European Union (Withdrawal) (No. 6) Bill

Debate between Christopher Chope and William Cash

3rd reading: House of Commons & Committee: 1st sitting: House of Commons
Wednesday 4th September 2019 Commons Chamber

[Sir William Cash]

That is true. Indeed, we had all this back in April when, if one looks at the text of the decision and the manner in which it has taken, one can see that it was hedged with certain conditions. What is going on here is that this Bill is driving us to do something that is in complete contravention to the decision that has been taken already in section 1 of the European Union (Withdrawal) Act 2018, which itself implements the decision that was taken by the British people. This Bill undermines the referendum, it undermines the law of the land as expressed in section 1 of the 2018 Act, and the commencement order has already been made.

I pay tribute to my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Exiting the European Union for bringing in that commencement order, which makes things a done deal. We are now in a position whereby we have repealed the European Communities Act 1972, subject only to the fact that the law of the land says that that will have effect on 31 October. This Bill is a monstrous piece of legislation designed to turn inside out not only our constitutional arrangements, but the decision of the British people in the referendum and Government policy.

The Prime Minister established another important point in his leadership election result. He got two thirds of the parliamentary Conservative party to vote for him, and he got two thirds of the grassroots—the associations—to vote for him. If ever a Prime Minister had a mandate to make such decisions within the framework of the Conservative party, it is there, which is another reason why I take exception to the fact that this Bill is going through because a number of colleagues—I am sorry to have to say this, because it is a sad business—are flying in the face of the mandate that the Prime Minister got within the framework of the Conservative party.

There is no doubt whatsoever that, within the framework of our constitution—and I will conclude with these words—it is simply monstrous that we should be put in a position where a judicial duty is imposed on the Prime Minister to make a decision under the terms of this Bill. Frankly, I find it inconceivable that anyone could possibly vote for it.

[Sir Christopher Chope (Christchurch) (Con)]

It is a pleasure to follow my hon. Friend the Member for Stone (Sir William Cash) who, as always, is on the side of the optimists rather than the defeatists.

Listening to the hon. Member for Aberavon (Stephen Kinnock), with whom I have had the pleasure of serving on the Brexit Committee, I fear he is a pessimist in this. He thinks we need a compromise, but he does not talk about the need for the European Union to compromise. He talks only about the need for the United Kingdom to compromise, in the face of a clear commitment by the British people to leave the European Union.

I will speak briefly to the amendments in my name and in the name of my right hon. and hon. Friends. Three years ago, the people of the United Kingdom instructed us, with the largest democratic mandate in our history, to obtain a divorce from the European Union and, in March 2017, Parliament accepted that instruction by giving notice under article 50 of the EU treaty.

Article 50 makes provision for an amicable divorce or for a divorce without agreement. In a traditional divorce to dissolve a marriage, both parties accept the irretrievable breakdown and try to agree sensible future arrangements, but the EU has never accepted Brexit. The EU and its institutions do not want a divorce. If there was any doubt about that, it has been made clear to us on the Brexit Committee whenever we have visited the European institutions and their leaders that the EU is just hoping and praying that Brexit will go away and that we will remain in the European Union.

They do not want a divorce, so their motivation is to contest that divorce by putting forward unreasonable and unacceptable terms that offer us only a punishment deal. My right hon. Friend the Member for Maidenhead (Mrs May) anticipated that in her Lancaster House speech, in which she said she feared that that might be the approach of the European Union, that it would be intent on offering us a punishment deal.

That is exactly what the EU has done, and the only alternative to a punishment deal under article 50 is no deal. Unless amended, this Bill will remove even that option, which enables us to put pressure on the European Union to come to the negotiating table to talk about a better deal.

As my right hon. Friend the Leader of the House said yesterday, this is a dreadful deal that has already been rejected by the House on several occasions. With this Bill, are we really going to be left with the options of either no Brexit or Brexit in name only? That is essentially what we are talking about tonight.

The United Kingdom’s freedom to divorce under article 50 is constrained by this Bill by being made subject to an EU veto that enables the EU to block Brexit, effectively indefinitely, unless or until the UK reneges on the decision of a referendum. The Bill removes any incentive for the EU to negotiate, which is why the Prime Minister is right. If this Bill passes tonight, we will take away from him any opportunity to negotiate. All he could do is be a supplicant at the table of the European Union. In effect, this would be an example of modern international slavery, where we are imprisoned by the EU with no reasonable way out.

European Union Referendum Bill

Debate between Christopher Chope and William Cash

Tuesday 16th June 2015 Commons Chamber

[Sir William Cash]

I seem to have spurred my right hon. and learned Friend to a passionate pursuit of his arguments, because he does not want what I am proposing at all. The fact is that the Electoral Commission says the proposal to remove section 125

“could mean that governments and others will be free to spend unlimited amounts of public funds promoting an outcome at the referendum right up until polling day.”

It goes on to say:

“In the Commission’s view, there is a risk that the use of significant amounts of public money for promotional activity could give an unfair advantage to one side of the argument. Unlimited government spending would also undermine the principle of having spending limits for registered campaigns.”

We have already heard about the interference in the Scottish referendum, and what the right hon. Member for Gordon (Alex Salmond) said is completely right.

[Mr Chope]

Does my hon. Friend agree that it is ironic that the section 125 provisions were adopted by the Venice Commission in the following year and are now universal best practice, and that the Venice Commission has endorsed the fact that there should be a prohibition on Government expenditure in the four weeks of the referendum campaign?

[Sir William Cash]

That is absolutely right. I was going to refer to that, but I am grateful to my hon. Friend for making the point.

I want to refer to what section 125 actually does say, because the proposal is to remove that tonight, in the face of our opposition. The explanatory notes accompanying the Bill state what they do:

“These Explanatory Notes have been prepared by the Foreign and Commonwealth Office…to help inform debate”

and

“in order to assist the reader of the Bill”.

However, paragraph 52 of the notes gives no explanation and simply says:

“Paragraph 25 provides that section 125 of the 2000 Act does not apply for the purposes of this referendum”,

and then mentions a consequential amendment. There is no explanation at all. That itself is a reason for our being concerned about the way this is being done.

I want to return to the question of what we are repealing. What is in the 2000 Act is very sound. It refers to

“any material which—

(a) provides general information about a referendum to which this Part applies;

(b) deals with any of the issues raised by any question on which such a referendum is being held;

(c) puts any arguments for or against any particular answer to any such question; or

(d) is designed to encourage voting at such a referendum.”

It is very comprehensive.

Commission Work Programme 2015

Debate between Christopher Chope and William Cash

Monday 9th March 2015 Commons Chamber

[Sir William Cash]

That is completely right. People think—in elements of the BBC and elsewhere, I suspect—that this is somehow a matter of policy, and that by using the right words one can change the effect of European law. No, we cannot. We have to pass legislation. There has to be a majority in this House to override European laws and regulations. It is, ultimately and tragically, a legal framework rather than just simply a question of policy based on the wishes of voters, as expressed by their representatives in Parliament. This has only fairly recently begun to gain traction with some people in the public arena, but not sufficiently, I am afraid, to achieve the kind of impartial analysis I believe is needed, for example in the BBC. Without going into this now, I have invited—in fact, I have effectively forced—the director-general and the editor-in-chief of the BBC to appear before my Committee to explain this problem in the kind of language that ordinary people can understand. That will take place on Wednesday afternoon at 2.30 pm, for those who want to take note.

