these matters should not be in a separate pillar but should be part of the main business of the Community, and that in the vast majority of cases there should be majority voting. Opinions change in the light of circumstances. Therefore, why should we tie ourselves up in referenda?
Baroness Williams of Crosby
I hope that I may suggest a response to the noble Lord. One example that we on this Bench have discussed is the growing incidence of piracy, which might stop a great deal of traffic passing through the Red Sea and affect the interests of our country and of others. Secondly, in the immediate aftermath of the freezing of assets of a number of non-democratic leaders following the Arab spring, money laundering might be regarded as an urgent issue.
Lord Liddle
The noble Baroness comes to my aid and makes good points, for which I thank her. I shall withdraw the amendment, but the Government should think hard about flexibility in the Bill. At the moment it is profoundly damaging to the British national interest because it gives our Ministers no flexibility whatever in their dealings with the European Union.
Lord Waddington
Lord Waddington
My Lords, I will not detain the Committee for very long. At first sight one might think that this amendment was a bit of a fuss about nothing. Why should anyone fuss about the codification of the practice of an existing competence? However, when one comes to examine the matter, the implications are serious. They were spotted by the House of Commons European Scrutiny Committee, which reported in these terms. It said, referring to the exception in Clause 4(4):
“In our opinion, this exception is significant: it would cover the practice of EU institutions pushing at the boundaries of their competence (competence creep), sometimes supported by judgments of the ECJ, and subsequently codified in a revision of the Treaties”.
I give your Lordships a simple example of what I am talking about. We are talking about, for instance, converting a non-binding intergovernmental agreement, which can be revised or revoked by another simple intergovernmental communiqué, into a treaty law which can never be changed except with the unanimous agreement of all member states. We are talking about what is in effect a transfer of power or competence because we are enshrining in the treaties an obligation that was not in them before. All this is not fanciful: conversion of simple agreements into what is to all intents and purposes permanent and irreversible Community law, backed up by sanctions against backsliders, has happened and does happen. In particular, parts of the Lisbon treaty were justified as mere codification of practice.
For instance, our own European Union Select Committee, in the 10th Report of the 2007-08 Session, on its assessment of the impact of the Lisbon treaty, found that new Article 43(1) of the Treaty of European Union, inserted by Lisbon, which set out the task for which the EU could deploy military and civilian missions under the common security and defence policy, codified in the TEU the tasks that had been agreed by member state Governments in 2003, as part of the European security strategy. However, the wording of the report, which I have here, hardly demonstrates that the committee had a clear understanding of what was happening. Rather surprisingly, at paragraph 12.127, the report stated:
“The Treaty will not change the scope of the CFSP or transfer any additional powers to the EU in this area. The new provisions in the Treaty could lead to a more active role for the EU in the area of CFSP, but much will depend on the degree of consensus among Member States regarding such a role”.
In fact, a non-binding intergovernmental agreement that could have been revised at any time by a simple intergovernmental communiqué was becoming virtually irreversible treaty law. It was not a mere codification, but a clear example of well concealed competence creep.
We are not debating whether the common security and defence policy is good or bad; I am pointing out that Clause 4(4)(a) would allow the conversion of a non-binding practice into binding and irreversible community law. The Bill is saying that when that happens, there is no need for a referendum.
Finally, the amendment and the situations that I have described should make us wonder whether the provision in the Bill for referendums, far from being an attack on parliamentary democracy, may mean that Governments have to take more care to ensure that they are open with their own Parliaments as to the implications of proposals, because of their statutory obligation to hold referendums, if there is a transfer of power or competence. I shall certainly not press the amendment to a vote, but I hope that Select Committees will in future be alert to the possibility of new law being made under the guise of codification, and report accordingly.
Lord Dykes
I apologise for interrupting. Can the noble Lord give any other examples, apart from the CFSP?
Lord Waddington
That is the example that comes to mind. There are three or four of them in the Lisbon treaty, but I do not have that information and, unfortunately, I cannot give it to my noble friend, but I will write to him, if he wants it. There were two or three other occasions; I am not saying that they were earth shattering, but it is alarming that the Select Committee did not spot that new law was being made here. That is the point I am making. It is alarming that new law could be made without holding a referendum, and it is doubly alarming that one of our expert Select Committees in this House did not spot what was happening on that occasion. It should not happen in future.
Lord Hannay of Chiswick
As a member of the EU Sub-Committee that was the author of that example, I should enlighten the noble Lord on the process. First, what he has said in the past few minutes is based on an interpretation that is a complete fantasy, whereby if this Government and country are party to an intergovernmental agreement, they can walk out of it when they like. They cannot do that. It is a matter of good faith and the law on treaties, and you cannot do that.
The noble Lord is quite right to say—and the text he read out demonstrates this—that we were perfectly well aware that the CFSP and the ESDP were being shifted from an intergovernmental basis on to a treaty basis. That is what we said in our report, but the key point was that the provisions for taking decisions within the Lisbon treaty in this area require unanimity, and there would be no surrender of powers or competences whatever. I am sorry—I will speak to the amendment in a moment, but I wished to correct that point.
Lord Waddington
With the greatest respect to my noble friend, he is in error. There was an intergovernmental agreement. You can say that that gave a competence to the EU, but it could have been withdrawn in a moment by just a communiqué between the member states. The noble Lord is surely not saying that it was a matter of insignificance to transfer an intergovernmental agreement into cast-iron treaty law. He is surely not saying that the report from which I read out made clear to its readers that, in fact, new law was being made on that occasion. The report does not say anything like that. It was certainly not a clear statement that an intergovernmental agreement was being transferred and converted into community treaty law.
Lord Radice
I thank the noble Lord for giving way, but what the noble Lord, Lord Hannay, made clear was that this position, even if it is in community law, is protected by veto. I do not think that the noble Lord, Lord Waddington, understood that.
Lord Waddington
That is nothing to do with the case that I have raised. I am saying that the Bill deals with all sorts of situations where it is said that there is a transfer of competence, and that there should therefore be a referendum. I am pointing out that, in this clause, what is dressed up as a mere codification can often be a transfer of competence and the conversion of an agreement between members states that could be altered at the drop of a hat into binding treaty law. That is what I am talking about. I beg to move.
Lord Lamont of Lerwick
My noble friend Lord Waddington is to be congratulated on and thanked for raising an extremely important point on which I should like the Minister’s reassurance. I should like him to address the points made by my noble friend.
Of course I understand that the Bill deals only with future treaty change, not the existing provisions of the treaty. If a power of competence has already been conceded to the EU from the UK, the decision obviously cannot be reversed by the Bill. Under it, codification does not require a referendum in any case, including a codified transfer of power or competence. Why? I know that the Government’s argument is that if codification takes place by the granting of a formal treaty base for an action, the transfer of power has already taken place, either under the treaties or through a different general article, such as Article 352.
However, the point that the noble Lord, Lord Waddington, raised is important. I know that some members of the Committee dislike the phrase “competence creep”, but a transfer of powers could happen through codification and the interpretation of existing treaties. I return to the point to which I referred previously, when challenged by the noble Lord, Lord Tomlinson, about an example of competence creep. I cited the use made of Article 122 of the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union to set up the European financial stability mechanism. That article, as many Members of the Committee are aware, states that financial assistance can be granted to a member state where the state is,
“in difficulties or is seriously threatened with severe difficulties caused by natural disasters or exceptional occurrences beyond its control”.
It is very difficult to argue that the case of the financial difficulties which Portugal got into were a natural disaster or entirely beyond its control. At the very least, it seems to me that there was a significant failure of regulation, and, other people would argue, of budgetary and other policies as well.
I do not want to go into that but, to many people, that seemed a bizarre interpretation of Article 122(2). It is that sort of thing that gives rise to the anxiety that the noble Lord, Lord Waddington, articulated. Of course I understand that there is a case for codification and that it will be necessary. Perhaps a significance test could be allied with that when assessing whether codification could be misused in that way. What the noble Lord, Lord Waddington, said, is not a fantasy or an imagined danger—it is very real when one looks at how legislation has happened in the past.
Lord Brittan of Spennithorne
With great respect to my noble friends Lord Waddington and Lord Lamont, I do not think that they are correct in this case. The test of what is codification and is therefore excluded from a referendum provision is an objective one. It does not depend on the procedures used to achieve the codification; it depends on whether there has been actual codification or something going beyond it. Codification, in the normal use of the word in English law, which is how the provision would be construed, means not a change in the law but the assembly in a convenient form of existing law. Of course there can be room for argument as to whether in a particular case there has been a change or merely a codification in the sense of an assembly of existing law, but the test is an objective one, not what procedure has been—
Lord Brittan of Spennithorne
Just one moment—not the way in which that has come about either in this country or elsewhere. In the last analysis, the test of whether what has happened is codification and is therefore exempt from a referendum would be applied in the normal way by the British courts applying common-law principles.
Lord Waddington
Is not my noble friend at loggerheads with the noble Lord, Lord Hannay? The noble Lord, Lord Hannay, was arguing a short time ago that there was an existing competence. It was not at that time enshrined in treaty law but, as the result of an intergovernmental agreement, there was a competence. Clause 4(4)(a) refers to the codification of a practice in relation to the present exercise of an existing competence, so I think that I am right and that my noble friend is in error.
Lord Brittan of Spennithorne
I do not think that that is the case. The question is: is it codification or not? That is the question, not how it has come about. If it is not codification but the creation of a new law, the provision exempting the requirement for a referendum does not apply. If it is codification, which will be determined by an objective test applied by British courts in accordance with normal common-law principles, it applies. That would mean that there has been no change in the law of England, however that may have come about.
Lord Waddington
Is my noble friend therefore saying that in the new article inserted in the treaty by Lisbon there was in fact no codification, although it was stated to be a codification?
Lord Brittan of Spennithorne
I am not making any statement about whether or not any particular provision was codification. I am talking about the correct interpretation of this provision in this Bill with regard to the future, which determines whether or not a referendum is called on the question. The test is an objective one: whether what occurs in future amounts to a codification, however it has been achieved, or goes beyond a codification and involves a change in the law. It is as simple as that.
Lord Blackwell
This is the one amendment this evening with which I confess that I have some sympathy. My interpretation of Clause 4(4)(a) is that it talks about the codification of practice under an existing competence. It does not talk about the codification of an existing competence but the codification of practice. As my noble friend Lord Waddington said, the EU has a history of stretching the practice of exercises of competence to take on ways of applying it that may not have originally been envisaged by those who agreed to the competence in the treaty. The example burnt in my mind is the notorious use of the health and safety provision to legislate from the EU on UK employment law a decade or so ago.
Lord Brittan of Spennithorne
I assure my noble friend that whether or not that is a good thing or a bad thing—I have a lot of sympathy with the view that excesses happened there—by no wild stretch of the imagination could that be described in English law, and we are in the process of creating a British statute, as codification. It might be wonderful; it might be disastrous; it might be neither; but it is not codification and therefore the provision would not apply.
Lord Blackwell
I said that I had some sympathy with the amendment, and I very much hope that the Minister will be able to reassure me. To my mind, that was an example of a practice coming into effect which could then be claimed was an existing practice that simply needed to be codified. I am not a lawyer, but if something can be done under an existing competence, why does it need to be codified? The EU already has the power to do what it needs. If something is then codified, the danger is that it creates a new base, or ratchets up the base, from which we can then have further ingenious development in practices. I am therefore very nervous about allowing codification of this sort to take place when, if the EU is already doing it, codification does not seem to be needed. I would very much welcome the Minister explaining and perhaps thinking again about whether that exemption is required in the Bill.
Lord Hannay of Chiswick
My Lords, I will now argue against the amendment on substance, having dealt with the ancient history to which we were all subjected previously; I do not want to go back on that.
A common-sense application to the amendment would lead one to regard it as bizarre. The object appears to be to ensure that if the European Union, with the agreement of the British Government—which is required under unanimity—conducted an act of genuine codification, we would have a jolly referendum about it. All I can say is that if noble Lords really want to go around this country stirring up apathy about the codification of some obscure piece of European law, common sense has flown out of the window.
The amendment is being moved, and support for it being given, on the basis of fear that a British Government will not know enough about the process to distinguish between a real codification and—in the parlance of noble Lords who support the amendment—competence creep. It is not sensible to add to the 56 other matters, to increase the number of referendums on a subject on which it is frankly just not credible that you could have a sensible political campaign involving the whole electorate of this country. I am not in favour of that.
Lord Waddington
I hope that the noble Lord will appreciate from the very fact that I am not pursuing the amendment that I use it as an opportunity to point out the severe error committed by members of his Select Committee when it carried out its study into the impact of Lisbon. I hope that he will always bear that in mind in future and that the error will not be repeated.
Lord Hannay of Chiswick
I am afraid that the noble Lord is going to be disappointed.
Lord Howell of Guildford
My Lords, if there are no further comments from your Lordships on this issue, it remains for me to seek to allay the fears of my noble friend Lord Waddington on a matter which is undoubtedly complex. Indeed, as the noble Lord, Lord Liddle, remarked earlier, the entire area is complex because the interface between the powers and competences of the European Union and the powers, rights and obligations of the nation state members is vastly complex and, in some senses, is in a somewhat fluid state. Indeed, it is that very fluidity that gives rise to the unease for which I believe there is substantial evidence, and I speak as someone who has been involved for just short of 50 years—even before the UK joined the then European Community—in trying to see that the European Union works in a balanced, effective and beneficial way. Over the past few years, not only in this country but in many countries we have seen an appalling record of declining confidence in, support for and public consensus over the whole construct of the European Union. In my view, the EU has conferred considerable benefits on its members and on the peace and stability of the whole world in the past, and, provided it proceeds in a sensible way with good public support, it will do so in the future in a number of, although not unlimited, areas. This is a perfectly sensible aspiration and one which I think the Bill and its aims reinforce, although I realise that that is not understood or accepted by noble Lords opposite.
The amendment would remove the provision setting out that future treaty changes which serve to codify practice under the treaties, in relation to the previous exercise of an existing competence, should not in principle require a referendum. My noble friend is concerned, as he says Members in the other place were during debates on the Bill, that codification could be used as a vehicle for transferring power or competence from the UK to the EU and that this provision might provide a loophole to allow such a transfer under a future treaty change without a referendum. If a treaty change is merely a codification of the previous practice of existing competence and nothing else in that treaty would fall within Clause 4(1) of the Bill, the Government do not think that a referendum should be required and the matter would proceed on that basis. Genuine codification—I emphasise “genuine”—is not a transfer of power or competence. The EU competence in question already exists and the EU has already acted to that effect. Even if the UK did not agree to codify existing practice by means of a treaty amendment, the EU would be able to continue to act within the relevant existing competence. Therefore, in effect there would be no point in attempting to go down another path because the EU would already be doing what it was doing within the existing competence.
An example of a treaty change which we would consider to be codification would be the introduction of a separate legal base for action previously taken to provide macro-financial assistance to some third countries. Article 352 of the TFEU, which we all know well, was used in April 2004 to provide macro-financial assistance to Albania. It was then used a further seven times to provide macro-financial assistance in a similar way to other countries. When the Lisbon treaty came along, it codified this use by providing a separate legislative base under Articles 212 and 213 of the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union, which cover economic, financial and technical co-operation with third countries.
Lord Pearson of Rannoch
My Lords, can the Minister give us any idea of the quantum at stake in this amendment, given the European Union’s well known capacity to take power by whatever method it can? He mentioned the use of former Article 308 and the noble Lord, Lord Blackwell, mentioned how we were deceived in the Maastricht negotiations over the working time directive which, in the end, turned out to be part of the social policy. How many existing competences are being practised which might require codification? Is this a big area or is it something that will not happen very often because there is not much left to codify or to put in the treaty or to agree?
