European Union Bill
John Redwood Excerpts(13 years, 8 months ago)
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Mr Clappison
Yes—and not only that, because my hon. Friend is being characteristically modest, as some of the warnings about the consequences that would flow from the treaty of Lisbon have proved right in the short time that has elapsed since its introduction. I am thinking in particular of the warnings that were given about what I regard as the unfortunate influence of the European External Action Service and the EU’s new Foreign Minister, Baroness Ashton, which has not entirely served the interests of this country.
Mr John Redwood (Wokingham) (Con)
The new clause is excellent. I like the idea that Ministers would have to report that they tried to get an improvement but they lost. Is it also proposed that some of the arguments should be made available, because it would be much more interesting if we knew how badly they had lost?
Mr Clappison
My right hon. Friend makes an excellent point. Too often decisions are made behind closed doors, certainly in the Council. They are made in a remote and unaccountable way, and members of the public in this country simply do not have the information that they should have to be able to evaluate the decisions taken in their name.
During our debates on the Lisbon treaty, it was striking that time after time we had to remind members of the then Government of what they had said in the Convention about the measures that they were now putting before the House. I cannot remember whether they had opposed the establishment of the EU External Action Service and the EU Foreign Minister—I would not have blamed them if they had—but it emerged on a number of occasions in the debates in the House that Ministers had previously opposed what they were now proposing. That came to light only through the assiduous work of the then Conservative Front-Bench Members, and I pay tribute to them, as well as to colleagues such as my hon. Friend the Member for Stone (Mr Cash) and my right hon. Friend the Member for Wokingham (Mr Redwood).
The new clause would remedy this problem, as the fullest possible information would be placed before the House, with the statement, so we would know exactly what had taken place, and whether the Government really agreed with what was being proposed or whether they had lost the arguments and been outvoted. In short, we would know whether we were being called upon to do something with which our democratically elected Government did not agree.
Mr Redwood
The hon. Lady is absolutely right. I can remember visiting EU Councils as a Minister and discovering that the Council of Ministers often met as a legislature. It was about to enact extremely important laws affecting all our countries, and all that the others and I said was entirely secret and did not have to be shared with the public. That is an absolute disgrace: we need much more transparency.
Ms Stuart
The right hon. Gentleman is absolutely right. I negotiated the opt-out for the junior doctors working time directive back in 1999, and in a sense we knew on the negotiating basis all the problems that would happen in the NHS that the UK Government saw coming. We also knew that the directive would not actually hit us until about 2008-09. Now it is here, and everyone here is entitled to say, “We didn’t see it coming.” In fact, on one level we did see it coming.
It is also important for the House to consider the fact that, during the discussions on the Convention on the Future of Europe, I was in the very unusual position of being a negotiating partner at Government level, and also representing the House. Therefore, provided that I used a legal adviser from the House, I could be given the legal advice that was given to the previous Administration.
We should consider the nature and length of debates in the European Union. I deliberately chose the working time directive for junior doctors as an example, because it started in 1992 and started to have legislative impact on this country 10 years later, and only now are we beginning to find out its full effect.
We have now moved from Conservative to Labour to Conservative, and within our Government machinery—[Hon. Members: “Coalition.”] It is okay—the Liberal Democrats came sixth in Barnsley, so there is a ray of hope. Given the veil that falls between one Administration and the next, which hides the accumulated knowledge that could allow parliamentary scrutiny, there must be a mechanism that transcends individual Administrations, which would give the House access to the information that has been given to Ministers. Although new clause 1 is limited, it is nevertheless an important wedge representing that principle.
Neil Carmichael
Excellent, a beautiful place. The hon. Lady might well think that the transparency of the Commission is important—indeed, the transparency of the Council of Ministers—and I have certainly thought about this long and hard. I understand why people would wish there to be more transparency in both those organisations. After all, they make decisions that are important to us, but the new clause tackles the issue in the wrong way because it would undermine the Government’s capacity to negotiate. That is what we have to underline.
When the Government enter negotiations with other nation states about the future of Europe, they must do so with the knowledge that they may or may not enter into alliances with various Governments, and that those alliances may change during the negotiations.
Mr Redwood
I think my hon. Friend is misreading the new clause. It would mean that, when all the negotiation was done and we knew the final outcome, we would also know whether our Ministers had won or lost. What is wrong with that? How dare he be so undemocratic?
Neil Carmichael
Because it is important to bear in mind the next negotiation and not think only about the one we have just had. That is obvious, because alliances can fluctuate and relationships are important. I do not think my right hon. Friend would say the same thing about any negotiation on a treaty outside Europe, and certainly not, for example, about NATO.
Mr MacShane
I am grateful that the poor fish thrown into the sea will now have their flippers flipped in the House of Commons.
I want our Government and our House regularly to debate Europe, but the plain fact is that it is the decision of this Government—this coalition—not so to do. The Foreign Affairs Committee, with its coalition majority, is also abolishing its regular trip to the European Union nation that holds the presidency.
Mr Redwood
Has the right hon. Gentleman noticed that we are debating Europe all day today, and that we have had quite a lot of days on this Bill?
Mr MacShane
Yes, and I well remember the right hon. Gentleman in the even longer debates—going through the night—on the treaty of Amsterdam saying that signing it would mean the abolition of Britain. When there is a new Bill, we have debates, and we have had many debates and some good discussions on this one.
Mr Hague
The Bill does make a material difference. It does not address the whole question my hon. Friend raises, because there are many different dimensions to it, but it is an important measure. In any future negotiations about the EU, British Ministers will be in the European Council saying very clearly that, under a vast range of provisions set out in the Bill, proposals that may be put to them in the European Council would require a referendum in the UK. That does change the negotiating position in Europe and the freedom of manoeuvre of British Governments, and it means that Governments have to be very alert to that point—not just British Governments, but all the Governments of the European Union. I can tell my hon. Friend that when I explain that point to them, as I already do, it makes a considerable impact on them.
My view is that the European Union has great achievements to its name: the single market; the enlargement of its membership, which has done so much to strengthen the spread of freedom and democracy in Europe; and the effective use of European nations’ collective weight in the world, which remains of high importance to our values and interests, as we have seen on sanctions and on Iran and hope to see in response to events in north Africa.
There are great challenges for the nations of Europe, in growth and global competitiveness, where action in the European Union on widening further markets in services, energy and the digital economy could do much to help to lift our economic prospects, but all that will be ever more overshadowed if the EU’s treaties change yet again to enlarge its powers still further without popular consent. That is the point that the Bill addresses.
Mr Redwood
I am all in favour of that democratic consent, but there is about to be a very substantial strengthening of power over economic governance for euroland, and, although we will be opted out of the most severe penalty, many of us believe that the measure will have a very big impact over the years on this country. Why cannot we have a vote on that crucial new treaty?
Mr Hague
It is already very clear, from our discussions on that treaty, that it will not have the effect on the United Kingdom which my right hon. Friend fears. There is no provision for it to do so; indeed, it is very clear that it should not do so. If any change were to be made to the arrangements of the European Union which imposed significant new sanctions or obligations on the United Kingdom, then of course a referendum would arise under the provisions of the Bill. That again will have to be remembered when all such provisions and changes are discussed within the European Union in the future.
It is one of our core beliefs in this coalition Government that power should not be hoarded by Ministers and officials in Whitehall, but be shared more widely with Parliament and people. That is wholly at one with the development of modern society. People increasingly want and expect to make decisions for themselves, not to have them taken for them by the Government. This Government believe that that desire and expectation are shaping our society for the better, so we are opening up public services to more choice, giving professionals more responsibility and devolving power in the Localism Bill.
The Bill before us is driven by our belief in giving power to people. Indeed, the lack of referendums on transfers of areas of power from Britain to the EU has become glaringly illogical, given the many issues on which the previous Government did institute referendums. We have had referendums on devolution and, locally, on whether towns and cities, from London to Hartlepool, should have directly elected mayors. The logic of all those referendums is the same: they are decisions on whether to change who holds power and how that power may be used. No decision can be more eminently qualified than one that could move an area of policy from the responsibility of this House to the responsibility to the European Union.
Mr Douglas Alexander (Paisley and Renfrewshire South) (Lab)
As is customary, I join the Foreign Secretary in paying generous tribute to previous speakers in today’s debate and in the debates on the Bill in Committee of the Whole House. Throughout these debates, there have been sustained contributions from a whole range of Members, and I will accept the challenge of trying to identify just a small number of them given the very many who have spoken. The hon. Member for Stone (Mr Cash) and my hon. Friend the Member for Birmingham, Edgbaston (Ms Stuart) have demonstrated their depth of knowledge on these complex but important issues. My right hon. Friend the Member for Rotherham (Mr MacShane) and the hon. Member for Harwich and North Essex (Mr Jenkin), who is not in his place this evening, have shown that rhetorical flourishes are not the domain of any one party but can be brought to opposing sides of this debate.
I also echo the Foreign Secretary in paying generous tribute to both Front-Bench teams, both of whom have been well briefed for these debates, as the immense red folder opposite powerfully attests. Alas, for the time being it is the only thing on that side of the Chamber that is red, with the possible exception of the Deputy Leader of the House’s socks, but I hope that that will change in time.
On the Third Reading of Bills, it is customary to thank the departmental officials who have toiled in support of their ministerial masters. Some in the Foreign Office deal with great affairs of state, while some see service in troubled lands. A chosen few are dispatched to represent our country to our firm allies in the great capitals of the world. The seven officials who have been obliged to work full-time on this particular piece of legislation therefore deserve our heartfelt sympathy and support.
Not everything in the Bill is bad, although nothing in it is particularly good. It has been described variously as a piece of “legislative PR”, a “show Bill”, a “missed opportunity”, as having clauses that are “entirely bogus”, and of involving “contemplating our navels”. Those remarks, of course, all came from Conservative Members, apparently in support of their Government’s proposals. The measures in part 2 to ensure that Britain is fully represented in the European Parliament are of course necessary, as are some of the changes to the way in which this House scrutinises European decisions, such as those in clauses 9 and 10. There is growing consensus in almost all member states of the European Union that national Parliaments need to play a bigger role in scrutinising its decisions.
During the Foreign Secretary’s first period of trying to appease Conservative Eurosceptics, he tried to move the euro debate off referendums and into the mainstream of a general election campaign. As I am sure he will recollect, this Bill comes 3,572 days after he told us that there were just 12 days left to save the pound. He does not yet seem to have learned his lesson. The Conservative party has called for a referendum on every treaty since it was last in office. Its last manifesto pledged to repatriate the European competences contained in those treaties back to the United Kingdom. Now Ministers appear content with the situation as it stands and offer this 18-clause Bill instead.
