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"Every person holding the nationality of a Member State shall be a citizen of the Union."People will not be able to say no. Things will be compulsory. People will not have asked for something, and will not want it, but they will get it anyway. There will be no referendum. So much for the citizens charter. It must be very embarrassing for Ministers to speak so highly in favour of the citizens charter, to speak brilliantly round the country about the free choice of citizens in John Major's Britain.
If it is clear that we shall not remain British citizens exactly as we are now, if it is clear that article 8 confers extra duties in many aspects of public life--and not just extra rights, as has been promised--if it is clear that we shall have no right to say no, it must be clear also that these amendments ought to be supported. They should be supported not just as probing amendments but as provisions that are necessary in their own right. If they win the day, there will be some hope of the Maastricht treaty's not being ratified. If the Maastricht treaty is not ratified, there will be some hope of the British people's being able to remain British in the full sense and of the Westminster Parliament's being able to retain powers that we are in danger of losing, powers that we know perfectly well we were not sent to this place to give away.
Mr. Gould : We are accustomed in these debates to complain about opacity of the Maastricht treaty provisions. Indeed, the comments of many outside observers almost exclusively concern the difficulties of understanding the arcane procedures that we are pursuing. There can be no complaint about confusion or opacity over this issue. The treaty, which is entitled "The Treaty on European Union" is very clear in its opening words where it says :
"By this Treaty, the High Contracting Parties establish among themselves a European Union, hereinafter called the Union'." As we have heard, article 8 of the treaty provides that "Citizenship of the Union is hereby established. Every person holding the nationality of a Member State shall be a citizen of the Union."
The remaining provisions of article 8 specify, or at least allude to, the rights and duties that pertain to that citizenship. The new rights are spelt out--rights to consular protection and to vote and stand in municipal and Euro-elections.
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Under the provisions of article 8e, the Council is given the right and power to strengthen and add to those rights as it sees fit. There can hardly be a clearer statement.
Of course, it is tempting--one knows of many hon. Members and people outside the House who are prepared to yield to the temptation--to say that the treaty is just a piece of Euro-waffle. We are accustomed to our continental partners talking in rather grand metaphysical terms. We are accustomed to telling ourselves, in our rather superior way, that we like to stick to black letter law, practicality and the pragmatic aspects of policy making. We tell ourselves that we can safely ignore all that verbiage.
Yet those opening words and the provisions of article 8 could hardly be more specific, deliberate, considered or portentous. They are meant to matter and, as so often in the past, we ignore them at our peril.
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It is not even the case that the treaty is simply a restatement of something that has gone before. We are often told that what appears to be a major new step towards the creation of a European state is of no account because it was already implicit in something that we did before. However, the Home Secretary was right--at least he knew something about that matter--when he conceded that this is a new provision. It is an innovation and it sets out a new concept of centralisation. We have heard about the origins of that concept this evening.There is no question but that the treaty of Maastricht does a new and important thing--it creates citizenship of something called "the Union". What does that mean? It is extraordinary that that apparently important provision is passed by with virtually no comment whatsoever. Until this debate I was hardly aware that anyone, other than one or two people who are interested in such matters, had ventured to comment on what might be thought to be a matter of some considerable importance.
Mr. Marlow : That is certainly true of the United Kingdom, but the hon. Gentleman will be well aware that the Danes were allowed to consider the treaty. In their referendum the concept of citizenship was of massive significance and importance to them.
Mr. Gould : The hon. Gentleman is right. I was directing my remarks to Britain. One might have thought that such concepts would have been of some interest and importance here, but it is here that the debate has been most notably lacking.
There has not even been much by way of explanation. The Home Secretary, representing the Government, spoke to the Committee on the subject and was unable to answer some of the most important and central questions that arise from the provisions.
Mr. Rowlands : While I accept the general tenor of my hon. Friend's case, and that the matter has not been properly investigated, the Select Committee on Foreign Affairs took a considerable amount of expert legal advice on the matter, which I hope we shall be able to discuss this evening, to establish the concept of the union. A confusing concept emerged, but nevertheless we endeavoured to do so.
Mr. Gould : I wish that the Home Secretary, among others, and even the Minister of State, who is with us, might have familiarised themselves with what the Select Committee was able to do.
