European Union (Referendum) Bill

Martin Horwood Excerpts

Friday 5th July 2013 Commons Chamber

[James Wharton]

I want to make a little more progress, if I may.

We know that the European Union has changed from the European Community that was voted on in 1975. We know that generations did not get a choice. But what of the question of having a referendum itself? This was once seen to be alien to the British political system. It was not what we did. Well, I would contend that we live in the age of the referendum. We have had referendums on whether Scotland should have its Parliament and whether Wales should have its Assembly, and on the alternative vote. We had a referendum on whether we should have a regional assembly for the north-east of England, and my hon. Friend the Member for Harwich and North Essex (Mr Jenkin) came up to the north-east and campaigned in that referendum. He campaigned against and he was remarkably successful. I would like to give him the chance to campaign in a referendum again, not on an issue of regional government, but on one of national Government that affects us all.

[Martin Horwood (Cheltenham) (LD)]

On the subject of consistency within the coalition that the hon. Gentleman just mentioned, we both voted for the European Union Act 2011 only two years ago. I am still happy with it. Is he?

[James Wharton]

Yes, I am.

It is important when we look at referendums to understand what they mean. They go to the heart of what democracy is about. They go to the heart of giving the British people their say on fundamental matters of importance.

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[Mr Hague]

I think the Bill sends the message that we are a robust democracy too. We welcomed Croatia into the European Union, and it had a referendum about whether to join. Therefore, it does not find discussion about referendums in other parts of the European Union surprising. That is why every Member of the House who is a true democrat can and should unite behind the Bill. It is about letting the people decide.

Those who like the EU just as it is—not me, but evidently some Labour Members—can campaign to see the EU regain its democratic legitimacy in this country. Those, like me, who want to see Britain succeed in reforming the EU can see what success we have in changing it, and then put the choice to the people. Those who want Britain to leave the EU come what may will also have the chance to persuade the British people. Ultimately, it would be up to the voters to decide, and that is the essence of democracy. That is why my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister said that

“in 2015”

we

“will ask for a mandate from the British people…to negotiate a new settlement with our European partners in the next Parliament.”

The Conservative party is ready to trust the voters with this Bill, and we are happy that the Democratic Unionist party is of the same mind. The Scottish National party is not here but it is content with a referendum next year, which means that the people of Scotland will vote twice on whether to leave the European Union. It is completely open to Members of other parties to support this Bill. Liberal Democrats can support this Bill. They are democrats and I remind my hon. Friends in the other part of the coalition of their last election manifesto, which stated:

“The European Union has evolved significantly since the last public vote on membership over thirty years ago. Liberal Democrats therefore remain committed to an in/out referendum the next time a British Government signs up for a fundamental change in the relationship between the UK and the EU.”

[Martin Horwood]

The right hon. Gentleman is a fine Foreign Secretary and he bangs on about Europe very eloquently indeed. He will recall that at the time of the Lisbon treaty, the Liberal Democrats voted for an in/out referendum, not in four years’ time, the next Parliament or at some point in the future, but then and there. Will the right hon. Gentleman remind me whether we were supported by a single Conservative MP at that time?

[Mr Hague]

My hon. Friend must remember that had our Liberal Democrat colleagues voted with us for a referendum on the Lisbon treaty, there would have been a referendum in 2008. Some Labour Members support a referendum. We have heard from some of them already, and this Bill is their chance; it is the best chance currently available to make it happen. Not only would it be a badge of honour for them, but it would help to show their weak leadership some real leadership that is sorely needed.

This is not the first time that the question of whether to consult the people has caused unmitigated dither, muddle and confusion in the Labour leadership. When the previous Prime Minister, the right hon. Member for Kirkcaldy and Cowdenbeath (Mr Brown), was trying to decide whether to call a general election in 2007, he asked the current Leader of the Opposition, the current shadow Foreign Secretary and the current shadow Chancellor, resulting in the decision taking so long that they never made a decision at all and never held a general election. The impulse to trust the people is not exactly their hallmark.