The principle of having a codified set of rules on when a referendum should take place on major issues, as is attempted in schedule 1, is reasonable enough, even if it seems somewhat extraneous. We will see how far such a power is applied in practice. For all the talk of legislative and referendum locks, which we have heard again from the Foreign Secretary this evening, the Bill cannot get away from the simple fact that each successive Parliament in the United Kingdom is sovereign. If a new treaty is signed or a new distribution of powers is decided on, Ministers will have to bring a Bill before Parliament, just as before. At that point, it would be straightforward for them to amend part 1 of this Bill and remove any of the requirements. They could also legislate for a referendum, or choose a new constitutional innovation that we cannot foresee. It will be for the Parliament of the day to make that decision. Rather than a legislative lock, the Bill actually seems to be the constitutional application of the latest theory much-loved by the Prime Minister: the nudge theory. I suppose that for Government Members, it is worth a little more than the cast-iron guarantee that the Prime Minister offered before the election.
Mr Redwood
On reflection, does the right hon. Gentleman think that it would have been better if the British public had had a vote on Nice, Amsterdam or Lisbon, because they might have felt a bit happier about the European Union if they had been properly consulted?
Mr Alexander
I find myself in sympathy with the Conservative position at the times of those treaties. The Conservatives were not convinced by the case for a referendum, and neither was I. It rather reflects the changing disposition of those on the Conservative Front Bench that, as I recollect, the Foreign Secretary was a fierce advocate of the avoidance of a referendum on the Maastricht treaty. At least on that, we are at one.
The real guard is the precedent established by political consensus that, for example, no party will join the euro without a referendum. No party pledged to ratify the proposed European constitution without a referendum. There was no consensus on Lisbon. Labour and Liberal Democrat Members did not believe that a referendum was needed, but Conservative Members did, and the Conservative leader did until he suddenly realised that he might be in government in just over a year’s time and did not fancy spending the first two years as Prime Minister obsessing over European renegotiations.
Mr Cash
I am fascinated by the line that the Opposition are taking. I am not impressed, if I may say so, by the line being taken by the coalition Government. It is difficult to resist the idea that a referendum is necessary in certain circumstances, so I rather anticipate that there will not a Division this evening, since the Bill is associated with what is really no more than the unlikely event of a referendum being called in respect of any of the provisions contained in it. The circumstances and the facts that we have had the opportunity to examine in the course of proceedings on the Bill, and indeed the trend, as I said in my earlier speech, of the UK being drawn in to the legal framework of a two-tier Europe but actually being neutered at the same time, increase the necessity of a proper referendum—an in-or-out referendum—so that the British people can decide whether they want to be Europeanised or absorbed, like ectoplasm, into the strange new world being created, over which we have increasingly little influence, let alone control.
This is, fundamentally, about a democratic deficit. I do not believe that the Bill will make any substantial difference to the landscape to which I referred in my previous remarks to the Foreign Secretary. A strategic mistake is being made in respect of Europe. Europe is failing. There is incredibly high unemployment in other member states: Spain’s youth unemployment, for example, is 43%. Very serious damage is being done by burdens on business—50% of all our economic regulation comes from the EU—and there is a failure to provide oxygen for the small business community in this country. The Bill does not, in my opinion, make any difference to those matters.
We have faced for some time now an economic crisis in Europe, but none of the measures—including the 2020 strategy, which will be no more successful than the Lisbon agenda, which had to be abandoned—will make any substantial difference to the mistakes and distortions associated with the European Union as it now is which continue to affect the United Kingdom. We need to renegotiate the treaties, and the Bill will not change that fact.
At the beginning of our debates on the Bill, the European Scrutiny Committee proposed to have a proper investigation into it. I am sorry that the Foreign Secretary did not feel that he could attend, but I am glad that the Minister for Europe came to see us, albeit somewhat late in the day. The Committee gave careful consideration to the Bill, but it is not evident that the Government paid very much attention to what has been described in many quarters as one of the best Scrutiny Committee reports produced in recent years. I am afraid that they have substantially ducked the issue.
I shall address a number of the points as they cropped up. Much play was made of the idea that the Bill would reaffirm the sovereignty of the United Kingdom Parliament, but when I tabled a motion to that effect the entire Conservative party, with some honourable exceptions, voted against it, which struck me as somewhat bizarre and extremely dangerous.
The European Scrutiny Committee report, which took evidence from many of this country’s pre-eminent constitutional experts, came to certain very clear conclusions. First, we noted:
“Clause 18 did not address the competing primacies of EU and national law”,
which is a matter of grave concern, and that on the evidence we received, clause 18 was “not needed”. We also concluded, on the evidence that we received, that
“If Parliament wills it may legislate to override the European Communities Act 1972 or the EU Treaties by repealing them, amending them or any provisions in them, or by clearly and expressly legislating inconsistently with them in respect of EU legislation or generally.”
That is a very important statement from the European Scrutiny Committee, because for many years it was asserted that, owing to the nature of the European Communities Act and the treaties on which it is based, with their amendments and their additions, it would not be possible for Parliament to legislate “notwithstanding the European Communities Act”. There was a movement towards the assumption—it was a dangerous habit of thinking and attitude of mind—that somehow we were locked into a situation that would never allow the United Kingdom to reassert its sovereignty in respect of European legislation.
For reasons that I have given, including the burdens on businesses, which are costing about 4% of gross domestic product, and the fact that since 1999 as much as £128 billion—it might be more now—has been lost to the British economy through over-regulation, we have to deal with these questions. That is the flipside of the idea of having a referendum on any further transfer of competences or powers. We have to deal with the existing European Union, not any future EU or any future extension of powers or competences. That is something for the future; we have to deal with the EU as it is now, and it is doing great damage, in many respects, to the UK’s national interests.
Mr Redwood
I am grateful to my hon. Friend, who as always is doing a great job on this issue. Will he agree that the legislation would be much more convincing if the very huge transfers of power now taking place—the power to regulate all our financial and banking services, the power in criminal justice and, soon, economic governance powers—were to be the subject of a referendum as a result of the Bill?
Mr Cash
Indeed, it would. For example, the fact that the City of London and its jurisdiction has legally been transferred to the EU is an indictment of the trends in the wrong direction. The landscape is changing in the wrong direction. With respect to the Foreign Secretary, the Prime Minister and other Ministers, I say that these matters need to be very carefully reviewed. All is not lost; the Bill is now going off to the House of Lords, and as I said earlier this evening, I hope that over the next few months serious consideration will be given to the impact of the European proposals on the competitiveness package, and the encroachments of European economic governance. I hope that these matters will be tackled. We need to ensure that we not only deal with future referendums, which we have been told will not happen until the next Parliament anyway—that is some years away—but tackle the crisis and the danger that we should be addressing now.
I trust that the House will not mind me mentioning that today I published a new note—perhaps I might even call it a pamphlet—entitled “Saving the British economy for the British people”. It sets out the history of the stabilisation mechanism and how it has drawn us into a dangerous situation regarding bail-outs. However, I will not go down that route now, because I want to return to what the European Scrutiny Committee said about the Bill. We concluded that
“if the legislative supremacy of Parliament is under threat, it is from judicial”
supremacy. That is the problem. It is a British constitutional problem, not only one of the assertions of the European Court of Justice; it is an internal domestic constitutional question, as Professor Tomkins made clear in his superb evidence. We said that:
“we attach weight to the warnings expressed by Professor Tomkins if the Government maintains clause 18 in the EU Bill.”
He spoke of the Bill overall as going
“out of its way to invite litigation”.
That is precisely the direction in which we do not want things to go. We need to be certain that the sovereignty of Parliament is a matter for Parliament and the people, not the judiciary or the Supreme Court, particularly in the light of the trend shown in assertions by the likes of Lord Steyn, Lady Hale and Lord Hope of Craighead, all of which we looked at in detail in the evidence that we received and the judgments reached when we concluded our review of that evidence.
Furthermore, we concluded:
“Clause 18 is not a sovereignty clause in the manner claimed by the Government, and the whole premise on which it has been included in the Bill is, in our view, exaggerated.”
We were also concerned about the manner in which the explanatory notes had been devised. We debated the matter at length, concluding:
“The Explanatory Notes present as fact what the evidence we have received tells us is disputed, viewed from any perspective.”
In other words, we were deeply dissatisfied with the way in which the explanatory notes dwelt on the idea of the common law principle. Indeed, I moved an amendment to clause 18 in an attempt to remove it from the framework of judicial interpretation, but that amendment too was defeated by the Government. In fact, I would say—I say this with respect to the Foreign Secretary and my right hon. Friend the Minister for Europe—that despite the soft words that the Foreign Secretary offered at the beginning of this debate, he knows well enough that we will not be put off or seduced by any flattery; we are interested in the arguments and the facts.
The European Scrutiny Committee analysed this Bill and found it wanting in many different ways. The other thing to say about clause 18 is this:
“The real point is whether a government can, in law, make it difficult for a future Parliament to amend or repeal the legislation it has passed”—
in a word, the point that the shadow Foreign Secretary made just now. We concluded firmly that
“in our view it cannot. Our conclusion therefore is straightforward—that an Act of Parliament applies until it is repealed.”
Sovereignty is not an arcane, theoretical or abstract question; it is, as I said in opening the inquiry, about the vast array of activities and functions that have been conferred on the authority of the European Union by the Lisbon treaty—a treaty that was passed by the previous Government but has since been adopted by our Government, despite the fact that we opposed its passage through the House tooth and nail when in opposition—and how they affect the daily lives of the people and businesses of this country in such a wide variety of ways, making it essential that we reassert the right of Parliament to override those provisions if they are deemed not to be in our national interest.
There is no presumption that merely because of the European Communities Act 1972 we have to accept as a matter of compulsion whatever is served up to us by the European Union. If it is not in our national interest, we must repudiate it. I see the Minister for Europe shaking his head. He knows that this is an important question, but he disagrees with me on it. I do not hold that against him; I simply say that he is wrong. There are those who will continue to argue that there is no way in which we can override European legislation, but no way will those of us who take the view that we do change our minds. We put the national interest first, and if what is being done under European Union proposals is not in the national interest, we will have to override it.
There are many aspects of the Bill, including the whole problem of the creation of a two-tier Europe and the extent to which a referendum is being denied to us under clause 4, that will cause grave difficulties for us over the next few months as we deal with the question of the eurozone and the countries that are not part of it. I regard this as a matter on which we will be judged as time goes on. On the exceptions, including clause 4, that preclude a referendum on matters that will dramatically affect the United Kingdom—such as a two-tier Europe or an accession treaty—the Committee concluded:
“the exceptions…have been drafted to allow the Government to support certain EU policies, such as strengthening of the eurozone, including through harmonisation of economic, fiscal and social measures if necessary…or enlargement, without triggering the referendum lock.”
