European Union Referendum Bill

Jim Cunningham Excerpts

Tuesday 8th December 2015 Commons Chamber

[Peter Grant]

I apologise for misunderstanding the hon. Gentleman’s comments.

My essential point is that I do not think it is enough to leave it to campaign groups to provide information. The purpose of campaign groups is to persuade people to vote for the cause that they are promoting. They will provide information that supports their cause. They will choose not to provide or emphasise information that does not support it. That is what we all did in order to get elected, and as long as it does not involve deliberately making untrue statements or trying to mislead people, that is part of the democratic process; it is part of politics. It is up to the electorate to judge whose arguments they believe, but if the electorate are starting from a position of significant ignorance, or in some cases significant misperception and misunderstanding of what the EU is all about, there is a danger that they will not be in a position to exercise that judgment at a critical time.

[Mr Jim Cunningham (Coventry South) (Lab)]

There is another issue when we talk about broadcasting and information being put in the public domain: how it is funded and whether there will be a balance in funding. That has been a big issue in past referendums, particularly the one in 1975.

[Peter Grant]

My own personal views about how political campaigns and parties are funded probably would not get a huge amount of support here, but that might be something for a ten-minute rule Bill some time over the next four and a half years. The hon. Gentleman makes a valid point. It is important that nobody has the opportunity to buy a referendum any more than anyone should be given the right to buy electoral success. I certainly would not want to see us going the way of America where people need billions of dollars behind them before they can even stand for election.

We are still not addressing the fundamental problem that, no matter how well or badly funded the individual campaigns are, if we are starting from the position of having the least well-informed electorate in Europe on this important issue, someone is going to have to provide the necessary information to bring people up to a better level of understanding of, for example, what “ever closer union” means and does not mean—because it does not mean what it keeps being presented as meaning, even by the Prime Minister.

People need to understand which aspects of immigration to the UK the European Union is involved in and which aspects it is not involved in. They need to understand which aspects of our welcoming of refugees, or our failure to welcome them, involve a European Union decision, and which aspects come under the auspices of the United Nations, for example. These are massively important issues, and the debate in this Chamber over the last months has not always helped to increase public understanding and appreciation of what the European Union does and does not do.

If there are concerns that the Government might not be impartial, or that they might be over-enthusiastic towards one side or the other, I would be quite happy for the Electoral Commission to publish guidance and to require the Government and everyone else to comply with it. It would be inappropriate to ask the Electoral Commission to scrutinise, veto or censor Government documents in the first place, but it would be perfectly in order for it to issue guidance on the conduct of the referendum, including on the kind of information that could and should be funded and published by the Government.

I find myself in the strange position of almost telling Government Back Benchers that they are wrong because the amendment seems to be based on an unwillingness to trust Her Majesty’s Government. I am not the biggest fan of this Government, and I am not the biggest believer that we can trust them, but if they cannot be trusted to present a fair case to the public in this matter, we are in trouble. The media will not present such a case; the print media absolutely will not do so. The political campaigns will not do so because it is not their job to be impartial. It is their job to be partisan, although perhaps not in a party political sense, on the issues that they are campaigning on.

I welcome the fact, if it is confirmed, that the hon. Member for Stone is to withdraw his amendment (a) to Lords amendment 5. I hope that he will not press his amendment to Lords amendment 6 as well. There is a crying need for reliable, well-researched information to be put into the public domain. Let us not forget that, a few yards from here, we have one of the most highly regarded research facilities anywhere in the world. It is highly regarded not only for the quality of its research and the speed with which it is done but, most importantly, for its impartiality. If we cannot rely on the research facilities within this House to provide reliable, well-documented information, who can we rely on?