The Prime Minister’s speech had a lot in it, which demonstrated the extent to which he wants to try to resolve many of these questions. That is undeniable, but the question we have to address, and to which I now turn, is the extent to which it would require treaty change or otherwise—that is the acid test.

My first general remark is that the package includes only one proposal that directly limits or imposes a quota on the number of EU migrants. This would relate to future accessions and so could be part of normal negotiations. However, to impose a direct limit on migration from existing member states would certainly require treaty change.

My second general comment is that many of the relevant treaty obligations have already been interpreted in this context by the European Court of Justice. The Court plays a huge, vital and exceptional role, and cannot be appealed against. It has already interpreted these matters as providing limitation on the action that member states can take in this area. Indeed, the recent case of Dano, which is frequently referred to—the Foreign Secretary referred to it on “The Andrew Marr Show” only this weekend—demonstrates that the Court can change its approach.

However, some of the judgments mentioned are long-standing, well-entrenched and engage charter rights. Any change along the lines suggested by the Prime Minister would therefore not be sufficiently strong, to the extent that they rely on the Court of Justice changing its established jurisprudence. That is why we want the Commission to take account of these points—these are the issues. The European Commission is the legal guardian of the treaties. The point I am making in this speech is that, in order to change the law to ensure that we can actually deal properly with the problems that come from free movement, we have to persuade the Commission, in its work programme, to take account of such relevant questions. It could be inferred from what the Prime Minister had to say that he accepted that some treaty change would be required—and in fact, when he was asked questions, he accepted that towards the end—but there are a number of real problems, and I will now turn to them.

The first problem that the European Commission will have to consider in its work programme is a stronger power to refuse entry and to deport criminals. The free movement directive, which the European Commission has to enforce, requires decisions to be taken on a case-by-case basis on the grounds permissible by the treaty. That provision reflects Court of Justice jurisprudence extending across a wide range of treaty rights, including the freedom to travel to other member states to receive services, which is highly relevant to the work programme. It is likely that any significant stronger action will require treaty change, particularly if it detracts from the requirement derived from the principle of proportionality to look at each individual case.

Secondly, I believe a ban on re-entry for those who have abused EU rights may be possible, as this falls within the public policy exception to the treaty right of free movement. However, there are again questions of proportionality.

[Mr Chope]

Is this not all pie in the sky? There is no way in which the Commission or other member states will agree to these fundamental changes. Is that not why we need to go back to basics and have a free trade organisation without the free movement of people, just as we have free trade agreements with other countries without having to take in all their people as a right, without any control over them? Would it not be better to work towards, for example, visa waiver systems?

[Sir William Cash]

I very much agree with what my hon. Friend says. In fact, if I may say so, I have said it many times in the past myself. However, we have to be able to identify the problems that have been presented by making assertions that we want this and we want that, in order to demonstrate the fact that it cannot be done before we move to the next step, which is of the kind that he and I would want: to address this on a realistic footing and to say to the European Commission, the European institutions and the Government that these proposals are simply not going to stack up because they are not going to happen. There is no chance of a treaty change as far as I can see—my hon. Friend and other hon. Members in the Chamber obviously agree—that will result in getting rid of the dangers presented to the United Kingdom as a result of imagining we will be able to do things, when in practice we know perfectly well it is not going to happen because we will not get the treaty change.

There is also the problem of access to tax credits, housing benefits and social housing for four years. The law of the Court of Justice indicates that an attempt to do this would be contrary to the treaty rights of free movement insofar as the limits on benefit extend to benefits for jobseekers linked to labour market participation and benefits to those who are classified as workers. Such persons are entitled to equal treatment as a treaty right. There is another problem. These things are not going to go away. My hon. Friend is completely right, as I have said so often, not to allow ourselves to be induced to believe that because we say something it will happen, particularly when we are dealing with the acquis communautaire and the rules and regulations that are imposed, which we voluntarily accepted in this House under the 1972 Act. We are the only country of the 28 member states that has the right, because of our constitutional arrangements—we do not have a written constitution—to make changes and override that legislation if we so wish to do. We can do it. The question is: have we got the political will in relation to matters of vital national interest?

Any restriction on access to social housing would likely be regarded as discrimination on the grounds of nationality. Thus, that too would be contrary to the treaty. There is then the question of removal if jobseekers do not find a job in six months. The law of the European Court of Justice overrides even this Parliament, by our voluntary agreement, but we can unwind it if we wish to do so by using the notwithstanding formula to override it and pass a law in this place. If jobseekers do not find a job in six months and are faced with removal, we could legislate. Under sections 2 and 3 of the European Communities Act, however, Court of Justice law prevents it, on the grounds that it interferes with the treaty right of free movement—insofar as a jobseeker can demonstrate that he or she is continuing to seek work and has a genuine chance of being engaged. Thus—again—treaty change is likely to be necessary.

Then there is the requirement for a job offer before entry—the same case law points to the requirement for treaty change on that account, too. Then there is the further restriction on the entry of non-EU family members. The rights of family members to enter with someone who has rights as an EU worker are set out explicitly in the free movement directive and could in principle be adjusted by amendment to the directive, but limits to wholesale change are set by the requirements not to undermine the essence of the treaty right of free movement and to respect human rights.

As I mentioned in my lead letter in yesterday’s The Sunday Telegraph, there is also the problem of human rights issues in respect of the deportation of terrorists, who can also insist on the right to family life under the present arrangements. We have to get real about this. We have to change it. So far, the Court has taken a consistently firm approach in favour of ensuring family life where these matters arise in the context of free movement, and it is likely to continue to do so—with huge implications for the number of people who can enter.

Finally, there is the question of whether there should be no child benefit for non-resident children. The requirement to pay child benefit for children in another member state is currently in the social security co-ordination regulations. It is theoretically possible to amend the regulations to end these payments, but it would raise the serious question of indirect discrimination on nationality grounds—again contrary to treaty free movement rights— and the same would apply to the proposal to limit child benefit paid abroad to that paid in the child’s country of residence.

I do not mean to criticise for the sake of it. I have tried to present the House with a proper examination and legal analysis of the problems, which would not have been the case had we not been able to debate the amendment, and it is now on the record that these are serious problems that cannot simply be washed away with fine words and which in most cases will require treaty change. When I wrote to the Prime Minister 10 days before his speech, I asked if he would be good enough to seek the advice of the Attorney-General and Government lawyers on the questions I raised. I trust that the House, the Minister and the Prime Minister will listen, and that we will take the steps necessary to deal with the vexed issue of immigration in a manner that overrides the treaties and the charter, as and when it is in our vital national interest to do so.

Overseas Voters Bill

Debate between Christopher Chope and William Cash

Friday 23rd January 2015 Commons Chamber

[Mr Chope]

Clause 3 would apply only to British citizens who were ordinarily resident overseas, not those who happened to be on holiday. The latter group would be brought in only in the event of our extending internet or online voting to the United Kingdom electorate, and it is important to distinguish between those two groups. It is much more complicated to deal with people voting while on holiday than with those who are resident overseas.

[Sir William Cash (Stone) (Con)]

I very much agree with my hon. Friend’s Bill because, as he would say himself, this is about the rights of British residents to vote in a general election. Has he made any comparison with other countries—perhaps, although not exclusively, in other parts of the European Union—that have similar arrangements? Should the Bill apply not only to parliamentary elections but, for example, to a referendum on the EU?