Now we wonder: what is Labour’s policy? The shadow Defence Secretary, the right hon. Member for East Renfrewshire (Mr Murphy), who is not here, said in October:

“I think at some point there will have to be a referendum on the EU. I don’t think it’s for today or for the next year, but I think it should happen…My preference would be an in-or-out referendum when the time comes.”

In January, the Leader of the Opposition told the House,

“we do not want an in/out referendum”—[Official Report, 23 January 2013; Vol. 557, c. 305.]

The shadow Foreign Secretary said that Labour will not commit to an in/out referendum now, but might do later—apparently that is the way to avoid uncertainty.

The shadow Chancellor said:

“I don’t think we should set our face against a referendum and I certainly don’t think we can ever afford to give the impression that we know better than the voting public”—

although that was never a problem for him when squandering tens of billions of pounds of taxpayers’ money. Will Labour make up its mind or not? Its chief strategist, the noble Lord Wood, said the week before last on whether Labour would offer a referendum:

“It’s conceivable because we are going to make up our minds before the next election.”

Last week, the shadow Chief Secretary to the Treasury said, “No, no, no. There’s no change of policy and there’s no prospect of a change of policy”.

With some in favour, some against, some adamantly in favour of not having a referendum, some adamantly for deciding later, at some point, perhaps before the general election but who knows?—with such a shambles of confusion and weak leadership, no wonder Labour Members are wondering what they are here for and where their leader is today. One day Unite will give them their orders on how to vote on these matters.

The Leader of the Opposition and his closest friends are being asked to make a decision—to vote one way or another and be held accountable for it. The position of the Labour party on this vital national and international issue is that Labour Members would rather not be asked and they would rather not be here.

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[Martin Horwood]

Given the hon. Gentleman’s childish remarks about the Liberal Democrats, I can tell him that he has lost one member of Unite today. I am holding up my trade union membership card, which I have stuck to religiously since my days in the charity sector, but I can give it to him after the debate and he can do what he likes with it.

[Mr Davidson]

Well, I suggest the hon. Gentleman does not tempt me to do what I like with it, because what I might like to do with it is not necessarily what he would enjoy, unless he is not the man I think he is.

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[Mr David Nuttall (Bury North) (Con)]

I hope I will set an appropriate example, Madam Deputy Speaker, in my brief speech.

It is a pleasure to follow the right hon. Member for Belfast North (Mr Dodds). I agree with what he said and it is worth noting that he leads at Westminster a completely united party on matters relating to the European Union. I also commend and congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Stockton South (James Wharton) on coming first in the ballot and proposing this excellent Bill.

It is surprising how quickly things change in politics. Members will recall that less than two years ago, I moved a motion on holding a referendum on our membership of the European Union. On that day, all parties had a three-line Whip against my motion. Today, my party has a three-line Whip to support a referendum on the European Union and the official Opposition are so weak and divided that they cannot even make their minds up what to do.

The Bill will be welcomed warmly by my constituents in Bury, Ramsbottom and Tottington. It is nearly four decades since they have had a say on this country’s relationship with the European Union. That means that many of them have never had a say at all. Since that time, the nature of what was then the European Economic Community, which was widely called the Common Market, has changed out of all recognition. As the stated aim of the treaty of Rome of “ever-closer union” has gradually been achieved, the tentacles of what is now the European Union have been felt in a growing number of areas of life, in a way that was never envisaged by the British people when they voted to stay in the Common Market in 1975.

[Martin Horwood]

On a point of information, the question in 1975 was not about the European Economic Community, but the European Community. The words “Common Market” were inserted by Eurosceptics in Harold Wilson’s Government. A lot of that historical debate, which I have been looking at over the past couple of days, was about the political, social and international aspects of the European Community. Those aspects were in Harold Wilson’s official leaflet that went out.

[Mr Nuttall]

I did say that it was widely referred to as the Common Market. It was called the European Economic Community, then the word “Economic” was dropped and it became the European Community, as the hon. Gentleman rightly says. It then changed from the European Community to the European Union as ever-closer union began to take effect.

