European Union (Withdrawal) Bill

Lord Deben Excerpts

Report: 4th sitting (Hansard): House of Lords
Monday 30th April 2018 Lords Chamber

[Lord Reid of Cardowan]

The noble Lord may be able to predict whether it will be better or worse, but any deal that is acceptable to the British Parliament would be better than the disastrous situation of no deal at all. But that may need time. Why have an artificial deadline cutting us off from the conclusion of a deal, which may be there in the bones or, in the famous words of the Brexit Secretary, as a “platform”—and deny ourselves the opportunity of having the alternative of a cohesive deal rather than no deal, which I think would be the worst of all worlds? This is an opportunity that we should take.

A lot of the debate on Amendment 49 was about the ideological motives of those who are handling this. As my noble friend and occasional protagonist Lord Grocott keeps pointing out, I was a reluctant remainer. I was sceptical about the eurozone and the bureaucracy and unaccountability of the European Union, but on balance I wanted to stay in because all the challenges that we face are global: cyber, terrorism, trade and the environment. Being part of a larger bloc is, on balance, worth it. Therefore, my approach to this is pragmatic, not ideological. I admit to being confused by the ideological positions of the leaders of the major parties. We appear to have the leader of one party who is ideologically inclined to remain in the European Union but doing her best to get us out of it, and a leader of the other party who is ideologically inclined to remove us from the European Union who appears to be doing his best to keep us in part of it. I am confused about the ideologies that are supposed to be driving this on all sides of the House.

I believe that we should take what the noble Lord, Lord Cormack, called a common-sense position. It is possible that the vote on the final deal could be little more than a deal or no deal choice, where a rejection of the Government’s Motion would mean the UK exiting the EU with no deal on WTO terms, which would be the worst possible option for the UK. That is not according to me, in my lack of wisdom, experience, depth and analysis, but according to the Government’s own impact studies. I believe that we must insure against that, which is what Amendment 62 seeks to do.

The Secretary of State told the House of Commons that the agreement will deliver the “exact same benefits” as our EU membership. That is basically what the noble Lord, Lord Hamilton, said our objectives were. As it happens, that is also the commitment of the Opposition Front Bench, which has adopted it as one of its six tests. Amendment 62 simply safeguards this commitment by guaranteeing that we keep our current benefits until a withdrawal agreement has been reached that can match our objectives. As the noble Lord, Lord Cormack, said, it is a common sense, pragmatic amendment. It has no political motivation and no ulterior motive, other than the objective of preserving the best for this country. That is what this whole debate is supposed to be about.

It is my great pleasure to support Amendment 62. I am grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Cormack, for indicating that, if time constraints prevent us pushing this to a vote later tonight, we may come back to it at another stage.

[Lord Deben (Con)]

My Lords, I do not think that this is really about the European Union. This is about parliamentary sovereignty. I have to say that I do not understand why it is that the Government do not want Parliament, in the end, to be in a position to make the decisions which these two amendments make possible. It seems to me, in any case, that that would be valuable to the Government in negotiation, because it would enable them to say that a deal, if both sides want a deal, is one that has to get through Parliament. However, I do not want to go down that route. I want to go down the route of parliamentary sovereignty.

This is the most important decision we have made for a very long time—perhaps the most important peacetime decision that we have made ever. There are people in this House on either side of the debate and I would not be able, even if I wished to, to pretend that I was not absolutely committed to one side. But I am also a parliamentarian, and it is clear to me that there is no reason why Parliament should not make sure that it is able to make a proper decision on this issue and to make a decision that does not leave the nation in an impossible position. All that these two amendments really do is to ensure that there is a sensible programme into which Parliament is “properly”—I use that word in almost a technical sense—conjoined.

Why should one not want this? Well, one might not want it because it is not properly drafted. Of course, the technique of Governments of all kinds is to say that they would be very happy to go along with something but unfortunately there is this or that technical reason why it does not work. Maybe that is so, but I would therefore ask the Government this: if it is technically wrong, would they come before the House with the amendments that would make it technically right? If they do not, they are saying that in this most important issue of all, the Executive are going to make the decision, and that they wish to leave themselves open to making the circumstances in which Parliament cannot make a sensible decision. They would be saying to Parliament, “Vote for us or total disaster and collapse”. This is the technique of dictators down the ages: “Me or chaos; me or something much worse”. This House should insist that the decision is in Parliament’s hands. That means avoiding circumstances in which it is possible for the Executive to say, “However bad this is, anything else would be very much worse”.

My noble friend Lord Hamilton is also arguing from a clear, previous position—so we are in the same situation. He asks whether we have any evidence that going back for a further negotiation would be better. I have been in business since I was 22, except for when I was a Minister, and I have never started by saying that if the negotiation was not successful I was not prepared to go back and see if I could do better. That is how you run businesses and make money. It is how you improve the circumstances. I do not know in advance whether I can achieve something better, but I would never say that I would never go back and put myself into a position in which I could not negotiate again.

So I say to my noble friend that all this amendment says is that if Parliament decides that a negotiated agreement is not satisfactory, then, and only then, the Government will have to go back and seek something better.

[Lord Hamilton of Epsom]

Is the negotiation with the EU not somewhat unique, because you are negotiating with 27 different countries?