[Mr Chope]

I understand that the franchise for an EU referendum includes all those who are eligible to participate in a parliamentary election, and I would stick to that. If we encouraged more people from overseas to register, they would be able to participate in a national referendum that had been extended to all registered voters.

I sometimes monitor elections on behalf of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe, and almost all its 47 countries have more extensive systems for facilitating voting by their diaspora, as it is described, than we do. Many countries extend voting arrangements to providing facilities in embassies, consulates and other places, in addition to postal or proxy votes. Those countries believe—quite rightly—that their diaspora is an important part of that country, and that people should be encouraged to participate in its affairs. That can best be done by participating in elections. We are probably well behind the curve by comparison with the 47 member countries of the Council of Europe. That is another reason why the Bill needs immediate attention rather than putting on the back burner.

HS2 Funding Referendum Bill

Debate between Christopher Chope and William Cash

Friday 23rd January 2015 Commons Chamber

[Sir William Cash (Stone) (Con)]

I totally support everything that has been said and my hon. Friend’s efforts on behalf of all the people who are opposed to this project.

[Mr Chope]

I also want to thank a lot of people who have helped to raise awareness of this debate, particularly one of my constituents, Penny Gaines, who moved into my constituency relatively recently, having been forced out of the constituency where she lived before but unable to sell her house at a reasonable price because of the blight of HS2. She remains very strongly opposed to the project, as do large numbers of my constituents.

The question people ask at this stage of a debate is, “Where next?” I am reliably informed that if we pushed the Bill to a Second Reading, it would not receive the Government’s support for a money resolution and would therefore be unable to make any progress. It would not be able to go into Committee or be dealt with before the end of this Session—the last Session of this Parliament.

However, this issue is not going to go away. Our country is still running an annual deficit of close to £100 billion a year. The HS2 hybrid Bill is still in Committee and will be there beyond the general election. Come June, after the general election, there will be a fresh ballot for private Members’ Bills and I hope that a successful colleague will promote a Bill along the same lines as mine. We will then be able to drum up the necessary support to give the Bill a Second Reading, take it to Committee and, I hope, get it on the statute book.

As the right hon. Member for Holborn and St Pancras has said, it is obscene for such a proposal to waste so much public money when taxpayers’ money is so scarce, and the Front Benchers, in a cosy alliance, are trying to force it through against the will of the people.

Finally, the £20 billion for Crossrail 2 is an additional cost to that for HS2. Without it, people getting off HS2 would not have anywhere to go because it would be so congested. My right hon. Friend the Minister gave no answer to that and there was no clear answer from the Opposition representative, the hon. Member for Nottingham South (Lilian Greenwood). I am afraid that typifies what has almost become a dialogue of the deaf on this issue. Ultimately, this is costing the taxpayers money, and the Government need to be brought to account.

I look forward to this Bill, or something like it, being reintroduced later in this calendar year and, ultimately, making it to the statute book. I beg to ask leave to withdraw the motion.

Motion and Bill, by leave, withdrawn.

UK Borders Control Bill

Debate between Christopher Chope and William Cash

Friday 9th January 2015 Commons Chamber

[Mr Christopher Chope (Christchurch) (Con)]

I beg to move, That the Bill be now read a Second time.

Let me share a chilling thought with the House. The United States had both the suspects of Wednesday’s Paris atrocity on its travel ban list, but the two French citizens who are the suspects were freely able to come to and go from the United Kingdom should they have so wished. That is one of the consequences of our lack of control over our borders, in stark contrast with the control that the United States has over its borders.

The principal attribute of a sovereign country is its ability and rights to control which aliens, that is non-citizens, can visit or stay and which cannot. That is the issue that the Prime Minister has correctly highlighted in his various speeches on immigration during the course of this Parliament. On 14 April 2011, he said that

“for too long, immigration has been too high. Between 1997 and 2009, 2.2 million more people came to live in this country than left to live abroad. That’s the largest influx of people Britain as ever had…and it has placed real pressures on communities up and down the country. Not just pressures on schools, housing and healthcare—though those have been serious…but social pressures too.”

He went on to talk about those social pressures and issues relating to integration. The Prime Minister referred to 2.2 million extra people coming to this country between 1997 and 2009, and it is against that background that the Conservative party manifesto for the last general election said that

“immigration today is too high and needs to be reduced. We do not need to attract people to do jobs that could be carried out by British citizens, given the right training and support. So we will take steps to take net migration back to the levels of the 1990s—tens of thousands a year, not hundreds of thousands.”

That led to the pledge.

What are the latest figures? They show that between June 2010 and June 2015—that is, over the course of this Parliament—we will have a net increase of migration into our country of a further 1.1 million. Roughly speaking, that is some 200,000 people a year for the first three years, 250,000 people last year and a similar number this year. That means that over the course of the five years of this Parliament, the rate of increase will be even greater than the rate of increase that was so rightly criticised by the Prime Minister in his speech in 2011 and that led to his concerns being reflected in the Conservative party manifesto. I welcome the Prime Minister’s recent reaffirmation in his speech on 29 November that he is determined to try to get net immigration down below 100,000 a year—in other words, to the tens of thousands.

It is worth considering a brief history of what has happened. The treaty of Rome in 1957 set out free movement for economically active people—in other words, for people who were working or self-employed. Everybody thought it was perfectly reasonable that someone who had a job could go and undertake it in another country within what was then the European Community comprising a much small number of nations. In the early 1990s, that right was extended to the non-economically active. Worst of all, article 8 of the treaty on the European Union conferred rights as European citizens on all those holding individual nationality of an individual member state. Against that background, this Government and this Parliament are severely constrained in what they are able to do about this matter unless we change the law along the lines set out in this Bill.

Clause 3 states:

“Section 7 of the Immigration Act 1988 is hereby repealed.”

That section, which is entitled “Persons exercising community rights and nationals of member States”, says:

“A person shall not under the principal Act require leave to enter or remain in the United Kingdom in any case in which he is entitled to do so by virtue of an enforceable Community right or of any provision made under section 2(2) of the European Communities Act 1972.”

It then goes on to explain how that will be implemented. Interestingly, although most of section 7 was passed into law on 20 July 1988, section 7(1) was not passed into law until 20 July 1994—six years later. I suspect that that is because the Government of the time realised in the late ’80s and early ’90s, when we had Prime Minister Thatcher in charge, that the implications of implementing it in full would potentially be very significant. Let us remember that at that stage net immigration into the United Kingdom, including immigration from the European Union, was running at about 37,000 a year. Now, over 120,000 people a year are coming in just from other countries within the European Union. In my submission, we need to ensure that the people who are currently given a privileged position under section 7 have that removed from them so that each case can be treated on its merits, as I think the public would wish.

The problem is that because of European law and the judgments that are passed by the European Court of Justice, even groups that we thought were exempt from the provisions of section 7 are now being included. In the case of Chen, for example, the United Kingdom initially made provision to allow the primary carers of European economic area residents—self-sufficient children —to seek leave to enter or remain under paragraph 257C to 257E of the immigration rules. In that case, it was ruled that those people were entitled to come in anyway. Whatever has been passed by the European Community has been extended in its impact, making it more difficult for us to be able to take control of our own borders.

Clause 1 reasserts the sovereignty of the United Kingdom in determining which non-UK citizens may enter our country and the circumstances in which non-UK citizens may be required to leave the United Kingdom.