Mr. Cash : Does the hon. Gentleman agree that one of the most disgraceful aspects of this entire farce is the fact that there has been no White Paper? Whereas the hon. Member for Merthyr Tydfil and Rhymney (Mr. Rowlands) was right to refer to the fact that some extremely good evidence is scattered among Select Committee reports and so forth, there has been no clear and coherent attempt to bring it all together in about 20 pages for the benefit of the British people, which is quite possible. That negligence lies behind the whole of this farce.
Mr. Gould : I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman because that is the central point, and what I am seeking to explain in this part of my speech. Other people may well have dealt with the question, but the Government have not done so and they have offered no explanation, by way of
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a White Paper or statement of any sort, to suggest for a moment that they recognise the importance of what they are proposing to do through the Bill. Given that the concept of citizenship is newly fashionable, as several hon. Members including the Liberal Democratic party's spokesman, the hon. Member for Ross, Cromarty and Skye (Mr. Kennedy) have said, it is surprising that the Government have not done so. The hon. and learned Member for Burton (Mr. Lawrence) mentioned the citizens' charter. Citizenship is said to be the basis of a raft of new rights and duties. It is the current fad, is it not?A year or two ago the present Foreign Secretary was full of ideas about something called "active citzenship", although I confess that we have not heard much about it recently. That was to be the basis of a new contract between the citizen and Government, but we hear nothing about that from Ministers. They even seem to be embarrassed when they are asked simple questions about what the change--the creation of a new citizenship--may mean.
As other hon. Members have said, the truth of the matter is that citizenship in a vacuum is a meaningless concept. It only means something as part of a relationship--the relationship that links the individual to the political structure in which he or she lives or is governed. Citizenship links the individual to the monarch, to the Government, but most of all to the state. Citizenship without a state--in this case, without a union--is meaningless.
Mr. Richard Shepherd : One should be cautious about laziness and the slipping of language when referring to the citizens charter. That only serves the new Conservative-Labour Front Bench arrangement. It is not a citizens charter but merely a customer or consumers charter. The distinction must be made and we have to be precise because we are talking about the most intimate relationship--that of the individual and the state- -and not about the relationship between a customer and a business.
Mr. Gould : I agree and I am seeking to argue that. It is precisely that relationship which is at issue.
The terminology is difficult. We have had to grapple with concepts of nationality and with being a subject. When I arrived in this country I was a New Zealand national but a British subject. I am glad to say that I have gone through the process of naturalisation, and I am proud to be a British citizen. Nationality, citizenship, subjecthood, the citizenship of the citizens charter are all slippery concepts that have been chopped and changed to such a degree that it is sometimes difficult to know what is intended when the terms are used. Even the treaty is obliged to talk of citizenship as it has to define the citizenship of the union by reference to the nationality of member states.
Let us be under no illusion : citizenship in terms of the treaty is, to all intents and purposes, indistinguishable from nationality as it applies to the nation state. How does that change affect the rights and obligations of British citizenship or nationality ? It is tempting to say--we hear the argument advanced all the time, especially from the Front Bench teams--that we have nothing to worry about and the changes make no difference to British citizenship. It is suggested that we are being offered a sort of add-on
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extra--a bonus, a sort of Green Shield stammp that brings only benefits, no duties. The terms of article 8 give the lie to that suggestion.It is not a provision for a shared arrangement or reciprocal swapping and exchange of rights and duties. As others have said, that could have been done without creating a citizenship of the union. The Home Secretary professed that the provision simply created new rights. He glossed over the issue of duties and said that there were no new duties, but massive new duties have been created that are now owed, not just to a British nation state, but a totally new organisation : the European union--whatever that may be.
Mr. Winnick : The Government sometimes argue that the treaty will not make that much difference. They say that, whatever their views on Maastricht, all Labour Members of Parliament are and always have been enthusiastic about the United Nations. My hon. Friend the Member for Dagenham (Mr. Gould) and I certainly are. We also accept our obligations under the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation. We are not little Englanders, and have made that clear on numerous occasions, and we carry out and recognise our international obligations. Is not there a fundamental difference between all that I have mentioned and the new scheme in the treaty that completely changes the concept, both of citizenship and the authority of the House? I am not aware that the authority of the House has been diminished as a result of our involvement with the United Nations and the rule of law on the international scene or our membership of NATO.
Mr. Gould : My hon. Friend is right. It astonishes me that there is so often a failure to distinguish between the obligations under international law taken on by the Government through signing treaties and the creation of a new political entity with its own Government, structures and, we now discover, citizenship.
How will such citizenship impinge on British nationality? Is there any competition between them? What happens if they are in conflict? What I am about to suggest may seem far-fetched and hypothetical, but one of the acid tests of citizenship or nationality is that it defines the duty of allegiance. If allegiance is ignored, it gives rise to serious charges such as treason.
