Brexit: Declaration of Friendship

Lord Wallace of Saltaire Excerpts

Tuesday 14th March 2017 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Goldie]

I apologise to the noble Lord if I omitted to answer my noble friend’s Question: I thought that I had tried to do that in a rather original manner. But I reassure him that the sentiments raised by my noble friend Lord Cormack are extremely important, and they will be at the forefront of the manner in which we conduct the negotiations.

[Lord Wallace of Saltaire (LD)]

My Lords, the Minister quoted the Prime Minister as saying that we are leaving the EU but not leaving Europe. That seems to many of us to be a deliberately meaningless phrase in the face of the underlying hostility to continental European Governments of some Conservatives on the Benches behind her. The Foreign Secretary, rather more floridly, has several times said that he sees the future relationship between the UK and the European Union as similar to the relationship between a flying buttress and a cathedral. Could she explain exactly what he means by that?

[Baroness Goldie]

I have no pretensions to architectural expertise and I hesitate to venture an opinion. What is clear is that during the negotiations we will not only seek to do whatever we can to get the best possible deal for the United Kingdom but, equally importantly, set out the parameters for our future relationship with the EU. I do not agree with the noble Lord’s dismissal of the argument that we will leave the EU but remain in Europe. I do not think that that is a platitude; it is a self-evident truth.