European Union Referendum Bill

Lord Lea of Crondall Excerpts

Tuesday 13th October 2015 Lords Chamber

[Lord Lea of Crondall (Lab)]

My Lords, the leitmotiv of this debate seems to be “Come back, Harold Wilson, all is forgiven”. He may have kidded the rest of us sometimes, but I do not think he ever kidded himself. I only wish that were true of his successor in 10 Downing Street today.

My qualification, such as it is, for speaking is a little along the lines of that of the noble Lord, Lord Stoddart, in that I wrote the TUC pamphlet in 1975, saying, “Vote no”. Albeit brilliantly argued, two-thirds of our members voted yes. That is the sort of thing one tends to remember. Jack Jones subsequently said to me, “I thought I asked you to write a popular pamphlet saying, ‘Vote no’.” I said, “I did, Jack, I did.” He replied, “Well, it wasn’t very popular, was it?”

The trade union movement has now, I think it fair to say, come to terms with the reality of multinational but accountable capitalism. I say “but accountable”. There is a question mark there. I hope no one in this Chamber thinks there should be any withdrawing of the degree of accountability of multinational capitalism, be it Volkswagen, which we have been very conscious of in the past few days, or, indeed, the hedge funds. The noble Lord, Lord Stoddart, said that we do not want people financed according to the ratio that applied in 1975, but it seems that hedge funds are now the epitome of our national interest. Are they not multinational, or does he not want any of the money coming from the hedge funds? That is a rhetorical question, but he will forgive me for that.

We want a debate with proper rules of engagement.

[Lord Stoddart of Swindon]

I am very sorry to interrupt, but I do not quite understand the reference to hedge funds. I do not think I made any reference to hedge funds.

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Lea of Crondall]

The noble Lord did not make a reference to hedge funds, but the point I am making is that, according to the papers, there is a very prominent role for hedge funds in financing the “get out” campaign. I assume that he is not unhappy to take their money.

[Lord Stoddart of Swindon]

I did not take anybody’s money.

[Lord Lea of Crondall]

One of the most complicated points we have been discussing is describing what “out” looks like. It is a genuinely difficult problem. There are two issues which are very hard to separate out. First, as the FT says today, Paris, Berlin and Brussels are increasingly exasperated about what Britain wants. The noble Lord, Lord Kerr, said he was baffled by the negotiating strategy. The problem is that it is very hard to pin down what the “out” position would be and what, therefore, is the correct comparison with the “in” position.

People such as the noble Lord, Lord Lawson, are not really interested in renegotiation. He makes no bones about it: he wants out. But there are others who say it depends on the outcome of the renegotiation. I think it is fair for us to give more thought to what it is that the British people will be looking at. They will be able to look at what “in” means a lot more easily and unambiguously than what “out” means, so I want to spend my other four minutes on what “out” might mean.

I agree very much with my noble friend Lady Morgan of Ely, who said that the Office for Budget Responsibility or an organisation of that ilk could look at some of the economic consequences. Of course, the rest of the picture is very hard to give to the OBR or Whitehall. It is far too speculative, and it probably will be a picture of a future period, let us say in three years’ time, involving a vote to say “out” and further negotiation with the countries of the 28 as to what “out” actually means.

As Donald Rumsfeld said, there are known knowns and known unknowns, and there are both types in this quandary as to how we present what “out” looks like in an objective and unambiguous way. The answer is that we do not know, because the negotiation beginning now would have to be followed by another negotiation about what “out” actually meant in terms of customs, tariffs, industrial standards and so on.

The throwaway line of the noble Lord, Lord Blackwell, about the EU raising trade barriers against us as some sort of eccentric thing to do—that is only the converse of our getting out. If we think that the trading arrangements within the EU have no substance, being out of the EU will not present us with any difficulties, because according to his hypothesis, if we were out, there would be no change at all. Thus, we all disappear, chasing our own tails. If that is the position, clearly it is misleading. Getting out would have some consequences. We have only Greenland to go on at the moment, and that is a slightly odd comparison, given that it has just a few thousand people and millions of fish, and Denmark controls its foreign policy. Before the referendum, we must give more thought to how the “out” question can be better identified.

I conclude with one quick point about the franchise. The dog that has not barked today, and it is an important one, is the dire state of the electoral register. In many places—but equally, in the inner circles—it is a scandal. Will the Government agree to examine the steps that could be taken with the electoral authorities to address this deepening problem? It is not a million miles away from the other work that they will be doing if the amendment on age limitation and so on is accepted.