Business of the House

Lord Willoughby de Broke Excerpts

Wednesday 4th September 2019 Lords Chamber

This is the big problem of Europe. It has divided politics in a most unproductive manner. I hope very much that we will not continue with the sort of discussion which the party opposite has put down in the form of a guillotine for its legislation. It will be very bad for the future of this House, which is rather more important than it seems to think.

[Lord Willoughby de Broke (Non-Afl)]

My Lords, I support the excellent amendment moved by the noble Lord, Lord Marlesford. It is badly needed, because, as so often over many years, this House seems to have forgotten the result of the referendum. It has forgotten that it voted for the referendum Bill, that it voted for Article 50 legislation, and that it voted for the withdrawal Act.

I need to remind noble Lords that the referendum, at which 17 and a half million voted to leave, as the noble Lord, Lord Marlesford, said, was the biggest single democratic vote this country has ever had. I am always surprised in this House when noble Lords—

[Lord Harris of Haringey]

May I clarify a point? I am slightly surprised at the noble Lord’s position, given what I understood were his views on these matters. He is supporting an amendment which will say that the referendum,

“is no longer relevant and may be ignored”.

[Lord Willoughby de Broke]

I am supporting the noble Lord, Lord Marlesford.

[Lord Harris of Haringey]

The amendment moved by the noble Lord, Lord Marlesford, is to add that the,

“referendum to leave the European Union is no longer relevant”.

[Lord Willoughby de Broke]

Yes, I agree with that.

[Lord Harris of Haringey]

Ah, good.

[Lord Willoughby de Broke]

Those words should be in the Bill.

[Lord Marlesford]

I thought that the noble Lord, Lord Harris, would have realised that we were trying to make clear the implications of the guillotine Motion which we are discussing, which is an extremely arrogant Motion.

[Lord Willoughby de Broke]

I am grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Marlesford, for clarifying the issue for the noble Lord, Lord Harris.

The fact is that this House too often forgets the result of the referendum. I must correct the noble Lord, Lord Marlesford, on one very small point. David Cameron did indeed legislate for the referendum, but only because of the electoral pressure he was under from UKIP. I am delighted that my noble friend Lord Pearson is here tonight. We had the referendum because the then Conservative leadership was frightened of losing even more voters and MPs to UKIP.

Passing on from that, the Brexit voters in the referendum have continually been misrepresented as a lot of ignorant backwoodsmen. Of course, that is not the case at all. A huge number of people voted to leave. We have heard the cries from noble Lords who are not here now—the noble Lord, Lord Bilimoria, and others—for a people’s vote. I thought that the referendum was probably the biggest people’s vote we have ever had. I remember sitting in the Chamber in April when it was said that we needed another people’s vote and all the banners outside said: “Let’s have a people’s vote”. Well, in June, we did have another people’s vote. We had the European elections, when the Brexit Party smashed every other party to smithereens. It got twice the number of votes of the Conservative and Labour parties put together. I congratulate the Liberal Democrats, who got 17% of the vote, just under half the Brexit Party vote.

The idea that leaving the EU is some oddball movement and that Brexiteers are deranged is far from the truth. I hope the Government will understand that. I hope the Prime Minister understands that and continues the course that he has set so far. I believe it is important that the House accepts the amendment moved by the noble Lord, Lord Marlesford, because it makes it quite clear what this is all about. It is about Brexit. In the end, this whole arrangement and this debate today are about Brexit. It is about why people voted to leave and not letting them down. I support the amendment.

[Baroness Noakes]

My Lords, perhaps I can help the noble Lord, Lord Harris of Haringey. My noble friend Lord True’s amendment, which was moved by my noble friend Lord Marlesford, is trying to perfect the Motion in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady Smith of Basildon, by inserting the true motive behind it. It is not that my noble friend Lord Marlesford agrees with the sentiment that the referendum result should be ignored—far from it. I am sure the noble Lord is aware that my noble friend Lord Marlesford and many of us in the Chamber this evening fully wish to respect the result of that referendum. My noble friend is trying to make plain what this Motion is all about.

--- Later in debate ---

Moved by

[Lord Willoughby de Broke]

That the Question be now put.