Let us imagine that, in a far-fetched scenario, the issue was tested in a court case. Other hon. Members may say that that is unlikely, but there are cases of treason charges. What if the defence offered in the British court were to the effect that the allegiance owed to the British state was superseded by a superior allegiance owed to a different political entity and that the action complained of was not regarded as treasonable under that superior law? What would be the outcome of such a case? Would such a defence succeed? It is important to understand--as has been made clear on numerous occasions--that the par excellence would be decided by the European Court of Justice, which regards itself as the instrument of European union and a constant upholder of the superiority of Community law. Can there be any doubt that, given the right case, that defence would succeed and immediately establish as a matter of principle that citizenship and allegiance are, at bottom, in conflict and cannot be held together. Such a conflict would be resolved in favour of citizenship of the union.
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Mr. Budgen : Does not the hon. Gentleman agree that, in fairness to the European Court, all the statutes of the European union speak of a progressive move towards the union? It is only here in the House of Commons that Ministers pretend that we can accept one measure and that will be the end of it. I am sorry to refer to the bad old days of Lady Thatcher, but she used to be so unwise as to talk about the ratchet effect. May I remind some of her erstwhile supporters--I do not want to embarrass anyone--that she used to be cheered when she talked about the ratchet effect. As we all know, the party has grown out of that vulgar and silly way of talking about things now that it is a pragmatic party, but it may have a certain truth to it. It is the ratchet effect to which the constitution of the EEC assigns the European Court as an essential instrument.
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Mr. Gould : I certainly intend to come to precisely that subject later. I merely observe in passing that I wish that Lady Thatcher had sometimes been a little more aware of the ratchet when she was turning it.
I am still engaged in an exposition of the case, and have yet to comment on the desirability or otherwise of the developments. I shall now mention another aspect that has rightly attracted some attention--
Mr. Nicholas Winterton : Before the hon. Gentleman moves on to another subject and while he is still making his exposition, will he speculate for the Committee on why he believes that the Front Bench teams are not prepared to be honest with the people of this country about the fundamental changes that are being made in their name? Is not it wrong that we should bring about the changes by ratifying the Maastricht treaty without people being able to show that they sought those fundamental changes to our citizenship, which they certainly did not at the last election?
Mr. Gould : I agree wholeheartedly with the hon. Gentleman's conclusion and shall speculate a little later on why we are confronted with so many people who seem unwilling or unable to recognise their true responsibilities in the House.
Mr. Ray Whitney (Wycombe) : I am not surprised that the hon. Gentleman--coming, as he does, from his wing of the Labour party--has difficulty with a new concept. It is undoubtedly true that citizenship of the European Community is a new concept. Does the hon. Gentleman accept that article 8 of the treaty makes it clear that there is a difference between that citizenship--there may be a better word for it--of the European Community and nationality as allegiance to the nation state? Article 8 makes that difference extremely clear, but the hon. Gentleman does not seem to have detected that difference. He now states that he or the European Court could suggest that European citizenship could be seen as superior to nationality. Will he say where, in article 8, even a hint of that possibility arises?
Mr. Gould : I am sorry to say that the hon. Gentleman either was not listening or was unable to follow my argument. I was saying that there certainly was a difference between citizenship of the European union and the
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citizenship of member states--the latter would be subordinate to the former. If the hon. Gentleman will allow me I will go on to develop that point.I return to the example of a person who uses as his defence when the issue of citizenship becomes critical the fact that he owes a superior duty and allegiance to the European union. That displaces his duty to the British state. That may or may not be right, but it was an interesting illustration of how the conflict could arise. If it did arise there is no doubt that the European Court of Justice would find in favour of the superiority of Community law. If it failed to do so it would be breaking with the body of precedent that it had itself established.
Mr. Wilkinson : Does the hon. Gentleman agree that, while it might seem far-fetched, there was a recent and relevant historical parallel? A number of brave nationals of Latvia, Lithuania and Estonia and the Ukraine owed allegiance to the nations of their birth but paid for it, in some cases with their lives, as they were not prepared to accept citizenship of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics, which was imposed on them against their will.
Mr. Gould : I am happy to agree, and I hope to refer to a point of similar political significance in a moment.
