Brexit: Parliamentary Approval of the Outcome of Negotiations with the European Union

Lord Dobbs Excerpts

Monday 28th January 2019 Lords Chamber

[Lord Newby (LD)]

My Lords, today’s debate is the seventh opportunity for the House to discuss the Government’s deal since the first debate on the withdrawal agreement and political declaration on 5 December—some eight weeks ago. We have had two full debates, three Statements and one Urgent Question. It is now just over eight weeks to the anticipated exit date. Yet over the past eight weeks we have moved no closer to a Brexit outcome that can command a majority in the Commons.

The only substantive change that the Government are seeking to the deal that suffered such a catastrophic defeat two weeks ago is that the Prime Minister is looking to find a way of keeping a frictionless border in Northern Ireland that does not involve the current backstop proposals. To date, there is simply no credible suggestion as to how that might be achieved.

With every passing day, however, confusion continues to reign, and businesses and individuals are voting with their feet. Within the past few days the high-profile headquarters moves of Sony, Dyson and the European Medicines Agency have been announced, but behind the big headlines myriad smaller companies are opening warehouses and offices in continental Europe to ensure that their companies survive Brexit. They are being wooed ever more openly by political and business leaders across the EU, with, for example, high-profile political interventions from Belgium and France last week. Furthermore, when it comes to EU migrants, the Polish Prime Minister has issued a “please come home” appeal—and there is every sign that it is working. When I asked why a popular local restaurant closed over Christmas, I was told that it was still making money but that, “The Poles went home”.

The Motion before the House in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady Smith, is in two parts. The first part reiterates our opposition to a no-deal outcome. Many noble Lords have spoken in previous debates about the costs of such an outcome. To show its utter folly, I simply refer your Lordships to the article in yesterday’s Sunday Times, in which it is reported that officials are having to consider the introduction of a state of emergency, or even martial law, to deal with the possible impacts of no deal. This is madness indeed.

The other part of the Motion reflects the fact that, over the past eight weeks, despite our debates in the Lords—and indeed our vote a fortnight ago—we have counted for little. But this may be about to change. The proposals which will be debated in the Commons tomorrow include one led by Yvette Cooper and Nick Boles which would have the effect of deferring the withdrawal date by several months, and would enshrine this in a Bill. As with every other Bill, it would come to your Lordships’ House. It is therefore particularly important today for your Lordships to assert that, if that is the case, we will deal with it in a timely manner and not seek to thwart it.

It should not be necessary for us to do this. Your Lordships’ House has always acted quickly in response to urgent legislation that has gone through the Commons. For example, some of us remember the passage of the Bill to rescue Northern Rock. But in this case there is clear evidence that some Ministers are actively seeking to encourage Members of your Lordships’ House to filibuster on the Cooper Bill if it passes the Commons. According to last Friday’s Daily Mail—so it must be true—Liam Fox has had meetings with pro-Brexit Peers to discuss such filibustering: a tactic that other government sources have also predicted, hence the many articles to this effect over the weekend.

I cannot believe that the Leader, the Chief Whip or the noble Lord, Lord Callanan, would countenance such behaviour, but it would be extremely reassuring if the noble Lord, Lord Callanan, could confirm in his winding-up speech that they will positively discourage it.

[Lord Dobbs (Con)]

I am grateful to the noble Lord for giving way. I am fascinated by his allegation—but, as he says, it is a matter of scaremongering in the newspapers. He has spent some time asking people to rebut this allegation. Can he name a single Peer who has been approached by Mr Fox to engage in this filibustering? I have to say that I am aware of none.

[Lord Newby]

It may come to the noble Lord as a bit of a shock, but Liam Fox is not in the habit of consulting me about secret meetings and who attends them—so, unsurprisingly, I cannot answer his question. Amazingly, Peers who might be thinking of filibustering in your Lordships’ House have not written a letter to the papers saying, “I have had this good idea of filibustering in the House of Lords. I am looking for volunteers to join me. If you are interested, here’s my email address ”.

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Dobbs]

My Lords, I thought this would be a debate reserved for headbangers, but it is a privilege to have followed two such fine and thoughtful speeches from the Back Benches. Of course, all the Front-Bench speeches were scintillating as well.

One of the most powerful memories of my life is that of a young man in a white shirt on his own in Tiananmen Square, who walked out in front of a column of tanks and stopped them dead. Why? Because he wanted a voice, a say in how he was governed. His was just one voice, but that voice rang out around the world. Another enormous memory was that of the Berlin Wall. I lived for a while in Berlin as a young man in the 1960s, shortly after the wall was built. The wall was one of the most evil things I had ever witnessed. One of the most joyous moments was the sight of it being destroyed, not by tanks and missiles but by the bare hands of those who also wanted a voice and a say in how they were governed. I have a chunk of that wall at home to remind me.