Lord Howell of Guildford
I do not think it is possible to quantify what will happen, what is happening or what has happened. Codification has occurred from time to time and I described one or two instances where it has occurred. There have been more. I would love to be able to say to the noble Lord that it has happened 15 times and it will happen 15 more times, but that would be completely unrealistic. I have no idea how it will occur, but it is important to ensure that we understand what genuine codification is. It will occur again and, as my noble friend Lord Brittan said, it is an objective legal concept but it is a bit like an Omega wrist watch that seems to be genuine but turns out to have nothing inside. There are non-genuine codifications and we have to watch very carefully to see that they do not join the genuine move towards competence creep, which is a phrase that people do not like. The phrase that people like in relation to the European Union is “knowing where they stand”, believing, as I think the majority of people in this country do, in the value of the European Union but feeling thoroughly uneasy about it continuing to take too many powers away from the nation states. Most nation states in Europe do not want that and we do not want it either.
Lord Triesman
“( ) provisions that strengthen the effectiveness of the European Union single market”
Lord Triesman
My Lords, with some regret, I think I am bound to irritate the noble Lord, Lord Howell, but I hope I do not irritate him so much that he regards what I say as being entirely in the world of fantasy. I hope he knows that I have a high enough regard for him not to use his time in that way.
In introducing the amendment I would like to reflect briefly on the debate on the previous amendment. Eminent Members of your Lordships’ House—and eminent lawyers—had a very clear difference of view about whether a codification exercise, which was intended to be non-binding in practice, had become a substantive change and a move of powers. I do not want to put words into the mouth of the noble Lord, Lord Waddington, but in essence I think that was his argument. The noble Lord, Lord Brittan, countermanded that argument by saying that it depends on the actual codification or whether what is being undertaken goes beyond the codification. I hope I have understood him correctly—that codification is not a change but an assembly of existing law in a convenient form. That argument is readily understood.
The contribution of the noble Lord, Lord Hannay, also readily understood that. I know from past experience in the area of employment law that in trying to make sense of a codification of different elements of law, it is necessary on occasion to reconstruct the language, to some extent at least, to ensure that the assembly adds to the process rather than produces confusion.
I do not think it is fanciful at all to think into the future and to consider that there may be a number of occasions—not rare occasions—when a lively discussion will take place about whether some new movement of competence is taking place or not. As they have today, noble Lords—and no doubt many in the other place and in the country as a whole—will take part in that discussion. Some will argue fiercely on one side that there is a change that requires a referendum, subject to having gone through a parliamentary process and subject to the possibility of judicial review—I understand all those points perfectly well—and others will argue that it is no such beast, that it does not require any of those kinds of steps because it is merely a tidying up in the sense of assembling the changes into a convenient form under the existing law.
I do not intend to be disagreeable about the points that the noble Lord, Lord Howell, has made, but I put to him this thought: that were the world a very tidy place, and were everyone to come along with changes that they wanted to see to arrangements in European law with a declaration that they were indeed changes to European law, and there were a movement of competence from one place to another, I have no doubt that we would see each of those events as a major event and everyone would understand the process in exactly the way that he describes it. But I do not think the world is like that. I think it is a much more muddled place in which people move and nudge existing arrangements to try to gain some advantage out of them or to tidy them up, in the course of which someone will say that an advantage is being gained and the argument will rapidly emerge that this is precisely what this piece of legislation was designed to prevent. That is what was called creep earlier in the debate. That is why I do not think it is reasonable, with the greatest respect, to say that it should be blatantly obvious to the Opposition or to anyone in your Lordships' House that one set of circumstances applies and that everyone can see that it would plainly happen very rarely and would require a special arrangement, rather than that there are things happening which many people will think pretty much continuously require some sort of special arrangement, because that is the nature of political life. With the amendments in this group, we are making a legitimate attempt to say that it would be helpful if Ministers had scope to move: a capability to do the necessary political work under certain circumstances and within the constructs of United Kingdom law, and to respond to the circumstances that they face.
Baroness Falkner of Margravine
Perhaps I may interpose a thought on this important point. My noble friend Lord Lamont several times mentioned the European financial stability mechanism. Does the noble Lord accept that, when it comes to financial crises arising and bailouts being instituted, the mechanism will take some years to come into effect? While I agree that technology can drive an impetus for change, in general I do not see any decision-making processes in the EU being affected by this. The bailouts were urgent for the countries involved, yet they will take about two years to implement.
Lord Triesman
My Lords, I appreciate the question. With respect, I think that the noble Baroness is conflating the first amendment in this group, which concerns the efficiency of the operation of the single market, with the second, which I will come to in a moment and which concerns the strengthening of financial regulation. The issues that have just been raised may be more relevant to that.
I hope I have made the point about the steps that might be needed in order to ensure that proper competitive arrangements are in place in a business environment that changes rapidly and in which the potential for monopolistic behaviour is considerable.
I turn to Amendment 23F, which concerns the strengthening of financial regulation. I accept the point made about the time that would be taken. However, we also know about the speed at which the degradation of financial institutions took place, not just in Europe but in the United States and elsewhere; and that the aim of most of the major policy-makers in a period that was both extremely troubled and extremely complex was to intervene where they felt that they could as rapidly as possible and not necessarily against an 18-month to two-year timeframe. There was a very early consideration of whether the role of the central bank in Europe should be considered. Many nations in Europe urged each other—but not very effectively—to look at the balance sheets of the banks across Europe; at the consequences for one another of the weaknesses in their balance sheets; at the issues that have since arisen from the ridiculous ways in which a great deal of interbank lending took place; at the collapse of liquidity when it could no longer take place; and at the fact that many of the institutions were deeply indebted to each other for toxic derivative products that they traded largely among themselves, and which had in many instances destroyed their balance sheets.
I would like to think that almost everybody in this House, had they been in a position to take a view, would have said that that way lay lunacy and ruin. Almost all of us would not have gone there. Therefore, while it is true that some arrangements would take a good deal of time and some states would pore over them exactly as the noble Lord, Lord Howell, said, some emergency arrangements could have assisted in circumstances of severe financial meltdown, had they been in place.
In those circumstances somebody may very legitimately say, “This is not only a European problem—it is a worldwide problem. You would have had to engage many others as well”. Of course I accept and understand that international canvas. However, it would most certainly have helped had Europe and the European nations with considerable financial power been able to go to the original G20 conferences and make points in a very much better, co-ordinated way. You do not need treaty change to make a point in a co-ordinated way—of course you do not—but it is certainly true that had they gone and urged that they wished to use powers which were perhaps a little beyond the set of powers they had, that might have had a significant effect in the G20. From those who were at the G20, I believe that that is empirically true as well.
Finally, to sweep up this group of amendments, I turn to Amendment 23H, which addresses,
“provisions that advance the prospects of international agreement to a new global trade round”.
I promise that I will say only a little about this. However, I think that everyone has seen the enormous difficulties in achieving any successful outcomes from the Doha round and the huge difficulties in co-ordinating a European position let alone a world position. Yet everybody has believed that the success of the Doha round would be one of the fundamental drivers of a huge amount of international growth and, just as important, the elimination of a great deal of poverty around the world.
There is another case, where you can imagine small arrangements at the edge—which some will say are a codification of existing arrangements and you can bet that some will say are not—which might have made a real difference and enabled us to move faster, or may in the future enable us to move faster.
Lord Lamont of Lerwick
I agree with every word that the noble Lord has said about trade and the importance of getting a world trade agreement, although those have proved extremely elusive. However, given that trade is an exclusive—exclusive—EU competence, what is the effect of his amendment?
Lord Triesman
My Lords, the intention of the amendment is to provide the scope for further adjustments to the trade arrangements and the powers of the Commissioner dealing with trade arrangements, given that Commissioners who have dealt with trade arrangements have expressed their anxiety about the limitations that have been placed on them during the negotiations in these trade rounds. It is entirely possible—it may be part of the noble Lord’s point—that these powers exist in any case and can be handled in any case. However, the experience of the difficulty in making progress leads me to believe that there may on occasions be adjustments that would make the process easier, more helpful and capable of moving faster.
My point is not that these are all world-shattering changes—they may be small changes. The scope to make those changes, to respond to circumstances, seems to me to be a power that would strengthen the people of the United Kingdom and strengthen the EU rather than weaken the people of the United Kingdom.
Lord Blackwell
I confess that I am having some difficulty following the noble Lord’s argument on this point and I wonder whether he can help me. As my noble friend Lord Lamont has said, the EU already has exclusive competence in the area of international agreements. It has competence over the single market. It has competence over regulation. It can legislate in these areas using the normal provisions of the EU—that is what the competence gives it; that is under the existing treaty—so we are not talking about stopping it legislating. I am trying to understand what it is the noble Lord thinks might require treaty change to enable the EU to do something; and why, if it requires treaty change, that will not in any case take several years to accomplish, in the way that treaty changes normally do. I fail to understand what is the restriction to act in areas where the EU already has competence.
Lord Triesman
My Lords, I apologise if what I have said is not clear enough. My point at the very beginning of my comments was that when you begin to talk about the latitude to move in any of these areas, you can guarantee that one set of people will say that it is a new arrangement and demand the conditions which the Bill establishes for a referendum, while others will say that it is simply in the areas of competence: they can do it with a degree of codification, were that to be necessary, or they can do it under the rubric of the codified arrangements. It will always be the subject of conflict between those who believe that it is a subterfuge to extend the powers of the EU and those who believe that it can be done legitimately. I am saying that you cannot run a proper political process that way, with that much obscurity and that many arguments and with the prospect of many things not only going through our Parliament but through judicial review, and with fierce arguments around the country about the need for a referendum in those circumstances. It just strikes me as being a way of tying the hands of those who you hope and expect will be competent to conduct the discussions in the European environment to a successful conclusion in the interests of this country.
Lord Pearson of Rannoch
My Lords, I speak against these amendments. Amendment 23B assumes that the EU single market is a good thing for this country. That is a common misconception among the political class upon which I should like to cast a little doubt. This is a big and detailed subject and I recommend that any serious student should consult the briefing notes on the globalbritain.org website, which demolish the whole myth of the EU's economic usefulness and that of its single market.
The background point, which is not generally understood, is that the single market is more than a free trade area, it is a customs union. This means that a single customs barrier surrounds all the countries in the Union, whose international tariffs and trading arrangements are negotiated and decided centrally by the European Commission. In a free trade area, on the other hand, the countries concerned enjoy free trade among each other, but they remain able to make their own tariff arrangements with countries outside that area. They have their own seats on the World Trade Organisation and they are also able to make their own domestic law in areas such as working time, health and safety at work, part-time workers and so on.
So a country does not need to belong to the EU to enjoy free trade with it. According to a recent government Answer to me, the EU and its single market already have free trade agreements with some 63 countries outside the EU and are on their way to having similar agreements with another 75 countries, or roughly 80 per cent of the other countries in the world. It is perhaps worth noting that both Switzerland and Norway, not in the EU or its single market, both export more per capita to the single market than we do; Switzerland three times as much and Norway five times.
Lord Hannay of Chiswick
I am grateful to the noble Lord for giving way, but I fear that he is in danger of misleading the House fairly elaborately in this matter. He is talking about three things, not two: the first is a free trade area, the second is a customs union and the third is the single market. Norway, he has just stated categorically, is not part of the single market. I am afraid that he is in error. It is part of the single market, and it applies single market legislation by receiving fax messages from Brussels telling it what it has to do. The members of the European economic area are in the single market but are not in a customs union. However, I am not totally sure that this line of argument is going to get us very far—but it would be useful.
Lord Pearson of Rannoch
I do not want to delay the House, but that is why I made the distinction between a customs union and a free trade area.
The worst aspect of our membership of the EU single market is its sheer cost. Like their predecessors, this Government are determined to avoid an official cost-benefit analysis, and so we are left with the eight analyses that have been produced since the turn of the century, four of which are pretty much official, and which put the cost of our single market membership at anything between 4 per cent and 10 per cent of GDP. Indeed, the highest cost estimate came in 2005 from the Treasury itself in a paper entitled Global Europe: Full-Employment Europe under the signature of Mr Gordon Brown when he was Chancellor of the Exchequer. It put the cost of EU regulation at 6 per cent of GDP and of EU protectionism at 7 per cent. In March 2006, the French Conseil d'Analyse Economique, which is attached to their Prime Minister’s office, found that France had gained nothing from the single market or, indeed, the euro. In June 2006, the Swiss Government published their finding that joining the EU and its single market would be nine times more expensive than staying with their current sectoral free trade agreements with Brussels. Later in 2006, the EU Commissioner for Enterprise and Industry, Mr Günter Verheugen, said that EU regulation was costing its members some €600 billion a year, or around 6 per cent of GDP at the time.
One of the troubles with being in the single market is that this EU overregulation, whatever it costs, applies to the whole of our economy, not just to the 9 per cent that trades with clients in the rest of the EU. So the 11 per cent of our GDP that goes in trade with the rest of the world and the 80 per cent that stays in our domestic economy—91 per cent of our GDP—has to carry the burdens of Brussels’s overregulation. There are, of course, those who fear that were we to leave the EU and its single market our trade would somehow suffer and that, to quote the propaganda, 3 million jobs would be lost. The truth appears to be the opposite: trade would expand and jobs would be created. It is, of course, true that we have 3 million jobs exporting goods and services to clients in the EU, but they have 4.5 million jobs exporting goods and services to us. We are, in fact, the EU’s largest client. Would the French stop selling us their wine or the Germans their cars just because we had left the single market and were no longer bossed around by Brussels? Of course not. There are also the points that the World Trade Organisation would prevent any form of retaliation were we to leave and that the EU’s average external tariff is now below 1 per cent. Our trade is going up faster with the rest of the world than with the EU, both inwards and outwards. Our exports to the EU single market are declining. The single market is sclerotic and overregulated and its demographic trend is against it. It is the “Titanic”.
It is also hard to think of any other customs unions along the lines of the EU. There was the Soviet Union, and there may be something similar in the Caribbean, but nowhere else. Mercosur in South America does not count because its members are free to agree their trading relationships with non-members. Can the Government advise us of any other customs unions like the EU? If not, does that not suggest that it may not be such a great idea?
As to Amendment 23F, I do not think we need the EU getting more involved in financial regulation. Commissioner Barnier has openly said that he does not favour what he calls the Anglo-Saxon model, and we have yet to feel the damage done to the City of London and its ability to pay tax by the new EU supervisory bodies. When the movers of the amendment say that they do not want it to interfere with the UK’s general approach to financial regulation, I ask whether they have Monsieur Barnier’s agreement? The deed is done. Overall financial supervision has passed to Brussels. No provisions in this Bill will prevent that.
As to Amendment 23H, I fear that those of us who come from the Eurorealistic perspective would rather that the unelected Commission did not continue to negotiate on our behalf in a new global trade round. As the world’s fifth-largest economy, we would rather do it for ourselves.
Finally, is it not really grotesque that an organisation that has so dismally failed to look after the vast sums entrusted to it by the taxpayers of Europe should have its powers strengthened, or made more effective, as the amendments have it? More will certainly mean even worse, and I oppose the amendments.
Lord Empey
My Lords, I think we are straying back to a Second Reading debate, because we seem to have moved somewhat from the amendments. I shall return to what the noble Lord, Lord Triesman, said about emergencies and new technical developments that could arise and that are reasons that he is using to justify his amendment.
