European Union Referendum Bill
Debate between Cheryl Gillan and Alex Salmond(8 years, 10 months ago)
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Mrs Cheryl Gillan (Chesham and Amersham) (Con)
It is a great pleasure to follow the hon. Lady, who speaks for Vauxhall. I agree with almost every word she said. I have been sitting next to my right hon. and learned Friend the Member for Rushcliffe (Mr Clarke), and, although he is a much-revered Member and a man I have known for a long time, I am afraid I cannot agree with his remarks on this occasion.
I am very pleased to support and welcome the Second Reading of this Bill. For almost my entire adult life, Europe seems to have dominated the debate: whether it has been de Gaulle’s efforts to keep us out—in some ways it is a shame they did not succeed; the referendum, in which I voted yes originally; or indeed the negotiations on the Maastricht treaty. That was an exhausting process and, as a signatory with many colleagues to the “fresh start” early-day motion, one that is seared on my memory of my first term in the House.
I welcome this opportunity to clarify our relationship with the other 27 members of the EU, to recalibrate it and then to put it to the people of this country in a vote. It is quite right that we should re-examine that relationship, not least because, at a time when we are tightening the purse strings to pay off this country’s overdraft, we should look at the money we pay in subscription to that expensive club, which was about £9.8 billion on the most recent examination. To get a perspective on that, I was looking at what we contribute to the UN regular budget and to the UN peacekeeping budget, and they amount to £85 million and £301 million. I welcome the fact that the Government have got the review of the balance of competences, which has given us the necessary audit information to move forward, and I hope that the Chancellor and the Prime Minister can produce the reforms that this country and the institution of Europe need to make that institution and our membership fit for purpose. After all, 200 million more people have joined the EU since we signed up to membership of that club.
I have some concerns not just about the Bill but about what might happen. I am worried that this debate will dominate our political landscape for the next two years. It must not override and interfere with our domestic agenda so ably set out in the winning manifesto that took us to election victory, and neither should it be used to split our party, as it has done in the past; there has always been a range of opinions about the EU in our party. We should have an objective negotiation and a plan of action set out by the Government, and then I hope that the leadership will allow individual MPs to promote their views without fear or favour, no matter their rank within or without government.
The timing will be crucial. I urge the Government to lay out more clearly their thinking about timetabling. My experience with the Welsh referendum was that the Welsh Government were determined not to have the referendum at the same time as the elections for the Welsh Assembly. I hear what SNP Members are saying, and I believe that there are some valid arguments to be deployed. In fact, I believe that the referendum is so important that perhaps it should be a stand-alone referendum. I hope that the Government will listen to the views laid out by others with whom I do not agree with politically in any way, shape or form, but with whom I am willing to make common cause when I think they are being sensible.
I hope that the Government will resist the call for the triple lock, quadruple lock—or whatever we are going to call it now. I asked the House of Commons Library to look at the disaggregation by UK constituent nation of the EU budget contributions and receipts. My right hon. Friend the Minister will be interested to know that it clearly shows that although the average cost across the UK in the last year for which figures were available was £48 per head, when that is disaggregated, we see that the real burden falls on England. The cost of membership is £72 per capita in England, whereas in Scotland, it is a mere £2; in Wales minus £74; and in Northern Ireland minus £160. So the devolved nations, which are effectively featherbedded against the real cost of membership, should not be allowed to slant the results of any referendum by demanding an individual country lock on any result.
Alex Salmond
I will not go into featherbedding and 30 years of oil revenues, but I do wonder where this argument is taking the right hon. Lady. If she believes the referendum should be based on financial contribution, by extension her argument would mean that Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland should not get a vote at all. Is she aware that 3.5% of the population, or 13 states, of the United States of America can block a constitutional amendment there?
Mrs Gillan
This is not the United States of America, and the people of Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland have a vote as members of the UK—and long may they remain so.
We will need clear and straightforward messages, because, as is obvious from the debate so far, there will be myriad voices in the referendum campaign, and the options will not be easy for the man in the street to understand. However, I share the concerns of my right hon. Friend the Member for North Shropshire (Mr Paterson) about the purdah. When I was Secretary of State for Wales, I ran a successful referendum on more devolution of powers to Wales, but I remained strictly neutral, because I thought that that was the right way to behave, and indeed it was a successful referendum and nobody felt that I had slanted it from my position as Secretary of State.
It is also important that the necessary intricacies of article 50 of the treaty on European Union be spelt out to people. On both sides of the argument, we need to know what would govern the processes and negotiations of unilateral withdrawal. However, the terms of engagement in and around the referendum period with other European institutions must also be made clear. For example, do the Front-Bench team know what plans any of the devolved Governments within the UK have for spending money on this referendum, or indeed what plans the European Commission or other European institutions have? I think we might find money being spent from other directions that will slant the results of the referendum.
I do not share the views of the right hon. Member for Gordon (Alex Salmond) on the franchise for 16-year-olds. I was at a school in my constituency when I expressed that opinion, and I thought I would be out of kilter with what they thought, but—surprisingly—many of those young people told me they would not be confident about making the decisions necessary in a general election or referendum campaign. I would, therefore, like the franchise to remain as it is.
We have been a member of the EU for many years, but for the past couple of decades it has been clear that the British public have fallen out of love with it. It is also clear, however, that we cannot stop being European—and nor do many want to stop. I hear from people that they want to reverse the feeling of impotence that has developed over the increasingly centralised European decision-making process. Specifically, they want a fair deal in Europe without disproportionate and disadvantaging regulatory costs. At a time when we are heralding devolution so widely at home, we need to see this principle applied firmly to our EU relationship.
The Bill is about an internal process and, as such, does not constitute the real substance of this debate, but before we can get on with putting our renegotiated position into a shop window for people to examine, we need to pass the Bill so that people know that the process will be fair and not loaded in favour of our remaining in an institution that has seemed to load so many processes in its own favour over recent years.