European Union Bill

Lord Empey Excerpts

Tuesday 22nd March 2011 Lords Chamber

[Lord Dykes]

My Lords, resuming the debate rapidly after that procedural change, first I express my gratitude to the noble Lord, Lord Lea of Crondall, for reminding us of Labour Party history concerning the fundamental change of attitude towards the European Union and for his remarks on the Bill. For those of us who have been fighting the European cause for many years, it has been a great pleasure to see the change in attitude in the Labour Party, and not merely because there were some good suggestions from Michel Rocard and Jacques Delors, as well as, to a lesser extent, Helmut Schmidt. Eventually, before the election that produced the coalition Government, we saw that the Labour Government of Gordon Brown, too, had become fully European so far as we could tell. There are some, although not many, Labour Members of Parliament in the other place who are still sceptical about European matters, but to varying degrees, and I think that one can now officially say that the Labour Party is a pro-European party and that the previous Government were a pro-European Government. In those days, the Liberal Democrats in opposition—I was proud to be involved myself—proposed no amendments to the Lisbon treaty legislation in the upper House. We followed what the Government presented in the legislation and enthusiastically endorsed it. That perhaps is a good example to consider and quote compared with the present sad situation.

This has been a great debate. Inevitably, by this stage, the points that one makes are bound to be a little repetitive but at least I can refer to the House of Commons. Being fairly masochistic, I decided to sit in on quite a few sessions of its deliberations on the European Union Bill. I attended not only the Second Reading but some of the Committee stage of what I regard as a very peculiar Bill, as has been brought out in the comments of other noble Lords in this debate. Even more masochistically, I sat in a little on some of the remaining stages of the Bill in the Commons, and it was not at all edifying. After all, it is not often that we get the chance to listen repeatedly and monotonously to the hyperbolic words of people such as Bill Cash, John Redwood and Jacob Rees-Mogg—a new Member of the other place—and others. I thought that I would briefly convey to the House some of the erudite offerings that I heard during those proceedings. Those who spoke did not prevail with any of their amendments but they put forward these extremely educated thoughts.

I shall quote without giving any names in order to save time:

“We want our country back”.—[Official Report, Commons, 7/12/10; col. 234.]

I think that that is what Sarah Palin says when she is speaking on behalf of the extreme end of the Republican Party in America. Another comment was that the Tory party is now “the old Referendum party”. Another said:

“I am no friend of the EU”.—[Official Report, Commons, 7/12/10; col. 254.]

Another comment was:

“The European Union is a state in decay. It is rotten at its very core. It is corrupt. It is dishonest. It is bullying” .—[Official Report, Commons, 7/12/10; col. 256.]

Another said that the accession treaties give up control of our borders and that means that other EU citizens can circulate freely here too. Another said that the question we should all face is,

“whether we should be part of the European Union at all”.—[Official Report, Commons, 11/1/11; col. 188.]

Yet another said:

“many Conservative Members want withdrawal from Europe”.—[Official Report, Commons, 11/1/11; col. 206.]

I shall not mention any more, although there were plenty of others, in case noble Lords think that those extremely learned utterances give the total picture.

Many such sentiments were expressed throughout the difficult proceedings in the other place, although I am glad to say that the characters who repeatedly expressed those views numbered a maximum of 30, including one or two rather strange Labour MPs who do not seem to be so enthusiastic about Europe. One of them is a lady Member from the Birmingham area who has changed her mind fundamentally in recent years. They were defeated so heavily on amendments that eventually the Tory antis gave up pressing any votes at all.

Although the Tory leadership in opposition had made what I would describe as a disgracefully reckless point of stirring up all those atavistic emotions before the May 2010 election to get their Members excited and to bring about withdrawal from the European People’s Party in Strasbourg and Brussels, together with the rest of the absurd and provocative behaviour, it has backed off since then. I am told that even William Hague, the Foreign Secretary, is developing an interest in the EU and its benefits and workings. Of course, that happens in government. People like going to the grand meetings and gathering with the officials and other politicians. It is a club of like-minded sovereign countries working together for the good of Europe.

However, this Bill remains to be dealt with. Foolishly, following the preamble on Europe, the coalition agreement says:

“We will ensure that the British Government is a positive participant in the European Union”.