[The Deputy Speaker (Lord Lexden) (Con)]

Noble Lords are familiar with the words that I must now read. I am instructed by order of the House to say that the Motion “That the Question be now put” is considered to be a most exceptional procedure and the House will not accept it save in circumstances where it is felt to be the only means of ensuring the proper conduct of the business of the House. Further, if a Member who seeks to move it persists in his intention, the practice of the House is that the Question on the Motion is put without debate. Does the noble Lord still wish to move the Motion?

[Lord Willoughby de Broke]

Yes.

European Union (Notification of Withdrawal) Bill

Lord Willoughby de Broke Excerpts

2nd reading (Hansard): House of Lords
Tuesday 21st February 2017 Lords Chamber

[Lord Willoughby de Broke (UKIP)]

My Lords, it is a pleasure to follow the noble Baroness, Lady Kramer, but it is a pleasure also to disagree profoundly with her suggestion of having a second referendum.

I would like to begin by congratulating the Prime Minister on her excellent Lancaster House speech; it had vision and clarity, and was exactly what we have been hoping to hear for many, many years. She was quite clear that she accepted the result of the referendum and that the result was “out”—no ifs, no buts, no EEA, no one foot in and one foot out, but a clear and clean Brexit. That was what the referendum called for and that is what this Government are going to deliver; I am very pleased with her for doing that. It was, as the noble Lord, Lord Lang, called it yesterday, a transformative speech—it was actually a UKIP speech, and I am very pleased with her for delivering that, too.

Some of us in this House have been waiting for very many years—it has been more than 23 years since we debated the Maastricht treaty in this House—to hear a British Prime Minister at last saying what Mrs May said at Lancaster House. We asked for a referendum during the debate on the Maastricht treaty but were sadly defeated in the Lobbies due to the very effective whipping of the hereditary Peers by Lord Hesketh, who later saw the light and joined UKIP. I am only sorry that many of the Peers who took part in those debates with us are not here today to see history made. I think in particular of Lord Bruce of Donington, Lord Shore, Lord Moran and Lord Harris of High Cross, who were effective speakers against our membership of the EU long ago, and they should be remembered for that. I also pay tribute to the noble Lord, Lord Stoddart of Swindon, who for the whole of his political life has been an opponent of our membership of the European Union. He was taken ill two weeks ago in the House. I later saw him in hospital and he said he wanted to be here today but sadly his doctors have told him that he should not travel to come and speak today—I think it may be something to do with Mr Blair crawling out from under his wallet and telling us to rise up.

I should remind your Lordships that this House already voted to leave the EU during the passage of my noble friend Lord Pearson’s European Communities (Amendment) Bill of 1997; here it is. This House—the House of Lords—voted to leave the European Union. In spite of the attempt to torpedo the Bill by the Lib Dems—for whom no surrender to Brussels is ever enough—we won that debate. I say to noble Lords today that they have already swallowed the camel; they should not now strain at the gnat in passing this Bill.

Reading this debate now, it seems to me striking how the arguments we made then are still relevant today—we have been making them for 20 years. The problem we then had was that we were making such arguments to Governments who, for whatever reason, were committed to what they laughably called our European destiny. So we did not get anywhere making those arguments to Governments, but, last summer, we were finally able to take those arguments directly to the electorate, with the result we saw in the referendum: an out vote.

Thankfully, we are coming to the end of the days when we had to ratify every EU measure that was put before us in this House or in the other place—we could oppose them; we could debate them; we could even occasionally convince, although perhaps only ourselves—but, at the end of the debate, we had to listen to the noble Lord or the noble Baroness the Minister telling us that it was “the Government’s treaty obligation” and that was the end of the story.

From a historical perspective, when we look back and think that it was only in 1926 that women were given the vote in this country, we should be rather surprised and perhaps shocked at that. I was equally shocked, and still am—I did a little research—to find that it was only in 1965 that President Johnson gave African Americans the vote in America. In 50 or 100 years, when people come to look at this debate here, they will be equally shocked and surprised that, until 2016, this country of Britain was still contracting out its laws to be made by people whom we did not elect, we did not know and we could not sack. The time of “pay and obey” is done, and not before time.

Outcome of the European Union Referendum

Lord Willoughby de Broke Excerpts

Tuesday 5th July 2016 Lords Chamber

[Lord Willoughby de Broke (UKIP)]

My Lords, I bumped into the noble Lord, Lord Howell, before coming back into this debate, and he reminded me of the old Chinese proverb which says that it is important to have the last word. I am delighted to have the last word, and I am sure than noble Lords, whatever they think of my views, will also be pleased, after a very long day, that this is the last word this evening.