Of course emergencies will always arise—they are part of life’s rich panoply—and there will always be new developments, but even if they did require changes to treaties and so on, we know that that will take a considerable time. Emergencies can be dealt with by multilateral agreements, bilateral agreements or in a range of other ways, and we deal with them that way all the time. I have worked with an international treaty: the Belfast agreement. We had specific arrangements with the Irish Republic. They were codified. I suspect that people on the streets of Britain talk of little else but codification from what I have been listening to this afternoon.
The debate is so complicated that it causes the eyes to glaze over. We had specific areas of co-operation set out in an international treaty and discovered that an emergency arose. It was the prospect that we would not have enough gas on both sides of the Irish border. What did we do? Because we did not have it codified and it was not part of a treaty, the two Ministers—I was one of them—reached a bilateral agreement that we had ratified through our existing processes. We were able to do the job and get the pipeline built in a fraction of the time that it would have taken had we taken it through a formal process. I believe Governments will always be able to find a way to work together in an emergency and that when things are part of an elaborate process, that does not guarantee speed.
The amendments talk about the effectiveness of the single market, effectiveness in mitigating climate change and effective financial regulations. Effectiveness, like beauty, is in the eye of the beholder. If you talk about all these issues, you are talking about pretty well everything in modern life and policy. Not an awful lot is left if you include all these issues.
A fundamental underlying mistake is being made here; nations that require referendums as part of their existing constitutions are not rendered useless negotiators in Brussels. A number of our fellow members of the European Union have referendums as an integral part of their constitutions. Do we mean that the Danes or the Irish are unable to negotiate? Of course not. They are able to do it, and they sit down with fellow Ministers who might not have that requirement. Does that mean that the Danes, the Irish and others are hogtied and unable to negotiate? Over the years, they have sometimes done a jolly good deal. The recent referendum in the Irish Republic on the Lisbon treaty was initially rejected. They went back to the table and got a better deal, and then it was passed. I do not believe that that indicates in any sense that, just because a referendum might be required, a Minister, or a Government, is paralysed. In fact, the evidence is to the contrary. Of course, if it gets far too detailed and concerns trivial matters, I would agree, but I do not think that we are facing that.
In any event, this Bill is about the future. It is not about the past. I believe that there is sufficient wriggle room in the existing treaties and that you would be a pretty bad Government or a pretty weak Minister if you could not find something on which to hang a hook to move a particular measure forward. I am not confident that this Bill will be a showstopper for the European Union. Of course it will not. The European Union will continue. We have many treaty obligations in it, which I believe will be honoured, but this Bill is about preventing expansion and trying to restore public confidence. It is precisely because people do not believe politicians any more that this sort of Bill is necessary.
Baroness Williams of Crosby
My Lords, my noble friend Lord Taverne and I have a difficulty. A number of speeches addressing this group of amendments have moved somewhat between the groups. There have been references to later amendments. We are not quite sure whether this debate is meant to comprise the list of things being put forward by the Front Bench of the Labour Party, including this amendment as well as the others that fall within the same general area, or whether we are supposed to limit ourselves entirely to the single market. In that case, a great many speeches have been rather close to being out of order. Perhaps the Government will indicate whether they wish this debate to be limited to the single market or to take a number of these amendments together, in which case my noble friend Lord Taverne and I both wish to say something.
Lord Wallace of Saltaire
As the noble Lord, Lord Triesman, recognised, and perhaps I may suggest, as this group and the groups that follow cover similar themes one might talk about this group and those that follow, which will save time later when we get to the others.
Baroness Williams of Crosby
I am grateful for that, which is exactly my view. Perhaps I might refer to what the noble Lord, Lord Triesman, said. I also associate those concepts with some of the later amendments. I will not keep the House for long. The noble Lord’s good argument was made strongly on the basis of the need in some cases for urgent decisions to be made. He pointed out that the formal procedures are long-winded and slow and that therefore in some cases it would be irrelevant to the issue that had come up because it would take so long to deal with the procedures.
I now refer to a second group of amendments, which is what I might call the Canute group. What is the Canute group? Those of us who remember the early history of Britain will remember that the king at the time ordered the tide to turn back. In other words, he insisted on not seeing the world as it is. The amendments in this group are about insisting—
Baroness Williams of Crosby
Perhaps I may finish my sentence before I give way. The amendments in this group insist, to some extent, that the urgent and very troubling issues that confront us now can somehow be put off and not dealt with at the present time.
Lord Willoughby de Broke
All I want to say is that King Canute did not order the sea to go back. He was demonstrating to his courtiers that he did not have the power to turn the sea back, so the analogy that the noble Baroness was making is incorrect.
Baroness Williams of Crosby
I defer to the noble Lord’s deep knowledge of history, but he will accept that metaphors and similes are sometimes rather broader than a deep knowledge of history would insist on them being. I insist on keeping my metaphor going for a few more minutes. The point that I want to make strongly is that issues are coming up that clearly will require a degree of competence on the part of the European Union that is not embraced in the present treaties. Unless we exclude some of these issues from the elaborate procedure of the referendum lock, we will find ourselves hobbled in trying to deal with them.
I shall give two illustrations. I particularly urge my noble friends in the Conservative Party to consider one of them very carefully. In the past couple of months we have seen some of the consequences of the Arab spring. One of those consequences has been the placing of substantial sums of money within the structures of the European Union because there is very little control over how the European Union at present deals with inflows of money from other quarters. Members of the European Parliament have shown a great deal of sense about this and have urged the European Union to take additional action, which, as I understand the Bill, will probably require the referendum lock procedure to be met.
One of the most vociferous and articulate Members of the European Parliament on this issue of how one deals with what one might believe to be illegitimate funds—funds that have been stolen from a nation by its leader or funds that have been deliberately laundered through Europe—was the spokesman of legal affairs in the European Parliament. Mr Karim is a Conservative Member of the European Parliament, and I will quote what he said because it is extremely relevant to this debate. He said:
“I would … invite Baroness Ashton, as a key architect of the EU’s new plan for north Africa, to implement strong anti-money laundering provisions as an important part of the future EU strategy in the region. More broadly, the … Commission must act to urgently address the deficiencies in the current arrangements regarding funds originating overseas. The EU cannot continue to be a savings account in which leaders of developing countries deposit their ill-gotten funds”.
Mr Karim went on to call for urgent action by the European Union, which under this Bill will of course be caught by the referendum lock.
I think that my second example will stir a number of Members of this Committee as it certainly stirs me: namely, the relative unwillingness of the United Kingdom to address the issue of human trafficking. According to the International Labour Organisation, human trafficking has now become the third largest common illicit business in the world. It is valued by the ILO at approximately €32 billion in the past year. It is third after the drug trade and the arms trade. It has burgeoned and mushroomed in the past few years.
The United Kingdom was unwilling to sign and agree to an EU directive on the trafficking of children. It refused to do so on the grounds that the United Kingdom had its own measures and did not require a European Union directive on the issue. As many will know, the argument went on month after month, with only Denmark and the United Kingdom refusing to agree to the proposed directive. In this country, the official figures are said by the Home Office, the Metropolitan Police and the UK Border Agency to be far higher than the official figures that are given. Recently, the Home Office said that the official figure for child and human trafficking was around 250 cases a year. One area of the borough of Westminster alone has found something like 1,120 children who are being trafficked. It has announced that it is having to strengthen its own steps strongly to try to deal with the issues.
I will not bore the House with telling it—
Baroness Williams of Crosby
I will not give way at the moment. I am in the middle of an argument. I will gladly give way to the noble Lord afterwards. I will not bore the House by going on about some of the unspeakably awful cases. For example, a boy from the middle of Africa was brought to this country at the age of 16 by a man who pretended to befriend him. Day after day, he was locked up in a house with just one meal a day being served to him and was repeatedly sexually abused by older men. A young mother of several children was trafficked to this country and used by up to 15 men a day against her own will. That was the price of the people who trafficked her in order not to reveal that she was an illegal immigrant.
I will not go on about this, but the cases are bloodcurdling, frightening, terrible. People are trafficked for three purposes: first, sexual exploitation; secondly, direct slavery, often in domestic work; and, thirdly—this is not unfamiliar to those of us who, like me, live in East Anglia—fruit and vegetable picking; young men and women, often children, are used in fruit and vegetable fields, often with almost no wages at all, in conditions of near slavery. We do not like to observe these issues. We like to think that that does not happen here and we reject the concept that such things can happen in an orderly and well policed state, but we are wrong. Unless we can get some international agreement, or at least a European-wide agreement, we will not be able to stop the sources that are being dealt with in other European countries in such a way as to bring this kind of thing to an end. It took 10 months for the British Government and the Prime Minister, under pressure from a group of women who organised visits and petitions to No. 10 Downing Street, finally to agree to this directive a couple of weeks ago. The Prime Minister did not want to do it because he did not want to agree that this extension of the competence of the European Union was essential to deal with this disgusting trend.
I have mentioned these things, and I shall now stop arguing them, to point out that there are what I call—I am sorry, but I shall repeat it—Canute cases, where we try to pretend that the massive structure of organised crime, ranging from the drug trade to human trafficking to money laundering, is not there. When you weigh these issues in the balance, it is right for the noble Lord, Lord Triesman, and his colleagues on the Labour Front Bench to press for certain issues not to be subject to the referendum or to the inevitable delays that follow it. These issues affect our fellow human beings, many of them British, in ways that we should never accept as a country. They require at least a reasoned reaction; they can no longer be dealt with on a purely national basis.
Lord Pearson of Rannoch
Without wishing to detract in any way from the terrible situation to which the noble Baroness has so brilliantly spoken, does she have any statistics on how many of these people come here from Europe through the European open border? Would it not be easier for this country—which is, after all, an island—to police its borders more effectively if we had control of those borders? I suspect that the majority of these people come through from other countries in the European Union.
Baroness Williams of Crosby
In the case of prostitution, quite a lot of the entries are from eastern Europe. Indeed, some of the more disagreeable people have exploited the fact that the eastern Europeans are not aware of where they are going. They are offered jobs in the catering trade—hotels and so on—and then find out that they have been sold into prostitution. They are not aware of how to deal with the situation or of the safeguards that should be open to them. However, that is not the case with the other two examples I gave of domestic slavery and agricultural exploitation. In those cases, most of them come into this country, rather amazingly, straight from third countries and not by way of other member states of the European Union.
Lord Stoddart of Swindon
On the first intervention, I got the impression that the noble Baroness thought that all five groups of amendments were being taken together. Is that correct? If we are taking all five groups together we will be here for a very long time and noble Lords will miss their dinner. Could we have clarification on this?
Lord Wallace of Saltaire
I understood the noble Lord, Lord Triesman, to say that as this group and the following group of amendments cover a number of similar issues he had touched on some of the broader issues behind them. It was not my intention to go into the detail on all of them as the noble Baroness has just done.
Lord Taverne
My Lords, some very important issues are raised by these amendments. If they are now to be considered and debated, I do not see how we can possibly break for dinner.
Lord Triesman
My Lords, we have been urged by the usual channels to make sure that the business is handled as effectively as possible. For those reasons I spoke to group three, which has broadly related economics based arguments. I spoke to nothing else. I was kindly reminded that I would need to move the amendment at the end and, in due course, formally move the next two amendments. However, I spoke to the economic group, group three. I hope I have now made it clear.
Lord Wallace of Saltaire
My Lords, in that case, perhaps I may give the Government’s response on this group. We will then be able to break for dinner and return to the others later. All afternoon this has been a rather untidy debate. I almost congratulate the noble Lord, Lord Pearson of Rannoch, on actually mentioning in his speech the amendment under discussion. In the previous debate he did not mention the amendment we were supposed to be discussing. We are in a Committee stage debate at the moment in which one is supposed to address one’s remarks to the Bill under discussion rather than to the state of the world, the wickedness of the EU as such and all the other things he touched on in his interventions.
The noble Lord, Lord Triesman, raised large questions about global markets and global governance. As we address these amendments, we all recognise that what the EU does in competition policy, in negotiating on world trade and so on is part of a rather complex system of different intergovernmental organisations, of which the EU is one. I remind the noble Baroness, Lady Williams, that money laundering is largely dealt with, for example, under the financial action task force, which is more closely associated with the OECD than with the EU. It does it rather well. Indeed, I have read a volume by one of the noble Baroness’s close relatives which refers to how well the financial action task force does in this respect. The EU is not responsible for all of the issues involved in managing a global market. However, it has a number of extensive powers, some of which have been discussed on this occasion.
This group of amendments and the ones that follow seem, in general, to contain a number of assumptions about the Bill, the EU and what the Government think about the EU which, I repeat, are erroneous. First, the EU has competencies in all of these areas. We are not talking about extending competencies. Opting in to the human trafficking directive does not extend competences; it merely uses the available competencies in a more effective way. The treaty of Lisbon provides ample scope for EU action in the areas cited in the amendments tabled under this group and the group that follows. The assumption that the United Kingdom is tying itself up in knots and is thus unable to act and that we are the only Government who wish to go through constitutional procedures of the kinds listed in the Bill is also erroneous. As we have said, the UK Government are in the forefront of pushing for new policies in a number of areas. As the noble Baroness said, we have just signed up to the human trafficking directive.
On the Doha round, it is not the EU that is causing the problem, as the noble Lord, Lord Triesman, knows. Incidentally, when Britain first joined the European Community as it then was, one of the first things that I and many others learnt about it was Article 113 and the 113 committee, and the exclusive competence of the European Community in external trade. I am not sure what one can provide more than exclusive competence —perhaps super-exclusive competence is needed next.
We are now negotiating on services as well. The assumption that the EU is unable to act in all of this is part of the misunderstandings that others are raising. There is also the question that if the European Union suddenly found that it lacked these powers then it could rush through a treaty change in two months. Actually, we have discovered that urgent treaty changes take somewhere between 18 and 24 months. That is part of the process we have gone through. The noble Lord, Lord Empey, rightly pointed out that in a crisis you are better off negotiating rapidly in an ad hoc framework, as we often find ourselves having to on a global level—G20 has emerged as part of this—rather than attempting to go through all of these very complicated programmes.
On competition policy, the European Union has now emerged as one of the two most important forums for competition policy in managing global multinationals. Until the EU developed its competition competence, the United States effectively managed the competition policy of multinational companies and operated through extra-territorial jurisdiction in imposing its judgments on multinationals operating elsewhere. The record of the EU in competition policy has on the whole been very good. The noble Lord, Lord Triesman, is quite right to point out that innovation constantly raises new problems. That is true for all jurisdictions and there is a constant race between one international organisation and another. So far, the EU has managed as well as the federal United States in that respect.
On the lack of competences, I have looked at what used to be Article 113 and is now Articles 206 and 207. There are two areas of reserved competence in Article 207. One is on audio-visual and cultural relations—not inserted by the British but by the French—and the other is on limitations on negotiations in health, welfare and social services—not inserted by the British but by the Germans. We are not always the ones who are hesitant about giving way on sovereignty; it is often others. On the single market and global trade agreements, the EU is well supplied with competence.
On financial regulation, the EU is one among many actors. The Bank for International Settlements, the financial action task force and the range of other bodies to which the United Kingdom belongs and in which the UK is a full participant also play a role in this area. Our EU partners play a large role as well. The Government want to see—we will stress this on all these amendments—the European Union using the tools it has under existing treaties and its now very extensive competence more effectively, bringing about the benefits that we want to see the EU delivering for the British people and everyone across the European Union. The noble Lord, Lord Mandelson, made an excellent speech on our previous Committee day precisely expressing those sentiments. Those are sentiments that the Government share. Having said all that, I hope that the noble Lord, Lord Triesman, will be willing to withdraw his amendment. Then we will return to the next group on similar arguments after dinner.
