European Union Bill

Lord Howell of Guildford Excerpts

Monday 16th May 2011 Lords Chamber

Moved by

[Lord Howell of Guildford]

That the House do now resolve itself into Committee.

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[Lord Dykes]

My Lords—

[The Minister of State, Foreign and Commonwealth Office (Lord Howell of Guildford)]

My Lords, I have a feeling that we have reached the stage in the debate when we could leave the press and the Daily Express, and move to the precise issues and amendments in the debate.

[Lord Pearson of Rannoch]

No, my Lords—

[Lord Howell of Guildford]

The noble Lord does not.

[Lord Pearson of Rannoch]

I wanted to press the mover and supporters of the amendment on one or two points. We have heard a lot during these debates about how inconvenient it is in the Council of Ministers if things get held up by the British people being consulted and the whole of that process in the United Kingdom. I ask those who support the amendment: what is their timeline for the independent review committee? It has to be appointed by the Secretary of State. Surely it will take a long time to be appointed, to meet, to deliberate, to report and all the rest of it. Are they not extending the inconvenience which they see as putting a spoke in the wheels of the European juggernaut?

Secondly, they seem to have great faith in the scrutiny of Parliament. I must repeat to them the figures given to me by the noble Lord, Lord Howell, on 7 February, when he told me in a Written Answer that in the years from 2004 to 2010 inclusive, the scrutiny reserve had been overridden no fewer than 347 times in your Lordships' House and 364 times in the House of Commons. Those figures, apart from being almost unbelievable and, I should have thought, destroying any pretence that parliamentary scrutiny was worth anything in the process of European legislation, must remove some of the confidence that the noble Lord has in his amendment.

[Lord Howell of Guildford]

Those are interesting and important points. The noble Lord, Lord Liddle, who was the father of the amendments, or one of the fathers—anyway, he has some paternity—will no doubt comment on them after me, but I thought that I should address some of the serious points. Not everyone has been sharply focused, but we have heard some extremely interesting observations and responses to them. I would like to express the Government's view.

Just to be clear, I say that the two amendments would make the question of whether to seek the consent of the British people in respect of the big 12 decisions in Clause 6—that is the big five or six decisions and then the whole section in Clause 6 which governs the surrender of the veto—subject to a small committee of either both Houses of Parliament or an independent review committee. The assessment of the committee, via the composition, would then be validated by a short debate and a single vote of each House of Parliament. That is what the amendment states.

That design—which, as the noble Lord said, was proposed only as a probe—would frustrate the whole purpose of the Bill. Why would it do that? I will make the general point; I will come to the detailed ones in a moment. The amendments would, in effect, replay the history to which my noble friend Lord Waddington referred, because they would hint at referendums being held with the prospect that people would once again be denied their say because, in this case, some small committee of experts—or a committee of two Houses of Parliament—had made decisions. That undermines the whole intent and thrust underlying the Bill, which is designed to rebuild trust by ensuring that the British people can decide on the key decisions affecting the future course or expansion, if that is what is required, of the competences and powers of the European Union. By going into the detail—and I can see that the detail is considerable, because the legislative patterns of the European Union are very complex and detailed—the Bill makes clear the transfers of power and competence on which the British electorate would have the right to be consulted. However, the amendments would seek to unpick that by making recommendations in small committees.

Therefore, in effect, the British people would be denied the say that they want when EU powers are to be expanded. Very few seem to want that anyway and I am very puzzled by the sudden passion of the Front Bench opposite for an expansion of powers. The British people would miss yet another opportunity to regain trust, further exacerbating the electorate’s disconnection with, and cynicism towards, the European Union. That is what the amendments would do and that is why I am glad they are only probing amendments and not a serious intention to undermine the whole purpose and spirit of the Bill.

[Lord Triesman]

Can the noble Lord give me one or two examples of the extensions that he believes this Front Bench supports and is enthusiastic about? I ask that because, certainly during the previous day in Committee, and I think that he is also inferring it tonight, it was suggested that we were in favour of the possible production of a European army—something to which I was explicitly opposed as a Minister, as I am tonight—and the abandonment of Schengen, to which I have been explicitly opposed, as we were in government. What are the examples? These are either straw men or there is substance to them.

