European Union (Withdrawal) Bill

Baroness Deech Excerpts

Committee: 7th sitting (Hansard): House of Lords
Wednesday 14th March 2018 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Randerson]

The noble Lord underestimates the level of wisdom and expertise that sits within Parliament. The EU is managing its negotiations in line with the European Parliament. There is no way in which we need to adopt a different model; the supremacy of Parliament should remain.

[Baroness Deech (CB)]

Perhaps I may ask the Minister a question in relation to these amendments—I am sorry that I was a little late because of the early start; I may have missed the answer. Given that three times as many European students come here as ours go to Europe—in my experience, ours always wanted to go, and still go, to the USA; given that we know that we will not expel our migrants in any brutal fashion; given that they will presumably want to fly here; given that we have more Indian and Chinese students coming here than we have from the whole EU because our universities are so much better and far higher in the league table than any single continental European university, and given that Australian and Middle Eastern airlines fly in and out all the time, what is the problem? Is the pressure not on European nations? Are they perhaps begging us in the negotiation to allow them freedom of movement to come here to participate in the activities that I have mentioned? Cannot our airlines fly in exactly the same way as Australian, Middle Eastern and American airlines?

[Lord Judd (Lab)]

My noble friend Lord Stevenson invited me to add my words to what he was saying, and I am very glad to do so, but I am associated with some of the other amendments as well. I want to speak honestly from past to past. In 1978, I can vividly remember enjoying being part of the Committee of Ministers in Europe working on mutual recognition of qualifications. What was so exciting about that discussion was that everyone in the room recognised that the issues with which we were dealing could not be contained within national frontiers, that they were all international in character and all crossed frontiers. We recognised that the way we looked at health, at the enhancement of the arts and at the quality of the professions as they built for our future would be best served if we fully co-operated. The measures we sought were there to support the whole concept of co-operation and enhancement of the quality of life for people in Europe. I find it utterly miserable that we have deserted that reality, have deserted that dream and are talking now about regulations to try to salvage a situation into which we should never have strayed.