Lord Davies of Stamford
I did not want to interrupt the noble Lord’s flow while he was speaking, but I have a rather important question. He referred to Article 207 and the derogation in that from the usual procedures on the common foreign policy that the council needs to act unanimously in these two matters involving, first, trade in cultural and audio-visual services, which he said was a provision put in at the demand of the French, and secondly, the field of social, education and health services, which he said was put in at the demand of the Germans. The noble Lord was really saying that here was a case when the treaty needed to be amended to accommodate the particular requirements of those two countries. They were not our requirements and we would rather have had no derogation in the common foreign trade policy. Let us suppose that the French and German were prepared to remove those two derogations or obstacles to freer international trade. Is it the case that under the Bill we would then require a referendum to allow the Germans and the French to agree to give up concessions which they had previously obtained?
Lord Wallace of Saltaire
I have spent a good deal of my adult life studying and teaching on the European Union. I struggle to imagine a situation in which the French Government would suddenly decide, on their own and as a single action without asking for any concessions in any other area, to give up that. Hypothetically, in a parallel universe inhabited by the noble Lord, Lord Pearson of Rannoch, and a number of other people, it is always possible that these things might happen. In the practical life of the way that the European Union works, that seems completely inconceivable.
Lord Davies of Stamford
I am grateful for that response which seems to reveal that there is potential for a complete absurdity, which must also exist elsewhere in the treaty. We would force a referendum on ourselves simply because some other member state was prepared to adopt more communautaire policies in the future and to withdraw concessions that previously they had insisted upon.
Lord Triesman
I thank all noble Lords for the contributions to the debate, in particular the noble Baroness, Lady Williams. I know we will get to people-trafficking in a later group. It is a critical issue. The examples around money laundering and the massive theft from states of their assets by their erstwhile and in some cases current leaders are also huge issues.
Of course I understand that the EU is not the only player in the global marketplace. It is not responsible for managing the whole of the global market place. I am sure there is a balance of weaknesses and strengths, but one of its strengths has been that when it has been able to act together and in a competent way its impact on other international bodies has been enormous. That is the solid evidence that has come from commissioner after commissioner, particular in the areas of competition and trade. It has been the commissioners in the areas of competition and trade who have pointed most frequently to the empirical evidence for the weaknesses when it is impossible to move effectively because of restrictions on activity. That seems to be quite central to this general proposition.
I understand where the competencies lie. I can read the texts in exactly the same way as any other Member of your Lordships’ House but I am mightily impressed by the debate that we had just before this one started and other debates of a similar kind that I have heard over the years. I know that people do not go to the pub to talk about codification—quite rightly and nor should they. Yet one party says that something that is a tidying-up exercise of one kind or another is a fundamental change and it produces what it regards as overwhelming evidence of that. Other people say—I have probably done it myself—that that is nonsense, that it is simply a tidying up and how could anyone else read that much into it?
We have heard today and on so many occasions that, because this is the EU, this will be the subject of major contention. It will be the subject of real arguments and people urging the use of powers. In those circumstances, as we try to proceed within the realm of what many of us believe are the competencies, we will find that someone will argue or powerful bodies will argue that it is a fundamental change—more fundamental, at least, than I or indeed the government Front Bench have argued that it should be—and the lock will become a threat to doing it at all. That is how it will be played out. It will be the tactical opportunity that anyone would take in the circumstances. It would be naive to believe that that is not true when it is exactly what will happen.
I seek leave to withdraw this amendment but I do so by predicting that if this Bill proceeds as it is written, the scope for Ministers to behave effectively will be reduced and in some cases—in the current climate, money laundering is a very good example—they will be left way behind the game. That will lead to a very negative judgment about our sometimes rather meagre capacity for foresight.
Statement of Changes in Immigration Rules
(13 years, 7 months ago)
Lords ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
Lord Hunt of Kings Heath
To move that this House regrets that the Government have not published a comprehensive explanation of the findings from the consultation on Tiers 1 and 2 relating to the Statement of Changes in Immigration Rules. (HC 863)
Relevant document: 27th Report from the Merits Committee.
Lord Hunt of Kings Heath
My Lords, this Statement, HC 863, makes a number of significant changes to tier 1 and tier 2 of the points-based system to implement the Government’s strategy for reducing non-EEA economic migration. The change follows a public consultation and a number of other notable statements of changes in immigration policies.
The key changes to tier 1 are as follows: to close the in-country category, other than for extension applications for migrants who are already in the UK in that category or one of the categories now proposed that preceded the introduction of the points-based system; to create a new category in tier 1 of the points-based system for exceptionally talented economic migrants with a limit of 1,000 grants of entry clearance in the first year of operation; and to implement changes to the tier 1 categories for entrepreneurs and investors, including provisions for accelerated settlement.
The key changes to tier 2 are: first, to implement changes to the tier 2 intra-company transfer category, including differing requirements for transfers depending on whether they are to be for more or less than 12 months; secondly, to implement changes to the tier 2 (general) category, including a limit of 20,700 overseas applicants who can be sponsored under it in the first year; and, thirdly, to revise minimum skill, salary and English-language thresholds.
The Merits Select Committee has made the point that the parliamentary scrutiny process for this type of instrument is unusual, yet with any policy changes of this importance the Government should always be aware of the need to allow the House full opportunity to scrutinise the changes. The committee was previously critical of the lack of information presented to Parliament to explain why HC 698 effectively ended tier 1 (general) to overseas applicants. As a result, the Merits Committee wrote to Damian Green, the Minister for Immigration, saying that it would have expected to see an evidence-based explanation of why the Government were changing tier 1, some measurement of the impact of the changes and a more comprehensive explanation of the findings from the consultation on which the changes were based. The committee also asked for assurance that a better package of supporting information would be provided when the full migration limits were introduced in April.
The House will be aware of the Opposition's concern about the approach that the Government have taken and the impact of the migration cap on business, the arts and the university sector. Indeed, we have debated that on a number of occasions in the past few months. We have also been concerned about the reputation of the UK and the potential advantage that we are giving to other countries to recruit highly skilled migrants. Tonight, however, I want to focus specifically on the points raised by the Merits Select Committee, to which the House is once again indebted for the quality of its scrutiny and the advice which it gives to the House on matters which it considers ought to be debated by your Lordships.
The Merits Select Committee, as I have already said, has been consistently concerned about the lack of evidence-based information provided by the Government. It is a matter of great regret that, despite the committee writing to the Minister to ask for a better package of supporting information, the fact is that, as the committee has reported, the Government have made only limited information available from the outcome of the consultation on this policy. The Explanatory Memorandum says that the changes to tiers 1 and 2 have been developed following a full public consultation. It refers to Limits on non-EU Economic Migration—the title of the consultation, which ran from 28 June to 17 September 2010—with a summary of the findings published on the UKBA website.
However, the summary shows that there is a high level of interest in the development of the policy, since more than 3,000 responses were received to the questionnaire during the consultation period from a range of organisations including accountancy firms, manufacturers, telecommunications, universities, transport, retail, the media, the health sector, third sector organisations, trades unions and professional bodies as well as private individuals. Yet the summary is limited to a two and a half page numerical breakdown of the responses, with a few unattributed suggestions, and an annexe providing a list of the 571 responding organisations that provided their details. Unfortunately, as the Merits Committee says, there is no information about the rest of the respondents who were the great majority of those more than 3,000 respondees. The committee goes on to say that it considers that this does not provide a sufficiently detailed account of what has been learnt from the consultation exercise, and therefore allows only a limited understanding of the resulting decisions.
I would be grateful if the Minister would specifically respond to that criticism and perhaps give the House a rather fuller flavour of the consultation outcome. I put it to her that the paucity of information might perhaps reflect that the Government did not find much support for their proposals from respondents to the consultation. I would also like some reassurance that the Government will respond to the committee’s request for fuller information.
I would also like to ask the Minister about the impact assessment. The Merits Committee thinks that, because of the challenging nature of the policy objectives, the impact assessment has an important role in providing reassurance that the migration cap policy is indeed based on solid evidence. The problem is that the assessment does not provide that, as the committee identified; there is inadequate information about the relationship between migration and social cohesion, little evidence of the impact on employers and silence on how the Government will manage any perceptions of unfairness as a result of the changes and how that would apply particularly to the Indian subcontinent. I would be grateful if the Minister commented on those criticisms. How will the changes made by this Statement be monitored and reported to Parliament in due course?
I invite the Minister to comment on some of the points raised in the incredibly useful briefing that noble Lords have received from the Immigration Law Practitioners’ Association, which is particularly concerned about the process for selecting migrants for inclusion in the tier 1 “exceptional talent” category and for the identification of highly trusted sponsors in relation to tier 2. The association’s concern is the absence of a structured framework in which judgments can be exercised so that cases can all be treated in a like way. Any help that the Minister could give on this would be much appreciated. I should also say that the ILPA has raised a number of other interesting points, and I would welcome the Minister’s assurance that her officials will commit to discussing them with the association.
It is concerning that a Statement introducing a significant change of policy in such a sensitive and important area is being introduced on the basis of less than adequate information being given to Parliament. This is not the first time that this point has been made to the Minister about the Home Office’s approach to statutory instruments and rule changes—I am indebted to the Merits Committee for identifying these issues—and that approach means, inevitably, that there will be a prayer against those changes or SIs and we will have these debates. It would be appreciated if the Minister gave some sense that the Home Office has reflected and is reflecting on these criticisms so that fuller information is given on SIs in future, which would then mean that we would not necessarily have a continuation of these prayers, which at the moment are on what seems to be a weekly basis, on the number of SIs that are coming through to your Lordships’ House. I beg to move.
Lord Judd
My Lords, I am particularly grateful to my noble friend for his perceptive intervention. I want to underline two points that I thought were particularly important. The first was that any move in this sphere—indeed, in any sphere of government—should be evidence based. It is very dangerous when one starts meddling in human affairs without a convincing analysis of the implications and of what the outcomes are likely to be.
The second point is the impact. We all know that one of the difficulties with immigration policies is that so often the weight of immigration falls upon communities that are already underresourced in terms of education, health, social provision and indeed employment. It is those areas that find themselves on the front line and this, understandably, can lead to tensions. It is therefore very important to see how any move in immigration policy is linked to social policy and economic policy so that the whole thing stands convincingly together. Those were two crucial points made by my noble friend.
I would like to raise a slightly wider issue which is very pertinent to these proposals. We talk about the importance of joined-up government. I am very glad that the Minister who is replying has the portfolio she has, because, whether she agrees with me or not, she will understand why I am making this point. She has heavy responsibilities in security matters, which she discharges very convincingly. We are concerned about global stability and global security. Anyone who is concerned about those issues must recognise that they are related to the economic situations that prevail in various parts of the world.
Lord Avebury
My Lords, I am not going to follow the noble Lord, Lord Judd, down the road that he travelled, except to say that the impact assessment covers a multitude of subjects in great detail in the areas of statutory equality duties, economic impacts, environmental impacts, social impacts and sustainability. However, I do not think that it addressed the question of security. It will be interesting to hear what my noble friend has to say on the matter when she winds up.
I thank the noble Lord, Lord Hunt, for introducing this Motion and enabling us to debate a very important set of rules, as well as for his useful explanation of its purpose and of the Merits Committee’s comments. I add one point to the many useful ones that he made in his speech—that these changes to the Immigration Rules came into effect on 6 April, 15 days after the statement was laid and one day into the Easter Recess. I thought there was a convention that rule changes had to be laid 21 days before they came into force. I ask my noble friend why that seems to have fallen into disuse. Does she not find it incongruous that we are considering this instrument when it is already the law and, whatever we say, it is too late to alter any of its provisions?
As the noble Lord, Lord Hunt, rightly said, the Merits Committee report complained about the level of supporting information when the Government foreshadowed the termination of the tier 1 (general) order for applicants from overseas, and asked for this to be rectified when the full policy on caps was introduced. However, the Government still have not published the full report on the consultation on tiers 1 and 2, a month after publication of the Merits Committee report. I hope my noble friend will explain the reasons for the delay, which, as the Merits Committee says, makes it difficult to understand why the Government took the decisions that they did and whether the changes to tiers 1 and 2 will achieve their policy objectives.
Again, as the noble Lord, Lord Hunt, pointed out, the abolition of the tier 1 (general) category affects a wide range of organisations, as evidenced by the 3,200 responses to the consultation. These are summarised in very general terms in a two-page annexe to the impact assessment, but there may be large differences between the impact on, say, the universities on one hand and the health service on the other, to pick just two of the employers that have relied on tier 1 (general) in the past. There is the new category, which the noble Lord mentioned, of “exceptional talent” for internationally recognised scientists and cultural achievers, the criteria for which are to be agreed between the UKBA and “designated competent bodies”, which are yet to be listed on the UKBA website as the Explanatory Memorandum proposes. We are told nothing about these DCBs. Presumably there will be different ones for each speciality, such as the Royal College of Surgeons if the applicant is a surgeon, or the Institution of Mechanical Engineers if the applicant happens to be a mechanical engineer.
The 700 scientific and 300 cultural endorsements are to be divided among the DCBs, according to the standard note by the Library in another place—presumably by the UKBA in consultation with the DCBs. The note says that each of them will set its own criteria. Apparently there is no system to ensure consistency between the criteria, or to decide who the lucky winners are if the number of endorsements exceeds the allocation for a particular DCB. A crude way of dealing with that problem might be to provide in the guidance that each DCB should stop looking at applications once it has awarded the number allocated. However, that could mean having to turn away candidates who are even better qualified than the ones who have already been approved. Unlike for tier 2, there is no division of the total number of allocations by month, so the total could be exhausted very early in the year.
We welcome the amendments to the rules resulting from challenges in the courts to the Government’s right to add to or modify the rules in guidance that is not subject to parliamentary approval. Unfortunately, this means that more frequent statements of changes to the Immigration Rules, which are already fairly prolific, as the noble Lord has pointed out, are likely to come before your Lordships in the future. As Lord Justice Sedley said in his judgment on the Pankina case, this is an issue of constitutional importance. I pay tribute to ILPA’s briefing, as the noble Lord did. Its briefings are always extremely thorough and readable. ILPA suggests that there should be an audit of guidance to ensure compliance with the Pankina case. Perhaps my noble friend could say whether the amendments dealt with in paragraph 7.16 of the Explanatory Memorandum indicate that the UKBA has already carried out such an audit, to the extent that she can assure your Lordships that no further scope exists for litigation asking for judicial review of refusals that are based on guidance only, and not on the rules.
Tier 2 is divided into two: jobs which are exempt from the new limit because they are on the shortage occupation list or have been advertised in accordance with the resident labour market test, for which an employer can issue an unrestricted certificate of sponsorship; and jobs that are on the graduate occupations list of jobs eligible for tier 2, for which the employer has to ask the UKBA for permission to issue a restricted certificate of sponsorship. On 11 April the first monthly allocation of certificates of sponsorship took place and 1,028 were issued compared with the 4,200 that were available, meaning that the balance of more than 3,000 was carried forward to be added to May's 1,500.
At first glance one would suppose that the demand by employers for highly skilled workers from overseas had tailed off partly because of the recession but also because the applicants are required to have a better command of English and to have a degree-level qualification. If there are shortages of workers at the previous threshold of NQF level 3, they will have to be satisfied by stepping up the number of apprenticeships in this country. The Merits Committee reports that concerns were expressed by employers about whether the tier 1 cap would enable them to get the staff they need, but since a worker who had previously satisfied the tier 1 (general) criteria would qualify under the new tier 2 (general) conditions, it should have been possible for the affected employers to switch from tier 1 to tier 2, and evidently that did not happen, at least in the first month of the scheme’s operation. As the Merits Committee says, there was not enough evidence from the consultation to enable us to look at particular sectors to see where the shoe was pinching. I wonder whether my noble friend can tell the House what she is hearing from particular employers' organisations now that the scheme is actually in operation.