[Lord Howell of Guildford]

My difficulty in answering that question is due to the difficulty that the Opposition have in stating why they want particular treaty amendments and expansions of the powers and competences of the European Union. When we have pressed on this matter, it has been a bit like “King Lear”: the Opposition seem to want to do “such things” and there will be uncertain futures in which new powers will somehow be needed for the European Union. Therefore, they want to amend the Bill by removing areas where the Bill would prevent the surrender of the veto. That would not prevent activity, because a huge range of competences accorded to the European Union allow it to be highly active in all these areas. However, the Opposition want to remove the vetoes on the big decisions. I think that they want a referendum on the euro, although I am not at all sure about the others and I want to go through them as we discuss these matters. The Opposition have not answered that. Why do they want these huge treaty changes, and why do they want the vetoes removed? It seems to me beyond understanding that they should want vetoes removed when so many powers and competences are now accorded to the European Union, and they can do all sorts of things to achieve the kind of Europe that we want in the future. If the Opposition have some new ideas for expanding the powers of the European Union, let them state them, otherwise we are left with a kind of “King Lear” situation—they will do “such things” as it is too difficult to mention at this time.

I want to turn to the 12 decisions in Clause 6, which cover highly sensitive areas. When I heard the noble Lord, Lord Liddle, call some of them trivial, it made me, in the words of Hilaire Belloc, gasp and stretch my eyes. When one looks at the reality of them—their real-world implications—they are anything but trivial. The big five decisions under Clause 6 include joining the eurozone, and there seems to be a general consensus that there should be a referendum on that. Incidentally, I reassure my noble friend Lord Lamont that there is not really a problem there at all. The referendum would take place before the UK took the decision, and the exchange rate would then be struck at a certain point in the middle of the night or whenever it was technically advisable to do so. I think that my noble friend put that in perfect perspective.

On the provisions relating to EU common defence, I think I heard the noble Lord, Lord Liddle, say such decisions could not necessarily lead to anything too serious—I do not want to parody him—because it was a complex issue and it might be desirable, I suppose he was saying, to give up the veto or decide to join without a referendum because not too much harm could come from it. That is miles from reality. In fact, under an EU common defence policy—on which we would urge there should be a referendum—we would no longer be able to decide independently which situations and developments we should respond to and which situations represented a threat to our national security, we would lose our ability to decide unilaterally which operations we would mount and it would no longer be our choice alone whether we should act independently or with whom we should act in concert. Of course, in this modern world we will always be acting in concert, but we decide. To say that is in the trivial category seems to me to be taking off to another planet.

[Lord Liddle]

I cannot recollect using the word “trivial”, to be quite honest. The key point we were trying to make is that, when he talks about a common defence as though we were going to pool all our military and have a common air force and a common army and all the rest, that is a complete straw man. That is not what anyone on the continent is proposing. The real issues in European defence are ones such as why we have—I cannot remember the precise figure—400,000 people under arms yet we can manage to mobilise only 5,000 for a particular operation and why, in terms of bang for the buck, Europe is so unbelievably inefficient, given all the different national procurement systems. When we are up against it on the defence budget, the Government are saying they are not interested in common procurement and how we make that work. What we are talking about is very small-scale, step-by-step, gradual changes that would be useful, not suddenly deciding that we want to have a common army and a common air force. It is ludicrous to say that the Opposition are in favour of that.

[Lord Howell of Guildford]

The Maastricht treaty and other treaties make clear that common defence means common control and common finance. There may be all sorts of arrangements short of that with some aspects of existing competencies already available to the European Union for all kinds of co-operation. I am going to come particularly to the question of enhanced co-operation and other military aspects in a moment. The noble Lord is splitting hairs. In the treaty it is perfectly clear what this step would involve. He says that there might be just one small step and it will be all right because we can have adjustments later on; that is not how it really works and certainly not how it works in law and under the treaties.