Clause 2, which is entitled “Regulation of entry by non-UK citizens”, says:

“Notwithstanding the provisions of the European Communities Acts, or of any other Act or Order, Regulation or Directive, the United Kingdom retains the exclusive right to regulate entry by non-UK citizens to the United Kingdom and to determine the circumstances in which non-UK citizens may be required to leave the United Kingdom.”

I have referred already to clause 3. Clause 4 deals with registration certificates. Obviously, we must have some system of ensuring that people who are in this country who are not United Kingdom citizens are able easily to demonstrate their right to be in this country. That is why clause 4 states:

“From the date of the coming into force of this Act and notwithstanding the provisions of the European Communities Act 1972, any non-UK citizen resident in the United Kingdom without the authority to remain in the United Kingdom provided by a current visa, visa waiver, residence permit or other official document must apply for a registration certificate to confirm their right of residence in the United Kingdom.”

The clause goes on to set out how that would work. Certificates would be issued and administered by the Secretary of State, and the content of the forms and the grounds on which applications could be granted or refused would be prescribed by the Secretary of State.

The model that I used for those provisions is what is currently contained in the UK visas and immigration legislation, under which one can apply for a registration certificate. There is no requirement for a European economic area or Swiss national exercising treaty rights to fill in an application for such a registration certificate, but they are encouraged so to do because they can then demonstrate that they are entitled to be in the United Kingdom. Clause 4 would operate on that basis, except that under my Bill it would be mandatory for somebody to apply for a registration certificate and hold such a certificate.

As an aside, one can see what a farcical situation we have reached. The Government have said that they are concerned that a large number of people with criminal convictions from other European Union countries are coming into the United Kingdom, so I was encouraged when I saw that the application form for a registration certificate says under section 10:

“Please provide details as requested below of any criminal convictions you may have both in the UK and overseas.”

There is provision to set out all that detail. It is in the national interest that we should know whether people applying to come into this country have criminal convictions. There has been a series of well-publicised cases where people with previous criminal convictions have committed further crimes in the United Kingdom, which has caused outrage.That was fine, until I noticed that the form went on to say:

“However, please note that should you fail to provide this information this will not result in the rejection of your application.”

That is written in because the European Union will not allow us to require such information. This is just another example of the farcical situation that we are in at present, where we do not have control over the people entering and leaving our country.

Under clause 4, the registration certificate system would require people to fill in the form accurately and give information about their previous criminal convictions, in exactly the same way as anybody who wishes to go to the United States of America has to obtain a visa. If it is all right for the United States, why is it not all right for the United Kingdom, which is an attractive place to visit? People are not deterred from visiting the United States by such a requirement, and they would be no more inhibited from coming to our country if we had such requirements. The Bill would ensure that as far as possible people would be able to stay in the United Kingdom if they wanted to, provided they had registration certificates.

There is no point in issuing a command without having a sanction, so clause 5 states that anyone who is present in the United Kingdom after 31 December 2015 without legal authority or without having applied on or before that date for a registration certificate shall be guilty of an offence, as would anybody who entered or attempted to enter the United Kingdom without legal authority after that date. Clause 6 sets out the penalties. Under the current regime, there are no effective penalties against those who come into our country and we do not know how many such people there are.

In March 2014 I asked the Home Office for its

“most recent estimate…of the number of illegal immigrants employed in the UK; and what change there has been in this number since May 2010.”

The Minister for Security and Immigration, my hon. Friend the Member for Old Bexley and Sidcup (James Brokenshire) answered:

“HM Government have not made any estimate of the number of illegal migrants currently employed in the UK. Given the clandestine nature of illegal migrants, any estimation is, by definition, extremely difficult and prone to considerable uncertainty.”—[Official Report, 3 April 2014; Vol. 578, c. 740W.]

He then went on to explain all the wonderful things the Government are doing.

On 7 April I asked the Minister

“how many illegal workers whose employment has been the subject of penalties pursuant to section 15 of the Immigration, Asylum and Nationality Act 2006 (a) have been deported and (b) are still in the UK.”

He replied:

“We are better placed than ever to identify and charge those working illegally…It would not be possible to provide the information requested without linking immigration case outcomes to our data on civil penalties issued on employers. This would incur disproportionate costs.”—[Official Report, 7 April 2014; Vol. 579, c. 116W.]

That was another completely useless response from a Government who are apparently trying to regain control over our borders, which has my full support, to ensure that the only people living here are those we really want to live here. As part of that process, of course, we need to know who those people are.

Where does one go for information about how many people are here illegally? One source of information is the Government’s December 2013 publication, “Sustaining services, ensuring fairness: Government response to the consultation on migrant access and financial contribution to NHS provision in England”. It estimates that, at any one time in England, there are about 2.5 million overseas visitors and migrants, of whom about 450,000 are from the European economic area, 1.4 million are from outside the EEA, 65,000 are ex-pats and 580,000 are irregulars,

“including failed asylum seekers liable to removal, people who have overstayed their visas and illegal immigrants”.

The Government document estimates that there are 580,000 people here who should not be here, and it goes on to explain the significant burden they are placing on the national health service in various ways and how they are not contributing as they should be.

That is the scale of the problem. There may be well over 500,000 people in this country who have no right to be here whatsoever. The Bill would, in a sense, flush them out, because if they did not have British citizenship, a residence permit or the right to stay here, they would be guilty of an offence.

I have raised before in this House the issue of what the Government are doing to enforce the provisions that make it illegal to be here without authority. I have been told that there is no need to introduce new legislative requirements, such as those in clauses 5 and 6, because section 24 of the Immigration Act 1971 is clear that people who are in breach of the provisions can be prosecuted. Section 24(1) on “Illegal entry and similar offences” states:

“A person who is not a British citizen shall be guilty of an offence punishable…with a fine of not more than level 5 on the standard scale or with imprisonment for not more than six months, or with both, in any of the following cases:—(a) if…he knowingly enters the United Kingdom in breach of a deportation order or without leave; (b) if, having only a limited leave to enter or remain in the United Kingdom, he knowingly either—(i) remains beyond the time limited by the leave; or (ii) fails to observe a condition of the leave; (c) if, having lawfully entered the United Kingdom without leave…remains without leave beyond the time allowed”,

and so on.

In the context of the very large numbers of people thought to be in the country illegally, one might think that we would exercise effective sanctions against them. I was therefore extremely disappointed, although I must tell the Minister that I was not that surprised, to find that in 2013 the number of defendants convicted for offences under section 24(1) in all cases of people overstaying their time limit for leave—there may be hundreds of thousands of them—was two in the magistrates court and four in the Crown court. There was only one conviction in the magistrates court and one in the Crown court under section 24(1)(b)(ii) for failing to observe leave conditions.

At the moment, even the existing law is not applied. People in this country illegally and in breach of their obligations are not prosecuted or proceeded against, which is nothing short of scandalous. That is another reason why the Bill would provide a fresh starting point. Everybody not here legally would have the opportunity to leave, to seek to regularise their position by applying for a certificate or to face the consequences of failing so to do.