I come to another aspect of the new relationship--one that has already attracted some attention and on which I propose to comment only briefly. I refer to the position of Her Majesty the Queen. The Home Secretary was quite unable to answer a question about whether the Bill, if it became an Act, would bind the Queen in any way. Would she, as a British national, become a citizen of the European union? The Minister of State read out what I imagine was a note prepared for him by his civil servants, but it hardly answered the question. I suppose that it could be argued that the Queen is beyond the reach of this Bill. That would be odd, because I think that the Minister of State confirmed that she would be a beneficiary of the rights of European citizenship. It must therefore follow that she will incur the duties of European citizenship--that she owes some sort of allegiance by virtue of it. It is a remarkable thought that the Queen, the supreme citizen of our political entity, would owe allegiance to some higher, wider authority.
I profess no infallibility on these questions ; I merely point to possible interpretations, and this is what the law and the treaty appear to point to. We must therefore imagine a sort of sub-monarch in a sub-state, owing allegiance to some wider state. It follows that the debate on which we appear to be embarking may be entirely beside the point. The issue of whether a diminished monarchy would be good or bad may be beyond the competence of this House and the British people. It may be resolved by the treaty of Maastricht and the introduction of the citizenship of the European union.
At the very least we should be clear that we have created a new form of citizenship which is a relationship with a superior body of law and a wider geographical entity : a super-state. That relationship must be superior to the relationship that we all enjoy with the British state.
In a curious way we can already see the practical effects of this change when we arrive at Heathrow and are required to submit our passports not as British citizens but as citizens of the European Community. In a sense that was jumping the gun, but it was a practical manifestation of the effects of the new citizenship.
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Mr. Spearing : My hon. Friend's speech deserves the widest possible subsequent publication-- [Hon. Members :-- "Come on !"] Oh yes, this is the most important speech that we have heard so far. Does my hon. Friend recall that when the original legislation was passed the then Prime Minister, the right hon. Member for Old Bexley and Sidcup (Sir E. Heath) said that the position of the Crown was not affected, forgetting that direct legislation circumvented both this House and the Royal Assent--so the position of the Crown was most certainly affected? Does my hon. Friend agree that we are not only to take up allegiance to the constitution of this union but that, unlike the constitutions of states such as Australia and the United States of America, the union's constitution exhibits a particular political philosophy? That means that the allegiance is not just to the constitution but to the political philosophy as well. It is to be found in the preambles to the treaties, and they impose certain loyalties that may go beyond constitutional structures.
Mr. Gould : I am about to support the point to which my hon. Friend has directed me.
I have thus far not ventured an opinion on whether the changes I am seeking to describe are good or bad. I am merely saying that they are important. I shall go on to make the point that they are rather more important than many of those who would blindly accept the treaty realise. It is comparatively easy to sneer at terms which have a 19th century ring to them--allegiance, sovereignty and so on. They are wonderfully Diceyan in character. It is not so easy to sneer, however, at ideas like democracy and self-government--yet they are at issue if we are to impose on the British people or anyone else citizenship in a wider political entity than one which they have hitherto contemplated.
This is a matter of democracy, because there is an unfortunate tendency for many people to argue that democracy is merely a matter of elections--that the democratic process is no more than a question of deciding which of competing sets of people within a given political entity ought to form the Government. That is certainly an important aspect, but democracy is also a form of Government within a defined political entity. It is self-government if it is anything. What is at issue here is the definition of that "self". If the self which is the subject of a democratic government is to be changed without the consent or authority of that self, that is a development of the greatest significance.
We can elect representatives to our hearts' content to send to the European Parliament, from which, perhaps, a European Government could be drawn, but that will not of itself resolve the problem unless it is clear that the British people have signified their assent to be governed within the new political entity. Until that moment arrives--it cannot arrive until it is tested--those who would support the Maastricht treaty may sneer for as long as they like, but what they are doing is violating concepts that we are all in the House to verify, confirm and maintain.
These issues are not to be sneered at. They involve democracy, self- government and our consent to being governed by those whom we choose to govern us.
Mr. Marlow : I invite the hon. Gentleman to go further than that. If the treaty goes through without proper ratification by the British people in the form of a
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referendum, and if as a result obligations and duties are imposed from Europe on them, does the hon. Gentleman think it right and proper that the British people should feel obliged to observe those obligations and duties?Mr. Gould : That takes us into deep waters. I fervently hope that we shall never reach the point where citizens of this country have to choose, as Germans did under the Nazi regime, between their preparedness to obey the law--which is the normal condition of citizenship--and their refusal to accept a legal system imposed upon them from outside.