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[Martin Horwood (Cheltenham) (LD)]

This has been a thought-provoking debate—and, in some places, just provoking! I would say to the hon. Member for Glasgow South West (Mr Davidson) that I am afraid my Unite membership card has suffered irreparable damage during the course of this debate, but I thank him for his graphic advice on what I should now do with it. After recent events in Falkirk, I suspect there might be a few other people taking very similar advice.

It is good to see the House so full on a Friday. I gather that it has something to do with the provision of hog roast by the Prime Minister last night. One participant told me that burgers were being served by him, but they were a little bit rare. Perhaps that explains why so many left the Chamber so fast after the Foreign Secretary’s speech!

As a Liberal Democrat, I like referendums—and we have been consistent supporters of them. We supported all the referendums on Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland. We were quite happy with the referendum on the European Community in 1975, and we even went along with the referendum on AV—the alternative vote system—although we obviously cannot win them all. At the time of the Lisbon treaty, we alone supported an in/out referendum for this country—not at four years’ remove, not for some future Parliament, but at that time. We got absolutely no support from the Conservative party at that stage.

I am afraid that that was the completely consistent position through to the general election of 2010, and it is more or less our position now. The Deputy Prime Minister has set out our position, the only difference being that in the meantime we have passed the European Union Act 2011, which rather watered down the Liberal Democrat commitment to an in/out referendum and adopted—[Interruption.] Conservative Members may laugh, but they have obviously not read their own manifesto of 2010. What is in the European Union Act 2011 is precisely the basis on which Conservative Members fought the last general election, which was the idea that there should be a trigger relating to the transfer of power. The Conservative manifesto stated that in the event of a transfer of power from the British level to the European level, a referendum on that transfer would be held. That is exactly what went into the European Union Act in 2011. We will quite happily use that to trigger—that is fine—but we are still committed to an in/out referendum, and I am still going to argue for one.

[Neil Parish]

If the hon. Gentleman is so keen on talking about Liberal Democrat policy on a former referendum, why is he not supporting us today? I also congratulate him on being the only one of an endangered species here in the Chamber today.

[Martin Horwood]

I was not, in fact, the only Liberal Democrat Member here, and my colleagues are probably focused on jobs, A and E departments, the good deal we are delivering for pensioners and promoting employment and economic prosperity in their constituencies, rather than spending an entire day banging on about Europe. I am reassured that so many Conservative Members are so confident that all the jobs are provided and all the A and E departments are safe and no green spaces need protecting that they are willing to spend an entire day here talking about the minutiae of European referendums. I am equally confident that at one stage we had the Prime Minister, the Chancellor, the Foreign Secretary and, I think, the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions all in the Chamber for this debate, so I assume the Deputy Prime Minister must have been busy running the country at that point.

The consistent position the Liberal Democrats have taken is to be in favour of an in/out referendum either at a time of major, fundamental treaty change or at a time of a transfer of power, which also has to happen under treaty provisions. That is the consistent position we have taken, and that is the position we still take today. [Interruption.] Does the hon. Member for South East Cornwall (Sheryll Murray) want to point out when we have said anything different? She does not; I thought as much.

The Conservative party, by contrast, has taken a bewildering variety of positions on referendums. I think it was the hon. Member for Ealing North (Stephen Pound), who is no longer in his place, who pointed out that Margaret Thatcher opposed the original European referendum and she quoted Clement Attlee saying referendums were a device of demagogues and dictators. At that point she was a supporter of European Union membership, which at that stage was already identified as a discussion about social and political union as well as about access to an economic common market. That is clear from the literature produced in that referendum campaign. It talks about the new regional fund, the social fund, bringing the peoples of Europe closer together and promoting peace and freedom—so even the defence and security aspects of the EU’s work were already being debated. Margaret Thatcher said that for the Labour party the proposal of a referendum was

“a tactical device to get over a split in their own party.”—[Official Report, 11 March 1975; Vol. 888, c. 306.]

I think history might be repeating itself now.

[Richard Graham (Gloucester) (Con)]

I am grateful to my hon. Friend, who is my neighbour, for giving way. He talks about history repeating itself. Some of us remember very clearly that when the Prime Minister stood up and announced he was going to renegotiate the EU budget so that it was cut, one of my hon. Friend’s distinguished colleagues described that as being an inconceivable act. Does he believe it would be inconceivable to renegotiate anything with Europe?