If we won back control over our own system, we could require people coming into the country to provide fingerprints or DNA samples. At the moment, that matter is governed by the Eurodac regulations. I have done a lot of work on migrants crossing the Mediterranean, landing in Italy and finding their way into other parts of Europe. In Italy, they are often not processed at all: their fingerprints are not taken, so nobody knows that they have ever been in Italy, which means that they can ultimately present themselves in another country in the European Union and seek asylum. Some asylum seekers or migrants try to fight the system and refuse to give their fingerprints—the Italian authorities say they do not take their fingerprints because they refuse to give them—so I suggested that if such people do not want to give their fingerprints, we should take a sample of their DNA, but I was told that that would be illegal under the Eurodac regulations. This is crazy: what harm can there be in people seeking asylum supplying their DNA, particularly if they do not want to give their fingerprints?

[Sir William Cash (Stone) (Con)]

My hon. Friend will perhaps recall that a short time ago, I presented the United Kingdom Parliament (Sovereignty and Jurisdiction over Borders) Bill, which contains a provision that would deal with any difficulties that we have in respect of immigration policy by bypassing the European Court of Justice and using the hallowed formula, “notwithstanding the European Communities Act 1972”. All the regulations and provisions that would otherwise prevent us from getting proper control over our borders would be wiped away by taking that very simple step. What astonishes me is that that formula would return governance to this country. I hope that he will bear that in mind.

[Mr Chope]

I am grateful to my hon. Friend for that intervention. Not only have I borne that formula in mind; I have incorporated it into the text of my Bill in clauses 2 and 4. Clause 4 states:

“notwithstanding the provisions of the European Communities Act 1972”.

[Sir William Cash]

Superb.

[Mr Chope]

I am delighted that the Bill will have the even more enthusiastic support of my hon. Friend. I agree with him that there is no point in pretending that we can sort this problem out without distancing ourselves from all the European Union regulations. That is why I have drafted the Bill in a way that reasserts the sovereignty of this Parliament over the borders of our United Kingdom.

I am conscious of the time, Madam Deputy Speaker. I could carry on for a bit longer, not least to point out some of the practical shortcomings of the worthy proposals that the Prime Minister made in his speech on 29 November, but I will not do that and will instead sit down, having proposed the Second Reading of the Bill.

Devolution (Scotland Referendum)

Debate between Christopher Chope and William Cash

Tuesday 14th October 2014 Commons Chamber

[Sir William Cash]

My hon. Friend the Member for Harwich and North Essex (Mr Jenkin), I and others were on the Committee, and those were indeed the conclusions we came to.

As for the charter of fundamental rights—now reckoned to be within the framework of our own constitutional arrangements, although I do not have time to go into it now—the bottom line is that that would mean these matters being adjudicated by the European Court of Justice, which really would be a very dangerous situation.

[Mr Chope]

Does my hon. Friend recall that when Enoch Powell was a member of the Procedure Committee, he used to say that in the absence of a written constitution, the procedures of the House and our Standing Orders are our constitution, so to call for changes to the Standing Orders is not to call for them in any subordinate form of legislation, but in a very important form?

[Sir William Cash]

Absolutely. To his great credit, Tam Dalyell admitted that it was Enoch Powell who first raised the West Lothian question—that is a fact. It is an especially important point, because it is this House’s inherent power to regulate its own internal business on behalf of the United Kingdom. As my right hon. Friend the Member for North West Hampshire (Sir George Young) clearly stated, there are many differentiations already. I would like to say that it is not just a question of classes of Member; it is about the differentiation of legitimacy and democratic functions. That is the way I prefer to put it, because we perform different functions in different circumstances. It is not about creating two completely different classes.

I add that opinion polls indicate that 61% now strongly support the idea of English laws exclusively for English issues. I do not think there is any doubt about it. With respect, I was appalled at the speech of the shadow Justice Secretary, the right hon. Member for Tooting (Sadiq Khan), who said almost nothing. When he did say something, it sounded as if it was based entirely on trying to avoid the issue at all costs.

When the Bill is introduced, it must specify its territorial extent if it is not to apply to the whole of the UK. If the Bill is silent on that, it will be presumed to apply to the UK as a whole. My amendment would effectively provide the power to declare the category of Member who would be voting, so that Members of the Welsh or Northern Ireland Assembly or the Scottish Parliament would know whether or not they were able to vote. It is also a convention that the Westminster Parliament does not legislate on devolved matters.

Finally, another idea that is floating around, which comes from the McKay proposals, is that a Standing Committee should consist of only English or only English and Welsh Members. Something similar has been happening under Standing Order No. 97 since 1948. My objection is that Second Reading, Report and Third Reading would still be considered by the whole House and that all MPs would vote. That would take us back to square one. I strongly urge the House not to go down that route.

European Union (Approvals) Bill [Lords]

Debate between Christopher Chope and William Cash

Monday 4th February 2013 Commons Chamber

[Mr Chope]

I think that is a brilliant idea, and for a long time I thought that was the policy supported by the Government. It is certainly supported by almost every member of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe, including many from core European Union states who regard themselves as being Europhiles in the extreme, but even they ask what the point is of duplicating the functions of the Council of Europe with those of the Fundamental Rights Agency. I hope my hon. Friend will take that idea forward.

If we are to have a Fundamental Rights Agency with a multi-annual framework, as stated in the Bill, why not concentrate on one or two areas with an obvious need for further work? At the moment, the management board mentions “thematic areas”, which include:

“Immigration and integration of migrants; visa and border control; asylum”,

and the European Union is fundamentally failing in that area at the moment.

The week before last I was in Greece where I visited the Greece-Turkey border and received briefings from Greek Ministers and the Hellenic coastguard about the problem of illegal migrants coming into Greece, mainly from Turkey. One problem in Greece that contributes to the

“racism, xenophobia and related intolerance”—

that is thematic area (j)—is that it is virtually impossible for Greece to return illegal migrants to the countries from which they came.

Let me give the House an example. When visiting a detention centre in Athens, I went up to the wire fence and asked whether anybody spoke English. To cut a long story short, I started a conversation with a person who said that he had arrived in the detention centre having set out from Afghanistan—he is an Afghan national—and that he had paid smugglers $8,000 to get across Iran and Turkey. He wanted to go from Turkey across the Aegean sea and on to the Italian eastern seaboard so that he could make his way to the United Kingdom. I inquired about that and asked why he wanted to go to London. He replied that it was because he had been there for five years until a few months ago, and that he had lots of friends in London who had paid the $8,000 for his return trip. He had been deported from the United Kingdom after playing our system for about five years, and within a few weeks of getting back to Afghanistan this wholly undeserving case was presenting himself in a Greek detention centre.

Unfortunately for that man, the boat from Turkey foundered—I suppose it is fortunate that the Greek coastguard rescued him and he was not drowned—and he found himself in the detention centre, but the Greek authorities had no way of returning him back to Afghanistan, because Afghanistan does not accept anyone in Greece who emanated from Afghanistan. If he is detained in Greece for the maximum of 18 months, he will be released and will join all those other people in Greece—this also happens in Italy—who do not belong or do not necessarily wish to stay there, which contributes to feelings of racism and xenophobia on the part of the indigenous population. Something like 60% of people in Greek prisons are non-Greek nationals.

If there is a need for the Fundamental Rights Agency, it should deal with that sort of thing rather than mess around with the other expanded areas to which hon. Members have referred. For example, if the FRA looked at the inability of people to claim asylum in Turkey because it has opted out of many Geneva convention provisions, it might help to focus attention on the need to strengthen the Turkey-EU border.