I thank the noble Lords, Lord Flight and Lord Blencathra, for their generous words about Nigel Farage, and disagree totally with the noble Viscount. Without Nigel Farage and his brilliant leadership of UKIP, the people of this country would never have had the opportunity to have a referendum on whether they wanted to continue to contract the government of their country out to Brussels or wanted to become a self-governing democracy again. It is thanks to Nigel Farage that we had the referendum, whose result was clear. There is no question of course of having a second referendum, as we have heard discussed tonight. That is absolutely off the table.

I agree with the noble Lord, Lord Naseby, that the Conservatives must now stop playing that popular parlour game Cluedo, whether it is Mr Gove in the parlour with the bread knife or Mrs May in the drawing room with the knitting needle—regardless of who did what to who, that is over. It is time that they organised themselves and elected a new Prime Minister as soon as possible, so they can get on with implementing the mandate given by the result of the referendum. That is absolutely clear. It does not really matter who is Prime Minister; they have the mandate and they must get on with it. That means there is no room for compromise on the basic arguments of the referendum: who makes our laws and who controls our borders. Those absolutely cannot be bargained away in some smoke-filled—or un-smoke-filled—room in the European Union parliament or any of the other buildings of the institutions of the EU.

I agree with the noble Viscount, Lord Trenchard, that we should not agonise too much over the single market. Let us just remind ourselves that we do not need to be a member of the single market to trade with the EU. We are a major economy, and all major economies, whether it is China, the United States, India, Canada, Australia or Japan, trade with the EU without being members of the single market—so can we.

I have a helpful suggestion for the Government at this stage. They should negotiate with the member states directly, leaving the entirely discredited Commission to wither on the vine. Nobody pays any attention to what the Commission says any more, particularly under the leadership of Herr Juncker, and we would get far quicker and better results if we negotiated directly with members states. I can already hear the objection that this runs contrary to the solemn and binding EU treaties, but of course the solemn and binding treaties have already been broken on many occasions. France and Germany both, in succession, broke the very solemn and binding stability pact. Later, “Mr Solomon Binding” was nowhere to be seen when the EU had to organise bailouts from some member states to others, directly contrary to Article 125 in the treaty of Lisbon. Mr Solomon Binding could be left on one side when it comes to negotiating with the EU. It is not the treaties that matter, but expediency, and the Government ought to remember that.

We have heard a lot tonight about the so-called misleading remarks made by the leave campaign during the referendum. That is an Oscar-winning case of the pot calling the kettle black. Let us just remind ourselves of what happened to all those absurd predictions made by the Prime Minister and his dream team of Mr Blair, Goldman Sachs and John Major. World War 3 has not broken out; we have not yet had an emergency Budget from the present Chancellor; manufacturers in our motor car industry have been at pains to say they will continue to operate here and not move their factories elsewhere—indeed some of them are opening new factories here; the stock market is at, what, a three-year high; the weaker pound has made our exports more competitive; and Andy Murray is looking very good at Wimbledon. I nearly missed one thing out: we can now run our own country. I do not think that is too bad a result.

Debate adjourned until tomorrow.

House of Lords Reform

Lord Willoughby de Broke Excerpts

Tuesday 15th September 2015 Lords Chamber

[Lord Willoughby de Broke (UKIP)]

My Lords, I strongly support the Motion of my noble friend Lord Pearson, and I will not rehearse the arguments he made so persuasively. I think it is common ground now in this House—even, I sense, after this evening’s debate—and certainly in the country at large, that it is absurd for a party which got nearly 4 million votes at the recent election not to be offered any representation whatever in this House, while the Lib Dems, who got exactly one-third of UKIP’s vote in the general election, have been given 11 extra peerages and will now be grossly overrepresented with, I believe, 112 Peers.

The noble Lord, Lord Steel, warned my noble friend Lord Pearson to be careful what he wished for, because we have only one MP in the Commons, while the Lib Dems have eight. They have eight MPs and 113 Peers. By simple arithmetic, that is 14 Peers per MP, so UKIP deserves at least 14 Peers here—QED, I think. I hope that the noble Baroness the Leader of the House will take note of that. I am grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Steel, for raising that point.