[Martin Horwood]

The point is that we can be in favour of reform, but not necessarily make that conditional on referendums. If we read the Prime Minister’s speech carefully, we can see that Liberal Democrats would disagree with very little of what he actually wanted to change in Europe. Indeed, we would enthusiastically support much of the reform agenda. We have gone along with Conservative colleagues in supporting the Government’s review of the balance of competences. I think that is a very important process, and I think it is an absolutely correct one to carry out, but I also think it was ill-judged to attach a time bomb to all this and say that unless we get what we want we will do this or that, and to try to negotiate on a unilateral basis. It is important now to try to achieve these reforms on a multilateral basis by co-operation with other European partners.

I was explaining some of the political background of the Conservative party’s position. In the 1990s John Major was in favour of a referendum, but only on membership of the euro. By 2001, that had changed and then we had an evolution of a policy that was really about—

[Tim Loughton]

rose—

[Martin Horwood]

I had better not give way repeatedly, but I shall give way to the hon. Gentleman for one final time.

[Tim Loughton]

I am sorry that the leader of the hon. Gentleman’s party was not able to flip a few lentil burgers last night to entice more of his colleagues to take part in this important debate. Will he just clarify his position? In the highly unlikely event that we have a Liberal Democrat Government after the next election, and this Bill, as is most likely, has been passed in this Parliament, would they abolish the undertakings that this Bill would give to tie us to a referendum, and thus give the British people a say at last?

[Martin Horwood]

I have already spelled out very clearly our position, which is exactly the same one as we took at the time of the Lisbon treaty and of the last election: at a time of treaty change, fundamental change or a transfer of power from the British to the European level, we would want an in/out referendum, and we would legislate to make that possible in the event of our having a majority in Parliament.

The Conservative position has flip-flopped dramatically. The position in the Conservative manifesto was enacted in the European Union Act 2011, yet within a year and a few months the Prime Minister was expounding a completely different position. Even that has changed between his speech and this Bill, because the question has changed from whether to remain in the European Union to whether to be in the European Union. [Interruption.]

[Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Lindsay Hoyle)]

Order. Many conversations are going on. I know that not many people may be agreeing with Mr Horwood, but I would certainly like to hear what he has to say.

[Martin Horwood]

I am very grateful, Mr Deputy Speaker. The chances of the Conservative party getting as far as 2017 without changing its policy again are pretty slim. Let me reinforce that point. Only 19 months ago, the Prime Minister said:

“That, for me, in a parliamentary democracy, is the right use of a referendum. However, as we are not signing a treaty, I think that the whole issue of a referendum does not arise.”

He continued by saying that

“there is a role for referendums in a parliamentary democracy, but that comes at the moment when a Government or a Parliament proposes to give up power, rather than at other times.”—[Official Report, 12 December 2011; Vol. 537, c. 535-549.]

That is precisely the Liberal Democrat position and has been for some time.

We are not going to oppose this Bill, but we are not content to support it because there is a long list of problems with it. Legislation already in force—the Political Parties, Elections and Referendums Act 2000—is supposed to lay down the procedure under which we hold referendums and, for example, the role of the Electoral Commission in helping to determine the question. This Bill is pre-empting any decision by the Electoral Commission and it does not even appear to comply or be consistent with the 2000 Act. I do not know whether the draftsmen had forgotten that that Act existed.

Then there is the question of the franchise, which has also been referred to—

[Mr John Redwood (Wokingham) (Con)]

Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

[Martin Horwood]

I do not think I had better. I am really looking forward to seeing the variety of different Conservative positions being expounded in the remainder of the debate, and if I give way to everybody—[Interruption.] Somebody is telling me to keep it short, and I think that the best way to do that is not to give way on every point.