[Lord Deben]

It is unusual to negotiate with 27 different countries, but I have negotiated with large numbers of different people on the other side. That is one thing that we just have to accept. It is, like anything else, a negotiation. If we think that it is so unique that we cannot do it, we should not have started the negotiation in the first place. It does not make any difference if you have a second negotiation: it is the same position that you had with the first negotiation. The fact that it is with 27 different countries makes no difference because it does not change from the first negotiation to the second. I do not think that my noble friend has a point on that.

The real issue is the fundamental fact: the amendment does not operate unless Parliament has voted in a particular way. The Government’s answer to the amendment must therefore be that they have a reason not to let Parliament continue to be involved after such a vote. The Government do not think that Parliament will take such a decision. They are very sure—and I have listened to government speakers again and again—that they will produce a result that will be cheered by Parliament. We will all be thrilled with what they have been able to achieve. I would be very suspicious if the Government’s answer is that they do not think they will get that sort of result and therefore do not want to get themselves into a difficult position. I am assuming that, whatever agreement they have, it will be a good one and this amendment will never come into operation.

The only reason for the amendment is to be a backstop for the circumstances in which the Government do not achieve what they tell us they can achieve and they therefore produce something that is so unacceptable that Parliament decides that it cannot accept it. The Government have to say, “What happens then?”. Unless they accept the amendment or some technically different one that suits them, their only answer can be, “We the Executive will decide”. That is why this is not about the European Union. It is about the powers of Parliament and it is why I am surprised at my noble friend Lord Hamilton, who was chairman of the 1922 Committee, who protected and defended the rights of Members of Parliament and who believes and believed in the nature of Parliamentary democracy. It is why I do not understand why this divides the House.

This should be something that both leavers and remainers—and those who wander between and those who are confused—all of us, should accept that we want Parliament to be in a position to accept and to decide. This will not work unless Parliament has decided that it does not want the agreed solution. The amendment will not come into operation unless that happens. Surely it is not too much to ask that the Government say, if we get to that point, that Parliament should have the right to ask the Government to go back and try again.

[Lord Adonis]

My Lords, I am a great admirer of my noble friend Lord Reid and therefore, if he presses this to a Division later on in the evening or at whatever hour of the night we get to it, I will of course support him. I have nothing against the contents of the amendment because it is clearly desirable that, if we cannot support the Government’s treaty, the default should be that we stay in the EU unless the House of Commons has a better set of propositions that it wishes to agree to.

However, my concern is that there is a certain element of unreality to the proposals to try to bind the hands of the House of Commons as to what it may or may not do in the autumn. One of two things will in fact happen when the Prime Minister presents her treaty. The House of Commons will either vote for it or vote against it. There are no other alternatives. If the House of Commons votes against the treaty, that is, to all intents and purposes, a Motion of no confidence in the Government. There has not been an incident since Gladstone’s Home Rule Bill in 1886, which was rejected by the House of Commons, where the central plank of a Government’s policy was rejected outright by the House of Commons. The idea that there could be a further negotiation after that is entirely unrealistic. The negotiation would have been concluded with the European Commission and the Council of Ministers, and ratified or not by the European Parliament and so forth. It is not realistic in the real world to expect that there would be further negotiation.

In the eventuality that the treaty is rejected, there are only two things that could conceivably happen. Either there will be an election because the Government have been defeated on what is in effect a Motion of confidence—it might take a formal triggering Motion under the Fixed-term Parliaments Act to produce it—or there will be a referendum, which we discussed earlier. A referendum could happen if the House of Commons itself resolved that there should be one immediately after the defeat or perhaps as an amendment to the Motion that the noble Lord, Lord Callanan, has said would be tabled. Everything else beyond that seems to be superfluous. The policy of the Government will then be the outcome of the referendum or the outcome of that election. A Government will have to be formed after the election, which will have to have a European policy and that will then be the policy of the Government that they would seek to negotiate in Brussels. There would either be some amendments to the treaty, if that is possible or—as I hope there is a Labour Government—there will be a decision not to proceed with Brexit, or there would be a referendum and we would proceed with the outcome of that referendum.

I say all that mainly to my noble friend on the Front Bench and her colleagues in the other place. There is no point in engaging in this displacement activity at the moment and making it sound as if we are being very tough on Brexit by placing ever more elaborate manacles and handcuffs on what might or might not happen in the vote in October. The only thing that really matters is the attitude of the Labour Party when the Government present their treaty. Either we are in favour of it or we are against it. If we are against that treaty, I can assure my noble friend that everything else will take care of itself. If we are against the treaty and vote against it, we do not need all the protections in this Bill. One of two things will happen. Either there will be another referendum or there will be an election. If there is an election, what matters is the policy of my party in that election. Will we or will we not proceed with Brexit if we win the election? Very simple facts of political power come into play.

What happens in Parliament after that will depend on those decisions. Ever more elaborate provisions in this Bill are, I say respectfully, entirely beside the point because they miss the reality of political power. That is that there has to be a Government, they have to have a policy and that can come from only one of two ways. Either a new Government are returned if this Government are turned out on the treaty or there is a referendum that will determine it.

I am entirely in favour of everything in my noble friend’s amendment and I hope that it will be warmly welcomed from the Front Bench, but what really matters, I say to my noble friends, is the policy of the Labour Party when the Prime Minister presents her treaty. If we are against the treaty and we are successful, there has to be either an election or a referendum. I am afraid that there are no alternative options on offer.