European Union (Referendum) Bill

Debate between Lord Wigley and Lord Hannay of Chiswick

Friday 24th January 2014 Lords Chamber

[Lord Wigley]

My Lords, I have put my name to both amendments in this group. I thank the noble Lord, Lord Anderson, for moving them briefly. I shall speak very briefly indeed, as he indicated that he will want to come back to certain aspects of these issues on Report.

It is vital that we nail the idea now that there must be clarity with regard to the alternatives to membership before the referendum takes place. The worst possible outcome of a referendum would be if it were voted on in a nihilistic atmosphere and with a nihilistic attitude and people were just saying no to something without having the faintest idea what was going to happen. If that were to be the case, and we were to pull out of the European Union on that basis, and if things then started to unravel, there would be immense bitterness, and I am not sure where that would take us politically. There needs to be a mechanism for spelling out what the alternatives are, and that mechanism has to go beyond the daily or weekly press. There needs to be some objective assessment of those alternatives, and people have to know what those assessments add up to. Therefore, in whatever way we try adding this to the Bill, I hope that that issue, that dimension, will be taken on board.

[Lord Hannay of Chiswick]

My Lords, there is another amendment on the Order Paper, Amendment 72—which we are not within miles of reaching and will obviously not reach in the next 50 minutes—which covers very much this ground. It is down in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Turnbull, and would basically put a requirement on the Government to state before the referendum took place what alternative relationship Britain should seek to have with the European Union without Britain in it, if there were a no vote. I agree absolutely with what the noble Lords, Lord Wigley and Lord Anderson, said. It is essential that before the electorate cast their vote they should be told what the consequences in terms of Britain’s relationship with the truncated European Union would be in the event of a no vote. It would be too late to say what the Government are going to do after the vote; they must say so up front, before the vote.

However, that will come up in the later amendment as well. At the moment, the important thing is to note that this is a serious issue which will have to be addressed on Report, or in Committee when we get to Amendment 72. I hope that by the time we get there, the noble Lord, Lord Dobbs, refreshed by a certain period of repose after his exertions today, will see the sense of this as one of the amendments which basically strengthens the Bill. It does not weaken it; it does not make a referendum less likely; it does not prejudge the outcome of the referendum or anything like that. It just means that if and when the referendum comes, there will be before the British people a clear idea of what the alternative is if, in their majority, they vote no.