There are times when I think we in this country take our own freedoms too much for granted, particularly the tolerance that glues the bits together. Tolerance is the sticking plaster of a democratic society. Without it, our system does not work—and right now, it is not working. I wonder if noble Lords saw the alarming poll last week suggesting that 9% of all leave voters would mind if one of their close family married a remainer. It is a sign of awful intolerance—almost one in 10. Perhaps that is to be expected; we Brexiteers are so often derided as bigots and xenophobes. What of remainers? In that same poll, it was nearly four in 10: 37% would object if one of their close family members married a Brexiteer. I assure you, you can relax: I am not in the market. I am not sure Boris is, either. But that poll suggests an awful lack of tolerance.

Things are changing for the worse, and it is our fault. We politicians have totally overplayed our hand—taken a challenge and made it far worse. We throw accusations and exaggerations around like children hurl snowballs. How can we be surprised if others follow our example and do not trust us any longer? I doubt we deserve to be trusted; we are “a ship of fools”, as my noble friend Lord Howell of Guildford so accurately and eloquently suggested in that very fine speech. And what do we do? We so often indulge in baseless scaremongering and insinuation. We fight for what we believe in, of course we do, but there will be a time beyond Brexit—soon I hope—when we will have to return to a system of trust and tolerance, if there is any left.

Most noble Lords know where I stand on Brexit and I am not going to talk about the specifics today—what is the point? At this time tomorrow it may all have changed. Will it be plan A, plan B, plan C, triple plus or the Labour Party policy of having no plan at all? Will we have withdrawn from the withdrawal agreement or customised the customs union? Will we have sent our troops to match the legions that Leo is apparently massing at the Irish border? It is so sad and so pointless—and we wonder why people think politicians have lost the plot.

We should reflect on the fact that we in this House, along with the House of Commons, voted to give the people a referendum in the first place. We promised that we would abide by the outcome. We voted through the withdrawal Act and we approved Article 50. Whether or not we approved of it is another matter, but that is what we have done. We have run out of excuses and almost run out of time. We have ripped off the sticking plaster of tolerance. The mess that we are in is not the fault of the people—it is our fault. Our system is not about doing what we think is best for the people but enabling them to do what they think is best for themselves.

What do I fear? I fear people coming to the conclusion that there is not much point in voting when their elected politicians keep turning a deaf ear: that they will stop voting and instead try to change things by other means, as they have on the streets of Athens, Rome, Berlin and Paris, and as they did with the poll tax in London. We can stretch their tolerance too far. I lose sleep over this, as I am sure many noble Lords do. I hope that my nightmares are nothing more than bad dreams and that we will somehow stumble upon a deal that delivers what the people voted for.

If we cannot in Parliament reach agreement, we need to do what our constitutional practice says we should do: let the people sort out the mess we have created. There is only one way to do that—as my noble friend Lord Howell of Guildford has elegantly set out in the past—and that is to hold a general election. Not a second referendum, which is nothing more than a loser’s charter; not grabbing at opinion polls, which our Lib Dem colleagues dine on so selectively; not further delay; not even more divisions—but a new general election which will give people the opportunity to take back control.

I know that some of my Conservative colleagues say that that might let in Mr Corbyn but, cheer up, even the Labour Front Bench does not want Mr Corbyn in Downing Street.

[Baroness Hayter of Kentish Town (Lab)]

I do.

[Lord Dobbs]

Then some have changed their tune. I hope that we in my party have not screwed up so badly that we have made Mr Corbyn electable. If we have, again, we have no one to blame but ourselves.

We have complained long enough about the democratic deficit. This is not the time to do what they do in Brussels and make up the voters’ minds for them. If we do not honour the people, they will not bother honouring or even tolerating us. David Cameron made a good speech about it all at Bloomberg—noble Lords might remember it. He said that for too many people the EU is something that is done to us, not for us. Wise words which outlasted Mr Cameron himself. Let us remember that the only thing that is certain in the midst of all this self-inflicted chaos is that the British people voted for Brexit: not to remain, not to delay, not for silly parliamentary games, but for Brexit. So unless we want to suffer Mr Cameron’s fate, let us do this for them, not to them, and try to earn their respect once again.

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Dykes]

That is not the first time I have agreed with the noble Lord in his assertions, which are usually very accurate, and I do so wholeheartedly in this case. It is the weight of that very adverse, condescending history of Britain and England’s relationship with the Irish that smacks of being repeated when people behave like that nowadays. Think of what Ireland has achieved as a country and as a loyal, constructive and successful member of the European Union, not one that whinges and moans about everything, as unfortunately have far too many politicians over the years of our membership of the EU, which is still continuing, in case people have not noticed that.