The reality is that we will need a referendum if the creation of a two-tier Europe affects the United Kingdom in the way that we anticipate. If we are so affected, and we are put at a grave disadvantage, the responsibility will lie with the Government for refusing to allow a referendum. We are not only moving towards a situation in which the creation of a new kind of Europe is in prospect; we are on the brink of it. That landscape will not be an attractive one unless we move down the route of an association of nation states. The Foreign Secretary knows perfectly well that the arrangements in the Bill do not deal with the present. They deal only with the future, but we are confronted as I speak with the present danger of a European system that does not serve our national interest. We must meet that challenge, and meet it now.
Mr Redwood
I, like my right hon. and hon. Friends, welcome the two aims of this legislation. The first, to hold a referendum on any future transfer of power, is vital to try to secure some democratic legitimacy for what might happen next. The second, to assert that this House and Parliament in general is sovereign, even over European law, is excellent, but I hope that Ministers will take away from this debate the great sense of unease among many colleagues, who feel that the Bill does not deliver what Ministers say it intends to.
As my hon. Friend the Member for South Dorset (Richard Drax) just said, we face a large transfer of powers in all sorts of areas at the moment—in criminal justice, in City and business regulation, in the External Action Service and, soon, in economic governance. Any one of those areas would deserve a referendum, but the whole lot together would make a good package for testing out the Government’s new enthusiasm for democracy and the debating skills of the Opposition, who say that that is exactly what the British public want. What is stopping them, other than fear and the belief that, perhaps, the British public would not vote for such measures after all?
I am also worried about the assertion of the parliamentary sovereignty clause. My hon. Friend the Member for Stone (Mr Cash) has probed and tested it, and there are legal dangers on the route that we are now taking. Sovereignty is something that we have for a period if we are prepared to use it, but it is also possible to let it slip away or to lose it, and we cannot make this Parliament sovereign by a single clause in a piece of legislation. It means nothing. This Parliament will be sovereign again only if it wishes to be; this Parliament will be sovereign again only if it has some political will; this Parliament will be sovereign again only on the day it says to the European Union, “We disagree with you on this. You will not give us what we want by negotiation, so we are going to legislate for ourselves.” Ministers should not pretend that this Bill has resolved the problem.
Let us take the issue of fish. I have heard Ministers, from all parties that have been in government, say to the House that they, like me, thoroughly disagree with the discard policy, think that it is wrong and intend to negotiate a better answer. No better answer has been negotiated. We gave the European Union 20 years’ warning. Why do we not simply legislate now to take ourselves out of the common fisheries policy and show that this Parliament is sovereign and works in the interests of the British people and a great British industry.
Mr Redwood
That’s great; I am very glad that I have the support, from a sedentary position, of Labour’s Back Benchers.
If this Parliament is never prepared to legislate against the views and wishes of the European Union, people will rightly conclude that the European Union is now sovereign. I mentioned in earlier debates on this legislation that the Crown remained sovereign for a long time in our country, and that Parliament whittled its powers away. There is no precise date on which people all agree that the Crown ceased to be sovereign and that Parliament replaced it, but the situation illustrates that, if we make too many concessions, make too many mistakes and grant too many powers on lease, one day we will not be able to get those powers back. The Crown discovered that it had given away too many powers and lost too many battles, and perhaps power finally resolved to Parliament on the day when they murdered—or killed—the King. That was a fairly definitive act, but it took place after a long series of battles and struggles when power had been ebbing away from the monarchy—and the monarchy was invited back.
I want no such violence in resolving the issue with the European Union, but I do want some political strength and some political substance. Surely, the European Union now does so many things that rile the British people that we should take matters into our own hands.
As my right hon. Friends on the Front Bench will always want to be diplomatic and to negotiate, I give them this final thought in the few minutes that I am allowed. The Germans, for their own reasons, think that they need a treaty change to accommodate the bail-out activities and the huge increase in economic governance powers that they intend to take over the other member states of euroland. They need our signature on that, even though we are not a member state of euroland.
I do not believe for one moment that we will be exempted from many of the requirements for information and common policy formation and negotiated solutions, even if we are opted out for the time being from the power of the fine. We will be dragged into the situation. I wish the Government would not only say, “We have no intention of being dragged into it and seek clearer language,” but to confirm that, say, “As proof of good faith, we want economic powers back.” The latest language from the Government suggests that we are going to keep control over the main elements of our taxation system, not our taxation system as a whole—a red line that the previous Government always said that they had attempted to preserve. We can see the drift in economic powers and economic governance.
The British Government must stand up for British interests. They will have no better chance than the new treaty that is about to be negotiated—so please, Government, use it, don’t lose it.
Libya and the Middle East
John Redwood Excerpts(13 years, 8 months ago)
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Mr Hague
As I explained earlier, in answer to the right hon. Member for Paisley and Renfrewshire South (Mr Alexander), whenever we deploy diplomats in a dangerous situation, we provide a level of protection based on professional and military advice. We do that in several other countries, so it is not an unusual thing to have to do, and we did it on this occasion too.
Mr John Redwood (Wokingham) (Con)
Before considering any military intervention, will the Foreign Secretary assure the House that he is aware that when intervening in a civil war, it is all too easy to kill the people one is trying to help?
Mr Hague
Direct intervention in these situations is, of course, a momentous thing that must be considered carefully from every possible angle, and my right hon. Friend points to another angle that we have to consider. It is important to stress that the contingency planning that we have asked for in NATO does not constitute such direct intervention in a civil war, or near civil war, but involves the consideration of measures to protect the civilian population and the provision of humanitarian assistance if necessary. That is different from directly intervening in a conflict.
European Union Bill
John Redwood Excerpts(13 years, 9 months ago)
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Mr John Redwood (Wokingham) (Con)
Does not the Minister understand that we do not want better impact assessments, but less regulation? How will the Government deliver their very good one-in, one-out policy on regulation if they cannot stop the torrent of regulation that is still pouring out of Brussels now that it is occupying the whole of the financial services field, for example?
Mr Lidington
We have to do both. The two are not alternatives. Impact assessments are valuable, and they focus the minds of other European Governments, and of the groups representing industry in those member states, to become more active in pressing home their interests than is sometimes the case at the moment. The more transparency that we get in the European legislative process, the more likely it is that we will move towards the objective that both my right hon. Friend and I seek.
I would share with my right hon. Friend a wish to see the EU legislate less. There is too often a culture in the Commission that identifies a problem and then seeks a remedy in the form of new law. Non-legislative measures can often be more effective, and certainly less burdensome and complex, than legislative measures. That is something that my colleagues across Government are pursuing with colleagues from other countries who share our views on this matter, and we seek to encourage other countries to work with us to look for non-legislative ways of addressing problems and challenges, rather than looking for a new directive as the first resort every time.
European Union Bill
John Redwood Excerpts(13 years, 10 months ago)
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Mr Lidington
The wider issue of justice and home affairs opt-ins is the subject of a number of amendments and new clauses that have been selected for debate tomorrow. If the hon. Lady will forgive me, I think that that will be the appropriate time to deal with it. We have decided to single out the European public prosecutor because that was a clear and explicit commitment in the coalition agreement and the coalition programme. The agreement stated:
“Britain will not participate in the establishment of any European Public Prosecutor.”
In accordance with that policy, we are putting a referendum lock on a decision by any future British Government to join the European public prosecutor and a further lock on the UK taking part in any expansion of that prosecutor’s powers.
I am grateful to my hon. Friends the Members for Daventry (Chris Heaton-Harris), for Wycombe (Steve Baker), for Cleethorpes (Martin Vickers), for Bury North (Mr Nuttall) and for Crawley (Henry Smith) for noticing a potential gap in the drafting of the Bill. As drafted, clause 6(4)(c) and (d) might not automatically trigger a referendum in the event that the UK chose to participate in the European public prosecutor after it had already been established. That is because the measure under the United Kingdom’s protocol on the area of freedom, security and justice, which would be used to allow us to take part in the European public prosecutor’s office or in an expansion of the office’s powers in those circumstances, does not have to cite the legal base of article 86 of the treaty on the functioning of the European Union.
Government amendments 57 and 58 respond to the concerns identified and expressed by my hon. Friends in their amendment in order to close that potential loophole. We did not intend to leave any doubt about the matter and, being keen to make that correction, I therefore urge the Committee to approve those Government amendments. These would ensure that a referendum would be required in all cases before the United Kingdom could join the European public prosecutor’s office or an extension of its powers, whether the decision was taken before or after the prosecutor had been set up, or before or after the powers had been extended.
Mr John Redwood (Wokingham) (Con)
I am very grateful for that concession, which improves the Bill. Now that the Minister is in this spirit of concession, does he not understand that most people think that criminal justice is central to their sovereignty in Parliament, and that the same provision should apply to all opt-ins under the criminal justice provisions? Why will he not concede that?
Mr Lidington
My right hon. Friend makes his point firmly, as I expect him to, but as I said earlier we will have the opportunity to debate justice and home affairs opt-ins in more detail during debates on the clauses that are set down for tomorrow. I look forward to hearing the concerns that he and other Members express on that occasion.
A number of amendments in the name of my hon. Friend the Member for Daventry seek to add a limited number of further JHA articles to either clause 6 or schedule 1, and I say to him and my right hon. Friend the Member for Wokingham (Mr Redwood) that I am well aware of and understand the Committee’s concerns about justice and home affairs matters. I share their view that they are matters of political, often of legal and sometimes of constitutional, significance, so I look forward with interest to the arguments that my hon. Friend might put forward later today.
On those amendments, which will be the subject of debate later today, I signal now that I am confident that I can make a compelling case why those particular articles should not be listed in clause 6 but be left, where they are appropriately dealt with, in clause 9. I shall explain briefly today and, I expect, at greater length tomorrow how that fits into wider JHA issues, as I set out in my written ministerial statement last week.
Mr MacShane
My hon. Friend is one of the most decorative parts of this House, and I hope that, after the reduction of representation in the wretched Parliamentary Voting and Constituencies Bill becomes law—it will weaken the House of Commons unless the other place defends our constitutional rights—when there will be 50 fewer of us, he is to be found among the survivors.
This is the eternal argument. The most sovereign person in the world was Robinson Crusoe on his island. No one could tell him what to do, and he did not tell anyone else what to do. Our nation’s history is entirely about finding partners and allies and making treaties. I invite hon. Members to go to the National Gallery and look at the depiction of the signing of the treaty of London signed in 1604, which has four British dips and four Spanish dips and you cannot tell the difference between them. That treaty brought to an end 50 years of conflict between Spain and Britain because—
Mr MacShane
That is a good crack, but I think that the right hon. Gentleman will find that Spanish power messed up the continent for another 100 years until we won again. If the House of Commons only exists to express the sentiment of the football fan that “We won, and they have to lose”, Britain will never advance.