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Mr. Iain Duncan-Smith (Chingford) : The hon. Member mentioned the European Court of Justice and its role in these matters--a subject that interests me. I tried to raise the issue a couple of weeks ago and it is interesting to hear the hon. Gentleman mention it. He raises an area of conflict, and it is always such areas arising from the treaty that lead to that court. Does he agree that the natural progression is that it is not democratically elected Governments which will decide the issue but the European Court, whose boundaries and views have been clearly stated?
Mr. Gould : The hon. Gentleman makes an important point. I suspect that he is a lawyer, but perhaps not. I used to teach constitutional law and international law. One of the interesting questions for courts is to decide the principles on which to interpret the provisions of statutes and treaties and so on. One such approach is described as teleological, in which the purpose and the end result of the process that is set in train by the treaty or statute is understood, and the treaty or statute is interpreted to conform to the accepted objective.
The European Court of Justice is interesting--I put it no more strongly than that--because of the overt way in which it has adopted, quite deliberately and self-consciously--this teleological approach. It interprets every legal question that is brought before it in order to further the cause of European union. I do not say whether that is good or bad : simply that we should understand that that is what confronts us. When any of these questions have to be decided by the European Court, we should not be surprised, because we are on notice, at the court's view.
Mr. Budgen : Does the hon. Gentleman agree that one of the questions that we were all taught to ask about international law was whether it had the characteristic of being enforceable? If eventually, as is suggested in the preamble, there is a European army, it is possible--I am not being fanciful or over-excited--that it could be used to enforce federal decisions against nation states. That could bring in the classic conflict of loyalty that we saw in the battle between the north and the south in America.
Mr. Gould : I shall leave to one side the issue of whether there is to be a European army. In many ways the situation we are already in has progressed well beyond the situation that the hon. Gentleman describes. We are not discussing a relationship that is defined by the principles of international law : we are discussing a new system of national law is already enforceable. The whole system operates as a hierarchy, as a pyramid, at the top of which is the European Court of Justice which makes sure that the provisions are enforced.
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Mr. Cash rose--Mr. Gould : I shall not give way, because I wish to make progress. No doubt the interventions are well intentioned, but I have sat here for at least three or four hours and know how wearying it is for those who wish to speak to have to listen to a long list of interventions.
In my view it is no accident that the treaty uses the term "union". The term has caused a great deal of difficulty in translation between French and English for a long time, but it is used specifically and deliberately. We tend to debate these issues in terms of whether what is proposed is federal, but that entirely misses the point. We believe that somehow a federal structure will be produced by taking powers from the nation states and giving them to a new federal government structure.
That is not what the treaty proposes nor is it in the minds of those who are driving the whole concept of a European union. They have gone well beyond any question of a federation. They envisage, as the treaty makes clear, a union. For them that has to be, and as I hope to demonstrate is already, a unitary state. To them, federation is a derogation from that unitary state to subordinate authorities in the regions. They support federalism as a process that is entirely consistent with and demanded by the concept of subsidiarity, whatever that might mean. For them the starting point is the union. A federation is then achieved by taking judiciously and carefully a few minor powers and giving them to regional authorities.
In this country, in our naivety, innocence and wonderful state of confusion and ignorance, we believe that we are confronted by a federation that will be constructed at some distant point in the future whereby a few powers are taken from the all-powerful nation states and handed over to a body in Brussels. We think that that is what is in store for us.
Mr. Charles Kennedy : As one who has already contributed to the debate, I am conscious of the hon. Gentleman's comment about interventions. I acknowledge the force of his argument that perhaps in this country we misunderstand the direction of the traffic when we speak about federalist or the federal movement. If the hon. Gentleman compared our set-up with the set-up in Germany, would he not acknowledge that many politicians in Europe who think and act and desire federalism envisage a degree of autonomy at local level in the nation states that is far greater than that which the regions of the nation states in the United Kingdom currently enjoy?
Mr. Gould : I do not have the slightest difficulty in agreeing with the hon. Gentleman. I am a great exponent and supporter of regional devolution. My central point is that under these structures and concepts the starting point is the union. We must grasp that. I should like to refer to a speech by the hon. Member for Aylesbury (Mr. Lidington). He is not in the Committee and I apologise for not alerting him to the fact that I would refer to his speech. It was a good speech and I mean nothing personal when I refer to it. It was intelligent and effective. The hon. Gentleman is a new Member and his speech showed that he is very able. I quote from it simply to illustrate how easy it is to misstate the situation. I also apologise to the hon. Gentleman because I freely
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acknowledge that I am using him as a surrogate for equally beside-the-point remarks by hon. Members on both Front Benches. The hon. Member for Aylesbury said :"I hope that, over the next 10 to 12 years, we can move away from the federal model of Europe towards one which is more confederal, and instead co-operate, one country with another, ceding limited and defined areas of policy, like the single market for decision on a supranational basis,".-- [ Official Report, 28 January 1993 ; Vol. 217, c. 1207.]