There is a known shortage of skills in the NHS, with a third of all medical staff already having qualified overseas. A leading medical recruitment agency says that cuts across the board in the healthcare sector have led to a decline in medical jobs across the UK but there are still job opportunities for GPs, nurses, midwives, and community nurses, for example. However, with the cuts biting, hospital trusts may be forced to look harder for doctors and other professionals in the European Union or to postpone recruitment, even at the cost of lowering standards of healthcare.
Tier 2 includes special provision for ministers of religion, which includes in this context members of religious orders. The rules assume that any minister coming to the UK is employed by their church, mosque, gurdwara or temple, but this creates a problem for Theravada Buddhist monks—perhaps this applies also to monks of other faiths—who are not employees and do not touch money. The rules also require that the post to be filled should be advertised to demonstrate that there is no suitably qualified candidate available on the UK labour market. It is manifestly absurd that temples should be required to advertise in the UK for a monk who is unpaid, has to speak Thai, Sinhala, Vietnamese or Burmese, as the case may be, is required to eat only one meal a day, remain celibate, abstain from alcohol and other mind-altering substances and be able to teach the dhamma. For some monks here it is not necessary to be proficient in English because their duties will be almost entirely with the diaspora from the particular country where they were ordained. There are monks of British origin here but they do not move from one monastery to another as a result of competitive forces because the vinaya or discipline is the same in all Buddhist monasteries.
I should perhaps declare an interest as patron of the Buddhist Prison Chaplaincy Organisation, which has a close association with a Buddhist monastery where these difficulties have arisen. The ultimate authority on these matters is the Buddhist Sangha UK, which was established in 2006 to speak for the body of Theravada monks, but was not consulted when the details of tier 2 were formulated. Clearly, the needs of Buddhist monasteries and the Immigration Rules for ministers of religion are mutually incompatible, and this needs to be discussed with the Sangha.
Lord Haskel
My Lords, I join other noble Lords, my noble friend Lord Hunt and the Merits Committee in regretting that the Government have not published a comprehensive explanation of the findings from their consultation. Could that be because the consultation showed that the changes were a mistake and there was little support for them, as my noble friend Lord Hunt suggested? Let me put on record some of the consultations that I have carried out.
I shall quote from a briefing note dealing with the impact on the Imperial College Business School of the changes in the work permit regulations, particularly the recent decision to abolish the two-year post-study visa. The briefing note states:
“The UK’s main competitors in the higher education sector use post study work options to attract the best students. Without post study work options the UK and HE will lose valuable revenue, talent and impact our reputation”.
The school polled its non-EU graduate students, who comprise more than 50 per cent at that college. Of those, three-quarters indicated that they would not have chosen to study in the UK without the availability of these post-study visas. I put it to the Minister that this decision was inconsistent not only with the interests of Imperial College, but also with the policy of the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills.
In March, along with the Budget, the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills issued its Plan for Growth. Page 6 states that Britain should be the,
“home to more of the world’s top universities than any other country except the USA”.
Surely, Imperial College must be part of that ambition. Was BIS consulted as well as Imperial College? On page 91 of the Plan for Growth, the Government speak of healthcare and life sciences as key contributors to our future economy. Paragraph 2.185 states:
“Innovation is a key driver of long-term growth in the sector”.
I recently visited Professor Molly Stevens at Imperial College. She is its professor and research director for biomedical materials. Perhaps noble Lords will join me in congratulating her on being ranked by the Times Eureka magazine as second among the UK’s top 10 scientists under 40. She carries out exactly the type of work that the Government’s Plan for Growth identifies as a key driver of long-term growth. I shall quote what she said to me:
“In my particular group I have several very talented postdoctoral fellows. Ten of these come from outside Europe. I have absolutely no doubt that it is this combination of highly skilled people that has helped to make my group so successful. If I had not been able to take on those 10 international fellows then our work would have been of significantly lower impact. Facilitating visas for these people to work for us would bring so much value and advantage to our UK universities—they are completely invaluable. These staff, although highly skilled, will typically have earned very little during their PhD studies, making it even more difficult to qualify for some high skilled visa categories”.
If her work is a key driver for our long-term growth, were she or any of her colleagues consulted?
Was BIS consulted, because that is part of its policy? What about other parts of government? Were they consulted? Last Thursday, we had an interesting debate in your Lordships' House on soft diplomacy. Noble Lords spoke about building relationships with the next generation; how people who work and study here become our best ambassadors; how we build lasting ties in that way—just the sort of relationships that Imperial College is operating. Winding up, the Minister, the noble Lord, Lord Howell, agreed with all of those comments. Indeed, he told us that the FCO had nearly completed a UK soft power business plan to reinvigorate and promote that very thing. Was the FCO consulted?
My noble friend Lord Judd spoke of joined-up government. Was there any joined-up government? Were the findings of the consultation just ignored? If they were properly considered, surely the Government would have found a way for the Borders Agency to control immigration in such a way that it did not help to defeat the stated aims of other government departments and cause difficulties for institutions on which the Government's policy depends.
I support my noble friend’s Motion because my consultation and the Government's decision are incompatible. I urge the Government to think again. Perhaps the most valuable role that this House performs for any Government is to provide a pathway for them to think again. I hope that the Minister will take advantage of that.
Baroness Valentine
I first declare that I am the chief executive of London First. I acknowledge that the Government have done a lot to address business concerns about the immigration caps. I remain, however, a sceptic on the benefits of a tier 1 and tier 2 cap and I certainly remain a sceptic about a net migration target where the Government have so little control over the factors influencing it. They cannot control immigration; they cannot control relative economic performance of countries or EU in flows and out flows. However, we are only one month into the new scheme, and we now need some stability and the opportunity to monitor the scheme's impact.
I make one plea of the Minister. Will she consider conducting a thorough economic and social impact study towards the end of this year so that we can improve the scheme based on evidence?
The Earl of Sandwich
I came in to say only a word in support of the noble Lord, Lord Hunt. I am very concerned about these rules going through without discussion. As the noble Lord, Lord Avebury, said, this is a water-under-the-bridge debate; we do not have time to have any impact. I have read the Merits Committee report and note the committee's disappointment about the lack of information all over the place. The Government are proposing major changes to the Immigration Rules which under the previous Government and the one before would have been the subject of serious debate— I have taken part in many of those debates.
The noble and learned Baroness, Lady Butler-Sloss, and I went to a meeting this evening at which we heard reports of the Government’s hesitation about a proposed new convention on domestic labour. The noble Baroness, Lady Williams, in the earlier EU debate, said that the Government were reluctant about the EU directive on trafficking. The Government, whether it is in the Department for Work and Pensions or the Home Office, must pay careful attention to their international reputation in all these categories and, above all, ensure that the proposals are given the fullest public attention before they come into effect. As the noble Lord, Lord Hunt, has already emphasised, these are sensitive issues. We must not have immigration policy by stealth.
The Minister of State, Home Office (Baroness Neville-Jones)
My Lords, a number of points have been made in this debate, which inevitably I suppose has evolved into a discussion on the operation of policy. I am not in a position to answer all the questions that were raised, some of which were quite detailed, but I shall do my best, and I promise to write to noble Lords on other points if I am not able to cover them.
The issue at hand is whether the Government should have published a more comprehensive analysis of the outcomes of the consultation. The Merits Committee, to which the noble Lord, Lord Hunt, referred, felt that the evidence published with the report was not adequate, and the Government take serious note of what the committee has said. However, I should like to begin my reply by putting the matter into context. I confess to being a little surprised that the noble Lord has brought forward this Motion, given the Opposition’s record in this area. Perhaps I may give an example or two.
In March 2010, the previous Government made significant changes to tier 4—they said they were significant—concerning the student route. Despite taking the views of key partners, they did not publish any formal explanation of the findings. In March 2009, they also made stringent changes to tier 1 concerning the general and post-study categories, and tightened the resident labour market test. On that occasion, the Government did not undertake any consultation and consequently could not set out any employers’ views because no views were sought, so I do not think that that is much evidence of policy-based evidence, which we have been told this evening is so important. In March 2006, following consultation, the previous Government published their policy for a points-based system, which we are following, branding it as,
“the most significant change to managed migration in the last 40 years”.
Again, the noble Lord has just said how important it is to base this policy on evidence and to make that evidence available. However, I think that the House will note that the previous Government did not publish the 517 consultation responses that they received at the time. I am not going to continue in this vein but it would be remiss of me not to expose double standards. Frankly, I think that it is a bit of a case of pots and kettles.
What have this Government done? We have gone to some lengths to set out our findings. The process began on 28 June last year, when the consultation paper was published. As has been said, we received more than 3,000 replies, and officials also spoke to 1,500 employers during the consultation period. That is a considerable volume of paper and consultation, and it was studied very carefully. My colleague, the Minister for Immigration, launched the Home Office research report entitled The Migrant Journey. This report, drawing on all the consultation, provides for the first time a great deal of useful evidence about migrants’ behaviour and their pathways to settlement. As the Minister said at the launch, the information showed that we needed to look harder at who can qualify in both the work and study categories to make sure that we attract the right people. I think that this country should be about attracting the brightest and best people. In November last year, the Home Secretary made a speech to business leaders setting out the Government’s broad objectives and strategy. She referred to the evidence that we received and how we would be acting on it. In November, she made a full Statement to the House setting out the details and giving figures on the basis of which the decision had been informed.
Lord Hunt of Kings Heath
My Lords, I am very grateful to the noble Baroness and to other noble Lords who have taken part in this important debate. The noble Baroness referred to the previous Government. I am sure that we can trade experiences of previous Governments, and that is always good sport, but one thing that the previous Government did do was to take the reports of the Merits Select Committee very seriously. One of the important conclusions of our debate is our asking the Government to reflect on the experience of this SI in relation to future changes that may be made in the Immigration Rules and the way in which information should be given to Parliament.
As my noble friend Lord Haskel said, this is a very important change. I am sure that he is right to reflect to the House on the potential impact that these changes might have on some of our most of successful institutions. The noble Baroness referred to the comments of the CBI director-general. Of course she is right to suggest that, as a result of the consultation, some changes were made in the Government's approach. We are very glad that that happened. She will be aware of the very high level of concern—particularly in the business, university and arts sectors—about the impact that the original proposals would have on them. However, as my noble friend Lord Haskel suggested, there are still concerns in those sectors about the impact. He referred to Imperial; he also referred to BIS and its role in promoting UK interests. Clearly there is concern that the proposals, as now enunciated in this statement of change, will none the less have an adverse effect on British interests.
I would say to the noble Baroness that my experience in the health field and in the Department of Health is that whatever the tensions—and there have been tensions—about the recruitment of overseas students into our medical schools, the fact is that for very many years the NHS has depended on those students becoming doctors and working in the NHS. Also, the evidence suggests that when those doctors go back to their home countries, the links that they maintain with UK medicine and the UK medical and pharma industries have been immensely valuable to the UK. It is very important that we do not lose those contacts. The noble Baroness, Lady Valentine, had a very good point to make about the need to analyse the economic and social impact of these measures—I think she suggested by the end of the year. I very much hope that that point is taken to heart.
European Union Bill
(13 years, 7 months ago)
Lords ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
Lord Liddle
“( ) provisions that strengthen the effectiveness of the European Union to mitigate the effects of climate change”
Lord Liddle
My Lords, with the permission of your Lordships, in order to expedite the business of the Committee—because we have no desire to be thought to be unduly delaying the consideration of the Bill—it would help if, for Clauses 4 to 7, we have a single debate on the remaining groups of amendments that we have tabled that come under the same broad heading. The common features of these amendments are that these are all areas where we believe that there is a broad ranging, cross-party political consensus in this House and in the country that Europe is a good thing and that we would like to see Europe acting effectively in these areas. There is a consensus on these issues and on the need to have a more effective Europe. Also we agree with the Government’s argument that, to a very large extent, the Lisbon treaty provides the European Union with sufficient competences and powers to deal with many of these issues.
We agree with that argument with two exceptions. One is the point that I made with some force—although I know that the Government did not agree with it—namely, that the Government are trying to have their cake and eat it on the Lisbon treaty. They are saying that the Lisbon treaty gives us all that we need but they are also trying to say that the provisions of the Lisbon treaty cannot in important respects be brought into force without referendums. The Government wish to restrict the passerelles, Article 48(6) and anything which provides flexibility within the Lisbon treaty. So it is not true that the Government stand behind the Lisbon treaty; they are seeking to tie up its implementation in important ways, which could be detrimental to the European Union being effective in the areas that we wish it to be effective.
Secondly, treaty drafters are not blessed with perfect foresight; they cannot anticipate all the circumstances that might occur ahead of them in the real world. A good example of that is the need for the treaty change, under the simplified revision procedure, to establish a European stability mechanism to deal with the sovereign debt crisis in the euro area. No one anticipated that at the time that the Lisbon treaty was going through the House. One has to recognise that circumstances can change.
When the Government say, “No change in anything for this Parliament” and, “We will not have lots of multiple referenda but we may at some stage in the future have another big revision”, we fear that it will defer the possibility of flexibility in the European Union powers for some considerable time—probably, at the minimum, a decade. We have to ask ourselves whether this is a sensible, realistic policy. The Government say that it is realistic because there is no will on anyone’s part to change the treaties and, therefore, that their policy is not out of line with the rest of the European Union. However, we saw in the establishment of the European stability mechanism that, when faced with a crisis, the European Union was prepared to act and to take the necessary powers.
The amendments deal with a series of areas and I do not intend to go over each one. I shall give one or two examples of where, within a medium-term time horizon, there might be a need for action which could result in pressure within the EU for some kind of treaty change, probably under the simplified revision procedure. The fear on this side of the House is that the Government are putting themselves in a position where they will rule it out on principle, without any serious consideration of the issues, and Britain will find itself isolated and ineffective when I am sure many of us in this Chamber want it to be playing a leading and effective role in the Union.
The examples in Amendments 23C and 23E relate to climate change and energy security. On climate change, the commitment of the EU to put itself at the forefront of the battle to tackle climate change has been striking. At the same time, at the Copenhagen summit the EU found itself largely bypassed. On energy, we all know that there is a real problem. There is a lack of common policy, particularly among the big member states of the Union, in our dealings with the major energy suppliers, particularly Russia. These are problems that are widely accepted within the European Union. There is a desire for Europe to be stronger on these issues. It is possible—I am not saying it is certain—that people might come up with treaty proposals or amendments to the treaty under Article 48(6) to address these weaknesses.
Lord Deben
What would the referendum question be, were such a suggestion to be made? Would that referendum question be capable of a reasonable yes or no answer for the majority of the people of Great Britain?
Lord Liddle
The noble Lord, Lord Deben, has made an apposite intervention. I do not know what the relevant question would be but this is something in the real world that Ministers might have to address. It could enormously strengthen the Union’s capacity to deal with climate change and energy issues.
Amendments 23J and 23L are further examples. Amendment 23L is on piracy. We know that there is a growing problem of piracy, particularly in the Red Sea and the Indian Ocean. We know that an EU force is attempting to deal with this problem but that its efforts are inadequate. What is the reason for that? Is it a lack of resources or commitment on the part of the member states? That is possible, but another explanation is that the basis on which the force is patrolling this area does not match the tough circumstances that need to be dealt with. There is no agreement between the member states on the terms of engagement between the EU force and the pirates. There is no agreement on the circumstances in which force can legitimately be used.
