European Union (Withdrawal Agreement) Bill

Viscount Eccles Excerpts

2nd reading & 2nd reading (Hansard): House of Lords & 2nd reading (Hansard)
Monday 13th January 2020 Lords Chamber

[Viscount Eccles (Con)]

My Lords, arguing that there are defects in a Bill to which the Government should pay attention is not the same as voting for an amendment and sending that amendment to the House of Commons. I hope that we will remember that.

I voted remain for two reasons. Our long membership, as one of the leading members of Europe as it expanded, seemed to me to warrant very careful consideration if we were to decide to leave, and there had been no preparations for us to leave, either by the European Union or ourselves. The Prime Minister at the time went to Europe, got nothing, had some dinners and was not really taken very seriously. Since we had always been an uncomfortable member of the Union, it was quite remiss of us and the Union not to have made any preparations.

But I was not a fan of the European Union. I had in my mind all the time an alleged quote from Valéry Giscard d’Estaing:

“If we had told them what we were doing, we would never have got as far as we have.”


Also, the mantra of ever-closer union worried me. My response was, “Yes, yes, but where to, and why?” No satisfactory answers were given, which took me back to the quote. These doubts redoubled during the long and abortive negotiations, because of the negative approach of the Union—a sort of, “What we have, we hold on to—in spades.”

It was not easy to believe any of the things that the Commission was saying in its political rhetoric about the future and where we were going. Yet the original purpose, which was to make sure that Europe did not start another great war, had in effect been achieved, so what was being put in its place, now that the centre of power in the world had shifted away from Europe to the Pacific? Was it a vague and grand project to build a unified bloc to rival the United States? If it was, that is not and never has been a good idea, and it is impractical. With 27 countries, each with a different history and culture, it is unbelievable that you could ever create an effective United States-type federal state. To me, individual states among the 193 are more important to the future of the world and are to be preferred over attempts to build yet another power bloc.

So my mind was made up for me, and I support this Bill. But in essentials it is an enabling Bill. This House can and will make its points and criticisms about what is and what is not in it, but we should let the House of Commons have its way.

European Union (Withdrawal) (No. 5) Bill

Viscount Eccles Excerpts

Committee: 1st sitting (Hansard): House of Lords
Monday 8th April 2019 Lords Chamber

[Lord Faulks (Con)]

My Lords—

[Viscount Eccles (Con)]

My Lords—

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Judge]

Of course it will be used by others. Lawyers use bad precedents constantly, but it does not mean that it has to be followed.

I did not intend to speak, for the reason I have given. This amendment will improve the Bill. That is the point of it. Beyond that, I do not wish to say any more, because it may indicate somehow that I am backing off from my concern about the Bill. So in lawyerly fashion I simply say that you have all heard the noble Lord, Lord Pannick. I agree with him. I have nothing to add.

[Viscount Eccles]

The noble and learned Lord tells us that it improves the Bill. Does it not change the Bill so materially that it is not the same Bill after all?

[Lord Judge]

No, it does not. We have to face the context, which is that the Commons has passed the Bill. So we are not having the first go at it; we are having a go at it after the Commons has resolved it.

UK and EU Relations

Viscount Eccles Excerpts

Tuesday 12th September 2017 Lords Chamber

[Viscount Eccles (Con)]

My Lords, we need the Government to bring us up to date with a wider view than these papers. The Lancaster House speech needs its second edition. For the EU it is all about tactics. Does Brussels want a special partnership? It does not look like it. Who is trying to go where? Shadow boxing comes to mind.

I voted remain, because there was enough trouble in the world already. Nobody needed us to create any more. Mr Cameron had been to Europe wanting to remain. Greeted by the short-sighted, he was not seen as wanting anything of substance. What did we need? I suppose it was an opening up of European Union rules, recognising that we are not federalists, and seeing this English-speaking island as a honey pot with sterling as its currency—a two-speed Europe, if you like.

Our trouble now is that accepting the referendum result seems to mean, for example, that we can “take back control”, as leave supporters insist. But we cannot go backwards; things have moved on. What does “control” mean in a world where Facebook has 2 billion users? Does it mean only ceasing to appear before the European Court? Or is it a credible border control plan? Does anybody believe immigration should be brought down to tens of thousands? That would certainly need a lot of people to leave.

As for the rhetoric of trade agreements, I have never found that selling things depended on agreements; rather, it depended on whether one had the things available that others wanted to buy. People can usually find a way of buying what they want. Right now, I hope that the Prime Minister, who has not been much mentioned this afternoon, as she remembers the leave campaign, also remembers Burke and knows she is not a delegate.

All this is not the heart of the matter. We are a member of a faulted institution and, as my noble friend Lord Howell said, an institution which has lost its original imperative—the prevention of another war which might well have started in Europe. So the institution changed and became intent on becoming an economic power bloc, expanding to a union of 19, 28 or maybe even more European states. This creation within the world order and its nation states was never a good idea. Indeed, as Willie Whitelaw assured Margaret Thatcher, it was never—and I would say now, never is—going to happen. Instead, trouble has mounted with time. First the euro itself and the intervention in Greece—classic problems of a common currency without fiscal and monetary union; then the steady rejection of subsidiarity, yielding little since 2008 other than unrest; and then the migrants with the desperate ways in which they come.

All this gives Brussels good reason to worry. Is it possible, or likely, that the project will fail one day? So the negotiator gets his negative brief, confidence and good will are in short supply, and both sides are living on illusion. How can it come out well?

Right now, we would do well to remember what would have persuaded us to remain if it has been on offer to Mr Cameron: a thoughtful version of the special partnership. The Prime Minister should provide it. We and the 27 need to see a bigger, bolder picture. Who knows what might happen then?