National Referendum on the European Union

Simon Hughes Excerpts

Monday 24th October 2011 Commons Chamber

[Mr Hague]

Let me give my fourth reason before giving way to a Liberal Democrat Member.

As the Prime Minister said, there is a serious danger that while holding a referendum such as the one advocated —it is predicated on a Bill in the next session of Parliament, which runs from 2012 to 2013 and means that a referendum would be in 2013 or later—we would lose important opportunities to protect or to further our national interest in the meantime. On all those areas where we need the agreement of others—from the shape of the EU budget up to 2020, to agreement on our requirements for any treaty change—it could be harder, not easier, to get our way.

[Simon Hughes (Bermondsey and Old Southwark) (LD)]

Although of course the Foreign Secretary and his party, and I and mine, come from different positions on Europe, we both made commitments to referendums, but both were conditional on there being a shift of power from this country to Brussels. It therefore must be right that, at the moment, we concentrate on helping our colleagues to sort out the European crisis, which is what businesses want us to do, and on getting our economy to grow again, which is what our constituents, in and out of work, want us to do. The referendum would be an absolute and immediate distraction from that.

[Mr Hague]

That is one of the reasons I am giving.

My fifth reason is that the concept of holding a three-way referendum as set out in the motion is innovative but seriously flawed. Leaving aside for a moment all the uncertainty and difficulty which would occur in the run-up to a referendum, which is my final point, if we are serious about this we have to think carefully about what would actually happen in a three-way vote. It is highly unlikely that any one of the three options would receive more than 50% of the votes. If, for the sake of argument, 40% of people voted to stay in, 30% voted to leave, and 30% voted to renegotiate, would that mean that we stayed in without any renegotiation at all? Is this to be a first-past-the-post referendum or a preferential voting referendum? If it is to be a preferential voting referendum, we have just rejected that system—in a referendum. Perhaps we would have to have a referendum on the voting system for the referendum itself.