I wonder in passing who was the genius who advised the Prime Minister to create 11 extra Liberal Democrat Peers. He must have known that they would routinely vote against him, particularly when it comes to the EU Bill, which we will be considering shortly. The Bill is coming to this House on 13 October, I think, for its Second Reading. This House has a Europhile bias. That is not a complaint or a stricture, it is just a fact. We have a galaxy of starry ex-Commissioners, ex-MEPs, European officials and advisers, all of whom have a Europhile bias, just because of the jobs that they have been doing. The EU Select Committee is heavily overweight with EU enthusiasts.

During the previous Government, Members on the coalition Front Bench vied with each other to make cheap cracks at UKIP, its leaders and the people who supported it. It is quite wrong that we should have no better representation in this House. It is also short-sighted because—and I find that some of the pro-EU Members of this House find this hard to believe—let us remember that outside this House UKIP won the European elections last year, defeating the Conservatives and Labour, and leaving the Lib Dems with only one MEP. All the recent polls have shown that about half of those polled want to leave the EU.

It is absurd that the millions of people who believe that this country can be run without advice from Brussels and without the help of the Brussels bureaucracy are so underrepresented in this House when it comes to debates on European Union matters. In spite of the best efforts of my noble friend Lord Pearson, we are still being stymied by No. 10 and the Prime Minister. We have been offered no more Peers. I hope that the Leader of the House will understand our deep concern at this loss and this fear of giving us more representation. I hope she will do her very best to put this right.

European Council

Lord Willoughby de Broke Excerpts

Monday 22nd October 2012 Lords Chamber

[Lord Strathclyde]

My Lords, I wrote down what I said and am very happy to repeat it. I said that we do not see the case for increases in spending that are above the rate of inflation.

[Lord Willoughby de Broke]

My Lords, one of the Council conclusions on which I hope the noble Lord can enlighten the House is headed, “Developing a tax policy for growth”. Is this a tax policy for having higher taxes or lower taxes? Secondly, the same paragraph of the conclusions refers to,

“enhanced cooperation to be launched on a Financial Transactions Tax”.

Was that supported by the British Government?

[Lord Strathclyde]

My Lords, on the first point, we are not in favour of any new taxes emanating from the EU. Secondly, we have not supported a financial transactions tax. We know that certain elements within EU countries have got together and decided to impose a financial transactions tax. I believe that in the long term that will prove to be against their interests.

Draft House of Lords Reform Bill

Lord Willoughby de Broke Excerpts

Monday 30th April 2012 Lords Chamber

[Lord Willoughby de Broke]

My Lords, I am grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Richard, and members of the committee for their report, but more particularly I am grateful to the members of the committee that produced the excellent alternative report. The noble Lord, Lord Ashdown, said that democracy is in trouble or danger, I think because of the lack of power, or the weaknesses, of this House. I should like to say to him that democracy and Parliament are in trouble because, over the years, we have given away so many powers to the European Union. That is why our democracy is in danger. It is not because of any shortcomings of this House. Perhaps I may remind your Lordships that, over the years I have been here, we have largely neutered Parliament by giving away powers of immigration, employment, social policy, trade, agriculture, fisheries and energy—to name just the most obvious.

I recently asked a Question for Written Answer about the Budget put forward by the Government when they said that they were going to increase the price of alcohol in supermarkets. I asked,

“whether their proposal for minimum pricing on alcohol is compliant with European Union law”.

The Written Answer given by the noble Lord, Lord Henley, was:

“The Government are currently in discussions with the EU Commission on this issue”.—[Official Report, 23/4/12; col. WA 292.]

That is where we have got to. Parliament, whether it is the House of Commons or this House, cannot even decide the price of drink in this country without going to members of the Commission in Brussels to tell us what we can or cannot do.

Before putting my name down to speak, I asked myself why there is all the fuss. Arguing about the reform of the Lords sometimes seems like two bald men arguing over a comb. It is just not worth it. Then I reminded myself that, over the past two years, all recent opinion polls have shown that a great majority of the people of this country want a referendum on our membership of the European Union. I was also encouraged by a poll in the Sun the other day that showed that UKIP has recently overtaken the Liberal Democrats as the third most popular party in the country. After people in this country have been given the right to vote in a referendum on membership of the EU, Parliament will get its powers back. Therefore, discussing the reform of the House of Lords is valuable, and I am delighted that we have the opportunity to do so today.