Mr MacShane
To be told to sit down by the hon. Gentleman, who, to his great credit, has never long warmed a Bench if he could stand up, is undoubtedly a real pleasure to be had from my small contribution to this debate.
Mr Redwood
The big difference is that the Government’s health reforms are reversible if they do not work or if a future Government do not like them, whereas the surrender of power to Europe is irreversible.
Mr MacShane
Again, this shows a failure to understand that if we do not like a treaty, there is an alternative. I have been told over the 16 years in which I have sat in the House that almost any change would undermine Britain. Indeed, the right hon. Gentleman famously said that the Amsterdam treaty would mean the abolition of the United Kingdom. Can anybody in the Committee tell me a single thing that was in the Amsterdam treaty?
Mike Gapes
That is very true. The hon. Gentleman should therefore welcome the fact that I am a signatory to an early-day motion on this very issue, which was tabled recently by one of his colleagues.
Mr Redwood
I am sure that the hon. Gentleman has been here long enough to know that signing an early-day motion never succeeds in doing what we wish. Does he have any better ideas for saving our fish? I am with him in wanting to do so.
Mike Gapes
We need a general approach that recognises that the planet’s resources are finite, so we need to try our best to conserve them. In saying that, however, I am sure that I am moving well away from a clause stand part debate or indeed from a debate on any of the amendments to clause 6.
The hon. Member for Westmorland and Lonsdale (Tim Farron), who is no longer in his place, tried to explain why the Liberal Democrats support the Bill and clause 6 in particular. I was struck by the fact that the real reason for that support was not explained. The real reason lies in the fact that a party that is allegedly pro-European—and whose Chief Secretary to the Treasury used to work for the European Movement—has become very European in the sense of taking on the Stockholm syndrome.
The Liberal Democrats have been captured by their partners to such an extent that they have signed up to making a gesture towards the Eurosceptics, giving the impression to the hon. Member for Witham (Priti Patel) and others who would rather have an in/out referendum—she said as much in response to an intervention—that the proposals before us are highly significant. I suspect that, in many respects, they are not significant, but if they were, and if many referendums were to be triggered in respect of the list of items set out in the Bill, and particularly those in the amendments in the group, the cost of having them would be enormous. I refer not just to the costs of running the referendums, but to the costs of the litigation and judicial reviews that would be incurred—as usual, it would be the lawyers, not the British people, who reaped the financial benefit out of the provisions. We would simply have to pay for the processes brought about by these measures being incorporated into the Bill.
The hon. Member for Stone (Mr Cash), the Chairman of the European Scrutiny Committee, and I had an exchange about these issues on Second Reading. He seemed to agree that there are dangers in bringing about a large amount of litigation and in conferring extra powers on the courts, taking them away from our parliamentary democracy. What we face today is the potential for this to become a dog’s breakfast and a lawyers’ paradise.
Amendment 8, tabled by the Chairman of the European Scrutiny Committee, deals with the European financial stability mechanism. This would not only be costly; it would not be in this country’s national interest. As the hon. Member for Stroud pointed out, more than half our trade—I think it is 60%—is with our fellow EU member states. We therefore have a national interest in the success of the euro; we have a national interest in growth in the German, French, Danish, Dutch, Spanish and Portuguese economies, for example; and we have a national interest in the prosperity of the European region.
It follows that measures will be required to stabilise the financial institutions in the EU, to stop the collapse of banks, to deal with a crisis such as we have seen in Greece, and to deal with the change in the Irish Government that is likely to happen in the next few weeks or perhaps to respond to the welcome return to government of a man who was a Finance Minister under the excellent Labour Government in Ireland, Ruairi Quinn. In light of that, it will be in our national interests to assist the stability and success of the other European economies. Amendment 8 should be opposed vigorously, because it is not in the interests of this country.
Mike Gapes
The hon. Gentleman and I have been debating these issues for nearly 20 years. We have never agreed on matters relating to the European Union, and I do not think that we are going to do so now.
I do not believe that it will benefit our country if the European Union and the European economies implode, as the hon. Gentleman seems to wish them to do. Certainly there are problems in some—not all—European Union economies, and some, including the German economy, are growing quite rapidly. At the same time, the world’s economic centres are shifting, overwhelmingly to Asia but also to other parts of the world, and as a result we as Europeans will face a very difficult period in the coming years and decades. We need to think carefully about what will happen if the British economy is speculated against in the next 10, 15 or 20 years, and—given that the coalition Government are presiding over a return to recession—about what will happen to the long-term future of the economy if, as the hon. Gentleman wishes, the European economies fail and the European Union implodes.
Mr Redwood
I certainly do not want those economies to fail. However, if, according to the hon. Gentleman’s analysis, it is right to involve ourselves in economic governance and in mutual subsidies to protect our trade in physical goods with euroland, should we involve ourselves in the same way with the rest of the English-speaking world? Should we aim for stronger economic governance and more transfer of subsidies to protect our extremely important trade in services, most of which takes place outside Europe?
Mr Cash
Indeed. I pay tribute to my hon. Friend, who, as a member of the European Scrutiny Committee, played an important role in the preparation of its report. As I am sure he will speak in the debate, and given his expertise as a member of the Select Committee on Home Affairs, I shall restrict my own remarks, and leave it to him to deal with these questions in his own time and his own way.
I simply make the point that these are well-founded concerns, and I can think of no reason on earth why the Minister would not want to accept these amendments. Perhaps he will, but while the Government have had regard to what the European Scrutiny Committee has said in a report that has been universally welcomed—by both Front-Bench teams and by all those with the competence to understand these matters—they have tended to ignore that almost entirely in considering our recommendations. I shall return to that issue later, but not today.
I turn to the reasons that we gave in the European Scrutiny Committee report regarding questions of criminal law:
“To be consistent with the extension of shared competence under clause 4”—
we debated that yesterday—
“the application of both of these provisions”—
the two provisions and the amendments relating to criminal procedure and serious crime—
“should be premised on a referendum and Act of Parliament, as in clause 6; not an affirmative vote before the Government’s opt-in decision and an Act of Parliament before it agrees to the adoption of the legislation.”
The fact that the report states that ought to be put on the record. Our view is that family law
“is…of similar if not greater importance to social or environmental policy and ought to come within clause 6, triggering a referendum as well as an Act.”
We can see no reason for not doing all those things.
On opt-in decisions, I defer entirely to my hon. Friend the Member for Hertsmere. Our conclusion is that it
“would seem to us consistent with the aim of Part 1…for all opt-in decisions to be subject to formal Parliamentary approval.”
My hon. Friend the Member for Witham referred to fishing, and there she was in sensitive and deep waters. She explained very well the six-mile limit, the fisheries limit of up to 12 miles, the 2002 regulation and the associated issues, but that does not alter the fact that this is a serious problem for the fishermen of the United Kingdom. In considering the idea that there should be any restriction of our sovereignty and territorial limits in these matters, we should remember that the entire fisheries policy, which we shall not debate in detail today, I can assure you, Mr Caton, is a complete travesty. There is no question about it: it constitutes the most monumental waste of good fish, which are thrown away and literally left to rot. It is pathetic, and I need say no more than that. That we should regain a degree of sovereignty and territorial competence in relation to fishing is to my mind a given.
Mr Redwood
My hon. Friend has made a very powerful comment. Many of us have felt for many years that the fisheries policy was a scandal. Successive Governments have said that they would do something about it; none have yet succeeded. Does this not show why we are also worried about the surrender of criminal justice powers? We are surrendering them to the very people who have made such a mess of our fisheries.
Mr Cash
Absolutely, and the same problem permeates so much of what goes on in the European Union. I am anxious not to get into discussing the merits of the European Union as a whole, and I shall certainly ensure that I keep to the amendments; but I entirely agree with my right hon. Friend. I will come on in a moment to the financial stability mechanism, and try to demonstrate exactly how wrong I think the hon. Member for Ilford South (Mike Gapes) is about the broad questions attached to it. I shall also deal with the mistaken remarks of the hon. Member for Rhondda (Chris Bryant) regarding the necessity for my amendments.
Mr Cash
Absolutely, and I shall elaborate on that very quickly. Article 122 concerns matters of emergency and natural disasters, and its use for the purposes of financial stability is clearly—as the European Scrutiny Committee has said—not based on a sound legal footing. That is the issue. I had made that point, but I am happy to repeat it. However, it goes further: because of the failure of the legal base, the whole deal is vitiated. That is the problem. The deal was done in an interregnum and by consensus between the two Chancellors, but it ends up being vitiated as a matter of law. That is very serious given that the whole deal is for €60 billion—£52 billion—but according to the right hon. Member for Edinburgh South West (Mr Darling), the United Kingdom is exposed to a risk of £8 billion.
Mr Redwood
Although we must ask the former Chancellor and the Chancellor to speak for themselves, as I understand it the former Chancellor quite properly consulted the then shadow Chancellor, who said, “You are the Chancellor”—he could not be sure at that point that he was about to become the Chancellor, because there was no coalition agreement—“and it is for you to make the decision.” It is also fair to say that I do not think that the present Chancellor objected to the proposal or sought to block it. I think he felt that it was not his decision to make. It was not a co-decision; it was a decision by the former Chancellor, which the present Chancellor knew about.
Mr Cash
It was indeed. Furthermore, this is not just a bit of esoteric dancing on the head of a pin. The Select Committee on Political and Constitutional Reform has examined the matter and I happened to be watching its proceedings when there was a discussion involving Professor Hennessey and two other eminent professors, Professor Hazell and Professor McLean. My hon. Friend the hon. Member for Isle of Wight (Mr Turner) asked a perceptive question about the status of the arrangement in the context of the Cabinet manual, which, as we know, is now out in the open and being discussed by that Committee in relation to caretaker Governments. The conclusion was that it was within the province of the incoming Chancellor to enter into such a bilateral arrangement in that context, in which he made his decision based on the information he was given by the outgoing Chancellor. My right hon. Friend the Member for Wokingham (Mr Redwood) is right. The problem is that, if that was unlawful, there was no basis on which either of them should have come to that conclusion.
Mr Redwood
As I understand it, the current Chancellor refused to make a decision. It was not a co-decision. He did not object or support it, but said that it was for the outgoing Chancellor to make the decision. Of course, in practice, if he had not agreed he would have unscrambled it when he got into office, because he had the majority and the outgoing Chancellor did not.
Mr Cash
I am very happy for that matter to be looked into further. My right hon. Friend might well be right, but I have an article that quotes the outgoing Chancellor of the Exchequer on the BBC’s “Today” programme, saying:
“Overall it is a very good deal for all of us in Europe but also for the wider world. It is”—
something for us “together”. He also said:
“Our exposure for the additional amount of money could be £8 billion”.
