European Union Referendum Bill

Baroness Miller of Chilthorne Domer Excerpts

Monday 2nd November 2015 Lords Chamber

Moved by

[Baroness Miller of Chilthorne Domer]

14: Clause 2, page 2, line 7, at end insert—
“( ) any United Kingdom citizen who does not fall within paragraph (a), but is resident in the European Union and has registered to vote in the referendum,”

[Baroness Miller of Chilthorne Domer (LD)]

My Lords, I remind the Committee of my interests as declared in the register: when Parliament is not sitting, I live in France, where my husband and I have a vineyard and a wine business. We have many friends there who are UK citizens, a number of whom have lived there for more than 15 years.

I am very grateful to the other noble Lords who have put their names to my amendment. I am sure they will have many good examples to bring before the Committee. Last Tuesday, when we discussed elections, the noble Lord, Lord Dobbs, asked for examples of real people. I am very happy to provide them. Indeed, I gave a couple of examples at Second Reading. But, first, I want to talk about the principle. I make it absolutely clear that I am not arguing for votes for life in general or local elections. Those elections involve different arguments about whether someone has invested in another country emotionally and financially more than they may have done in the country of which they are a citizen. What is before us today is a totally separate and different matter of whether British citizens who have lived in the EU for more than 15 years should have an exceptional franchise in this EU referendum. I am sure that they should.

If we can make a rule that exceptionally, Peers can vote in this referendum, we can surely make the same exceptional provision for a group with at least as great an interest in the matter as anyone in your Lordships’ House—and a group, I submit, with a lot more at stake. These British expats in the EU will face a giant step into the unknown, should the vote lead to an exit from the EU. They will face a mass of questions. Will they need to apply to become a citizen of the country in which they live? Will that even be possible? Will they pass any financial or language requirements? What will happen to their healthcare arrangements? How quickly will reciprocal arrangements cease? These issues have all been raised with me by very worried people. Even driving a motor car is not a given. My American friends Hank and Cindy, who live in France, have had real difficulty passing the French driving theory test, which comprises some 3,000 questions, all in a foreign language. I am not sure that many British expats of 70 and over would be able to do that.

Then there are those with businesses. For them, the implications are immense. Brian Cave from south-west France, who has long campaigned on this issue, says: “There are another half million or thereabouts in business on their own account or employed who are likewise concerned. It hardly needs expressing but they are concerned about the possibility of work permits—free movement around the continent. Free movement of capital for their businesses and for their own future pensions”.

With all these massive questions hanging over their future, surely these expats are absolutely entitled to a vote on whether or not the UK should remain in the EU. The fact that they have lived abroad for more than 15 years does not diminish that right but increases it. Years ago, they took to heart in an especially personal way the idea of the EU as a place in which to live and work, and so they have much more at stake. Many moved to the EU for employment after university. Those people often now have children at a critical stage in their schooling, and they will face upheaval in their own careers. In November 2012, a Home Office study showed that the majority of British citizens who emigrated abroad between 1999 and 2010 did so to work. Therefore, they moved abroad for a good reason and do not deserve to be penalised for it.

At this point I will give one example. Jane Golding says, “I now work in Germany as a lawyer under my home title practising EU law. I can do this because EU rules on mutual recognition of professional qualifications allow me to practise under my own title throughout the EU”. She has had an international career spanning four different EU countries. She says: “If the UK leaves the EU I could face losing my livelihood, because those rules no longer apply to me. Changing my citizenship, which I do not want to do, would not help. The worst-case scenario would be that I would need to requality. In short, having relied on my freedom of movement to leave the UK to find work in my field I now find myself deprived of a say in my future ”.

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Faulks]

The Government have their priorities and a considerable amount of legislation has been introduced, some of which has moved fairly slowly through your Lordships’ House. I cannot speak for the Government’s assessment of their priorities. This is an important matter and it will no doubt take its place in due course.

The noble Baroness, Lady Royall, suggested that the Government’s enthusiasm for UK citizens having a vote outside the EU might be motivated by their apparent desire to vote Conservative. As I have said consistently from the Dispatch Box, we have no idea how people would vote, whether they live in the EU or outside it. The Government are simply not concerned with trying to second-guess anything. They are concerned only with legitimacy—here, I agree entirely with the noble Baroness—that people feel there has been no manipulation and no sense that there has been an attempt to skew the result, however illegitimate they might think it was. We suggest that the best criterion is to have the Westminster franchise. Of course, I am sympathetic to much that lies behind the amendment, having regard to the Government’s commitment in respect of votes for life.

I should finally point out that many British citizens living in the EU and elsewhere in the world will be able to vote in the referendum as long as they have not been living overseas for 15 years or more. The parliamentary franchise already allows them to vote. So while I am sympathetic to the amendment, I do not believe that this is the time or place to make those changes.

[Baroness Miller of Chilthorne Domer]

My Lords, I warmly thank all those who have spoken in this interesting debate, which I think has fleshed out some of the major questions. I would like to make a couple of points. The noble Lord, Lord Grocott, asked what the difference is between someone living in Oslo and someone living in Stockholm, and other noble Lords had that question in their minds. The difference is that the people living in EU countries, when they decided to work or to retire abroad, for example, did so on the basis of being EU citizens, not citizens of anywhere else. What we are possibly about to remove in the EU referendum, if it goes the other way, is that EU citizenship. That puts them into a totally different category.

[Lord Grocott]

But, my Lords, as soon as you start speculating about other people’s motives, you end up in pretty deep water. It might be that someone has gone to live and work in Oslo because Norway is not a member of the European Union. You simply cannot make those kinds of judgments about people’s motivations.

[Baroness Miller of Chilthorne Domer]

I am clearly not going to agree with the noble Lord on that one. I think that there is a basic difference between us in our understanding of what being an EU citizen is. However, I was not as depressed by that argument as by the one put forward by several noble Lords—notably the noble Lord, Lord Dobbs—that it really all seems to be much too difficult. There are too many people and how would we reach them? That is not a reason for not giving people the vote.

[Lord Dobbs]

The noble Baroness really must not misunderstand me. I was not saying that it would be too difficult; I was simply saying that there are practical issues which need to be taken into account. They cannot be swept aside by somebody’s passion for a principle that they have suddenly grabbed on to in opposition, but seemed to be rather quiet about when they were in the coalition Government.

[Baroness Miller of Chilthorne Domer]

I think what the noble Lord said when he referred to Hansard was that there were too many practical problems. That comes back to the Government’s attitude, too. I can see that we are not likely to agree at this stage, but I am very glad to have discovered the true objection to the reason for giving people a vote. Before Report, it would be very useful if noble Lords dissociated votes for life, which is a totally different issue, from the right to vote in the EU referendum. I respectfully say to the noble Baroness, Lady Morgan of Ely, that she talked a lot about what is effectively a votes-for-life issue. When we come back to the Bill on Report, we need to concentrate solely on the EU referendum and not get diverted by something the Government seem to offer as a sop, saying that there is going to be a Bill on votes for life, if there is time, in this Parliament. Most of the EU ex-pats I have come across are Conservative voters—so I am not batting for them because I think we will do well out of it in the long run—and they are appalled at being given such a short straw.

Finally, several noble Lords who oppose these amendments seem to draw comfort from the fact that lots of EU citizens have been in the EU for less than 15 years and therefore would have a right to vote. That is no reason to feel better, because noble Lords themselves have discovered the inequity in their argument. I will come back to this issue on Report, but in the meantime I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.

Amendment 14 withdrawn.