Let me move on, as I have plenty more to say on the other areas that were apparently described as trivial. Those included abolishing border controls—I feel it absolutely extraordinary to put that in the trivial category, as it is a major issue. Joining the European public prosecutor system, which is already in the treaty, or extending its powers when we had joined it is a very serious issue affecting the whole of our judicial system. Then we come to—

[Lord Goodhart]

Is my noble friend aware that the EPPO would have virtually no effect on litigation or law in the United Kingdom? It would affect only a few elements which involve entirely cross-border matters.

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[Lord Howell of Guildford]

I do not think we are going to join the EPP. The previous Government did not want it, this Government do not want it and I suspect a future Government would not want it. The issue here is whether, if we were in the system and it sought to expand its powers, we would have been right to give up the veto or would we hope to achieve advance by unanimity. Would it not be more sensible, particularly in the legal areas that the noble Lord knows so well, to advance via a system of solidarity, unity and consensus, rather than by seeking somehow to move into the QMV area? These are serious matters that affect the overall pattern of our judicial system.

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[Lord Goodhart]

Again, is it not distinctly possible that QMV would have considerable benefits for the United Kingdom? With unanimity, things that we want to do can be blocked by another member state. Is it not best to have the decision about whether to go for QMV taken by Parliament?

[Lord Howell of Guildford]

I have always found this argument very curious. To go to QMV requires a unanimous decision by those involved in taking the decision. The suggestion is that a country that is anxious to protect its national interest by blocking the move to QMV should nevertheless vote for QMV and for the power to be overridden by itself. That seems to be a turkeys-for-Christmas argument that does not add up in the real world. To imagine that by the muscle of QMV—I will not call it a sledge-hammer—one is going to get other countries to fall into line with a proposition that we might like to see pushed through is unrealistic. Why should they vote against themselves? That is not the way the pattern is ever going to work. The truth is this—my noble friend Lord Lamont touched on it—that the reason there is a long list of items in Schedule 1—

[Lord Hannay of Chiswick]

The Minister has, with enormous eloquence, destroyed the case for the Single European Act and the single market. I believe he was a member of the Government who negotiated and ratified that. I can accept that there are areas of unanimity that we will never want to allow to be subject to QMV, such as taxation. That is quite clear. We will not allow them to be, and because unanimity is required to move from that, it will not happen. There will not need to be a referendum or anything else. The root-and-branch description he has given of national interest is frankly completely contrary to the facts. The Single European Act, which provided for qualified majority voting in a number of areas of technical barriers to trade, which had been blocked for many years, has been to this country’s interest. The Germans, who voted for the Single European Act, found themselves being voted down on the banking regulation. They willed the use of QMV, and they accepted the consequences. This country has never been put in that position. I do not think we should generalise this argument. There is no dispute that there are areas where any British Government are going to refuse to move from unanimity to QMV.

[Lord Howell of Guildford]

I do not want to sound critical of the noble Lord, who has had such experience in these things, but I have to ask where he has been because this Bill is about the present and the future. It is not saying that we can unravel the Lisbon treaty or that we should revert from QMV back to unanimity on a vast number of things where there is QMV. This Bill does not take back any competences or powers, although there are people in this House and another place who would like to consider that some of the powers are somewhat out of date in the central situation and should perhaps be revisited. It is not about that at all. This Bill is about further treaty changes and further transfers of power.

Here I agree with my noble friend Lady Williams. I suspect that most people—not the noble Lord, Lord Pearson—think that we are right to be good Europeans and to be effective in the EU, that we have given the European Union enormous powers and that almost anything we want to do can be achieved within those powers and with legislation within the existing competences, but that the case for allowing a further expansion of the powers and competences without consulting people who feel that time and again they have not been consulted is a very weak case. The case for not allowing people is very weak, and the case for allowing them is extremely strong. That is what this Bill is about, so I do not understand the noble Lord’s intervention about the past. It just does not add up.

