European Union (Notification of Withdrawal) Bill

Debate between Lord Balfe and Baroness Northover

Committee: 2nd sitting (Hansard): House of Lords
Wednesday 1st March 2017 Lords Chamber

[Lord Balfe (Con)]

My Lords—

[Baroness Northover (LD)]

My Lords, I will speak to the last amendment in the group—in fact the last amendment on the order paper, although there is one more that still needs to be addressed. Then we will get into a general debate, when I am sure that the noble Lord, Lord Balfe, will be given his opportunity to speak. I note that the Minister is looking a little weary after a long afternoon, and he is not there yet.

All the amendments address what the priorities should be in negotiations. Amendment 44, in my name, seeks to establish that in negotiating and concluding any agreements in accordance with Article 50(2) of the Treaty on European Union, the Government should have as a negotiating objective continued participation in the EU common foreign and security policy. This was established to seek,

“to safeguard the common values, fundamental interests, independence and integrity of the Union in conformity with the principles of the United Nations Charter … strengthen the security of the Union in all ways … preserve peace and strengthen international security … promote international cooperation … develop and consolidate democracy and the rule of law, and respect for human rights and fundamental freedoms”.

It recognises that armed conflict, destruction and the loss of human lives in the EU’s neighbourhood calls for such collective action. So of course does the UN, but this brings our geographically close group much closer together to seek to achieve these extremely difficult goals.

The right honourable Malcolm Rifkind, former Defence Secretary and former Foreign Secretary, put it this way in the Foreign Affairs Select Committee last year:

“The irony is, if we were not in the European Union, such are the common strategic interests between Britain and the rest of Europe that a lot of our foreign policy effort would have to be devoted to trying to influence the European Union … There is no geostrategic threat to France or Germany or continental Europe that would not also be a threat to Britain, as we found both in 1914 and in 1939. So we would be in the extraordinary situation of having given up the power to either control or influence policy, but seeking as outsiders nevertheless to influence it anyway, because the outcome would be very important to us”.


Surely, therefore, it is vital that continued participation in the common foreign and security policy should be our aim. The UK Government’s balance of competences review in 2013, in which my noble friend Lord Wallace played a key role as a Minister within the Cabinet Office, concluded that it was,

“in the UK’s interests to work through the EU”,

in foreign policy.

The election of President Trump makes this even clearer. As one former diplomat recently put it to me, “The most important element of the common foreign and security policy is, of course, the unquestioning, underlying support for NATO. And NATO itself is now questioned by President Trump. Uncertainty pervades today’s world with this new US Administration”. Working together on foreign, defence and security policy is now more important than ever, with the rise of isolationist, nationalist populism not only in the US but in continental Europe.