The Bill also needs to deal with a problem relating to the franchise. Some 1.4 million British citizens reside elsewhere than in the UK, but according to the terms of the Bill the referendum will be based on the Westminster franchise. As far as I can tell, that has only about 19,000 registered overseas voters, so more than 1 million Britons, whose lives will be fundamentally affected by this change—they are British passport holders resident in other parts of the EU—will be disfranchised in this referendum. By this formula, the Bill will give votes to Cypriot and Maltese citizens living in this country, because under the Westminster franchise Commonwealth citizens have the vote, but it will not give the vote to French, Italian or German citizens. So there are a lot of inconsistencies, and this issue has not been debated at all so far.

The House of Commons Library briefing also raised the question of whether or not the Bill is even legally binding. Even the hon. Member for Stockton South (James Wharton) has conceded that this parliamentary vote would not bind its successor Parliament and further parliamentary votes, probably on secondary legislation, would be required to give effect to the referendum in any case.

[Mr Baron]

The hon. Gentleman has now made one of the longest speeches. May I ask him, with all due respect: could he please cut it short, if only because a long list of Members also wish to speak?

[Martin Horwood]

I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for his advice, which should probably have come from the Chair rather than him. There is a slight problem, however, as most of my time has been taken up responding to interventions from his colleagues, so perhaps he should encourage them to be a little quieter.

The problems continue. The uncertainty that the Bill creates for business is clear, even if we make a number of big assumptions about the referendum process: first, that the Conservative Front Bench will not change its position between now and 2017, but having changed it three times in two years, that is a big assumption; secondly, that the timetable for the referendum does not have to be changed in any case, although we may find in 2017 that we are in the middle of a renegotiation or treaty change process resulting from changes in the eurozone, and at such a juncture, it would be nonsense to hold a referendum, as another referendum might be provoked in only a matter of months or years, so we would not really know what we were voting for in those circumstances; and finally, if the political landscape had not completely changed in any case we might have a different Government with different priorities and there might be a recovery in the European economy, and we may find votes for the UK Independence party subsiding and that Europe is not quite such a big priority—it is not a terribly big priority for most voters according to existing polls—so the idea of spending yet more hundreds of hours of parliamentary time banging on about Europe might not seem quite as appealing.

Even if all of that is true, and we move towards a referendum by 2017, that still condemns British business and British jobs to four years of uncertainty—what a message to send to investors. The CBI is quoted in the Independent newspaper, i, this morning, and raises the problem of the uncertainty caused for British business:

“British businesses don’t want to find themselves at the margins of the world’s largest trading bloc operating under market rules over which they have no influence.”

That is the prospect that we are going to live with, unresolved, apparently for up to four years. That is one of the problems with the Bill. This morning, The Daily Telegraph, I think, quoted the leader of the Norwegian Conservative party, who pointed out that the supposed solution of the UK trying to have a status more or less equivalent to Norway’s was worse than being in the EU. Norway pays hundreds of billions of euros to the European Union for access to the single European market, and finds out about the rules through so-called fax democracy.

There are many, many problems with the Bill, which does not really resolve the main question. It is, as we all really know—rather like Harold Wilson’s Bill in the 1970s—about papering over the cracks in the Conservative party itself. It will not really work. The Prime Minister has spelled out a reasonably modest set of ambitions for renegotiation that will never satisfy many of his Back Benchers, who clearly want to use a much more ambitious and unilateral agenda for negotiation as something that will provide them with an excuse to campaign for exit.

UK businesses have access to free trade in the world’s largest single market, worth nearly £11 trillion in gross domestic product, with over 500 million consumers. One in 10 British jobs are linked to the single market. Some £495 billion-worth of British trade is with other EU member states. To put that in jeopardy—

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[Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Lindsay Hoyle)]

I can see frustrations building up in the Chamber. I think that Mr Horwood is trying to give us an encompassing view of why the referendum may be good or bad. I am sure that even he recognises that a lot of people wish to speak, and hopefully we can move on. In the meantime, it is Martin Horwood.

[Martin Horwood]

Thank you very much, Mr Deputy Speaker. I shall draw my remarks to a close. Even if hon. Members do not listen to me, and even if they do not listen to the leader of the Norwegian Conservative party, or even the CBI, perhaps they should just listen to what the Prime Minister himself said in that speech. In the end he moved on to the main question, which is whether in an in/out referendum we would be campaigning to stay in or out. The Prime Minister said:

“Of course Britain could make her own way in the world, outside the EU, if we chose to do so. So could any other Member State. But the question we will have to ask ourselves is this: is that the very best future for our country?”