These are difficult issues to tackle within the European Union because they touch on terribly sensitive issues to do with defence and armies, areas where the European Union has rightly been cautious in getting involved. I am not in favour of a European army, nor is the Labour Party, so do not try to say that this is trying to open the door to that.
Lord Liddle
Yes, the noble Lord, Lord Wallace, is right about that.
We are not talking about that but it could be, if we are going to have an effective force for this purpose, that we need to have a much more integrated force posture with common rules of engagement. That is a possibility that member states in these particular circumstances ought to be prepared to consider.
Look at north Africa, where the events occurring mean that the European neighbourhood policy and the Union for the Mediterranean require a complete rethink in their light. We need, as a European Union, to develop a coherent policy which particularly offers those countries in north Africa which are going down the path of strengthening democracy and human rights incentives for going further in that direction. I was interested in a piece that I read—I think it was yesterday—by Peter Sutherland about what might be necessary in order to make that policy happen. It involves tackling very sensitive and difficult issues, such as the need to have more flexible rules on immigration for people from those countries so that they can come and study in Europe, spend time here and then go back there. It requires having more flexible rules on trade so that trade with the European Union can boost their economies and jobs. That would do something about the appalling problems of youth unemployment in those countries. It may require a more common approach to asylum. We are potentially facing having 400,000 people in refugee camps in north Africa, so I read in a newspaper article the other day. These are issues that cannot be addressed in 10 years’ time but on which the European Union needs to develop credible policies, in its own interests, in the next year or two.
Most of the time, we obviously want Europe to use its existing powers under the existing treaties. Yet are we saying that we would not contemplate any change at all? This is the Williamson question which was asked earlier. The Government are getting themselves into a trap here. The coalition has pursued a positive approach to the European Union so far in its negotiations, but if they really believe that they are pursuing a pro-European policy, we urge them to be flexible on these issues and to recognise that we do not want to tie ourselves down with referendum requirements in areas where there is cross-party agreement and a general consensus that we need a stronger and more effective European Union. I beg to move.
Lord Davies of Stamford
My Lords, the most important theme emerging from the contribution on this side of the Committee to the debate tonight is the need for the European Union, like any businesslike and serious organisation, to retain the capability for flexibility in responding to what are unpredictable and therefore, necessarily, unpredicted situations. That is enormously important and it is quite clear that the Government are, by contrast, saying of the European Union that we should remain rigidly anchored on the existing constitutional arrangements until and unless, by some enormous shift involving a public referendum in this country, there is a sudden, seismic change. That is the fundamental difference between the perception on this side of the House and that on the other side of the way that the European Union ought to be conducted.
Many of us on this side have the considerable suspicion that, because the Government’s attitude is so unrealistic in relation to what would be the requirements of any organisation that expected to survive in the modern world, there is actually a Machiavellian plan deliberately to make the EU inflexible, to cause crises and conflicts and, at some dramatic interlude, to stymie the whole of the EU. We know that many members of the Conservative Party have had that agenda for a long time.
There is a particular issue of flexibility facing me at the moment. As I understand my noble friend, he has suggested that in the interests of the House and of making rapid progress, we should debate in one session all the amendments from Amendment 23C to 23L. I understand that they cannot be formally moved together en bloc, but my noble friend’s suggestion was that they should be discussed and debated as such and I am happy to do that. If I receive so much as an eyebrow signal from either Front Bench that I am doing the wrong thing, I will sit down and try to address the House again under Amendment 23L, which is what I was intending to do. Unless I receive such a signal, I shall proceed to make a few remarks about that amendment against the background of the theme that I have just set out, which is the unifying theme in all the debates that we are having on this clause.
Amendment 23L deals with the issue of piracy. As my noble friend rightly says, this is a grave and serious problem that does not merely affect east Africa but, unless we get this right, could affect large areas of the world because, if piracy is shown to be something that pays and makes a lot of money with impunity, others will inevitably get involved in it. We will return to a situation that we thought we had left behind in the 19th century when the Royal Navy, above all, in collaboration with the navies of other civilised countries succeeded in more or less extirpating piracy, which had been such a threat to lives, to civilisation and to developing world trade, and I do not think anyone wants that to happen.
My noble friend Lord Liddle sensibly said—I agree—that there may be great advantage in trying to review and standardise the terms of engagement of our various naval units and fleets that are off the coast of east Africa at present. It is slightly absurd that we have three task forces there—one American, which we are supporting, one NATO and one EU. That does not seem a sensible way of making progress, but I leave that matter aside.
I agree with what my noble friend said about the probable need for greater operational co-ordination. I am not sure whether that raises the issues of the Bill in relation to changes in the competences or powers of the European Union, but I have a suggestion to make to the House. I listened with respect, as I always do, to the noble Lord, Lord Wallace, when he commented the other day that, by saying that in future the EU might need some particular power and it would not be sensible for us to deprive ourselves in advance of the opportunity of granting the EU that power in the interests of us all, I was raising hypothetical issues. He said that I did not actually come up with concrete scenarios or specific cases. I hope that I have his attention now because I am coming up with just such a specific scenario.
Anyone with a business or economics background will always look at the demand side before they look at the supply side, on the grounds that the supply side emerges only when there is a demand for something. I put it to the Minister that one of the big problems with piracy is that, on the demand side, people are prepared to pay the money. That issue has not been addressed at all. I have to tell the House that every week ransom payments are paid amounting to millions of pounds. Sometimes they are paid through banking channels, and sometimes they are paid literally with cash dropped out of chartered aircraft on to the coast of Somalia that is then picked up by pirates. As a result, some individual or ship is released from imprisonment by the pirates who have illegally hijacked them. This happens the whole time; I repeat, it happens every week. Every year tens of millions of pounds are paid in this way; indeed, the figure may well be getting into hundreds of millions in the course of a year. I have spoken about this to underwriters in the City of London, who confess that to pay ransoms to pirates is becoming quite a normal part of their business.
Lord Wallace of Saltaire
My Lords, I apologise if the noble Lord thought I was scowling at him. I was looking at him in some confusion. The question of how one deals with piracy off the coast of east Africa is rather different from how one might deal with piracy within the territorial waters of the European Union. Among the ships dealing with the anti-piracy patrols off the east coast of Africa are some very effective Chinese and Indian ships. The complications in co-ordinating ships from a large number of countries are considerable. How one should treat pirates whom one captures off the east coast of Africa is a large question in international law, but not under EU law since the EU does not extend to the Indian Ocean.
I was delighted to hear the noble Lord, Lord Davies of Stamford, spell out his conspiracy theory. It is useful to know which conspiracy theories underlie different views. I encourage him to compare his conspiracy theory with that of the noble Lord, Lord Pearson of Rannoch. They run in opposite directions. The noble Lord, Lord Davies, thinks that we are working secretly to undermine Britain’s membership of the European Union, while the noble Lord, Lord Pearson of Rannoch, thinks that we are not working hard enough by half to undermine it. The two of them could have a very enjoyable dinner together.
Lord Davies of Stamford
I am grateful for the noble Lord’s contribution. I said that it was how some people felt. That was the formula I used; I did not myself endorse the conspiracy theory. The implication was that the conduct of the Government was such as to make it possible for constituents to develop that conspiracy theory. In relation to his most recent remarks to me, I accept that piracy is a matter for international law. Piracy has always been against international law. There should not be a problem there. His implication was that we needed to co-ordinate with the Indians and the Chinese, which we do to some extent. We might need to co-ordinate with them more. That is true and I acknowledged it explicitly in my recent remarks. I said that in this context, as in others—I suspect the noble Lord used to teach this to his students—it is much more effective, if we want international agreement and consensus on a matter, to act as the European Union rather than as one country or as 27 different countries. That is the point I was making.
However, there is a third point that I must make in relation to the noble Lord’s comments to me, which is that I was specifically addressing the need for powers to make it an offence to make ransom payments. I think that he, and anyone with any knowledge of the world, will agree that the chances of getting 150 or 193 countries to legislate identically for anything are virtually zero; that is not going to happen. If you wish to make it a criminal offence to transfer such payments, to collect money for the purpose of paying ransoms, to provide money for the purpose of paying ransoms, to make ransom payments, and to enforce those criminal offences, you need to obtain agreement throughout the European Union as an essential starting point. That is not a matter of international law; it is very much a matter of European law. If we do not have the powers to do that at present, it is very desirable that we should develop them. However, if we needed to develop them, we would run into the issue that, if the Government succeeded in passing this Bill, Article 48 would no longer be usable in that context if Great Britain were to be included.
Lord Deben
My Lords, it might encourage your Lordships’ House to hear that I do not intend to talk about piracy; I seek to talk about the amendments that deal with the environment and climate change. These differ from earlier amendments. I disagree with the noble Lord, Lord Triesman, as it seems to me that most of the areas that he covered were unique competences of the European Union, whereas we are now talking about a number of areas where there is joint competence. I say to my noble friends that if we were arguing that the British Government felt that we had sufficient powers in the European Union to do most of the things that we wanted to do, if we saw no reason to extend powers, and if the Government were going to commit themselves not to do that, I would have real sympathy with that.
If the Government went on to say that there might be occasions on which we have to go along with things that seem to be sensible extensions, I would have sympathy with that too. However, I find entirely unacceptable the concept that we cannot go along with anything unless we have a referendum. I find that unacceptable with regard to the environment, for the reason that I gave when I interrupted the noble Lord. Many of the issues about which we are talking are almost incapable of admitting a question of the kind of which a referendum admits. I do not like referenda. As the Committee knows, I am opposed to referenda on any grounds in any circumstances. I am a believer in parliamentary democracy. One of the sadnesses of this Government is that they have betrayed what seems to me to be a fundamental part of our constitution.
Referenda have always been used in partial circumstances for particular reasons. Napoleon III was the best user of referenda before General de Gaulle. This is a foreign activity much disliked by sensible people in the United Kingdom. I yield to no one in my dislike of referenda. They are always partial and always undertaken for a particular reason. The provision that we are discussing is included because the Government want to make it difficult to do anything in this area. The noble Lord, Lord Pearson, thinks that this is not so. The difficulty is that the Government speak in different ways to different people. They say to some people, “This is a wonderful step forward for those who are Eurosceptic”, and to other people, “This does not matter very much anyway because we are not going to need it”. Therefore, I find it very difficult to take this debate seriously. However, it is crucial with regard to environmental issues.
I have one or two suggestions as to why that is the case. For example, we are going to have a real issue with the transfer of electricity across the European Union. The superconductor systems, which will enable us to pass electricity very fast without losing power, will be very important in enabling us to meet our energy requirements and the requirement to cut the damage we do to the atmosphere and to mitigate climate change. I know that the noble Lord, Lord Pearson of Rannoch, does not believe in climate change. He is a sceptic on a wide range of subjects. It will not therefore worry him, but it worries me considerably if we cannot do something about this
Baroness Falkner of Margravine
I wanted to make a point about his example and did not want him to lose his train of thought. If the superhighway had to go through France’s territory—leaving aside the parody of the need for a referendum there, because it is a policy question, not necessarily a competence question—and the French did not wish to sign up to that because they felt that one of their strategic industries, nuclear power, would be at a loss, would it be right, in the spirit of European Union co-operation, to use qualified majority voting or some other passerelle or clause to force the French to allow their territorial sovereignty to be infringed by others? That would seem to be curiously anti-European and against the spirit of European co-operation.
Lord Deben
That would mean that we had no common trade policy. Every country could say that this decision was contrary to their national interest. The French have managed to make the sale of Orangina contrary to their national interest. What the noble Baroness suggests would destroy any possibility of the scheme. It would not touch their sovereignty. They would not have to use the electricity. All that they would have to do was not prevent someone else using the electricity. It is otherwise a curious definition of national sovereignty.
Secondly, if we do not do that, my national sovereignty is being infringed, because my climate is being changed. Unless we find ways of using non-fossil fuels, my climate will be changed. This is a question on which we have to accept that our national sovereignties are all imperilled—but I do not want to go further down that road, or someone will suggest that I am not keeping to the amendments.
There is a whole series of issues here where the Government are making it more difficult to stand up for Britain's interests within the European Union by setting this entirely unnecessary and manufactured way to enable them to say to the rest of the world, “We are not going to be pushed around”. I think that the Government are perfectly capable of not being pushed around without the Bill. I think that my noble friend is quite wrong to apply Canute to a bit of the Bill. The whole Bill is a Canute Bill. It suggests that you can in some way stop the necessity of the nations of Europe working together by setting in train a system which makes Britain uniquely unable to play its part in the European Union. It is all right saying that other people have all sorts of methods, and the rest of it, but they have been much more careful in writing their legislation, and they do not have a situation where even the simplified system is called into question, which is the way that this legislation operates.
I want to say just two more things. The first is that if ever there were a policy that needs change, it is the common fisheries policy. It is hugely important, and it is based on a European competence, but there are some things on which the European Union does not have competence. For example, it does not have competence to enter member states’ ports with European inspectors, but there is no way to have a sensible common fisheries policy without that. Who has been against that? We do not want people entering our ports. I cannot understand why, because we try to keep the law, but evidently we will not allow that. If we were to do that, we might do something about the very policy which is, for most of us, the least satisfactory of European policies. That is why, given the environment, it will be very important. Evidently, we are not going to do that unless we have a referendum asking people whether they are prepared for French inspectors to come into English ports. Of course, they will say no to that, because the question does not say what I want it to say: are we prepared for British inspectors to go into French ports? They would say yes to that. It depends what the question is. That again comes back to the danger of having referendums.
My last point is that the trouble with this bit of the Bill, unless it is amended as we suggest, is that, as the noble Lord, Lord Triesman, rightly said, it gives the opportunity for anybody who does not like the European Union, who has an obsessive belief that somehow it is the epitome of evil instead of being our most exciting and remarkable peacetime achievement, to find any change, any aspect that is altered, any suspicion or scintilla of alteration proof positive that there should have been a referendum. Therefore, instead of doing what the Government think will happen under the Bill, instead of ensuring that people feel happier about the European Union, it will give endless opportunities for the noble Lord, Lord Pearson, and others to suspect that there is something much deeper, much worse, much more wicked. Frankly, it is like the Jehovah's Witnesses. It is a perversion of the realities and the truths. Once you have caught it, you cannot see the realities and the truth except through that prism. The Bill helps that. The bit which does not allow the European Union to take proper steps to strengthen its effectiveness in mitigating the effects of climate change and pollution is particularly damaging, and it is especially damaging for the nation that leads in these matters—Britain. I want Britain to lead in these things and not to say to the rest of Europe, “Frightfully sorry, old boy, we can’t manage this because it means a referendum and we’re within two years of an election”.
Lord Judd
The noble Lord is absolutely right. That was a powerful argument, well put, and one with which I found myself completely in agreement. These amendments go to the centre of what is wrong with this lamentable piece of legislation. It is not just a question of a lack of vision; it is a matter of selling the British people short. If there is one fundamental reality in relevant politics, it is that we live in a totally interdependent world. The job of government is to help the British people to find a place within the reality of that interdependence and to work out how the interdependence can best be handled. That should be central to our education system and to the whole message of politics.
The trouble with the Bill, as we said powerfully at Second Reading, is that it does not provide any flexibility. Here I slightly differ from my noble friend Lord Liddle, who is doing a formidable job on the Bill and makes me very proud to come from the same county in England. However, it is not simply flexibility that we are talking about but leadership of the British people in meeting the realities that confront us. The trouble with the Bill—and we all know it—is that it is an effort to reassure the British people that government will protect them against the European Union. Instead of asking how we can strengthen the well-being of the British people through the part that we play in Europe, and instead of coming out of negotiations and saying, “My God, look at what we have achieved for the people of Europe and therefore for ourselves in this context”, we come out saying, “Look at what we’ve managed to hold off in looking after British interests”. That kind of argument is all tactical and totally lacks strategy. From that standpoint, it seems to me that these amendments are central. Not one issue is mentioned in them that can possibly be carried forward on behalf of the British people within the context of the nation state alone. They require international solutions.