The article also states that he
“confirmed he had spoken to Shadow Chancellor George Osborne and Lib Dem Treasury spokesman Vince Cable about…responsibility for it”
and goes on to state:
“All three had agreed ‘there was no way Britain was going to underwrite the euro’.”
When he was pressed, he said:
“I am not going to disclose the conversations we had, because we had them on the basis that they were private and confidential.”
The article goes on:
“A statement issued after the talks confirmed that the new fund placed the potential risk squarely with the eurozone.”
That worries me. I do not know where that came from, because it most emphatically is not the case, as we are not part of the eurozone.
I hope that the Select Committee on the Treasury will look to considering all that. We are talking about substantial sums of money, about an interregnum period and about a rather unusual situation. We might be talking about errors of judgment involving considerable exposure for the taxpayer. For all those reasons, it is very important that we get to the bottom of this. We do not need to turn it into a witch hunt—I do not believe in those sort of things—but as regards scrutiny and accountability, this is an important matter that needs to be resolved properly and efficiently.
Proper answers need to be given, the Treasury needs to put forward the arguments that it presented and it should disclose the papers. We know perfectly well that, in the kerfuffle of 9 May and the days leading up to it, the then Chancellor might understandably have had a lot on his mind. In the circumstances, all sorts of things could have gone wrong. That is the moment, as I see it, when important strategic decisions involving enormous amounts of money and affecting the taxpayer on what I would term an unlawful basis—a basis that certainly is not legally sound—need to be considered very carefully.
It might not surprise some hon. Members that I tabled amendment 8. In all such circumstances, other than the situation vis-à-vis the Republic of Ireland, attention should be drawn to these matters, but under no circumstances whatsoever should we give money to Portugal or Spain when there is a facility, agreed at around the same time, for €400 billion to be available for the eurozone. Now a new arrangement has emerged which will be made available permanently after March 2013. If Portugal and Spain are going to go under, however, they will definitely go under before March 2013.
Mr Redwood
On the important point raised by the hon. Member for Great Grimsby (Austin Mitchell), is it not the case—my hon. Friend the Member for Stone (Mr Cash) would know—that the German Government are so worried about the legality of what was done under article 122 that they think we need a new treaty to cover that point?
Mr Cash
My hon. Friend is absolutely right. I have here an incredibly interesting article from this week’s edition of Newsweek. It is headlined, “To Rule the Euro Zone”. Hon. Members will know that I have tried to take a mild interest in European matters since I came to the House—I notice that one or two people are quite surprised—and I do so for good reasons. Indeed, in the first book I wrote on the subject, “Against a Federal Europe”, I drew attention to what I then perceived to be a significant danger that Germany would take a disproportionate and predominant role in European affairs, for which I received a great deal of censorship and some abuse. It was suggested that I was talking about the Germans in rather disrespectful terms, which was quite untrue. However, the sub-heading to an extremely interesting article by Stefan Theil, dated 23 January 2011, reads:
“The unified currency was supposed to limit German power. Now the Germans are in charge—and no one is happy, not even the Germans.”
The article merits careful reading.
European Union Bill
John Redwood Excerpts(13 years, 10 months ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
Mr Cash
I shall deal with that point shortly, but—with respect to the right hon. Gentleman—he will have to be a little patient.
As Members will have noticed, I have sought only to strengthen clause 18, which, as it stands, merely refers to the “Status of EU law”. We were promised a sovereignty clause, and my amendment would achieve that. The clause as it stands would be subject to statutory interpretation, and it would be strange, uncertain and hazardous not to insert this provision in the framework of the European Communities Act 1972 itself. Clause 18 is a stand-alone clause. It refers to the “Status of EU law” and to section 2 of the European Communities Act, but it does not amend the Act. I am talking here about section 2 through section 3, when the judges apply themselves to any law. The clause is only six lines long, but it incorporates and absorbs within it every single piece of European legislation, so it applies to everything. However, although we know that law from the European Union emanates through from the 1972 Act, this measure does not amend the Act when incorporating the status of EU law. I am extremely concerned about that and find it very strange. In fact I will go further and say that I think the measure is deliberately contrived to make sure it is not an amendment to the 1972 Act.
Mr John Redwood (Wokingham) (Con)
I am grateful to my hon. Friend for drawing the House’s attention to this crucial matter. As I understand it, he, like many of us, rightly wants to reassert the sovereignty of Parliament and make it clear that Parliament remains sovereign in all circumstances, and as I understand it, those on the Treasury Bench have the same aim. Given that his proposal seems to be stronger in this regard, can he think of any good reason why they should refuse it?
Mr Cash
No, I cannot. I am a bit puzzled by that, but as I develop my speech I hope to be able to explain where I think the origin of the problem lies.
The Government and the Prime Minister fail either to explain why the 1972 Act was not amended in the way I have just suggested or to follow the route I have provided in my sovereignty Bills, and which has also been provided by the Bills that have followed from colleagues over the past few years. I have to say, however, that my sovereignty proposals of 2006 in relation to the Legislative and Regulatory Reform Bill were accepted by the current Prime Minister when he was Leader of the Opposition and by the party Whips. Indeed, I might add that the Minister for Europe voted for those arrangements. I am glad that he smiles, because the smile is on the face of the tiger.
The fact is that we went through the Lobby then. The Whips came up to me in the middle of the afternoon and said, “Bill, will you please be good enough to allow us to adopt your amendments and put in Tellers?” I was extremely impressed, and slightly flattered. They decided to do that, and then, having accepted that and having faced down the then Government with such incredible force, they went off to the House of Lords and whipped it through the Lords six weeks later. A degree of conviction clearly lay behind that, and it matches up rather nicely with the manifesto promises about the sovereignty Bill and so forth. We were nearly getting there—we were on the brink, it might be said. The question is: where are we now?
As I have said, it is well-established that there is an historical and constitutional tension between the courts and Parliament because of the democratic basis of parliamentary sovereignty, not by virtue of a common law principle, and I have also proposed an amendment to prevent that principle from being subject to judicial application. It is also necessary to include the reaffirmation of Parliament so that the courts would not be able to ignore those words, which are lacking in clause 18 as it is currently drafted, and in order to address the problem relating to the 1972 Act.
In one of the Prime Minister’s letters to me—he has written two letters in the last few days—he claims:
“I can, of course, assure you not only that we have no intention to affect adversely the principle of Parliamentary sovereignty, but also that we do not believe that Part 3”—
that is a reference to clause 18—
“runs this risk. As you would expect, we made sure we looked at this matter very thoroughly.”
My letter to the Prime Minister of 13 December, which I have sent to a number of colleagues to ensure fairness and transparency, indicated that I thought that in the light of his previous observations and assertions about a sovereignty Bill, not to mention the manifesto and so on, this principle of parliamentary sovereignty was a given and that the drafting of clause 18—this is so in the light of the evidence given to the European Scrutiny Committee and our conclusions—had demonstrated that the Government’s intentions had merely produced unintended consequences. I went out of my way to say that I was sure that he did not intend this. However, our European Scrutiny Committee was doing what he has continuously said it should do: improve the scrutiny of European legislation. That is one of our fundamental principles; we are going to make sure that European legislation is looked at properly. That is what we have done, and we have reported. We revealed, after four weeks of taking evidence and engaging in cross-examination, that, unbeknown to others, this clause will have unintended consequences.
So our Committee came up with its conclusions, as a result of having followed the Prime Minister’s advice to scrutinise as well as we have done, and he then turns around and says, through his Ministers and in letters to me, that
“we looked at this matter very thoroughly”
and that, “We do not believe that part 3 runs the risk that you are identifying.” Basically, he said that we were wrong. It is a serious matter for a Prime Minister to say that to a Select Committee, which is one of the reasons why I am taking these steps. I hope that I am doing so with a good sense of timing and humour, because it is very important that we do not turn this into something more difficult.
However, I have to say that his reply of 10 January shows that the Government stand by the wording, having made sure that they examined the matter “very thoroughly”. I must say, on behalf of myself and others, that I am afraid that the consequences remain damaging for parliamentary sovereignty, for all the reasons that I have been setting out. He goes on to say that
“the words you have suggested would create uncertainty, because the term ‘Parliamentary sovereignty’ is not defined. There are no precedents for…referring to Parliamentary sovereignty in Acts of Parliament.”
He also says that attempts to define it will be “difficult and complex”.
With respect, that does not take us anywhere, because the expression “sovereignty of Parliament”, which is the one I have used, does not require definition in statute, as any examination of constitutional authorities makes abundantly clear. Some of those authorities prefer to use the expression “legislative supremacy of Parliament”, by which is meant that there are no legal limitations on the power of Parliament to legislate. I return to the words of the late Lord Bingham:
“The bedrock of the British constitution is…the supremacy of the Crown in Parliament”.
In the words of one of our greatest constitutional authorities—according to Dicey—under our constitution, Parliament has the right to make or unmake any law whatever and, furthermore, no person or body has the right to override or set aside the legislation of Parliament. There is no definition of “the primacy of European law”, nor, as I have just said, is there any definition in the Constitutional Reform Act 2005 of “the rule of law”. The fact is that certain expressions do not require that degree of definition, so I do not agree with the Prime Minister or with the Ministers on that point.
One of our witnesses, whose evidence the Committee did not accept, argued that Dicey’s exposition of sovereignty has been based on assumptions about representative democracy that, in his view, were flawed even in 1885 and could not be made today. That witness happens to be a proponent of and is in agreement with the views of other witnesses who promote the common law principle, such as Professor Trevor Allan. We rejected that view, distinguished as those people are, as we rejected the common law principle as set out by the Government in their explanatory notes—but merely removing them from the notes will not influence this kind of thinking in the Supreme Court or in influential academic circles. One has only to see the amount of time and effort that has been expended on this in learned journals to realise that they are not going to be pushed out of thinking the way they do merely because we correct them in the explanatory notes.
The same could be said of Lord Justice Laws’ views on constitutional statutes, which do not have special status in the traditional sense against any other statute. All are subject to repeal where Parliament so decides in the national interest. That is an advantage of our organic, unwritten constitution, so that we can, in a Burkean sense, adapt as and when necessary on firm and principled foundations. As Bradley and Ewing indicate by contrast to written constitutions such as that of the United States, the legislative supremacy of Parliament amounts to a fundamental rule of constitutional law and this supremacy includes the power to legislate on constitutional matters.
Mr David
It is extremely unlikely that her arguments would have been accepted by any legal authority given the categorical rejection of them in that case.
In other words, as Professor Hartley, one of the Committee’s witnesses, stated, the metric martyrs—or Thoburn—principle is that
“the position of EU law in the UK and the sovereignty of the British Parliament ultimately depends on British law”.
