Queen’s Speech

Lord Moynihan Excerpts

Thursday 28th May 2015 Lords Chamber

[Lord Moynihan (Con)]

My Lords, in the brief time available to speak on the gracious Speech, I shall focus my remarks on the UK’s relationship with the European Union. This will be one of the seminal questions facing us in this Parliament and the source of much newsprint and many hours of debate, not least in your Lordships’ House.

Today sees the publication of the European Union Referendum Bill, as promised in the gracious Speech. The result of the referendum that it provides for will chart the course of the UK’s history for the next generation. The Prime Minister’s dialogue with EU leaders in Riga last week marked the beginning of a two-part process: the negotiation of the package of reforms, followed by the referendum campaign itself. These are very early days and the Prime Minister is absolutely right to start with a broad-brush approach that lays the groundwork for a deal, sounding out the views of others in Europe and putting the desire for reform in the UK in context before revealing his full negotiating hand in the detailed discussions that lie ahead.

Prior to the election, there were some discordant murmurings about the dearth of concrete proposals on the table and objections to their vague, unquantifiable nature. However, nothing would have been more guaranteed to backfire spectacularly than a hectoring list of British demands laid before our European partners. For this process to succeed it must be about the interests of Britain—those are plainly paramount—but also about a determination to improve the EU as a whole.

Britain does not stand alone in wanting the EU to work better—far from it. Many in Europe share the same vision of a reformed, recalibrated EU with a vibrant single market freed from the stranglehold of red tape. To succeed, we need to work with the grain of that opinion, not against it. This cannot be seen across the channel as a zero-sum process in which the recalcitrant is pitted stubbornly against the reluctant, and where the best deal for Britain by definition will result in a diminished EU. Indeed, the opposite is true. Our interests are aligned with a great many in Europe. In securing real reform, Britain will work better within the EU and the EU will work better for all its citizens.

Paradoxically, it sometimes seems that those with the pragmatic perspective that location on the geographical periphery often bestows are best able to provide the impetus, energy and momentum for positive change at the centre. While we must allay concerns that ours will be a pick-and-mix approach that will undermine EU cohesion, fears that a British deal could open the floodgates for other countries to seek concessions and create a free-for-all of competing demands should be squarely countered on the basis that institutions that are not prepared to adapt and to flex in accordance with the needs and wishes of their members become over time at best irrelevant and at worst extinct. Straitjacketing 28 member states to achieve unity is no long-term solution.

Monday’s meeting at Chequers with EU Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker set a constructive tone and it is to be hoped that the Prime Minister’s meeting with Mrs Merkel tomorrow will do likewise. Her support for a deal will be essential, and while we should not suppose that Germany will support the unpicking of the treaties governing the EU to accommodate a British wish list, there is reason to suppose that our liberal-market advocacy earns us a certain amount of good will in Berlin. Indeed, the mood music from our European partners since the Prime Minister’s decisive election victory has become far more emollient. The hypothetical is now real: Britain will decide the European question through a referendum. This is surely concentrating minds in Europe on how a fair deal for the UK might be agreed.

I do not believe there is any appetite in Europe to see Britain leave the EU. The UK is no longer considered an affordable loss, as former EU Commissioner Günter Verheugen put it. The UK is crucial to both the economic future of Europe and its political future, but that still does not mean a blank cheque to write whatever changes we want. Just as we will have red lines, so too will our European partners, and we cannot demand other countries change any more than they can demand that we must. While stating our position clearly and firmly, we must address concerns that there will be a reductio ad absurdum of the fundamental essence of the EU, even if we do not share those concerns.

I have spoken about the need for EU reform and the prospects for a deal from the perspective of an unapologetic and instinctive Eurorealist, with the roots of my conviction firmly based in the history of the 20th century. I want to see the best outcome for the renegotiation effort, followed by a government campaign in favour of membership of a reformed EU. I echo the Foreign Secretary’s words:

“That is how I want this process to end up: a good package of reforms; a ‘yes’ vote; and a step change in the way the relationship works, with Britain being really engaged and a loud voice in the union”.

The Prime Minister has made it clear that he wants the UK to stay in a reformed EU that is,

“more competitive, more flexible and more accountable to the people”.

The start of his efforts to achieve that is not the time to ask the Government what they will do in the referendum if that necessary reform is not forthcoming.

Of course, there will be those who seek to defeat a deal before it is even struck, and those who say that any promise of reform is no more than a chimera or fig-leaf, unable to cover the deep fractures and fissures that the European question always opens. But the deal is a prelude and the referendum is the denouement. I agree with the noble Earl, Lord Sandwich, that unlike with the last referendum in 1974 the result needs to settle the European question for a generation, with no room left for disgruntled malcontents to express their resentment at the outcome or to suggest that the British public have been hoodwinked into a deal that is not really a deal. For this reason, voters are right to be asked only the simple in/out question.