He went on:

“Continued access to the Single Market is vital for British businesses and British jobs...being part of the Single Market has been key to that success...There are some who suggest we could turn ourselves into Norway or Switzerland—with access to the single market but outside the EU. But would that really be in our best interests?

I admire those countries and they are friends of ours—but they are very different from us. Norway sits on the biggest energy reserves in Europe, and has a sovereign wealth fund of over 500 billion euros. And while Norway is part of the single market—and pays for the principle—it has no say at all in setting its rules: it just has to implement its directives.”

The Prime Minister obviously is not really willing to risk millions of British jobs by voting no. This is a delaying tactic to get us past the next election. The Liberal Democrats are not willing to risk millions of British jobs by voting no. Europe means jobs, and we should not put those jobs in jeopardy.

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[Mr Baron]

I am going to crack on and be quick. I want to speak for just a couple of minutes because I am conscious that other Members want to speak as well. I hope the hon. Gentleman will forgive me.

The EU is now seen as too meddlesome in our everyday lives, too burdensome for our businesses, especially small and medium-sized enterprises, and too costly for our taxpayers. Yet the political establishment in this country has, in essence, closed ranks over the past 30 years and denied the people their say. That is fundamentally wrong. They have not had a genuine choice about this at any of the general elections of the past 30 years or so. This arrogant and somewhat condescending approach by the political elite has not gone unnoticed by the electorate. I therefore congratulate the Prime Minister on being the first political leader to offer an in/out referendum; I am convinced that other leaders will follow suit. I also thank him for listening to his Back Benchers, the party faithful, and, most importantly, the country as a whole in embracing the idea of a referendum in the next Parliament and legislation in this one. This party has moved closer to the electorate, and it is now up to the other parties to decide whether they are going to step up to the plate.

Legislation is terribly important because it is more believable than election manifesto promises. There is a deep public scepticism when people hear promises being made by politicians about the EU, because too many have been broken in the past. They remember Blair’s promises on the EU constitution and Lisbon, when a referendum never materialised. They remember—or are constantly reminded, I should say—of Liberal Democrat promises at every general election on the need for a real referendum, which, strangely, never materialise even when they share power.

[Martin Horwood]

rose—

[Mr Baron]

No, I have spoken for too long already.

In conclusion, I take issue with the right hon. Member for Southampton, Itchen (Mr Denham), who is no longer in his place. He claimed that, because I had suggested that this historic pledge by the Prime Minister was unbelievable—I have great respect for the hon. Member for Birmingham, Edgbaston (Ms Stuart), but I am afraid she was absolutely wrong about this—I was somehow criticising the Prime Minister. Let me make it absolutely clear for the record that, having congratulated the Prime Minister on his January speech, I then went on to say:

“However, where the Prime Minister’s pledge falls down is its believability. British voters are deeply sceptical of politicians making promises on Europe: too many have been broken in the past.

People bitterly recall Labour’s broken promise…on the EU Constitution…and they also remember…the Liberal Democrats’ 2010 Election manifesto.

Passing paving legislation in this parliament for a referendum in the next would be a concrete way of demonstrating serious intent.”

That was what I said in the article that the right hon. Gentleman took out of all context.

This is an issue not of trust between the Prime Minister and his Back Benchers—I have no doubt we will get an in/out referendum in 2017—but of trust between politicians in general and the electorate, for understandable reasons given our lamentable record in keeping good our promises.

This brings us to the nub of the issue. What will Labour and the Liberals do? Will they support this Bill? Will they honour past promises to the electorate? Will they allow the electorate their say, or are they still stuck in the mindset of the previous political establishment, which could not trust the electorate with this issue? Time will tell, but I say this to them: ignore the electorate at your peril. I suggest that they do what is best for the country and I predict that the Labour party in particular will change its position on this issue before the next general election.