In apparent contradiction of the reference to the metric martyrs case, the explanatory notes say that the Foreign Office itself sent written evidence to the Committee that stated:
“Our own analysis has led us to the conclusion that there is no persuasive legal authority to support the contention that the doctrine of Parliamentary sovereignty is no longer absolute. Our assessment is that, to date, case law since 1972 has consistently upheld the principle of Parliamentary sovereignty. There is no uncertainty here.”
Therefore, an argument that the Government accept is irrelevant is the only one that they can advance in their explanatory notes to justify the clause. How ridiculous can things get?
Small wonder, then, that when the European Scrutiny Committee concluded that
“the legislative supremacy of Parliament is not currently under threat from EU law”,
most scholars agreed. Moreover, the Committee went on to say:
“we have no reason to doubt that Thoburn reflected the well understood and orthodox position, which left the constitutional principle of dualism intact and is unlikely to be overturned”.
In view of that assessment, it is hardly surprising that the Government have tried two different arguments. The Minister for Europe said in a letter to his parliamentary colleagues:
“it cannot be denied that the issue has been the subject of legal and political speculation.”
We know about the legal speculation. As we have heard, it was dismissed by Lord Justice Laws and even by the Foreign Office itself. But what about the political speculation? Where is that coming from?
We know from evidence submitted to the European Scrutiny Committee by Jean-Claude Piris, director general of the legal service of the European Council—in other words, its legal adviser—that in his opinion clause 18 changes nothing. He believes that it reaffirms the doctrine of UK constitutional law under which EU law has effect in the UK by virtue of an Act of the UK Parliament. Furthermore, he went on to say that the clause is consistent with declaration 17 annexed to the final act of the intergovernmental conference, which concluded the treaty of Lisbon, and with the case law of the European Court of Justice. It is clear, therefore, that there are no threats coming from European Union institutions.
We do not imagine that any of the Government’s Conservative Back Benchers have questioned the sovereignty of Parliament, and I can assure the Committee that it has not been questioned by any Labour Members. Can it be, however, that the sovereignty of Parliament has been questioned by the Liberal Democrats? After all, they are the most pro-European party in Britain, and of course a former leader of the Liberal Democrats, the right hon. Member for Ross, Skye and Lochaber (Mr Kennedy), is the president of the European Movement. Furthermore, a former leader of the Liberal Democrats in the European Parliament, Andrew Duff, is a well-known European federalist.
That there is political speculation is one of the new arguments. Another has been suggested by the Minister for Europe in his letter to his own MPs, and more recently was advanced by the Foreign Secretary in The Sunday Telegraph at the weekend. He said:
“In its sovereignty clause the Bill also deals with one potential but important problem for the future.”
Having accepted that there are no current valid legal arguments, the Government are now pointing political fingers at unnamed politicians, and even suggesting that clause 18 is being introduced because of a hypothetical problem that may, or may not, materialise at some time in the dim and distant future. At the same time, the Government accept that clause 18 is not really needed at all, because Parliament is already sovereign. It is hardly surprising, therefore, that some have referred to the clause as being indicative of the Bill’s confusion, contradictions and general lack of clarity.
Mr Redwood
Does the hon. Gentleman think that there is ever the danger that if a sovereign authority gives away too much power, it ceases to be sovereign? That is what happened when the sovereign Crown ceded too much power to Parliament. Is he worried that his party gave away too much power to the EU?
Mr David
The hon. Gentleman will have to wait and see what the Opposition decide to do. As true democrats, one of the things that we want to do is listen to the debate. We are not entering into the exercise with a closed mind, and that is why we have tabled our amendment. We want to ensure that the debate does not finish here and now, but continues throughout the Bill’s progress through Parliament. I referred to Report stage earlier.
There is also the important issue of parliamentary sovereignty and all the complex ramifications involved. An ongoing debate has been started by the Government, but let us ensure that we have an annual debate on this matter in the House, based on a report produced by the Government. I very much hope that the House will accept our amendment. There may be different views on the conclusions that such reports would reach, but let us all recognise that the way to have an effective debate is to have an annual debate based on an annual report.
Many points have already been raised today, and I have listened carefully to the arguments, particularly those put forward by the hon. Member for Stone. I urge all colleagues to think carefully about supporting amendment 52. Clause 18, as it stands, means nothing from any point of view, but our amendment would make it far more meaningful. If our amendment is not successful, clause 18 will take us forward neither a millimetre nor an inch. As it stands, it is a bland restatement of a law that already exists. European Union law is enforceable in the United Kingdom only because of legislation made by this Parliament. That is a self-evident truth and, with or without clause 18, it will not be altered.
Mr Redwood
The Crown was sovereign once. It is intriguing that we are more than two hours into this debate but so far we have talked only about parliamentary sovereignty, even though the sovereignty technically still belongs to the Crown in Parliament. We all know about the events that took place over several hundred years, particularly when they were accelerated during the 17th century revolution and crisis. There was a large transfer of power from the Crown to Parliament. When a sufficiently large transfer of power takes place from someone who was sovereign to those who would be sovereign, a point is reached at which that sovereignty passes because enough power has been surrendered and the arrangements have changed sufficiently.
As other Members have suggested, we need briefly to look at how that very big transfer of power occurred in the 17th century from the Crown to Crown in Parliament and, in due course, effectively to Parliament standing on its own. One important factor was that Parliament was very good at aggregating power to itself. In those days, it decided to be very nice to bankers, which worked very well for it, because it got the City of London and the men of finance on its side. In those days, the English Navy did not have French ships in it, and Parliament made sure that it responded to the English Parliament. Parliament also took the precaution of hiring and training and paying—something quite unusual in those days—the best army in the country. It got over the problem of competing armies and, in due course, established that it had military power and could command the Army.
Parliament also needed to deal with the judges. It was established during the revolutionary period that judges were necessary and that, according to our current tradition, they had to be independent and should not interfere in parliamentary matters by trying to make the law. They simply had to deal with the law as Parliament provided it. We therefore eventually ended up with a very powerful Parliament.
In the 19th and 20th centuries, Parliament did something that everyone in the House is now united in admiring: it made the exercise of power by Parliament a democratic matter by extending the franchise until practically every adult in this country was able to participate in elections. That gave Parliament the authority of having a democratic voice and mandate. The question that we are debating today is whether that great democratic settlement, in which most Members believe, is now under threat from judge-made law, from European-made law and from other centres of power. Could parliamentary sovereignty come under pressure in the not-too-distant future? Is it being damaged because too much power is being transferred? These questions account for the nervousness, certainly on the Conservative Benches, about the degree of power that has already been surrendered by successive Parliaments over the years, particularly under the most recent Government following the treaties of Nice, Amsterdam and Lisbon. Under those treaties, a large number of areas were transferred either to joint decision taking or to sole European decision taking.
That means that the exercise of power in many important areas of activity, including regulation, the expenditure of money and the provision of public services, now emanates from the continent. Those powers are trying to establish their own democratic credibility through the European Parliament. They are also trying to establish their own judicial credibility through the European Court of Justice, and their own administrative credibility by strengthening the powers that are exercised around the various collective corporate tables that constitute the ever-evolving, and ever more powerful, European Union settlement.
The nub of our debate today is whether there is something that this Parliament could and should do, no matter how much power has passed, how many decisions are taken through the European Union and how much money it now takes to itself and spends on our behalf, to make it clear that, should we want those powers back, we can have them back. If we wish to change or moderate what the European Union is doing, do we have every right to do so because we are still the sovereign?
Some of us fought long and hard to keep the currency under British sovereign control. These arrangements involve a British sovereign and preserve the settlement of the Queen in Parliament, and the Queen’s face appears on the banknotes of the realm, but we all know that they are Parliament’s notes and that they represent an expression of parliamentary sovereignty. Indeed, it was this very Parliament that, by a majority, approved the previous Government’s decision to print a lot more of those notes—or electronic notes—as an expression of what that sovereignty can do for the people of Britain. We can argue about whether that was a good thing or a bad thing, but it was an undoubted expression of sovereignty.
Kelvin Hopkins
Wisely, Britain already has a number of opt-outs from the European Union. I am thinking specifically of the single currency; it was to the great credit of our former leader that he kept us out of the euro. Would not a test arise, however, if Britain decided to opt out of something that we currently opt into? For example, if we chose to withdraw from the common fisheries policy and to place our own historic fishing grounds under democratic British control, would not that represent a test of our sovereignty?
Mr Redwood
Indeed; the hon. Gentleman makes a powerful point. I, too, would like us to opt out of the common fisheries policy. I would like us to elect a Government in this country who had the necessary majority to go off to Brussels and say, “It is now the settled will of this Parliament that we want different arrangements for fishing, and if you will not grant them through the European Union arrangements, we would like to negotiate our exit from the common fisheries policy.” That is exactly the kind of renegotiation that many of my hon. Friends were elected to achieve, and, had we had a majority, we would have wanted our Government to do something like that. There are a number of other policy areas, some of which are more politically contentious across the Floor of the House, where we think we can make better decisions here than are being made in our name by the European Union.
If such renegotiations could be achieved, we would clearly have reasserted, or asserted, the sovereignty of our Parliament. If, however, they can never be achieved, it is difficult to see how Parliament could still be sovereign. If we are saying that nothing can ever be changed once it has been agreed under the various procedures in Brussels—including the many measures that the British Government did not want or on which they were outvoted—we cannot say that we are sovereign any longer. We would then be in a relationship with the European Union that would fall short of our preserving parliamentary sovereignty.
Tonight we are discussing a narrower, but crucial, legal issue that has been well highlighted by my hon. Friend the Member for Stone (Mr Cash) and the European Scrutiny Committee, whose perception is first class in informing the debate. I do not need to repeat all those arguments. Suffice it to say that I support the important amendments proposed by my hon. Friend. As I understand it, we have a Government who say that they wish to do all they can to reassure people in this country that we are and intend to remain sovereign. They do not wish to pick a fight with Brussels, and we are not asking them to do so tonight. They say, however, that should a disagreement arise in future that cannot be resolved through the usual channels, it will be settled here. I am very much in favour of that; it seems to me to be a wholly admirable and sensible place to take the debate. If that is the intention, it proves that Parliament is still sovereign.
We are arguing only about the words used to carry out that intention. It is one of those rare magic moments when the Conservative party is completely united on its intentions. The Government’s intention to reassert parliamentary sovereignty warms the cockles of Conservative Members’ hearts. It is wonderful to know that in another debate we can have a referendum when anything important happens. There may be some arguments about what is important, but we welcome the spirit. Again, we are at one with our Government.
When eminent lawyers and colleagues who have studied this matter at much greater length than I have say to the House that they have studied it carefully, that they have what sound like moderate and sensible words that basically repeat the Government’s policy and that it would be helpful if those words were written into the legislation, my feeling is—unless the Minister has a very powerful speech coming up—what is wrong with that? If the Minister wants to reassert parliamentary sovereignty, why cannot we just say that in the Bill? It is exactly what my hon. Friend says —it does not seem difficult, so will the Minister please humour us on this occasion?