In responding to my noble friend’s very important intervention on piracy, kidnapping and ransom, the noble Lord, Lord Wallace, seemed to suggest that these are matters of international law. Of course they are, and they are absolutely central to the future of my children and grandchildren. Of course we have to get the international and global policies right, but surely the noble Lord does not want to align himself with the argument that establishing firmly in the European Community a stepping stone towards making that wider international policy effective is somehow unnecessary. It is vital, and we have done it with, for example, arms exports. It was in the context of the whole issue of arms exports and the damage they could do that we saw the establishment of the European code on arms exports. A lot of work is still to be done on it but it is a starting point. It illustrates to the world what can be done and it enables us to move forward practically to a wider, more successful policy within the United Nations.
The issue that we must come back to is that these amendments are vital because they try to ensure that we bring home to the British people that their interests lie in strong collective action at the international level. I repeat that the trouble with the Bill is that it faces in the opposite direction. It is saying, “We will make some concessions to Europe where necessary, but we do not see our future in international co-operation and effective international instruments: we see these as something that reluctantly we have to concede from time to time—and, my God, we will insist on the opportunity always to test public opinion if we are asked to take an obviously sensible step”.
These amendments deal with the heart of the Bill. It is a sad day in British history when we have this wretched piece of legislation before us.
Lord Taverne
My Lords, the previous two speakers eloquently demonstrated the importance of these amendments. They made a passionate plea for a much more sensible and enlightened policy towards Europe. I will deal with one particular aspect: Amendment 23F and the banking crisis.
There are two aspects to the current financial crisis in Europe: sovereign debt and bank liquidity. Many continental banks are undercapitalised. They need more rigorous stress tests as a basis for recapitalisation. National regulation and supervision have failed. We need a special EU-wide resolution regime. We need new, more effective European regulation. If we have that, it will of course give new powers to Brussels and that, as I understand it, would trigger a referendum. The question arises: what sort of question would be posed in a referendum dealing with bank regulation?
Leaving that aside, it will mean that in the course of negotiations taking place in Europe, when negotiators are being very careful and thinking that they can achieve something without triggering a referendum in Denmark or Ireland, or an adverse ruling of the German constitutional court, our negotiators will have to have regard to the fact that there will have to be a referendum. They will be inhibited and looking over their shoulders: they will be negotiating with their hands behind their back. Since this will be an obstacle to reaching a very important area of agreement, the likelihood is that we will be bypassed.
Already we are being bypassed in many important respects. While John Major wanted to be outside the eurozone in a multipolar Europe, it seems that Mr Cameron has more or less accepted that there will be a small but very powerful unit in Europe. We will find that being in the outside lane of a much less congenial Europe is not a particularly effective experience for very important aspects of our economy. I have heard Treasury officials saying that we are now in the same position as Latvia, asking what agreements are being reached in rooms where the important people are meeting.
A story was told at a conference I went to about an occasion when Gordon Brown insisted on being present with eurozone Ministers. They said that they would meet him, but the press outside were speculating on how long he would last: would he be out in five minutes? In fact, that was precisely what happened: after hearing him for five minutes, they thanked him, said that they must now have their private meeting and asked him to leave. He could not face the press after five minutes, so he stayed in the lavatory for half an hour.
It is not very dignified to be outside the corridors of power. This, however, will be much worse. Obviously there were problems about joining the eurozone, but the regulation of banks will affect the City profoundly, and it will be another case where we are likely to be bypassed.
Lord Hannay of Chiswick
My Lords, I will address Amendments 23C, 23D and 23E, as did the noble Lord, Lord Deben, who gave us a brilliant illustration of why flexibility in this area is not only desirable but necessary.
I have, off and on, had quite a few dealings with the issue of energy in the European Union, and I have to say that we have got it comprehensively wrong. In the 1970s we fought desperately—of course, Mr Tony Benn was the Minister at the time—to avoid the European Union having any responsibility in this field whatever in case it stole our oil, which it was never going to be able to do because European law is perfectly clear on that point, and so we prevented any policy emerging then. Then, when the Single European Act was passed, we allowed—I agree that by then we were not favouring it—energy to be kept out of the single market at that stage because of the objections of the French and the Germans, and that was a disastrous mistake. Now, when we have discovered that we are not one of the three major oil and gas producers in the world, we have discovered, surprisingly, that we could do with a common energy policy, but it is quite difficult to get; and, as the noble Lord, Lord Deben, has said, it is in an area of shared competence. So it may very well be that, sometime in the not too distant future, we will want to support some changes that will give more powers to Brussels in the area of energy security, competition, interconnectors and all these things; yet here we are subjecting all that to a referendum requirement under which the no campaign would no doubt say yet again, “This is the European Union coming to take all our North Sea oil”, and so on. The result may very well be negative because that campaign would be very emotive. Heaven knows what the Scots would think about it—quite a lot, I should think.
I do really feel that this illustrates the case for flexibility—and the same is true on climate change. It is rather clear that the European Union will struggle under its current institutional arrangements to find a way forward through the next 30, 40 or 50 years on climate change. Things are going to be very different. Crises are going to emerge and Europe is going to have to find a response to them. Some of those responses may involve new powers for the Union as a whole. And yet again, this will be made extraordinarily difficult by the provisions of the Bill.
I am not saying that these particular amendments are the last words in wisdom on this particular issue, but I do really think that the Government ought to be taking this a bit more seriously. We have not had a single serious response from the Government since we began this Committee stage on any point that has been raised. I am waiting now for the response to this debate to have, for the first time, a serious response to the substance, because we have not had it so far. Those are issues of major importance. I think that if the Government were to go away and reflect on this now, they would see the wisdom, at the very least, of truncating the list of issues on which there need to be referendums.
Lord Empey
I am grateful to the noble Lord for giving way. A lot has been talked this evening about energy. Maybe I am missing something, but any of the energy sources that we will need for our future security will come from outside the European Union. In other words, they will be merely transmitted through the European Union, and that will largely be down to the authorities in each country, including planners, as to whether they will allow these things to pass through.
I was involved in a gas pipeline that transmitted from the United Kingdom to the Irish Republic and from the different parts of the United Kingdom to the Irish Republic directly. The European Union contributed financially towards it, because it could be done under a whole range of headings—infrastructure, the cohesion fund, economic development, climate change issues, carbon reduction. There are many mechanisms already in existence. I may be wrong on this, but I feel that the energy example is not necessarily the most relevant.
Lord Hannay of Chiswick
I am afraid to say that I believe that the noble Lord is wrong on this. He has used a particular example of which he has very great experience. It is extremely interesting for the House to hear that example, but it is not very typical. It does not deal at all with the issue, for example, of whether it might be in the interests of the European Union in the not distant future to give a negotiating mandate to a body—whether it is the Commission or the presidency or whatever it is—to negotiate for energy supplies from outside the European Union, particularly gas, and to negotiate as a single unit. That would require new powers. It is as simple as that, and is, I am afraid to say, nothing whatever to do with building a pipeline between Ireland and Northern Ireland, interesting and important though that was.
I think there is serious matter in the energy field, the climate change field and the pollution field to reflect on here and a need for greater flexibility. I plead with the Government that we do not have the preprandial/postprandial schizophrenia that we have had in recent Committee stages in which in one session we are told that we need not worry about this enormous number of referendums because none of them will ever take place and we will stop anything happening in Brussels that will cause them to take place and then immediately afterwards we are told that we need not worry because the European Union does not work that way, and there will be a big package and we will all be able to find some nice sugar-plums in it for ourselves. I thought that was where we came in and decided that that was nothing that we wished to encourage in future. I think the Government need to make up their mind whether they are trying to lock the door and throw the key away, which is what this Bill does, and the consequences of that are pretty damaging for this country, or whether they are trying to propel the European Union towards another big institutional package, which I do not believe to be in the interests of this country. I would like to hear a response on Amendments 23C, 23D and 23E.
Lord Willoughby de Broke
My Lords, on the issue of climate change, the subject of the amendment that we are supposed to be talking about, several hours ago the noble Lord, Lord Wallace, said that Amendment 21 was the most useless, superfluous amendment that he had come across during the hours of Committee stage. I believe that Amendment 23C actually takes the palm as the most useless and redundant amendment we have had. The idea that the European Union is effective in climate change is frankly laughable. Let me remind your Lordships that our policy on emissions is guided entirely by the EU and we have to have 20 per cent of our energy from renewables by 2020. Of course, there is not the remotest chance of achieving that, and in the past couple of years, that aspiration—that dream—has begun to collide with reality.
Just to give your Lordships a little information on that, I shall repeat what was said in two sets of figures from two separate reports over the degree of delusion that surrounds the wish of our Government in Brussels and their subsidiary here in Westminster that the centrepiece of our energy policy should be to build ever more windmills. The report that drew most attention was from a Scottish environmental charity that focused on the fact that last year, despite our building ever more wind farms, the lack of wind meant that they operated on average at only 21 per cent of capacity, and that was during the period of highest demand. Several times when demand was at its highest the contribution of wind to our electricity supply was virtually zero.
I do not know why, but less attention was given to an interesting report put out by our Department of Energy and Climate Change showing that the 3,168 turbines that we have built at a cost of billions of pounds contributed on average less than the output of one large coal-fired power station. From the DECC figure, it is possible to work out that for this derisory contribution we paid through our electricity bills a subsidy of nearly £1.2 billion on top of the price of electricity itself. In return for getting 3 per cent, roughly, of our energy, nearly 7 per cent of our bills are paid in subsidies for these completely useless wind farms, and that will go up as years go on because we have committed to this 20 per cent from renewables by 2020. That report dealt with last year.
Lord Deben
Might the noble Lord not suggest that there could be a better question: do the people of Britain want to have their climate changed and their health impaired by the continuation of extremely dirty power stations, which happily we are going to close down?
Lord Willoughby de Broke
The noble Lord says, “happily we are going to close down”. I hope that he has got a generator in his house so that he can watch his television and read his books because with wind power that simply will not happen. Nuclear of course is a different matter, but let us not get into that debate right now.
Lord Hannay of Chiswick
I merely want to congratulate the noble Lord on having raised the issue of gas storage, which is a subject close to my heart. I ask him to recognise that the best way to improve the level of gas storage in Europe would be to impose a minimum gas storage obligation through the European Union.
Lord Willoughby de Broke
Surely it could be up to the nation member states to impose their own minimum gas storage obligation. Why do we have to do it through the European Union? It is perfectly ridiculous. This unhealthy EU obsession, which is what it is—I am very sorry that the previous Government and this Government seem to have signed up to it—of using wind power to keep our lights on is one of the most damaging fantasies of our time. I oppose the amendment and I hope that it will be dealt with accordingly.
Lord Lamont of Lerwick
My Lords, I want to make one simple and brief point, but before I do that perhaps I may respond partly to what the noble Lord, Lord Taverne, said because I was a little puzzled by it. He is a former Treasury Minister and chairman of a think tank in the City. He was referring to the two aspects of the banking system in crisis being capital and liquidity, with which I totally agree. But he was, I think, arguing that perhaps we need more European attention to capital. That was quite a surprising thing to suggest because, as he will remember, not long before the Irish banking crisis struck and the Irish banks were revealed as hopelessly undercapitalised, we had stress tests carried out on the European banks—a separate exercise in the European Union and in Britain. The European Union banking tests revealed that no bank had a problem with capital other than one bank in Germany. That was shortly before the crisis was fully revealed in all its horror in Ireland.
I agree with the noble Lord that there is a separate aspect of liquidity which the European Central Bank has, in a skilful and constructive way, provided to the European banking system. Equally, the Bank of England has also exercised its national function well. He did not make the case for further European competence or the transfer of power or competence from this country to Europe by merit of that alone.
The noble Lord went on to make the familiar point about the eurozone and whether we were marginalised by not being in it. It is of course true that eurozone Ministers may make certain decisions affecting themselves in which we do not participate. We do not participate in meetings of the Federal Reserve Bank, although its decisions affect us. However, anything that eurozone Ministers decide to do that is governed by the rules of the single market or competition law continues to be governed by the rules of the single market and competition policy. He was careful to say that issues would arise if we were proposing to join the euro but the implication of his argument was that in order to gain influence we should join the euro, which I am sure he does not really subscribe to. Very few people will own up to arguing that we should join the euro today.
Lord Taverne
I was not arguing that we should join the euro today. On the earlier question, I defer to my noble friend’s greater experience in these financial fields. However, a large number of economists have taken the view that what is needed at the moment are much more effective stress tests for European banks on a euro-wide basis. For example, I dare say my noble friend has read economist Willem Buiter’s considerable contribution to Citigroup’s paper on the subject. He is not alone in this because a large number of economists are concerned that only through a much more rigorous euro-wide stress test system will the banking liquidity part of the problem be adequately resolved.
Lord Lamont of Lerwick
I think the stress tests refer to capital rather than liquidity, which is a slightly shorter-term issue. I agree with the noble Lord and Willem Buiter that we need proper stress tests. However, the previous stress tests that were applied within the EU were revealed in all their nakedness as thoroughly inadequate.
As the noble Lord, Lord Wallace, said, we should remember that the regulations that govern these issues are not only European but worldwide. The BIS has a crucial role—in fact the lead role—in determining the capital ratios of banks. I do not think that the argument about the failure of the banking systems is an argument per se for why the UK, which is outside the eurozone, ought to contemplate further integration in this field than has already been provided for. This area has to be addressed internationally and through many agencies.
The main point that I want to make about the debate is this. We have had some amazingly excellent speeches but there is confusion, or insufficient distinction, in these debates between the European Union acting to legislate or make a policy decision and it altering its own constitution—if I can use the word “constitution”; I know people who might object to that—or its own rules. People have made eloquent speeches about human trafficking, piracy and the environment, but not all the speeches have distinguished between the EU’s ability to act and to have a policy and its need for more powers.
The noble Baroness, who made a tremendously moving speech about human trafficking, did not actually demonstrate that more powers were needed. More agreement might be needed, and might be achievable within existing powers, but she did not demonstrate that more powers were needed. Equally, the noble Lord, Lord Davies, spoke about piracy but did not demonstrate that we could not have an EU policy on piracy within the existing competencies and powers of the EU. I appeal to the Minister to make that distinction when he addresses all these areas.
Where there are political and human problems—piracy, the environment, energy, human trafficking and all the other issues listed in the amendments—can the Minister distinguish between the EU’s ability to act, to legislate under its own rules and, quite separately, the need to change its own constitution? The people speaking for the amendments ought to have argued for a change in the European Union’s rules. With great respect to all those who spoke so movingly on the issues that mattered to them, not all of them made the case for a change in the rules of the EU. That seems to be the crucial point in this group of amendments.
Lord Grenfell
I hesitate to intervene at this late hour but what the noble Lord, Lord Lamont, has just said provokes me to do so. He has, maybe inadvertently, hit the nail on the head. This Bill is about trying to prevent the European Union acquiring more powers in ways that the Government feel would be wrong. The noble Lord spoke about the difference between powers and agreement. In fact, the effect of the Bill is to prevent and make far more difficult the reaching of agreements within the European Union. That is what it is all about. It is not about power but the ability of the European Union to reach more and better agreements.
