European Union (Withdrawal Arrangements) Bill

Debate between Scott Arthur and Peter Dowd

2nd reading
Friday 6th December 2024 Commons Chamber

[Peter Dowd]

My hon. Friend may be in a much better position to say, but I suspect that this is the place where that consultation happens. We listen to the views of people, and we can reflect them in our observations.

I want to continue on the theme of trust. Dictators and autocrats consider treaties a sign of weakness, to be dispensed with as soon as is practicable. In this country, we tend not to take that transactional and cynical approach. I am forever thankful for that. Keeping faith with a treaty or agreement that we have signed without duress says a good detail about our moral compass as a nation.

Having started on the issue of the importance of treaties, I want to look at one or two examples of the 14,000 treaties to which this country is a signatory. [Interruption.] No, I will not go into the treaty issue again, but I refer Members to the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office’s online treaties database if they wish to look up the treaties that this country has signed over the years—and yes, I do have a life.

This country has had a good deal of experience in writing, agreeing, monitoring, enforcing and advising on treaties. There is little that this country does not know about the history, implementation, negotiation, monitoring and abrogation of treaties. We may even be the place to go to get that advice. Over the decades, this country has decided in good faith and with good intentions to put its name, credibility and integrity up front by signing treaties to ensure that its national interests can are secured as far as is practically possible. We have centuries of experience of the pitfalls, implications and consequences of a unilateral breach of a treaty. I ask colleagues to hold that thought during the deliberations on this Bill.

It goes without saying that serious, sometimes convoluted, diplomatic manoeuvres and mental gymnastics are involved in agreeing the terms of a treaty. That will come as no surprise at all to Members—if it did, that would be surprising to me. One has to be careful before signing a treaty. That does not mean that one does not sign it, but once an agreement is reached, signed and ratified, it remains duly constituted until the treaty is renegotiated through the proper channels. Do we really want to feel, as Sophocles said, that

“No treaty is ever an impediment to a cheat”?

I do not believe we are cheats. Sophocles also said:

“All men make mistakes, but a good man yields when he knows his course is wrong, and repairs the evil. The only crime is pride.”

I hope that the hon. and learned Member for North Antrim does not have too much pride. Call me old-fashioned, but I am afraid that whether we like it or not, we have to negotiate a treaty or an agreement through the proper channels.

[Dr Arthur]

I am impressed by my hon. Friend’s knowledge of the classics. He makes an important point, because it is almost as if we were being presented with a false choice between ripping up the Windsor agreement and setting it in stone. It has already been shown that the agreement can adapt and evolve, and it will continue to do so.

[Peter Dowd]

My hon. Friend makes an excellent point: treaties are renegotiated all the time. Yes, that can be messy—as I have said, we have a great deal of experience of how messy it is—but that has never stopped us from doing it, or attempting to do it, in good faith.