The fact remains that if we succeeded in amending the Bill in this way, we would not be truly sovereign in future unless we had the will and determination to shape our own destinies, should the need arise. I hope we can do it by agreement. Any sensible person wishes to do it by agreement, given how far we are in this thing with our European partners and what a mess they are in.
Martin Horwood
The right hon. Gentleman makes an eloquent case. He and I might disagree on whether we want to withdraw from the common fisheries policy, but would he have seen any constitutional bar to that taking place had a Conservative majority Government taken office? Surely, if this was in the manifesto, he must have believed that it was possible to achieve it under the present constitutional arrangements.
Mr Redwood
Withdrawal from the common fisheries policy was not in the manifesto, although it might have been in the personal manifestos of some of my right hon. and hon. Friends. I gave it as an example because I believe it has a great deal of cross-party support. Most people think the common fisheries policy is extremely badly run and is not in the interests of the fish or the fishermen. Casting all those dead fish back into the sea is not my idea of conservation and it does not bring cheap fish to the fish market either, so it does not seem to be good news.
Successive Governments have always said that they quite agree with those of us who make such points, but they have never managed to negotiate a better deal. Would it not be wonderful if the Government said, “If we cannot negotiate a better deal next year, we will use British parliamentary sovereignty to pull out of the CFP”? I would like to do that and I do not think it would be tantamount to leaving the European Union. It would be pretty cross, but it would probably do a deal with us because it would be more embarrassing to have a sovereign Parliament taking unilateral legislative action than to do a deal. I hope the EU would do a deal; it would be sensible for it to do so.
If we are not prepared at some point to assert our power, we lose our sovereignty. Just as the Crown lost its sovereignty, became the Crown in Parliament and eventually lost practically all its real powers, so this Parliament is losing its powers. If it goes on losing them, without sensible provision being made of the kind proposed by my hon. Friend the Member for Stone and without at some point standing up for a better deal for Britain, this Parliament, too, will no longer be sovereign.
Mr Kevan Jones
I congratulate the European Scrutiny Committee on its excellent report. I commend it for the clarity with which it looked at the Bill and for the evidence it took. I concur with my hon. Friend the Member for Caerphilly (Mr David) that it was disappointing that the Foreign Secretary did not deem it necessary to come before the Committee to explain why this Bill is so important.
Basically, the Bill is a dog’s breakfast. It is full of contradictions. On the one hand, it tries to constrain the sovereignty of Parliament by committing future Parliaments to referendums; on the other, through clause 18 it tries to put on the statute book support for parliamentary sovereignty. Clause 18 makes no difference whatever. That is the important point to be made here, and one that was made in the excellent European Scrutiny Committee report.
The reason for the Bill and for clause 18 was evident in some of the earlier contributions, particularly in the speech of the hon. Member for Dover (Charlie Elphicke), who is no longer in his place. It is to placate the Eurosceptic wing of the Conservative party—something that it is completely failing to do, judging by the smiles on the faces of some Opposition Members and by some of the earlier contributions.
Mr Lidington
I have had no private conversations with my hon. Friend the Chairman of the European Scrutiny Committee—the hon. Member who expressed concern. The hon. Gentleman is in his place. Like every other hon. Member, he has had the opportunity to hear about the proposed change.
New clause 1 deals with section 3(1) of the European Communities Act 1972. By virtue of that Act, jurisdiction has been conferred on our courts to determine and adjudicate on disputes arising under EU law. That jurisdiction does not arise from the treaties, nor have the courts conferred it on themselves. Courts here possess that power because Parliament has determined that it is appropriate for them to do so and has legislated accordingly.
Section 3(1) of the European Communities Act provides that, for the purposes of legal proceedings in the UK courts, any question about the meaning or effect of the treaties is to be treated as a matter of law and requires the UK courts to take judicial notice of the treaties, the Official Journal and any decision of the European Court of Justice. Together with section 2, it is a cornerstone of the European Communities Act and, like the rest of the measure, subject to appeal or amendment by Parliament if we choose.
New clause 1 would restrict the exercise by the courts of their jurisdiction to interpret and address issues of EU law by ensuring that it does not extend to construction or interpretation by the courts of the nature or legal effect of parliamentary sovereignty.
Mr Redwood
Will the Minister tell the House that he wishes to assert parliamentary sovereignty and resist judicial incursions, even if he will not put that in the Bill?
Mr Lidington
Yes. I am an elected Member of Parliament. I did not campaign for many years to come here to hand over the powers and privileges of the House of Commons to unelected groups of any sort.
New clause 1 is ambiguous because the lack of a definition of parliamentary sovereignty may encourage the courts to intervene rather than discourage them from doing that. I also think that it is mistaken because the primacy of EU law in the UK legal system does not flow from section 3(1) but is addressed under section 2(4) of the European Communities Act. If the intention is to guard against any risk of our courts using European Court jurisprudence to undermine parliamentary sovereignty, I do not think that it would achieve its desired objective given its drafting.
New clause 4 refers to part 3, but its primary focus is clearly clause 18. In one sense, I support the new clause’s aim. We have made it clear that clause 18 is declaratory and does not alter the existing relationship between European and UK law, and that the rights and obligations assumed by this country on becoming a member of the EU remain intact. However, I am afraid that the Government cannot support the new clause, which implies that something in clause 18 could adversely affect the existing constitutional law on the sovereignty of Parliament in relation to European law. That is not the case. As hon. Members can imagine, we examined the matter carefully and took legal advice from the Foreign Office and elsewhere in Government. I therefore urge my hon. Friends not to press new clause 4.
Amendment 52, tabled by the official Opposition, need not detain us for too long. It is misleading because it implies that the ECJ has a role in determining how European law takes effect in this country. When the hon. Member for Caerphilly next refreshes his memory by reading the treaty, he might see that this is not a matter that falls within the ECJ’s jurisdiction. It is a matter for the UK courts, and no less a figure than Jean-Claude Piris, recently retired as head of the Council’s Legal Service, said in his evidence to the Committee that it is for each member state to determine the constitutional mechanisms through which it gives effect to the legal obligations arising from membership of the European Union.
The Government think that this amendment is not necessary. It is not necessary to take up additional parliamentary time through the process that the Opposition propose. In the event that there were to be a serious challenge to the authority and sovereignty of Parliament, I would expect that hon. Members, on both sides, would want an immediate statement from the Minister and an urgent debate, instead of waiting 12 months for an annual report, which is the only remedy that the hon. Gentleman proposes.
In the coalition’s programme for government, we said that we would examine the case for a United Kingdom sovereignty Bill, to make it clear that in terms of European law ultimate authority remains with Parliament. Through clause 18, we are affirming and confirming that the status of European law in our legal order is dependent on a continuing statutory basis. That is a commitment that the Government believe it is right to put beyond any future speculation. The place where future UK law and future decisions about the authority of European law should be determined is in Parliament and nowhere else. I commend the clause to the House.
European Union Bill
John Redwood Excerpts(13 years, 11 months ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
Mr Hague
My hon. Friend may have worked out that the Bill has exactly the same effect as amending the Act and that it therefore absolutely honours the commitment in the coalition agreement. We additionally agreed, in the coalition agreement, that we would not agree to any transfer of powers from Westminster to Brussels for the duration of this Parliament. In addition, if Parliament approves the Bill, any future treaty change that transfers powers from Britain to the EU could be agreed only subject to the consent of the British people. That will provide a referendum lock to which the British people hold the key. The Bill makes a very important and radical change to how decisions on the EU are made in this country. It is the most important change since we joined what was then called the European Economic Community. It marks a fundamental shift in power from Ministers of the Crown to Parliament and the voters themselves on the most important decisions of all: who gets to decide what.
It has been said that because the Bill will place a high democratic test before any Government can agree to participation in deeper political integration in the EU, it will marginalise Britain, but I believe that that argument is dangerously mistaken in its assumption of what progress in the EU means. The yardstick for progress in the European Union is not the depth of political integration. The lost opportunities of the past decade of institutional navel-gazing have made that plain. Progress for the European Union means its institutions’ ability and willingness to help its member states meet the challenges of today, and for us today that means our international economic competitiveness, sustainable low-carbon growth and the use of our collective weight in the world to advance our shared values and interests.
That is why, from their first day, the Government have been active and activist in European policy. That is why we have played a strong and positive role in the EU which in six months has delivered significant results—agreement on EU sanctions against the Iranian Government that are already having a material effect, and agreement on measures that will substantially aid Pakistan’s economic recovery in the aftermath of the floods. We have pushed hard at EU level on measures to further free trade, in particular with Pakistan and South Korea, thus far with success.
The UK has not taken part in every aspect of the EU’s development. The euro was created, and the decision to retain our own currency has, for example, been vindicated. Staying out of the euro and maintaining our own border controls has not weakened our influence, either. The previous Government’s successful championing of enlargement to the east, to which I pay tribute, is proof of that. In the single market—for example, on patent reform—the UK should be ready to move forward in the national interest with other like-minded partners.
As in all matters, the Government’s policy on European issues should be based on the pursuit of our enlightened national interest. Our ability to advance our goals by working with European partners is crucial to that. Ensuring that our role is based on democratic consent is equally necessary, and that is what the Bill is about.
Mr John Redwood (Wokingham) (Con)
Will the Foreign Secretary explain why, when the Government are giving away powers to regulate the City, powers over criminal justice, powers in two regulations and a directive that will affect our economic governance, and big new powers for an expanded External Action Service, none of those qualifies for a referendum under the Bill? People want a referendum now on the powers that the current Government are giving away.
Mr Hague
That is simply because we are not giving away those powers. The European External Action Service was agreed, established and given its role by the Lisbon treaty. My right hon. Friend may regret that, and I may regret that, but it was given by the Lisbon treaty. On the City, the European Union has long had the power to legislate in this area, which has equally long been subject to qualified majority voting and co-decision with the European Parliament. On economic governance, it is clear—for instance, in the Van Rompuy report on economic governance—that the proposed sanctions do not apply to the United Kingdom and that the proposed changes will not affect the United Kingdom. I reject my right hon. Friend’s basic thesis.
Yvette Cooper
If only the Foreign Secretary’s willingness to open EU buildings extended to opening a proper debate on European issues in the House. Clause 10 purports to increase Parliament’s role before ministerial decisions are made, yet the truth is that the Government do the opposite. We have had no discussion of the European economy prior to the discussion between European Finance Ministers today, no discussion of practical measures to cut the European budget, such as reform of the common agricultural policy, and no discussion of working with Europe on human trafficking or the directive that the Government continue to opt out of.