How ironic that the following paragraphs came after that promise. To be benevolent, I assume that many Tory MPs have accepted the fact that this is a pretend Bill, and I presume that they are genuinely horrified by the absurd xenophobia of their colleagues, some of whom I have quoted this evening, who merely parrot the non-UK-taxpaying, foreign-based owners of our extreme right-wing comics—called newspapers—whose views on Europe are taken as their subject matter.

I am not sure that this House, now the sole revising and improving Chamber in our Parliament, will take such a benevolent view of the need for this peculiar Bill. We are where we are with the sad story of Britain’s antics in recent years as the increasingly bad member of the club. Despite what I said about the recent Labour Government, that has been the case over many years. Britain is always the one with the exceptions, the opt-outs, the exclusions, the derogations, and the one saying, “I don’t want to do that”. It is the bad member of the club who goes on a coach outing to Eastbourne and shouts from the back seat, “No, I want to go to Hastings”. That kind of attitude has annoyed all our fellow member states.

If government spokesmen tonight, or on other occasions, as this dodgy Bill proceeds to Committee stage, suggest that others do not mind this legislation, an increasing number of our foreign friends and colleagues in the institutions in Brussels and in the European Parliament will begin to see what is happening with this legislation. Despite the arrival of a very distinguished member of the Government from the other place, who is beyond the Bar of the House and whom I must not mention, I add that that will be increasingly so as they discover this daft suggestion coming from the coalition Government.

Unlike other member states, for years politicians from Thatcher to Blair, and Brown to start with—although not in more recent times, to which I pay tribute—cast unnecessary aspersions, had unnecessary rows, needlessly betrayed commitments in the treaties and generally behaved like the Artful Dodger. Contrast that with Spain, which also has a thousand years of glorious history, where the two main parties bitterly fought their domestic battles in the last general election, but no one, including in the Partido Popular, the right-wing party, sought to invoke Europe as a domestic issue to try to get cheap votes.

As the noble Lord, Lord Lea of Crondall, said, I am so glad that the Labour Party has changed. It is the duty of the Liberal Democrats to restore their own enthusiasm for Europe in the processes that we shall follow in the coming months. This wretched Bill is a step back and this House has to deal with it in a way that the other House failed to do. Therefore, I am sure that your Lordships will wish to propose a large number of amendments. Fortunately, the power to determine decisions about what is referendable remains with Ministers, but they will still need Commons approvals via Motions and primary legislation, as has been discussed tonight. There is no need for this Bill at all and in this House we have to deal with the problem through amendments.

Harold Wilson brought in the only national referendum in 1975, solely because of internal divisions in his own party. That is the only reason why it was done. Surely, we must not repeat that exercise this time. The public wisely remain supremely indifferent to the comings and goings of the antis. The ridiculous Daily Express struggled to get just over the population of a single London borough in its recent petition, in comparison with millions of our enlightened citizens who regard membership of the European Union as a natural item, like being in NATO or the UN or the World Trade Organisation. This daft referendumitis disease is now undermining the renewed authority of Parliament after the struggle of the financial expenses scandal and the need for Parliament to become psychologically stronger again.

[Lord Empey]

Even though there are many people in this country who are for the ideals of the European Union, does the noble Lord accept that public opinion is in a different place from that which he says? That is because of stupid things like straight bananas, Cornish pasties and such nonsense, instead of looking at the strategic overview. I believe that many people in this country support the concept of Europe, particularly its ability to prevent war, which was the starting point, but they are put off by some of the nonsense because behind it there are people with a political objective who do not accept the concept of the nation state.

[Lord Dykes]

That is entirely true. Politicians leave a vacuum by not explaining the proper arguments about our European Union membership because they become pusillanimous when the mass media and the right-wing papers, owned almost exclusively by non-UK-taxpaying, foreign-based owners, put forward poisonous arguments. I believe that that even applies to Mr Desmond, the Daily Express owner; if I am incorrect, I will apologise to him personally. They put forward these poisonous arguments—pretend, nonsensical arguments—such as the headline about straight bananas. As I mentioned earlier when the noble Lord was not in the Chamber, an independent survey was commissioned which showed there have been 125 banner headlines in the Daily Express, Daily Mail and Daily Telegraph in the past calendar year about wicked things being done in the European Union. Literally all of them were incorrect, and I have the evidence if the noble Lord wants to see it.