European Union: United Kingdom Renegotiation

Lord Jones of Birmingham Excerpts

Thursday 4th February 2016 Lords Chamber

[Lord Jones of Birmingham (CB)]

Does the Minister agree that in main street UK this debate and the whole issue of reform will be reduced to a grubby little debate about immigration instead of what reform of this amazing group of 520 million people should be, which is how to enable southern Europe to make enough money to compete with northern Europe, and how to enable the whole lot to be globally competitive in Asia’s century? Why does not reform from the Prime Minister mean that instead of using our taxes to subsidise someone growing olives in Greece we use the same money to skill them up so that they would be welcome immigrants in our country because they would qualify for a job, or they would be qualified in their own country to attract inward investment to work there? If we continue to base southern economies in Europe on exporting olives and importing BMWs, they will go bust.

[Baroness Stowell of Beeston]

I am not sure that I agree with the noble Lord that the debate on the referendum will resort to being purely about immigration. Indeed, we all have a responsibility to ensure that it does not. In the answers that I have given to other questions already today, I hope that I have highlighted and reassured noble Lords that there is a positive case to be made, and we would have to make it if that is what we were promoting.

However, while I very much understand where the noble Lord is coming from and the arguments that he had just made, it is important that we do not diminish the concerns of people of this country about the current situation on immigration from Europe to the United Kingdom by saying that it is not something that should be addressed. It is part of the package of measures that the Prime Minister sought to negotiate because it concerns people. It concerns them for good reason, because there is a sense of unfairness and injustice about the way that the benefit system works for those who come here from other countries. At the same time, I am also clear that the people of this country are very positive about the important contribution that is made by immigrants from wherever they come.