[Mr Cash]

Is my hon. Friend conscious of the fact that, in the explanatory memorandum of 10 January 2012, Lord McNally, the Justice Minister, gave an example of a useful tool in measuring the impact of European legislation on fundamental rights in Europe? He cited

“a comparative legal analysis of the position for gay, lesbian, bisexual and transsexual people across EU States which has provided useful data in an area where there is little research”.

Is my hon. Friend aware that that criteria was chosen by the Justice Minister?

[Mr Chope]

I was not aware of that and am grateful to my hon. Friend for pointing it out. As hon. Members often say, it is an issue of priorities. People and organisations must be judged on the priority they give to different issues. In the light of the enormous crisis in Europe and on European borders, it is odd that that should be a priority as opposed to the problems to which I have referred.

The debate gives us an opportunity to go into many other aspects of asylum and border control, but I will not do so. I have highlighted why they are important. If the organisation has to exist, it would be better if it got on with dealing with serious issues rather than trying to expand its remit.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Chope]

I hope that that is not correct. My hon. Friend is demonstrating pessimism—or realism.

[Mr Cash]

I assure my hon. Friend 100% that, if this House, in its sovereign right, decides to repeal the European Communities Act 1972—we entered on a voluntary basis in that year—or any provision that emanates from section 2, by, for example, using the “notwithstanding” formula, we are entitled to do so. Nobody can do anything to stop us doing so. Whether the Whips would allow it is another thing.

[Mr Deputy Speaker]

Order. I have been very generous in allowing hon. Members to drift all over, but I am not going back to 1972. I want us to stick to Second Reading. We have a bit of time and a bit of latitude has been given, but I do not want to go to the complete ends of it.

Multiannual Financial Framework

Debate between Christopher Chope and William Cash

Wednesday 31st October 2012 Commons Chamber

[Mr Cash]

Absolutely. It is impossible to make any public expenditure—including our contributions to the whole of the public sector: health, education, local government, the lot—unless the money comes from reasonably taxed small and medium-sized enterprises. Yet the whole of the Commission’s paper—which is at the heart of the 2020 strategy and at the heart of why the Commission is asking for this increased amount of money, which it calls an investment for growth—contains only one reference to small and medium-sized businesses, in one line. That is the problem we are up against. We cannot give money to the public sector unless we get it from private enterprise on a reasonably taxed basis.

The Prime Minister’s letter continues:

“The action taken in 2011 to curb”—

“curb”: that is the word he uses—

“annual growth in European payment appropriations should therefore be stepped up progressively over the remaining years of this financial perspective and payment appropriations should increase, at most, by no more than inflation over the next financial perspectives.”

The situation was wrong then, and it has got worse since. That was in December 2011. We are now in October 2012, and we know what the picture is, and it is getting progressively worse. That is why we had to call for a reduction rather than merely what the Prime Minister describes as an

“increase, at most, by no more than inflation over the next financial perspectives.”

[Mr Christopher Chope (Christchurch) (Con)]

Will my hon. Friend take some support from the fact that on 20 June our right hon. Friend the Foreign Secretary told this House he thought reductions in the EU budget of 20% were “highly desirable”?

[Mr Cash]

Absolutely; that is a very good point indeed.

I would like to dig a little deeper into what this money is supposed to be used for. It is all set out in the papers laid before the House for the purposes of this debate. They talk about turning the EU into a “smart”—whatever that means—“sustainable and inclusive economy” delivering

“high levels of employment productivity and social cohesion.”

How on earth are they going to achieve that given the measures they think will produce growth? Almost every single aspect of what they want to deliver is based on increasing grants and subsidies, but not on asking where the money is coming from.

The money comes from our constituents. It comes from the taxpayer. It does not grow on trees. That is what they do not understand. Therefore, the entire strategy on which this multiannual financial framework is based is nonsense. It is an Alice in Wonderland fantasy, as I have repeatedly said when I have had the opportunity to meet the other 27 Chairmen of the national scrutiny committees. I have noticed that there is increasing awareness, too. The hon. Member for Luton North (Kelvin Hopkins) was with me only a few weeks ago, and he noticed the degree of response I was getting from the other member states’ national chairmen. They understood that they were in deep trouble.

The money does not grow on trees in Spain; that is why there are demands for independence from Catalonia. The money does not grow on trees in France or Germany either. The fact is that it has to be found.

United Kingdom Parliamentary Sovereignty Bill

Debate between Christopher Chope and William Cash

Friday 18th March 2011 Commons Chamber

[Mr Chope]

He has written more than one document. I find it odd that the Minister asserts that everything that Jeffrey Goldsworthy says on the important subject of parliamentary sovereignty is wrong, and that the Minister is right—he has many attributes, but I am not sure that he is a constitutional law expert. I would prefer to go along with Jeffrey Goldsworthy’s expertise in the absence of any other compelling legal arguments.

I am grateful to my hon. Friend the Member for North East Somerset (Jacob Rees-Mogg) for raising some interesting points, not least when he intervened when the Minister objected to clause 1. The Minister seems to be under the illusion that the courts in this country can only interpret legislation, rather than apply common law principles. My hon. Friend bowled the Minister middle stump on that.

I am also grateful to my hon. Friend the Member for Witham (Priti Patel) for her support. She has done the House and the people a great service in tabling a host of probing and effective written questions that have exposed the Government’s policy for what it is—the Government are far too relaxed about the further erosion of our sovereignty.

I commend the hon. Member for Rhondda (Chris Bryant) on the brevity of his speech. There is a lot to be said for Opposition Front Benchers making similarly short speeches when they do not have any support on their own side of the House at all, as is the situation today.

The idea that the UN resolution passed last night is inconsistent with the Bill is far fetched. May I suggest a better analogy? When this country went to a war in Iraq that, arguably, was illegal under international law, we were not prosecuted by some international criminal court. However, if we went into something that was at odds with the decisions of the European Court of Justice, we would be prosecuted and taken before that Court on the continent. That is the difference.

The Minister suggests that various details of the Bill could be made clearer. One way to do so would be to ensure that clause 2 refers to clause 1. However, the essence of the Bill is in clause 1, which stands on its own, reaffirming the sovereignty of this Parliament.

[Mr Cash]

Does my hon. Friend agree that it is highly significant that the Government have rewritten—I am glad to say—the explanatory notes to make it quite clear that the supremacy of the United Kingdom Parliament is understood in those terms by the Government?

[Mr Chope]

My hon. Friend made a good point on that, to which the Minister did not really respond.

I tried earlier in the debate to give examples of where our sovereignty is under continued threat of erosion, not least of which was how we are left powerless when international courts make rulings against us. We are told that we cannot, as a sovereign Parliament, correct those rulings and redress the balance in a way that our constituents wish us to do. I am disappointed that my hon. Friend the Minister did not respond to any of those issues, so the best thing to do would be to press the Bill to a Division.

Question put, That the Bill be now read a Second time.

United Kingdom Parliamentary Sovereignty Bill

Debate between Christopher Chope and William Cash

Friday 18th March 2011 Commons Chamber

[Mr Chope]

That just shows how they’ve got at me, doesn’t it? I am going to tell the House later about some of my discussions earlier in the week in, dare one say it, Brussels.

The principle of parliamentary sovereignty means that the UK Parliament can enact any law whatsoever on any subject whatsoever, and can do so by ordinary legislation. That means that if the people want to change the law, their representatives elected to Parliament can do so. Likewise, if the people do not want the law to be changed, their parliamentary representatives can ensure that it is not. If the courts interpret laws that we have passed in a way that Parliament does not wish, it can change those laws.

