European Union Bill

Lord Triesman Excerpts

Wednesday 13th July 2011 Lords Chamber

[Lord Williamson of Horton]

My Lords, we have not proposed any amendment to Motion A, which has been moved by the noble Lord, Lord Howell of Guildford. Accordingly, we accept the decision of the House of Commons to refuse any role for Parliament in the event—a perhaps rather unlikely event—of a referendum with a small or even derisory turnout. It is regrettable that, not just in relation to this Bill but in relation to other issues more widely, we have not established how we might deal with such cases. As we see in the Localism Bill and elsewhere, the referendum is likely to play a much bigger role in government in Britain in the future and on more issues.

Although in this case the House of Commons has refused the role which this House proposed for Parliament, no doubt the noble Lord the Minister will agree that because Parliament is sovereign it could in the future, if it so wished, amend the Act to insert a role for itself as we proposed in relation to a low or very low turnout in a specific referendum. But that issue does not arise today.

[Lord Triesman]

My Lords, I want to associate this side of the House with what the noble Lord, Lord Williamson, has said. The matter will not be pressed today but I would ask the House to understand the reasons in the briefest sense for why this was argued and why I think, even in the earlier example of devolution decisions in the past, people were keen to see some sort of threshold. The proposal for a 40 per cent threshold is not a benchmark which would be insisted on for every kind of vote in every kind of circumstance, although some people might in many circumstances wish to see that figure exceeded.

We are talking about changes in quite fundamental constitutional arrangements. It seems quite reasonable to say that there should be some degree of consensus that is visible and substantial when a major constitutional change is to take place. These changes in relationships with Europe would be significant constitutional changes, which is precisely why this legislation is before the House in the first place. It would be wrong to say that it is not simply a matter of how many turn up to vote because whatever the proportion was you would still have to win the vote as well in order to achieve the result.

To conclude, a number of constitutional changes are before your Lordships’ House in this parliamentary Session. We have had them on constituencies, on AV and in this Bill. We will probably see some in any Bill about reform of your Lordships’ House. In introducing piecemeal constitutional change, always with the possibility of it being adopted without there being real and genuine safeguards, we will end up with a set of jig-saw pieces from different jig-saws all shaken into the same box and without prospect of being joined together in any realistic way or without people making realistic decisions about the overall impact of what we are doing. We deny ourselves the safeguard today and, once again, I suspect that we will regret it.

[Baroness Williams of Crosby]

My Lords, I consider that the very strong and articulate arguments put forward by the noble Lord, Lord Williamson of Horton, and very carefully considered by this House, deserve a little more than the rather supercilious dismissal of the whole argument by the other place:

“Because the outcome of the referendum should be determined by those who vote in it and should not depend on how many do not vote”.

One might say that that is almost contemptuous. I support what the noble Lords, Lord Williamson of Horton and Lord Triesman, have said, although I do not expect them to press the matter to a vote.

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[Lord Maclennan of Rogart]

My Lords, I had sat down and was perfectly happy to hear the view of the noble Lord, Lord Judd. The House is eager to take a decision.

[Lord Triesman]

My Lords—

[Lord Stoddart of Swindon]

My Lords—

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[Lord Triesman]

My Lords, either the Whip on the other side is making a judgment that he is inviting the House to endorse or he is not. I do not mind either way but I suspect he is right.

[Lord Stoddart of Swindon]

My Lords, this is perfectly out of order. If necessary I will get the House to vote on whether I can speak.

[Noble Lords]

Hear, hear!

[Lord Triesman]

My Lords, we are taking part in this debate this evening because the House of Commons did not accept Amendment 15. The noble Lord, Lord Empey, made the point that the other place may have been indifferent because relatively few Members were there. I ask him not to make that judgment in general about things that happen at the other end. When most debates are conducted, you see the camera sweep around without many people being there. It is entirely possible that you could regard this as indifference to almost everything, or you could say that it is the nature of the life of this place. I certainly do not think that the House could accept what he commended to us—that we should send no messages that are in any sense disagreeable to people in the other place. Such a supine response from this House to matters on which we feel amendments are needed would surely be exactly the opposite of the role that this House should play, and ample argument for its having no role at all.