This very morning, European Finance Ministers met to discuss the Irish support package and the European economy. In 10 days’ time, decisions will be made on the crisis resolution measures that will affect the entire European economy—not just the eurozone—for many years to come. National leaders will discuss a treaty change to introduce that package, yet when is the debate in the British Parliament? We have no idea what British Government Ministers are proposing or asking for.
We should hold pre-Council debates in this Chamber. The economic and political pressures that Europe faces are serious. European growth is slowing, unemployment has increased and markets are putting pressure on several eurozone countries, all of which matters immensely to Britain, yet we have had no pre-Council debates. At the end of this year, there will have been four European Councils, but no debate.
Mr Redwood
The right hon. Lady is raising crucial issues. Does her party support the idea of Britain being part of more EU economic governance powers to help euroland, and does she think we ought to offer more financial assistance to other euroland countries in crisis?
Mr John Redwood (Wokingham) (Con)
This Bill is born of a very serious mood in our country. A majority of people in Britain feel that a great amount of power has already passed to the European Union over the past 20 years, and they feel that powers are still drifting away under this new Government. They would like to see that progress arrested, and they would like to see powers brought back in certain crucial areas. They would like to feel that more of their lives were under democratic, accountable government here in Westminster than under the less accountable, less democratic government of the European Union. The Government would be wise to heed the seriousness of that view among many in this Parliament, representing many outside it.
I welcome the Foreign Secretary’s noble aim. He says that the aim of his legislation and policy is to give us all a greater sense of empowerment when it comes to matters of European governance and action. I would urge him to look again at his Bill, however. It is certainly cleverly contrived, and it is certainly contrived in a great deal of detail, but it is, in practice, the not-the-referendum Bill. On every area of competence and power that we see drifting away or being transferred from us as we have this debate, we are told, “That would not qualify for a referendum under this legislation.”
I believe that the Foreign Secretary has taken legal advice, and he wants to have a referendum on the transfer of competences rather than on the transfer of powers. I would suggest that that is a tad too clever. We all know that most of the competences have already gone. That was what Lisbon was all about. That was why he and I fought tooth and nail, together, against that treaty and in favour of a referendum on the treaty. Most of the things that the Government now wish to do are a shared competence with the European Union. What matters is not a further transfer of competence, but a further grab or transfer of power by the European authorities.
When the Conservatives were in office, we made it very clear that we wanted trading relationships and friendships, and a certain amount of common legislating in single market and related areas, but not a common Government or political union. To reflect that, the architecture that we persuaded the partners to accept had the third pillar areas of foreign affairs and home affairs, which were matters for independent sovereign states to decide, and we always preserved the veto on any common action. That has now been eroded. So, as we meet to debate the so-called referendum lock, we see powers on home affairs being surrendered, issue by issue, by this Government—as they were by the previous Government—which will result in a much more common criminal jurisdiction from the European level. The British people need a voice on that matter; they need to be asked about it. Some of them might even agree with it, but they want to be treated seriously, as grown-ups, and asked if that is how they want their country to be run in the future.
On foreign affairs, we are being told as we meet that we still have a veto on the big issues and that my right hon. Friend the Foreign Secretary can play his part in shaping a common European action and diplomatic strategy. At the very same time as we have to cut severely the growth rate of our public spending and make some deep cuts in certain areas, which we do not like, we see the European budget going up rapidly, partly to finance a big expansion in the European diplomatic service. This is not being done in order to have holidays in the sun, as some national newspapers seem to suggest, but because the EU wishes to exercise power and authority on our behalf and on behalf of other member states.
Mr Jenkin
I do not think that the Foreign Office has fully understood the consequences of encouraging this to go ahead, which is what it did. I am afraid that a great many of us voted for it in this House. The European External Action Service is ordering much more expensive cars, is to have grander embassies and is to pay much higher salaries than our own diplomatic service. That will be to the detriment of our diplomatic service because it will attract the talent away from our service and towards the European External Action Service.
Mr Redwood
It means that when a British Foreign Secretary makes foreign visits, he or she will be kept waiting while the EU ambassador is received and considered, because the latter will speak with more authority on behalf of more people and more states.
It is the third area that we have always reserved for national veto and national competence—central economic policy making—to which I shall address the remainder of my brief remarks in this truncated debate. Literally as we meet here this afternoon, crucial and massive issues are being hammered out in secret around the Council table in Brussels. Quite likely to be on the agenda is the issue of European sovereign bonds and the effective creation of a European sovereign in financial matters that issues debt and guarantees debt on behalf of member states. Do we want that? Are we in it? Is it not a transfer of power if we go along with it? Is it not an issue on which we should be invited to express our views?
Another item on the agenda may be the future membership of the euro. The Council could be considering in secret whether all member states are able to stay in the euro and whether the strong or the weak members should leave. If they are to keep the euro area together, what will be the arrangements for the large transfer payments that need to be made if the single currency is to have some hope of a decent life in the future, as all successful single currency areas have much bigger transfers of tax revenues, subsidies and money around them than the euro area currently has?
Mr Cash
My right hon. Friend portrays so accurately the realities that lie behind this Bill, which is about the economic crisis in Europe as well as many other matters. Does he agree that one serious current problem is the financial stability mechanisms and that if we do not assert our rights in this House and make certain that the courts cannot get their hands on an interpretation that would go the other way, we could end up paying for other countries beyond Ireland—Portugal, Spain and others?
Mr Redwood
My hon. Friend is absolutely right, which is why the transfer of power, if not of competence, is such a crucial issue and why we need to engage in a public debate at this very moment about how far this should go.
I hasten to stress to the House—particularly to my critics, who like to misconstrue what I say—that I wish our partners every success and prosperity with their single currency. I know that if that is the way they choose to run their economies, it is in our interests for it to work. We want them to be happier and more prosperous, and we like to benefit from trading with them, just as they like selling us a lot of their products. My worry is that in the process of our enthusiasm for that, we will draw in Britain—with her rather stretched budgets, even after the changes that the Government have rightly and wisely made—at a time when we do not have the financial strength to go to the aid of all these other euroland countries that are in some difficulty under the euro scheme.
I am a critic of the Irish loan. Of course I do not want to see the Irish economy go down, but I do not happen to think that lending the country lots of money at that juncture, as a result of a crisis deliberately created by the European Central Bank, was a terribly good way to behave. I do not believe that if Britain had declined to make some money available, the Irish loan would not have been negotiated. It would have been negotiated quite successfully by the architects of it—the powers behind the European Central Bank, who literally decided to withdraw funds from the Irish banks at a difficult time and made that decision public, thereby precipitating the crisis. We were engaged in a refinancing package for the European Central Bank. I think we should be told the truth; we should be told why it was a good idea for a country that rightly stayed out of the euro because it did not want the financial risk and hassle, to be drawn into helping finance the consequences of an ill-judged currency without a political union.
A successful currency needs a sovereign to love it and support it. That is why the sovereign’s face traditionally appears on the coinage and why there has to be a symbol to show that the whole weight of legal and economic authority stands behind a currency. If Europe is to have a successful euro, she needs a sovereign. I do not want my country to be part of the euro, and I think that around 80% of the British people agree with me. I think that even Opposition Members temporarily agree with me on this issue; they are not rushing to say that now is a good time to join the euro. We should be open and honest with the British people and say, “We wish the euro well.” We are doing it a great favour by not trying to join it—we would have been an over-mighty subject in it, which might even had led to its toppling earlier—and we are not currently in a financial position to make all the transfer payments available that are necessary for full members of a single currency area.
The House needs to understand that while we are debating some abstruse language and pledging this and future Governments to hold a referendum on treaties unknown about competences unspecified, a potentially massive transfer of power is under way yet again from the member states to the centre. There has to be; the thing cannot work without more central power behind the banks and the economic institutions.
The British Government say that they will accept a treaty extending the centralising powers in the economic sphere because the penalties on these will not apply to the UK Government. Well, I am delighted that the penalties will not apply, but I see no reason why the requirements should apply either, because we are not part of the euro. We should offer our support for a strengthening of economic governance for the euro area alone and make it clear that all the regulations and the directives apply only to that area. I think that my right hon. Friend the Foreign Secretary got it wrong when he said that none of those applies to Britain; several of them do, although without the ultimate penalties. There could be other penalties, incidentally, which might apply to Britain.
When we surrender our veto and allow this treaty to go through on that condition—that it applies only to euroland—we should say that we want something back. We should seek to establish that we believe the European Union already has too much power and that we want something back. Do we want our fisheries back; do we want control over our borders back; do we want control over elements of taxation that have already gone to Europe through common taxation and a series of court judgments?
Power is seeping away as we meet. A massive debate is under way. Will the Government please take this Parliament and the British people into their confidence? Will they take us seriously? Will they give us an adult debate on the reality rather than this show Bill?
Tim Farron
Every act of legislation creates a possibility of further litigation. That is the nature of what we do. The hon. Gentleman raises an important issue, and if this Bill becomes an Act it will deal with many of the uncertainties and genuine concerns raised by my hon. Friends from a different party about our position in the European Union and the legitimacy of the decisions that are taken. The power should ultimately rest in this place and—even more ultimately—with the British people.
Tim Farron
I had better be fair and give way to my right hon. Friend the Member for Wokingham (Mr Redwood). Then, I think, I will have no more opportunities to give way.
Mr Redwood
Will my hon. Friend explain why we had 13 years of a pro-European Government who said we were at the heart of Europe when we were still in the boot?
Tim Farron
My right hon. Friend makes a very good point. The reality is that for 13 years we had a Government who said they were pro-Europe but never went on the front foot and defended that position. There are all sorts of reasons to defend our position in the European Union and say that this country’s interests are best placed if we are inside the EU. However, because of the national mood and if we were to have a referendum today on in or out, there is a very good chance that—
Mr Lidington
We debated this matter at great length in Committee in January. A number of the learned academics who gave evidence to the European Scrutiny Committee discussed parliamentary sovereignty in broad constitutional terms, rather than in terms of the precise objective of clause 18, which is to recapitulate in statutory form the means by which European law is given effect in the United Kingdom.
I want to make it clear from the start that we are talking about a referendum lock on future treaty changes that transfer powers or competence—in particular, powers involving the surrender of vetoes—and that we are not seeking to overturn the terms of existing treaties. I know that that will disappoint a number of Members on both sides of the House, but, as my right hon. Friend the Foreign Secretary said in his opening speech, we are in a legal environment established by the Lisbon treaty, even though some of us might wish that we were not, and we must start from the position that we are now in.
Mr Redwood
Will the Minister tell us whether he can conceive of any circumstances in which this Government would offer a referendum on any aspect of Europe?
Mr Lidington
I thought I had made that clear—[Interruption.] The Government—[Interruption.]