I am more attracted by the alternative report than by the Joint Committee’s report. I do not think that the alternative report should be spoken of as a minority report. Looking at the figures, it seems that, excluding the chairman, the alternative report was produced by exactly half the members of the committee; so it has, to my mind at least, at least equal validity with that of the main committee. I am quite surprised that some of those who produced the alternative report felt able to sign the committee’s report at all, given the list in the alternative report of the fundamental areas on which they differed from the committee’s report.

On page 33, the report lists:

“Primacy … Electoral mandate … Powers … Electoral democracy … Constituency issues … Funding limits … Ministerial voting … Transition”.

On all these points the alternative report argues persuasively against the conclusions of the committee. I hope very much that we will not have to waste a lot of valuable time vetting the Deputy Prime Minister’s Bill, but if we do, this House owes a vote of thanks to the members of the committee who produced the alternative report—the noble Baroness, Lady Symons, and others—who have given a lot of time to producing this valuable document. I support its conclusions and the recommendations for incremental reform based on the Bill of the noble Lord, Lord Steel, and for the establishment of,

“a new Constitutional Convention to consider the next steps”.

In preparing for this debate, I looked back to the 1911 debate in this House on the introduction of the Parliament Act, which was held on 10 August 1911, two days before the beginning of the grouse-shooting season. My grandfather led the opposition to that Bill as leader of the so-called “die-hards” or “last ditchers”. I realise of course that the noble Baroness, Lady Symons, the noble Lord, Lord Norton, and the others who produced the alternative report would baulk or recoil at the thought of being called “last ditchers” or “die-hards”, but I hope the one thing they will share with my grandfather is the conviction to stand up for their beliefs. I will certainly stand with them if the battle is ever joined.

EU Council

Lord Willoughby de Broke Excerpts

Tuesday 31st January 2012 Lords Chamber

[Lord Strathclyde]

However, basically we wanted to protect the single market. We also wanted to make sure that we were safeguarded from a financial transaction tax that would have an unfair bearing on Britain within Europe. Unless it was applied on a global scale, we were not going to support it. The noble Lord shakes his head as though I have not been helpful but, if not to safeguard British interests, why else would the Prime Minister have vetoed it?

[Lord Willoughby de Broke]

My Lords, I want to follow the point made by the noble Lord, Lord Dholakia, in reference to competition. Is not this Council statement just a rehash of the European agenda, which was such a notable failure? Does the Minister agree that, as usual, it is all words and no action? Do not figures of 23 million unemployed in the European Union and 51 per cent youth unemployment in Spain show that the European Union is a total failure for its citizens? Would it not be much better to leave before we get sucked even further into the euro mire?

[Lord Strathclyde]

My Lords, the views of the noble Lord, Lord Willoughby de Broke, on this are extremely well known. He believes that there should be a referendum in the United Kingdom about leaving the EU or that the United Kingdom should just leave the European Union as soon as possible. That view is not shared by this Government. We think that in the past the EU has gone in the wrong direction but we are hopeful. The noble Lord may not have read the European Commission’s statement but I hope that he will take the opportunity to do so. I am glad to see he is indicating that he has read it. I think he should be heartened by much of what was said in it about growth, jobs, deregulation and single markets, which will aid prosperity in the long term.

Agriculture: CAP Direct Payments

Lord Willoughby de Broke Excerpts

Tuesday 27th July 2010 Lords Chamber

[Lord Redesdale]

My Lords, will the Minister consider—

[Lord Willoughby de Broke]

This side.

[Noble Lords]

Order!

[Lord Strathclyde]

My Lords, let us hear from the noble Lord, Lord Willoughby de Broke, and then from my noble friend.

[Lord Willoughby de Broke]

I am most grateful. Will the Minister reassure the noble Lord, Lord Livsey, and indeed the noble Lord, Lord Tomlinson, that successive French Governments have stated repeatedly that there will be no change whatsoever to single farm payments after 2013? Will he also therefore reassure the British taxpayer that they will continue to pay for French farming for the foreseeable future?

[Lord De Mauley]

My Lords, the noble Lord is a noted cynic on this subject. I assure him that the British Government will be negotiating hard at EU level for a reform to the CAP.