European Union (Referendum) Bill

Lord Vinson Excerpts

Friday 10th January 2014 Lords Chamber

[Lord Vinson (Con)]

My Lords, I should like briefly to revert to why we need a referendum and why this Bill is thus so important. Our nation has nearly bankrupted itself fighting three wars in Afghanistan, Iraq and Libya, all of which aimed to give democracy and self-determination to those three nations. Yet here at home we daily deny self-rule, even to the extent that last week, contrary to the views of our own Health and Safety Executive, the EU issued a diktat controlling the nature of how much spice bakers can put into pastries. This is a perfect example, albeit insignificant in itself, of how Parliament has become a charade, as the EU reaches into every nook and cranny of our nation. Surely, it was never meant to be like that. Things have moved on. Currently, thousands of the decisions that widely affect the lives of voters are taken by anonymous and unaccountable bureaucrats rather than by parliamentarians responsible to those voters. Is it any wonder that there is widespread voter disenchantment?

Noble Lords will recall that the American War of Independence, just over 200 years ago, was triggered on that famous slogan, “No taxation without representation”. We are now back to roughly the same position: we have regulation without rectification. It is virtually impossible to change EU regulations. Most decision-making has been taken away from national Parliaments and for virtually everything that matters, from the economy to immigration, decisions are made elsewhere, many of them extremely damaging to our national efficiency—not least as regards the working time directive; and we were told last night in an excellent speech by the noble Lord, Lord Kakkar, of the harm that that had done to our medical service.

Far from being little Englanders, there are those of us who believe that democracy, however imperfect it may be, is the right for citizens to sack those who rule and regulate them, something we are unable to do today. This democratic deficit lies at the malfunctioning heart of the EU. The people of this country have been promised a referendum and I hope that they will get one as we need our sovereignty back. Meanwhile, of course, every attempt will be made from the Benches opposite to scare people into thinking that we should hold on to the EU nurse for fear of meeting something worse.

Unbalanced projections are given that 3 million jobs in this country depend on our EU trade, conveniently forgetting that 4 million jobs in the EU depend on us. We are advised that the car industry will be in deep distress, overlooking the fact that we import some 800,000 more cars from the EU—450,000 from Germany alone—and that this only partially accounts for our huge trading imbalance with the EU, currently running at £50 billion a year.

Trade crosses all boundaries. Germany exports all round the world. It will continue to export to us, just as we will continue to export to it. Can anybody seriously argue that trade on this scale would come to a standstill? Bilateral trading arrangements would be made, as they have been recently with Turkey, and trade would carry on. They need us more than we need them.

It is high time that the truth of this matter was given to the British people, and the BBC editorial committee, for once, has encouraged a fair and balanced coverage of the alternatives. Frankly, I believe that it is impossible to be a democrat today and to support our continued membership of an unreformed European Union. It is time that this matter was put to the British people—we want our country back.