European Union (Notification of Withdrawal) Bill

Baroness Jowell Excerpts

Monday 20th February 2017 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Jowell (Lab)]

My Lords, it is a great pleasure to follow the noble Lord. I only wish I could share his optimism. I shall make some short observations on process—both the democratic process and negotiation with the EU.

As has been said, before today a mandate was given in the referendum by a narrow majority comprising 37% of the electorate. This has left the country deeply divided but it has been overwhelmingly endorsed in the elected other place, and our role in this appointed House is, within that framework, to secure the best possible outcome in these perilous circumstances for our country.

As has been well said, the referendum was a black and white question that invited a technicolour answer. Many paths led to “No”, but I have to say that for me as an elected Member of the other place, in 20 years of weekly surgeries and countless doorstep meetings, the issue of Europe never once arose. All sorts of concrete issues did, but never Europe. So we should not delude ourselves that leaving the EU will for one moment mend all that needs mending in our society—in particular, the sense for many of being left behind and facing a frightening pace of change, locked out of the opportunities in our globalised economy and often feeling threatened by them. It was therefore not surprising when subsequent social surveys showed that immigration was in fact an issue that served, for significant numbers of people, as a proxy for their other fears about their lives.

In areas of steep recent growth in the immigrant population, the impact of immigration was obviously the issue, but let us recognise that it was also often the peg on which other concerns—just as real—were hung. It has now been made a more central issue even than the well-being of our economy and other vital national interests which rest on our membership of the European Union, with the consequence that we have to attend, cap in hand, on the most unpredictable US Administration in living memory.

To turn to the negotiation process, the Government have damaged the national interest by throwing away their cards in the first two rounds of this process: first, by accepting that Article 50 should be triggered early, as the EU requested, rather than treating that issue as one to negotiate about to our national advantage; and secondly, and perhaps more seriously, by declaring at the outset our intention to leave both the single market and the customs union. How much better it would have been to offer other members of the European Union a choice: make reasonable and real changes to the right of free movement, such as would satisfy most of those who voted to leave, and we will stay in the single market and the customs union; or deny even that, and you will force us out.

This makes the need for proper parliamentary engagement even more urgent if we are to get this process back on track, remembering the important part that the Supreme Court played in getting Parliament engaged in the first place. We all know that it is often more effective to negotiate if you do so as the agent of a powerful principal. Parliament—our Parliament—should be that powerful principal, and it must make clear what is and what is not acceptable to it: its own red lines. The Prime Minister should realise that that would only fortify her and her team.

At the very least, therefore, as the lead letter in the Times today suggests, Parliament must have the right to determine what happens if negotiations break down or if it considers that the terms arrived at are not in the national interest. We are, after all, a parliamentary and a representative democracy.

As we stand, therefore, two of our limited quids have been given away in exchange for no EU quos. It is not a good start, but there is a way back, if Parliament asserts itself and the Prime Minister recognises the strength that Parliament can give her in delivering the best available for our country and its people.