[Baroness Nicholson of Winterbourne]

Does the Minister not agree that the point made by the noble Lord, Lord Hannay, is in fact a misunderstanding of the purpose of this Bill and that his remarks and the remarks of so many of those who oppose this Bill still relate to overwhelming ownership by government of all these decisions? The purpose of the Bill is to bring the British public and the voter into that decision-making process. The focus of the Bill is in fact quite different.

[Lord Howell of Guildford]

My noble friend puts the matter with wonderful clarity. The truth is that not only is it not in our interest to remove the locks on so many aspects that the noble Lord finds so difficult but that many member states, not all of them, like us want no such thing as a removal of the veto in so many areas. Indeed, this explains why most of the areas requiring unanimity are in the treaty in the first place, remain in the treaty and are in Clause 6 and Schedule 1.

[Lord Hannay of Chiswick]

I have a strong preference for interpreting what I say myself and for not having it interpreted by another Member of the House. The reason I spoke as I did about the past was because the Minister spoke about it himself and expressed very strong views about the total unacceptability of movements from unanimity to QMV and about why it was inconceivable that any country would ever agree to that knowing that it might then be voted down. I gave one or two examples of why that was not inconceivable and why that had actually happened and had been in the British interest.

[Lord Howell of Guildford]

I am receiving strong hints—correct hints, I think—that not too much more time should be taken up from this Dispatch Box on these matters, and I will leave that debate aside for a moment.

This Bill is about a further expansion of competencies and powers; it is not about unravelling the past, because we are not in a position to do that, although some would like to. It remains unclear to me why the Opposition want more competencies and powers for the European Union; I am very interested that that is now the official position of the Opposition. I am longing to hear how they are going to deploy that and expand on it in the coming weeks and months.

Let me finally turn to Amendment 39B, which states that the committee must have regard to the urgency of the draft decision. Again, this shows a lack of understanding—possibly through my deficiency in being unable to convey how the system actually works, although there are other people in this Chamber who know it much better than I do. As I tried to explain previously on Amendments 16A and 16B, and as my noble friend Lady Falkner rightly said, one could think of few more urgent things than stabilising the eurozone. It still needs doing, of course, yet the use of the simplified revision procedure to enable member states in the euro area to set up the ESM to safeguard the financial and economic stability of the euro area will take 21 months to finalise. It was agreed in March 2011 and approved at the end of 2012. How could anyone consider that to be urgent? I do not understand what the “urgency” word is doing in that amendment.

There are a couple of other weaknesses in this probing amendment, which I suspect the noble Lord, Lord Liddle, who is extremely experienced in these matters, is well aware of. These amendments do not seem to take account of the work of our excellent scrutiny committees. I know that the noble Lord, Lord Pearson, thinks they are not paid enough attention. There is always the point that our scrutiny should be more effective, but it does go on and it is conducted with great vigour and assiduity under the leadership of people like the noble Lord, Lord Roper, in the European Union Committee of this House. It is within their gift to make recommendations similar to those prepared by the referendum committee at the time when Parliament came to debate the primary legislation required under Clause 6. It could be done there.

Finally, the amendments do not seem to take into account the need for primary legislation—the point that the noble Lord, Lord Hannay, is reminding us of—in all these situations, which would provide for full parliamentary consideration of the decision in question through the rigour of the legislative process. It is therefore not clear how the provisions for resolutions of Parliament would fit with the requirements earlier in the clause for an Act of Parliament. Nor is it clear what would happen if one House approved the recommendations of the committee and the other House did not. Therefore, there is no need for the additional complications and opportunities for prevarication, because that is what we would get with these amendments, along with delay and opaqueness.

It is surely right that if a future Government really believe that a further transfer of power or competence from the UK to the EU is in the interests of this country, they should not be afraid to make the case to the British people and let them decide. Those who might be in favour of more powers to the EU and those who might be against should have the courage of their convictions—possibly more so than in the past—and be prepared to seek a mandate from the public, not from a small group of Parliament or some external committee. That is why I ask noble Lords to withdraw these amendments.