What is fundamental at this stage is that this legislation takes us, in several constitutional areas, into waters that are—I candidly submit to the House—unknown. We are being invited to change from a system that is fundamentally parliamentary in the main thrust of its work to a system that is plebiscitary. It will on one reading lead to a significant number of plebiscites—that is entirely possible—or on another to very few, as the noble Lord, Lord Lamont, suggested. That is also entirely possible; I do not know which it will be. What I do know is that it will be fundamentally different from the way in which we have conducted parliamentary debate on key issues over many generations.

There is a fundamental constitutional change in that Parliament will offer the public votes—either frequently or infrequently, depending on which reading one takes—on whether to overturn the decisions that it has taken as a result of major debates and major opportunities to review changes in Europe in both Houses. Inevitably, there will be a fundamental change in how we conduct our relationship with Europe as a whole. That is what is intended. Some people advocate that, while others of us believe that this is a disproportionate way of trying to do that. None the less, these are all fundamental changes.

I suggest to the House that, in sailing into these waters, the reality is that we do not know how it will play out. Least of all do we know in what circumstances it will play out. We do not know which things will provide the most significant changes, although we have reason to believe that the present difficulties in European nation state economies give us ample evidence that they will be the tapestry against which all of this will play out. We do not know how the constitutional matters will play out. I doubt anybody here has the temerity to suggest that they know in which circumstances all these matters will play out either.

I entirely understand the argument that there are some things, even against the background that I have described, that are so important to the people of the United Kingdom that they will insist on having a say on them. It is also true that the Government of the day will be bound, in those circumstances, to try to make judgments of their own about what the interests of the country are at any time. There is no point to a parliamentary democracy where the Government of the day say, on some quite critical issues, “We will not be finally responsible for taking judgments about what the interests of our country are”. That would be a peculiar country to live in and one in which the notion of fundamental democracy had been considerably eroded. Variations by subsequent Governments in subsequent Parliaments, of the kind that are suggested in this amendment, seem just to be prudent as a means of allowing the possibility of dealing with circumstances as they arise in a way that is more flexible—I am not afraid of that word—in all of those circumstances.

I am wholly in agreement with the noble Baroness, Lady Williams, when she says that a significant number of these issues will be judged in general elections. When people look at the questions that must be resolved, they will look at them in general elections. For those who say “Trust in the people”, my trust is at its highest point when they decide which Government they want in a general election. That is a fundamental form of trust. I accept that there will be circumstances in which a referendum would be absolutely right. I hope I have been clear from this side of the House that these include such matters as defence policy, Schengen and the euro. There is a raft of policies where I can see that that would be entirely true. However, I do not believe that, in comparison with a general election and the decisions that are taken, the people of the country—in whom, inevitably, trust must be placed in all such circumstances—believe it is somehow better to replicate “The X Factor” than to deal with real politics in real circumstances. “The X Factor” may be fine as a form of entertainment, but it is hardly a way of dealing with the national interest when it must be dealt with under stress or duress.

I also agreed with the noble Baroness, Lady Williams, when she responded to the noble Lord, Lord Lamont. This is an important point; I hope the House will not mind my repeating it. The noble Lord, Lord Lamont, is right when he says that the case for clauses that limit the life of legislation is far clearer in dealing with emergency legislation. You do not know whether you will need it in the future, and you are not 100 per cent sure that it will meet the intentions for which it was introduced. However, there is also a completely reasonable case for saying that, when we are taking such significant steps into the dark in constitutional terms, there needs to be a way to say, “How do we make sure that we’ve got the balance right in the interests of the country? How can we make sure that we are taking the right decisions in the right way against the right environmental circumstances?”. That is, after all, the function of government.

I cannot stand at this Dispatch Box and claim that I know with certainty where those new balances will lie. It is precisely my point that none of us knows where they will lie. However, this generation of politicians or the next will have to make those judgments. They will come around and they will have to be made. Politicians should be in a position to make them with the greatest confidence and authority that they can. It is critical to our country that they are successful in doing so.

I hope we will accept Amendment 15B. It is a much more limited suggestion than Amendment 15. It seems, in every respect, to grant flexibility without overriding the key provisions of the Bill in any significant way. It commends itself strongly to me on that basis. Most of all, it commends itself on the basis that, if it is true that the cause for dissatisfaction is the belief that Parliament has let too many of its roles and responsibilities go toward Europe and for those reasons fundamental constitutional change is needed—because that is the argument for this kind of fundamental constitutional change—let us be certain as time goes by that we have got it right, that the balances are right and that whatever the causes were we have not backed ourselves into a cul-de-sac or something worse.

[Lord Wallace of Saltaire]

My Lords, I thank the noble Lord—