We have had an interesting debate that has covered an enormous number of topics. We have talked about the Monetary Policy Committee, the environment, piracy, human trafficking—all very interesting for those of us who respect the views of those who know what they are talking about. However, I am not sure that the coalition Government and those on this Front Bench are at all interested in this debate. They have already made up their minds; the integrity of Clause 4(4) has to be defended at all costs. They are not prepared to give way on any of this and do not want any additions to the clause. One wonders what this debate is all about.
I do not want to belittle the powers of this House to be able to persuade Governments to change their minds, but on this particular issue I am a pessimist. We are not going to be able to do so because if these excellent amendments are accepted, one of the central pillars of the whole Bill collapses. When that pillar collapses, the whole edifice begins to crumble, so I am sure the Government are going to stick firm on this. It will be extremely hard for us to persuade them to accept any of these amendments. That depresses me greatly because these amendments are vital. I suggest that we make every effort to persuade the Government, but I am a pessimist on this. The case has been well made by my noble friends Lord Triesman and Lord Liddle to get these amendments through, but if the Government are not prepared to accept them this bad Bill becomes even worse.
Baroness Brinton
My Lords, I absolutely agree that the policy areas set out in these amendments are important for debate. We had an extremely interesting debate earlier and it is absolutely key as well that the EU continues to focus on these issues. However, I am really struggling to identify the areas within the existing treaties where the EU is not able to act. I would be grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Liddle, if he could help by giving some specific examples. On those covering climate change, for example, which the noble Lord, Lord Deben, spoke eloquently about earlier, I understood that Article 191 of TFEU allows the EU to act in,
“preserving, protecting and improving the quality of the environment”,
so where is it not covered that requires this amendment?
Lord Deben
Very simply, the EU does not have powers to insist that we improve the electricity transfer between countries, yet that will be an essential part of our future energy needs.
Lord Wallace of Saltaire
My Lords, Article 170 says:
“To help achieve the objectives referred to in Articles 26 and 174”,
et cetera,
“the Union shall contribute to the establishment and development of trans-European networks in the areas of transport, telecommunications and energy infrastructures”.
That seems to me very much to give the competences needed.
Baroness Brinton
I am grateful for that intervention from my noble friend Lord Wallace, which was much more informed than I could possibly have given.
Lord Deben
It was a perfectly right intervention but that does not actually give powers to compel. It says that the countries shall do it but there is no mechanism at the moment to insist that they do it. That is the issue.
Baroness Brinton
My Lords, I fundamentally disagree with that point. The key point here, which we have come back to day after day on this Bill, is that this is about the process not the policy. The process has been absolutely clear and I still wait to hear from the noble Lord, Lord Liddle, on where these are not covered by existing treaties.
Lord Pearson of Rannoch
My Lords, the noble Lord, Lord Deben, was good enough to mention me in his few remarks and to accuse me of what I think was the impossible and most undesirable dream of the United Kingdom being altogether free of the European Union in all these matters. He is of course correct. However, he then mentioned the common fisheries policy as though that has to be solved by the European Union and as though the EU will not solve the acknowledged disaster which the policy is, environmentally and in every other way, if it is prevented from doing so. Surely, from our point of view, as I have mentioned before, the answer is terribly simple. We simply leave the European common fisheries policy and take back our international waters. Seventy five per cent of the fish which swim in European waters all the year round swim in waters that used to belong entirely to the United Kingdom before we made the mistake of joining the European Union. We then manage our own waters, re-establish our fish stocks and let out any surplus to foreigners.
On energy, the noble Lord again believes that the European Union is essential to solve our energy problems but, surely—
Lord Hannay of Chiswick
I am afraid that the noble Lord is yet again misleading the House. The waters did not belong to Britain before we joined the European Union. We had 12-mile limits in those days and the areas beyond those limits were high seas. The decision to go out to 250 miles was taken by the European Union collectively when we were a member.
Lord Pearson of Rannoch
Yes, but we should not have gone along with that decision because we should not have been in the policy in the first place. I therefore insist that most of the fish which swim now in European waters and are fished by European boats used to belong to us and they could and should belong to us again. I do not wish to detain the House—
Lord Deben
The noble Lord really must not say that. It is not true. Most of our fishing grounds have always been shared with our neighbours—the French, the Belgians and the Germans—and we have always had to come to terms with them. All that the European common fisheries policy does is to have a sensible mechanism. It is not that the policy being common is wrong but that the policy is wrong. You have to have a common policy; otherwise you can only make these decisions with the marlinspike. It is just not true that we had 75 per cent of it before.
Lord Pearson of Rannoch
The noble Lord and those of his view have been saying this now for 30 years. It has not happened and it is not going to happen. The solution for this country is to leave the common fisheries policy and take back our waters to the median line and whatever we had before in territorial waters into our own control. Then, when our own fishing industry, which has been decimated by the common fisheries policy, has been rebuilt, we can share any surplus and lease it out to people who want to buy it.
Lord Davies of Stamford
I do not know in which amendment the common fisheries policy arises, but I have to tell the noble Lord that if he is interested in that policy, he will rapidly find that the only explanation consistent with the facts is that the common fisheries policy suffered from an excess of member state sovereignty and an insufficiency of federalism. At every stage the European Commission, being the regulatory agency, has proposed quotas that, if they had been accepted, would have preserved the stocks. It is the member states pursuing their own individual interests that have always resisted those proposals on the part of the European Commission. As a result, the quotas have never been sufficiently tight and all these waters have been overfished. Under all circumstances, whether we had our own fisheries policy or not, it would be necessary for us to have regulation, quotas and some effective enforcement mechanism. If we disbanded the European Union, the next day we would need to set up a new common fisheries policy by agreement with a set of quotas and a common enforcement policy.
Lord Pearson of Rannoch
My Lords, when we leave the European Union, we will not do as the noble Lord, Lord Davies, suggests. We will take back those waters that were our waters, take back those fish that were our fish and re-establish our national fishing industry. That is what we will do. As the noble Lord has mentioned, this was not actually in the amendments but as the noble Lord, Lord Deben, mentioned it in connection with me, I thought that I would just touch on it in closing.
The noble Lord assumes, again, that some form of European common energy policy is in any way necessary for this country. We simply rebuild our own energy supplies. We do not let the European Union close down our coal-fired stations, as my noble friend Lord Willoughby de Broke has mentioned, but build new ones. We might even consider incineration of landfill. We certainly consider nuclear power. We therefore supply our own energy. If we then wish to go on buying Russian gas through France, which is what we have to do at the moment, then we may be able to, but I entirely agree with my noble friend that this pursuit of wind power is madness of a dimension that only the political class could be guilty of. I think that that covers everything that I had to say to the noble Lord, Lord Deben, and I shall sit down.
Lord Howell of Guildford
Perhaps your Lordships would welcome it if we began to come to the end of this enormous debate. I agree with my noble friend Lord Lamont that the effect of this debate has been to clarify our differences, particularly the concerns of noble Lords opposite, about the Bill, and the worries that lie at the centre of their anxieties.
I do not want to parody what the noble Lords, Lord Liddle and Lord Triesman, have said again and again. They wish for more flexibility, and by “flexibility” they mean the readiness to agree to or even initiate treaty changes. They further argue that in some of its provisions—notably Article 48(6), but in others as well—the Lisbon treaty provided this flexibility, which somehow the Bill is reversing and putting back in the box. I think that that is a fair summary of where they stand. I question straight away whether they have got the Lisbon treaty quite right. We know that using the passerelle provisions requires a treaty change, and in a life experiment, not a laboratory experiment, we have seen how that is conducted. It is conducted through some very elaborate negotiations on an urgent issue that will not be solved by any immediate policies to hand—namely, the stability of the European financial and monetary system—and, to meet that, a treaty change is winding its way through the system and will take one year and three-quarters to come to fruition and be agreed. So that structure, that passerelle arrangement—which, incidentally, was as noble Lords know very well, an agonising compromise between several other suggestions at the Lisbon treaty negotiations—is certainly not a quick solution, a flexibility device, an emergency provision, which somehow the Bill is negativing. That is not the pattern.
Then we come to the broader question of whether treaty changes generally are synonymous with flexibility. I have considerable difficulty with the line taken by the Opposition. Not only does it take 18 months to two years to work up and elaborate treaty changes and get them agreed between the 27 members, which all have their own procedures for handling these matters, going through their own legislatures and constitutional arrangements and, in many cases their own referenda arrangements as well, but this seems to be a very poor response, a very poor kind of flexibility and a very poor pattern of responding to emergency and difficult issues.
As I understand it, the implication of the amendments, which extend the exemptions to a very wide range of issues, is that it would be nice to be ready to have treaty changes in an enormous list of things. We dealt with banking and financial regulation in the previous group of amendments, and I would be testing the patience of the Committee if I went through that again. However, these amendments deal with climate change, pollution, energy security, migration, cross-border crime, neighbourhood policy, maritime law, piracy and human trafficking, about which my noble friend Lady Williams spoke with such precision, knowledge and telling appeal. In all those areas, as I understand it, the amendments would like to see treaty change. I wonder whether the Opposition realise quite what they are asking for; it seems extremely doubtful that treaty change is the way to solve crises or problems in any of those areas. The amendments appear to have been drafted on the assumption that the Bill is trying to impair the UK’s role and participation in all these areas. They take no account of the fact—and it is a fact—that the existing treaties which extend enormous areas of competence to the EU already afford the European Union ample scope—I shall show in detail why this is so—to legislate in all the specific areas referred to in all the amendments.
If I were to go through that vast list now, we would be here till well after midnight and probably the early hours of the morning, so I cannot do justice to every aspect. But let me try to show how, in many of these areas, the competences are there. The need to plunge into this complicated area of treaty change is minimal; the opportunities for creating a highly effective European posture and policy are available within the existing competences and the existing absolute competence in particular is available to the EU in trade questions. Let me explain some of the points where this is so.
Perhaps I should begin with referenda generally and the concern that a multiple stream of referenda lies ahead if the Bill gets on to the statute book. That, I think we have established, is nonsense. Far ahead, a great new treaty could touch on a number of the issues we are looking at tonight. But the idea of a stream of referenda, which I know noble Lords in many cases dislike intensely, is unrealistic. In two highly eloquent pieces of oratory in two debates, my noble friend Lord Deben has let us know that he does not like referenda at all. That is my impression from listening to his words. He is perfectly entitled not to like referenda at all. However, he must face it: they increasingly creep into modern government, particularly in this internet age when 2 billion people, out of 6 billion on this planet, are on the web every morning. This obviously empowers people and leads to more consultation of public opinion than ever before in many democracies. It goes with parliamentary representative government; it does not undermine it, provided it is handled in a sensible way.
Lord Hannay of Chiswick
I am sorry to interrupt the noble Lord, but no one, as far as I know, has tabled an amendment to Clause 2. It states that if there is a major new constitutional package there will have to be a referendum. No one has argued about that—not one person. What we are all arguing about is whether you need this cascade of Clauses 3, 4, 5 and 6 that block off the non-intergovernmental conference treaty big-package route. Honestly, I ask the noble Lord not to answer the wrong question. All the amendments relate to this cascade of referendums for matters that are dealt with within the Lisbon treaty.
Lord Howell of Guildford
The noble Lord, who is very skilled in these matters, knows that he is putting the question upside down. It is dangerous to halt a cascade, because you may have to divert it, and the cascade that the Bill is designed to halt is the cascade of small competence and power transfers that have been going on over the years in many areas and have caused a lot of people to fear that competence creep—I am sorry to repeat that unfortunate term—and power creep are continuing all the time, allegedly under parliamentary control, but somehow without proper public discussion, and certainly without the consent of the people.
The referendum-lock device is precisely to ensure that when the big transfers of competence and power come, they are in a clear package. The noble Lord said that that was the wrong thing to talk about, but that is the way that it will happen, like the Lisbon treaty, and the country will be invited, because of the many items that will involve competence transfer, to have a referendum on them. That is precisely my point. There will be no cascade because, if the Bill works effectively, which I think it will, the great changes needed in the 2020s and 2030s in the European Union, as it adjusts to new conditions, will have to be treated in a substantial treaty that must and will automatically trigger a referendum. That is entirely right and it will offend only those who, like my noble friend Lord Deben, do not like referenda at all. However, for most people, including 84 per cent of the country, or their children, that will be the right way to proceed. It should ensure that some degree of trust, reconnection and support for the great European cause is resurrected. At present that support is fading away very fast. It is draining away in Finland, Hungary, to some extent in Poland and in many other countries. I am not sure that even in Germany these matters carry the popularity and support needed for the kind of reforms we want to see in Europe.
This is a very serious matter. I do not say that this Bill alone will do the job of reconnection—of course it will not. We need leadership, articulation and an understanding that giving more and more powers to the centre is an outdated 20th century idea and that the more you accumulate powers at the centre, the more you get public disaffection and remoteness. That must be understood. It must be understood that in this networked age, you do not need centralisation to carry out effective powers. Once that is understood, we will begin to get shapes in the European Union that relate to and connect with the people, as the Laeken declaration pleaded for almost a decade ago. That is why I believe that these exemptions will increase mistrust and take Europe back, rather than forward to the 21st century adjustment needed in the information age, and why I therefore plead with the noble Lord and his colleagues to withdraw the amendment.
Lord Liddle
My Lords, I fear that in trying to be helpful to the Government in helping the business in Committee to go forward more quickly, we have ended up with a long omnibus debate and are sitting late. I shall be very brief.
In his reply, the Minister somewhat distorted what the Opposition are trying to achieve. We are not arguing for vast new treaties; that is a straw man. We are not arguing for the massive centralisation of powers in Brussels; that is a straw man. We are arguing that there are issues that we as a nation state cannot tackle effectively on our own. There are issues such as energy and climate change, our dealings with north Africa and the financial crisis in the banks, which are cross-border in nature. There are issues that have to be tackled at EU level which the nation state can no longer tackle, and we must ensure that there are the necessary competencies and powers at that level to act effectively. Otherwise, we will let our people down. That is not an argument for centralisation or for sweeping new treaties, but it is an argument for flexibility in cases where we discover—because we do not have perfect foresight and neither do the drafters of treaties—that those powers are lacking.
I argue that in the contributions that we have heard from all sides of the House tonight, we have had examples of where, not in 10 years’ time but possibly in two years’ time or less, we may need changes. There are issues such as human trafficking; energy, where in order to deal with networks and negotiations with third parties we may need to establish an exclusive competence at EU level; north Africa, where for a group of new democratic countries we may have to adopt an entirely new type of relationship; and for the financial crisis in the banks, where we may need a cross-border resolution mechanism.
The Government should be open to the Article 48(6) simplified revision of the treaty of the type that the euro area has had to agree to to establish the stability mechanism, rather than closing the door. That is the test of an effective European policy; “Are you prepared to do the things that are necessary to make Europe effective where it needs to be effective?”. The truth is that this Government do not want to do that. Instead, they want to apply this referendum lock, which will not enable Europe to be effective in all circumstances, and they are going to throw away the key.
Our position is a pragmatic one. It is not saying that these things are inevitable; it is saying that we have to be open to them happening. As part of the structure of the Bill, the Government are saying that there are certain grounds for exempting measures from the need for a referendum. We have tried to illustrate what those grounds might be and, on some of the other flexibilities in the treaty, we have tried to demonstrate where the significance test might be widened from the very narrow circumstances in which it is currently allowable.
If the Government want to improve the Bill, I urge them to come back to this House by Report with a set of amendments that give us cause for hope that Britain can play a leading role in the European Union rather than always having to say to colleagues, “No, we can’t possibly agree to that because we’re not allowed to have a referendum”. I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.