European Union Bill

Debate between Lord Liddle and Lord Kinnock

Tuesday 5th April 2011 Lords Chamber

[Lord Liddle]

The noble Baroness makes an interesting point. I am no lawyer and I do not think that she is a lawyer either. Eminent lawyers have made these points. I think that it is up to the Government to provide us with a clear explanation.

However, I am trying to make more than a legal point; there is also a moral argument here. The British Government are reneging on a compromise that they signed up for in the negotiations on the Lisbon treaty in 2007. They are overturning promises to our partners that they solemnly made. Of course the Government are entitled to say that for future treaties they can bring in new processes of ratification; they are perfectly entitled to say that and we can debate those processes. However, in relation to Article 48(6), the Bill proposes to introduce new procedures that place new obstacles to the use of treaty provisions to which Britain has already signed up. We signed up to that with the explicit purpose of not being subject to the cumbersome processes of ratification that the Government are now, retrospectively, trying to impose. That raises questions about the Government’s integrity.

[Lord Kinnock]

I am following my noble friend closely, and I am sorry to interrupt him, but does he accept that his declaration that the Government are entitled to make provision for the future is a moot point in the context of this Bill? The Government, as well as presenting this Bill, have repeatedly and solemnly declared that no use will be made of it in the lifetime of this Parliament—none whatever—because there will be no concession in the direction of competences or powers, however defined. That being the case, are not the Government seeking to do what no Government or Parliament can do, and that is to bind future Parliaments?

[Lord Liddle]

My noble friend Lord Kinnock, for whom I have enormous respect, corrects me on this point. I was trying to make a point about whether our European partners were aware of the new constraints being imposed on the British Government’s flexibility in relation to provisions which the British Government have already signed up to. Has the Prime Minister written or otherwise communicated to his European Council colleagues to explain that the deal which Britain did in 2007 is now off the table? Can Parliament be informed of the reaction of our partners to the knowledge that the flexibility which they thought the British had signed up to is no longer available? If we have not got that from our European partners, there should be a pause—after yesterday, pauses in the legislative process are almost a formal part of our proceedings. There should be a pause while this communication with our partners takes place, because it is not right to go back on these promises.

I would like to talk briefly about what I regard as the impracticalities of the Government’s proposals, to which several noble Lords have referred. The most notable instance of the use of Article 48(6) is the way in which it is being used for the establishment of the European stability mechanism in the euro area. That is clearly not a decision that extends the EU's competence because the Maastricht treaty provided for the creation of a single currency and the establishment of an economic and monetary union, both objectives to which the previous Conservative Government subscribed. However, a gap emerged in the framework for managing the euro when the sovereign debt crisis came about. The stability mechanism was established to deal with the crisis, and the clauses of the treaty have been used for this purpose.