European Union Bill

George Freeman Excerpts

Monday 24th January 2011 Commons Chamber

[Mr David]

I have to say that I have not had one constituent come into any of my surgeries since the last election—or, indeed, during the last Parliament—to raise this issue with me. People are concerned about their jobs, their livelihoods, and, under this Government, their falling standards of living. Those are the issues that we should be focusing on. Nevertheless, we are addressing the issue before us today, the European Union Bill.

[George Freeman (Mid Norfolk) (Con)]

On the subject of what we were sent here to do, I can assure the hon. Gentleman that the people of Mid Norfolk sent me here to speak up against their powers being given away without their consent. He quoted the evidence to the European Scrutiny Committee. In written evidence, Professor Philip Allott, professor emeritus of international public law at Cambridge, said:

“The Bill has a whiff of revolution about it. It is a Boston Tea Party gesture against creeping integration…So far as I know, no other member state has anything remotely approaching the degree of parliamentary involvement which the Bill would create”.

The Bill might not be perfect, and it might not be the ideal mechanism, but does the hon. Gentleman acknowledge that the Government are trying to ensure that the creeping integration that my hon. Friend the Member for North East Somerset (Jacob Rees-Mogg) referred to earlier is prevented in future?

[Mr David]

I have read all the evidence submitted to the Committee, and the significant point about that particular quote was the use of the word “gesture”. The Bill is a gesture, and I will say more about that later. It is a gesture to placate hostility to the European Union among Government Back Benchers, but it is not a serious, considered piece of legislation.