European Union Bill

Debate between Lord Goodhart and Lord Hamilton of Epsom

Tuesday 26th April 2011 Lords Chamber

[Lord Hamilton of Epsom]

I agree absolutely with my noble friend. I only wish that I could believe that we were going to see repatriation of powers, but unfortunately with the acquis and so forth that will be extremely difficult.

The plea that has been made for the amendments is that, in special circumstances and when there is great urgency, discretion should be given to Ministers to allow things through without a referendum. You can imagine how that will be abused. The procedure, like so much done by past Governments, will be abused to let things through without referenda and we will be back where we started. I totally oppose the amendments.

[Lord Goodhart]

If the noble Lord, Lord Hamilton, thinks that what happens in the European Union is of immense concern to the average member of the United Kingdom, will he consider the result of the general election in 2001, when the right honourable Mr Hague was the party leader and fought that election largely on the basis of dislike of the European Union? Perhaps the noble Lord remembers the result of that election.

[Lord Hamilton of Epsom]

Yes, and perhaps my noble friend would like to remind himself why William Hague fought the election on European issues. It was because he had done so incredibly well in the European elections not much before, and it seemed at that point that the country did not want to have anything to do with Europe.