This is still a hot topic, despite the lengthy discussions about it in this place when we debated the European Union Bill. To give a flavour of it, I shall give examples of the regular correspondence that I get from constituents on it. I have a letter dated 10 March, an old-fashioned holograph from a lady from Christchurch. She says that she is fed up with the way in which the British people are being overridden by the EU and disappointed by what the Prime Minister said in response to my hon. Friend the Member for Wellingborough (Mr Bone) about a referendum. She thinks that the sooner we get the British people a say in the issue, the better.

I have another letter, which came this Monday, which talks about the people’s pledge and the desire for the voters of the UK to decide once and for all whether we should remain in the EU or leave it. In a sense, the purpose of the Bill is to ensure that we do not have to go through that process, because we in this elected House would be able to decide what we wanted and what we did not want in relation to EU legislation.

[Mr William Cash (Stone) (Con)]

Under my hon. Friend’s splendid Bill, would we also be able to overturn the vote against reaffirming the sovereignty of the UK that the House took during the debates on the European Union Bill? Would it effectively put us back where we really belong?

[Mr Chope]

I am grateful to my hon. Friend and indebted to him for the work that he has done on this subject. This is but the latest in a series of Bills, many of which he has drafted. Of course, he knows the answer to his question, which is that if the Bill were passed, it would have the effect that he has described. I think the House and the country would be a better place as a result.

[Mr Chope]

Arguably, it would leave it as it is. There was a debate on the European Union Bill about whether we needed to reaffirm our sovereignty. My concern, which I think was first expressed in the House by my right hon. Friend the Member for Wokingham (Mr Redwood), is: “If you don’t use it, you lose it.” The monarch—the Queen—is sovereign, but because she has not exercised her sovereignty for a period of time and is exercising it less and less, there comes a stage when people say, “You have given it up.”

The concern that I and a lot of other Members have is that if we do not keep reasserting our sovereignty, we might suddenly find that an external body or court interprets that as meaning that, by default, we have conceded that Parliament no longer has sovereignty in various aspects of our country’s affairs. That is why clause 1 is in the Bill. It may seem bizarre that we have to reassert that, but I believe that we need to do so because our Parliament is under continual assault from external organisations that are trying to interfere with our right to decide our own affairs.

[Mr Cash]

May I refer vicariously, through my hon. Friend, to the book written by Jeffrey Goldsworthy, which would give my hon. Friend the Member for Worthing West (Sir Peter Bottomley) an opportunity to catch up with the meaning that should be given to the words “parliamentary sovereignty”? It points out that the necessity to reaffirm that is becoming acute, for the reason that the European Scrutiny Committee’s report published the other day stated clearly. Certain judges in the Supreme Court are strongly suggesting that parliamentary sovereignty has been qualified, and that they hold ultimate authority. That is a recent and extremely dangerous move.

[Mr Chope]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Chope]

Accolades from Mr Speaker are always welcome in my heart.

The article continues:

“The European Parliament’s constitutional affairs committee on Monday (7 March) gave its backing to a limited EU treaty change to incorporate the European Stability Mechanism into the EU treaty, only on condition that the new system is kept ‘as close as possible’ to the EU system, with the involvement of the European Commission and the Parliament.”

Basically, we are in a position whereby our Government are telling Parliament that the stability mechanism is solely to do with eurozone members and asking for authorisation for a treaty change, but the European Parliament is saying that the consequence of that change is giving the European Commission and the European Parliament a say over something that our Government tell us has no relevance to the United Kingdom.

[Mr Cash]

I do not know whether it is any consolation to my hon. Friend, but under the arrangements, the European Parliament has a right only to be consulted in that respect. However, it is pressing hard and I doubt that he has missed the fact that it deliberately moved consideration of the question to the date—24 and 25 March—when the European Council meets to exert pressure on it. Its ambition to get control and to insist on the Community method knows no bounds.

[Mr Chope]

My hon. Friend’s suspicions are well founded and backed by the facts that he gives the House. As we speak, moves are afoot on that issue.

I wish to address the remainder of my remarks to another matter—the admission of the European Union into the European convention on human rights. Page 113 of the Conservative manifesto states:

“We will never allow Britain to slide into a federal Europe.”

Yet article 6 of the Lisbon treaty and article 59 of the European convention on human rights as amended by protocol 14 provide for the European Union to accede to the European convention on human rights. On that basis, the European Union would become a non-state contracting party to the convention. It is said that it would be entitled to have a European Union judge, joining the other 47 judges from the member states of the Council of Europe, to adjudicate on issues relating to interpretation of the convention.

Clearly, that is not some innocuous move whereby the European Union submits to the European convention on human rights because it thinks that it is a good thing and desirable that European Union institutions should comply with the principles laid down in it. The European Union clearly has it in mind to put its toe in the door—or, perhaps more appropriately at this time of year, to be a cuckoo in the nest—and effectively drive out the convention and replace it with its own charter of fundamental rights, administered by the European Court of Justice.

If one looks back, one sees that the first reference in European Union law to fundamental rights was in article 6(2) of the 1992 Maastricht treaty, which provides that the European Union

“shall respect fundamental rights, as guaranteed by the European Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms…and as they result from the constitutional traditions common to the Member States, as general principles of Community law.”

Of course, no one would quarrel with that because it basically enunciated that there is no difference between the European Union law and approach to fundamental rights and the approach of the European convention on human rights. However, since then, the EU has developed its interpretation of those fundamental rights far in excess of what was originally thought reasonable.

[Mr Chope]

My hon. Friend has a point—that is part of the European charter of fundamental rights. Thinking along those lines caused one of the witnesses to the Select Committee on Political and Constitutional Reform last month to say that even if we won the day against the European convention on human rights on prisoner voting, we would find a case brought against us by the European Court of Justice—the EU would prosecute us through the ECJ for failing to comply with the fundamental freedoms it has laid down. In the same way, the bizarre ruling the other day will result in my 21-year-old daughter paying a much higher insurance premium for driving than the marketplace says she should pay. How absurd is that? That is another example of the way in which the EU uses its institutions to continue to interfere with what should be our domestic law.

[Mr Cash]

Both the charter of fundamental rights and the European convention on human rights, in their differing judicial aspects—the ECJ and the European Court of Human Rights—impinge on UK sovereignty. Is my hon. Friend aware that the Lord Chancellor himself took part in a European Committee two or three days ago? He and I had an interesting altercation on his assertion that the incorporation of the charter of fundamental rights does not change anything very much. However, for all the reasons that my hon. Friend is giving, to which I referred in that debate, the incorporation makes a substantial difference because it concentrates a mass of precedence from the European Court of Human Rights in the charter, and is thereby adjudicated by the ECJ.

[Mr Chope]

I am grateful, as always, to my hon. Friend—he is absolutely right.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Chope]

Perhaps we will deal with that in Committee. I admit to being present during the fantastic speech made by my hon. Friend the Member for Suffolk Coastal (Dr Coffey) in support of her Bill, but I must admit that I was not following every iota of its content, so I am not sure whether what has been said on her behalf by my hon. Friend the Member for Worthing West (Sir Peter Bottomley) is a valid objection to or criticism of my Bill.

Despite my hon. Friend’s intervention, I will not be diverted from finishing expressing my concerns about the proposals for the admission of the EU to the European convention on human rights. Fortunately, my understanding is that our Government have a veto, and its details are being discussed at intergovernmental level—certainly by the Committee of Ministers of the Council of Europe this week. I hope that the Minister will realise after this debate that we need to be alert and concerned about the implications of what is happening.

