Brexit: Foreign and Security Policy Co-operation

Lord Lea of Crondall Excerpts

Thursday 20th October 2016 Lords Chamber

[Lord Lea of Crondall (Lab)]

My Lords, a spectre is haunting Europe: the spectre of acrimony. Today, we are told that the Prime Minister, having made the big shift before the Conservative Party conference, says not only is there no going back but that any of the partial proposals people were attempting to put forward in our last debate, in July—and which were given a fair hearing at that time—have been ruled out. We are told that we cannot now think about a, b and c—I do not know whether that includes the single market and the customs union—or many of the things that were being seriously discussed in the context of Norway-plus or minus. All these options now seem to have been ruled out.

We might get into the position where, on hearing reports of the negotiations in Brussels, almost every newspaper—certainly those such as the Mail and the Telegraph; those controlled by Murdoch—will the next day say that Britain has been treated with contempt. That will be the headline in the tabloids every other week for the next two years. How can that have a happy ending?

At the same time, the Prime Minister has said that we want to be friends with everybody. If that is what we want to achieve, we will have to think about the criteria by which we are able to do so, rather than saying, “We are not going in for a new version of an even more special deal, we are out. We will have a different relationship and you can get on with your lives without us. We’ve always been probably the most difficult partner inside the EU. We are not a brake on you”.

Then, we come to a practical question: can we have an EU agreement on the next phase of our interface with the Russians in relation to Syria? That is the most practical thing in the world—we have RAF planes there and we want to be there, and indeed in other parts of the Middle East. There are many other examples around the world where we of course have to be part of an EU group. For example, when looking at criteria for distributing aid around Africa, in small countries with hardly any professional resources—we cannot have 10 different countries giving 10 different sets of criteria to one trained civil servant in Burundi, Mozambique or Madagascar. Also, I am sorry to disagree with my friend the noble Lord, Lord Marlesford, but the weekly EU meetings in these capitals are some of the most constructive of the meetings in many parts of Latin America and Africa. They work very well and pragmatically.

So instead of, “Let’s fight them on the beaches—never surrender”, how are we going to recoup following the seriously mistaken and premature decision by the Prime Minister to make this sudden announcement on the eve of the Conservative Party conference? The first thing that should happen following the change in tone from the Government is to remove the narrative that it is we remainers who are in denial. That is not the case: it is we who are pointing out that there are issues with the customs union, et cetera. The people in denial are those in favour of Brexit who deny that these questions even exist. They were not put to the people in the referendum. There was no prospectus—apart from the fraudulent prospectus about taking back control.

It is a globalised world of multinational corporations. The trade unions have learned pragmatically that, in European works councils, you have to co-operate with people. That is where our interest lies. But now, we are in the ludicrous position whereby we are told that there will be a rule of omerta and that Parliament will not know anything that is going on because it would show our negotiating hand. Who believes that? The reason for that, in large part, is that we do not have a road map. The Bus Services Bill gets more attention than this, times 10—we have an impact assessment, a Green Paper, a White Paper and every other sort of paper giving the case and setting up the pros and cons of the different approaches.

This is the biggest decision, and the most serious position we have been in internationally, certainly since Suez. Indeed, I agree with the noble Lord, Lord Liddle—I think it was him who said so—that this is the most serious position we have been in since before the war. Yet somehow, we are saying that we should take an oath of omerta.

What we have to do now is to nail the lie that, somehow, the British people decided on a plan and we have to fulfil that plan without any more discussion because the plan is out. There is no such plan. The British people were misled. I do not want to sound like Mr Trump, who says that democracy is not working because the people were misled—but goodness gracious, did the people think that a devaluation of 15% was what they were voting for? How many would have voted for that if they had been told? Ten per cent? I do not know, but not a lot more than that.

The narrative has to change. We will be at a crisis point if things go on like this. Little Englanders will have taken control of our destiny. I say that advisedly: it was not Little Scotlanders, Little Walesians or Little Northern Irelanders—or whatever the correct form of those terms is. There will be a break-up of a lot of processes in Ireland, and of a lot of relationships between England and Scotland. That is what Brexit would mean. I therefore ask the Minister whether she agrees that that is a message to which her colleagues should give very urgent consideration.