The other reason for my bad mood this morning was the totally ludicrous and absurd article in the Daily Telegraph by that failed ex-Foreign Minister Boris Johnson about his advice to the Prime Minister. After all the chaos of recent weeks, his even presuming to give any advice was grotesque. However, my mood changed for the better as I came here for work—early, as usual, of course, in a virtuous sense—because of the flag-wavers outside, led by the immensely impressive but hugely modest Steve Bray and his team. They have now been there for nearly three years, day in, day out, from 10 am—not 11 am, as it was before—until 6 pm. There are even more flags, and the leave component at the end, trembling with fear, consisted of one or two flags. That sums up the reality of the public feeling about these matters. Many of those educated people who join in the flag-waving are British citizens living in EU countries, who come over whenever they can, while others have a deep knowledge of the functioning of the EU and the success of our membership of it. If only we had made more effort. So I felt better after that, but, none the less, the Brexit nightmare is getting worse.

I find it astonishing that colleagues such as the noble Lord, Lord Dobbs, are so complacent about Mrs May’s alarming and indeed atrocious behaviour—I am sorry to have to use that strong adjective—especially after the 8 June election result. For her to go through the necessary and inevitable motions to follow up on the legislative requirements after the referendum result would be one thing, but to go on after that election result as if nothing had changed was quite preposterous. The mandate had been lost, but she did not accept that. In the old days in the House of Commons, when I was an MP, there was a natural self-restraint between members of all parties, and that would have been accepted by the Prime Minister, who would have said, “I no longer have this mandate to carry on this negotiation”. Instead, however, she did a grotesque deal with the most unpopular party in the House of Commons, let alone probably in the country, apart from some people in Northern Ireland: the unsavoury DUP—Protestant extremists who resist and oppose all women’s rights in Northern Ireland, in contrast to what happens now in England, with our more modern legislation. To go on as if nothing had changed was unacceptable. This now means, as the noble Lord, Lord Campbell, wisely said, that profound changes are in danger of being made on the hoof in the Commons. That can be an unfortunate consequence of what happens if mistakes are made. The Prime Minister pretended to hold substantive talks only after her massive defeat in the Commons last time—the biggest defeat in parliamentary history.

In the UK, we have always, tragically, failed to explain the EU’s functions and its success story. The euro is a good example. It is feared here, because we were driven out of the exchange rate mechanism, but it is also regarded as a dangerous currency. In fact, the euro is the most successful currency in the world, getting closer and closer to the US dollar, and most member states are very happy with it. Some have found it harder to adjust than others, but that is natural in such a large grouping. I am glad to remind noble Lords that my own modest European Union (Information, etc.) Bill, is still awaiting a Committee of the Whole House—I believe it is number 11 on the list. If it comes through, it will provide that information that should have been available in public libraries and public buildings all over this country, explaining how the EU functions, in non-partisan terms, to give people the necessary information about it.

I come back to the present crisis, which is a grotesque nightmare for everyone, even the Brexiteers, more and more of whom are beginning to realise that this is the case. The SNP MP for Glenrothes, Peter Grant, the party’s foreign affairs and Europe spokesman, recently intervened on the Secretary of State for Exiting the European Union:

“The Prime Minister has promised that her discussions with the devolved nations and the Opposition parties will be without preconditions, so clearly she will not refuse even to discuss the prospect of extending article 50, because that would be a precondition; she will not refuse even to discuss the prospect of taking no deal off the table, because that would be a precondition; and she will not refuse even to discuss the possibility of giving the people another say, because that would be a precondition. Can the Secretary of State therefore confirm on the record that all those topics will be available for discussion, in honour of the Prime Minister’s promise that there will be no preconditions?”.—[Official Report, Commons, 24/1/19; col. 318.]


The most important absence of a precondition would be to give the people the chance of another vote.

[Lord Dobbs]

Before the noble Lord sits down—I promise not to keep bobbing up and down, which would be very aggravating, but he mentioned my name—I want to apologise to him for appearing in any way complacent. I had not thought I sounded complacent. He mentioned the demonstrations outside, which he said had been going on for three years. They are very impressive, with all the flags waving. Can the noble Lord enlighten me, and perhaps the House, on who is paying for these demonstrations? The question has never really been asked, and it is about time we investigated.

[Lord Dykes]

Would it not be better for the noble Lord, Lord Dobbs, to go and ask them himself? I do not know the answer but I am told that they all do it by paying themselves for their individual efforts. That is the only answer I have ever received.