I say that because on 19 May 2010, the European Parliament passed a resolution on what it described as

“the institutional aspects of the accession of the European Union to the European Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms”.

Like most such resolutions, it is rather too long for most of us to bother to read—it runs to several pages—but I want to draw the attention of my right hon. and hon. Friends to paragraph K on page 2. It states that the European Parliament stresses that

“the main arguments in favour of accession of the Union”—

the European Union—

“to the ECHR…may be summarised as follows: accession constitutes a move forward in the process of European integration and involves one further step towards political Union”.

If that is the interpretation put on it by the European Parliament, we need go no further than getting a commitment from the Government today that they will not support this, and that in discussions on it they will play hardball, rather than the softball they have been playing up to now over EU powers.

The resolution also states that

“while the Union’s system for the protection of fundamental rights will be supplemented and enhanced by the incorporation…into its primary law, its accession to the ECHR will send a strong signal concerning the coherence between the Union and the countries belonging to the Council of Europe”.

It is actually nothing short of an attempted takeover. My hon. Friend the Member for Stone (Mr Cash) will probably be alert to the point at which the resolution states that

“accession will also compensate to some extent for the fact that the scope of the Court of Justice of the European Union is somewhat constrained in the matters of foreign and security policy and police and security policy by providing useful external judicial supervision of all EU activities”.

This is all part of the creep and incrementalism of the EU as it tries to put its finger into everybody’s pies.

[Mr Cash]

Given that the Prime Minister is coming to the House in about 40 minutes, will my hon. Friend bear it in mind that in the context of the matters to which he has referred—foreign and security policy and so on—it is woefully apparent that the EU had absolutely nothing to offer other than obstacles in dealing with the question of a no-fly zone, or indeed any other matter relating to Libya?

[Mr Chope]

That is absolutely right. Of course, we know that at the Security Council key members of the EU—France and this country—voted one way, but the Germans did not support us. They did not support us in the Security Council, but that is not the end of our friendship in Europe, and I do not think that our Government should be saying that if they do not do everything that German Governments want to do in Europe, it will undermine European solidarity. It is possible for sovereign countries to disagree on these issues.

At the European Parliament on Monday, I attended a meeting that included Mr Duff, to whom the hon. Member for Carshalton and Wallington (Tom Brake) referred earlier. It was a meeting of about half a dozen Members of the European Parliament and half a dozen Members of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe to look into the details of EU admission to the ECHR. Important questions were posed to which no answers were given. For example, at the moment, a number of EU countries have opt-outs from various parts of the European convention or its protocols, yet the EU is proposing to sign up to the convention in toto and to its protocols. To what extent does that mean that the EU member states that have taken a different view of particular provisions of the European convention will find that, notwithstanding their reservations, they are bound into that regime by the fact that the EU has joined the ECHR?

At a time when we are concerned about prisoner voting rights, for example, and about the administration of the Committee of Ministers of the Council of Europe—will it accept our right to have a bit of latitude in the interpretation of the treaty, or will it insist on forcing through the exact terms of the judgment?—it has been proposed that the EU should join the Committee of Ministers. There is also a proposal that the European Parliament should join in part the PACE, even though the Council of Europe treaty that set up the Council in 1949 expressly provides that the members of the Parliamentary Assembly should be elected parliamentarians from the member countries that join the Council of Europe. The EU is not a country and is not signing up to the Council Europe; it is only seeking to sign up to the ECHR.

I cannot go into all the details now. However, I want to draw my hon. Friend the Minister’s attention to exactly how grave and serious the issue is and how much it threatens to undermine his and the Government’s position, which is to ensure that we do not cede any more sovereignty to European institutions. Indeed, we ought to try to regain control over issues such as the fundamental rights convention and the Fundamental Rights Agency, which we want to bring back under this Parliament’s control. I know that a lot of other people want to join in this debate, but may I just say that the Bill would be a useful way of ensuring that this Parliament has its voice? This Parliament needs to do what the MEPs are doing against us. On every single occasion, they try to extend their remit, so that they have more control. We in this Parliament should increase our power and ensure that we have greater control over what his happening in our name.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Chope]

Frankly, I was not going to, but if my hon. Friend is going to use clause 3(b) as a justification for not supporting my Bill, and if he thinks that it should be excluded and that the ambit of the Bill is too wide, I will allow him to dilate on that at length, if need be, during his remarks. I am a perfectly reasonable person, and if he thinks that clause 3(b) goes too far, I might be amenable to an amendment to delete it.

[Mr Cash]

I think that the Minister might be in grave danger of misunderstanding the Bill’s provisions. It does not say that it will override any international law; all it says is that, under clause 2, if there is any question of an increase in the functions of the EU affecting the UK or if a legal instrument is inconsistent with the Bill, the judiciary would not be able to invoke any rule of international law in order to frustrate that provision. However, we could discuss all this in Committee, as my hon. Friend the Member for Christchurch (Mr Chope) has rightly said.

[Mr Chope]

I am grateful to my hon. Friend for that intervention.

Fixed-term Parliaments Bill

Debate between Christopher Chope and William Cash

Wednesday 24th November 2010 Commons Chamber

[Mr Christopher Chope (Christchurch) (Con)]

When we talk about the law of unintended consequences, which applies big time to the provisions of the Bill, will my hon. Friend not apply that in his mind to what is happening in Ireland at the moment? There is a constitutional crisis that requires the Prime Minister, in honour, to put an issue to the electorate for a general election. This Bill would preclude the Prime Minister from doing a similarly honourable thing in this country.

[Mr Cash]

My hon. Friend with his customary originality brings into play a contemporary example. Imagine a two-thirds rule being applied in respect of Mr Cowen at this moment. Be in no doubt, there would be riots in the streets of Dublin. This is an essential question about the irresponsible manner in which this power could be used to induce results that are fundamentally undemocratic.

Parliamentary Voting System and Constituencies Bill

Debate between Christopher Chope and William Cash

Tuesday 2nd November 2010 Commons Chamber

[Mr Cash]

I will undoubtedly be campaigning for a no vote, but I must also say that I rely very much on the good sense of the British people to decide exactly what they will do, because we trust the people; that is the point.

[Mr Christopher Chope (Christchurch) (Con)]

Does my hon. Friend accept that the problem identified by the hon. Member for Liverpool, West Derby (Stephen Twigg) is not one that applies to amendment 197, because it proposes a support threshold, rather than a turnout threshold.

[Mr Chope]

I see the hon. Gentleman nodding. If amendment 197 were to be accepted, at least one in four electors would have to support the proposed change, and that is very different from what my hon. Friend the Member for Stone (Mr Cash) is talking about, which is a turnout threshold.

[Mr Cash]

We were all much more in agreement about this in Committee. All I can say to my hon. Friend is that I believe very strongly, for the reasons I have given and because of the principles I have enunciated, that the 40% threshold is desirable. Incidentally, on the majority provisions prevalent in other democracies in the west, Denmark’s requirement on constitutional change is for 40% of registered voters and, as the hon. Member for Liverpool, West Derby (Stephen Twigg) implied, Italy has a turnout requirement of 50% of registered voters. Indeed, this country used something not similar, but parallel in the 1979 vote, when the requirement was for 40% of registered voters saying yes.