On that interpretation of what was happening, the hon. Gentleman urged the Committee to support the Maastricht treaty. There was nothing remarkable about what he said : it is common currency in the mouths of almost all those who support the treaty. I quote it simply to show how mistaken such people are and how easy it is to assume that the process that we are describing and witnessing is one whereby power is being moved up to some federal structure whereas what is in the minds of the creators of the European union is a centralised unitary state from which minor derogations might be made. The Europe in the treaty is not the Europe that we were promised. It is not an open, decentralised, democratic and welcoming Europe ; instead, it is a centralised Europe, a European super-state. It is exclusive because it closes its boundaries to others, it has centralised political institutions and it has all the trappings of a state. People who sneer at those who defend the British state are unaware of the fact that what is being promised is not some wonderful, evolutionary development that will be superior to the nation state, but the nation state writ large.
That is a substantial claim, which I shall try to substantiate. Let us ignore the description "European union" and acknowledge, for simple purposes, that it has a head of state ; a chief executive ; a defined territory with a common external boundary ; its own citizenship, by virtue of the treaty--a superior relationship between each individual and that union ; its own Government ; its own legislature, elected on a Europe-wide basis ; its own supreme court, which is not just an ordinary court, but is the guardian of its own constitution ; its own central bank, committed to enforcing its own economic policy ; its own foreign policy--and is in the process of acquiring its own defence policy ; a single market and, to all intents and purposes, a single economy.
Let us also acknowledge that it provides a common diplomatic and consular representation ; that it conducts its external and other trade relations in international negotiations as a single unit ; and that it has a comprehensive governmental competence. When Mr. Delors said that competence would extend to 80 per cent. of legislation in the Community, he knew what he was talking about ; he did not exaggerate.
The Americans have a saying, "If it looks like a duck and it quacks like a duck, it's a duck." I say that the European union is a state--"federal" is a misuse of the language. We are being offered a single, centralised, unitary state. Whatever view we take of that development--and again I have not at any stage criticised or condemned that development, but simply described it--we are ill served by those who try to pretend--but who know or, even worse, are too ignorant to acknowledge the truth--that that is not what confronts us. I do not criticise or condemn, I seek only to identify and describe. I believe that what I am describing is of far greater significance than
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the Prime Minister and his Cabinet or, indeed, those on either Front Bench, have so far bothered to tell the British people. One of the most disgraceful aspects of this very long- running saga has been the extent to which we--and I do not mean just the House of Commons, but the peoples of Britain and Europe--have been edged along, step by step, always told that the next step is of little significance and was implicit in what we had done before. When we take that step we are told, "Surely, when you took that last step you must have known that implicit in it was that the next one was to be taken as well."There are those who have always been honest about their desire for a European super-state. I disagree with them, but I do not complain about the honesty with which they put forward that proposal. Those for whom I reserve a special scorn are the dishonest, who know what is involved but do not want us to see the shape of the whole concept. Even more do I reserve scorn for those who delude themselves, avert their gaze and will not look at the evidence or listen to the argument, but instead prefer to go along with the process. They tell themselves and others that nothing is involved in that process ; it is like the United Nations or NATO, just another set of international obligations.
I say to those people, "Delude yourselves as much as you like, but if you are Members of Parliament your self-delusion is unforgivable because not only are you deluding yourselves, you are denying those whom you represent the freedom and the power to make their own decisions. You are denying them the authority that they gave to you to come to this House to make decisions."
It is not too late, I am not a great optimist on this matter, but I believe that it is yet possible for those who will listen to the argument and understand what is happening at least to take the one basic step that should never be ignored--that no irreversible change in the nature of the political entity in which we achieve self-government should be taken without first consulting the British people. That is the real issue raised by the provisions in the treaty on European union.
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Sir Nicholas Bonsor (Upminster) : The House has been treated to three exceptionally powerful speeches from my hon. Friend the Member for Ruislip-Northwood (Mr. Wilkinson), my hon. and learned Friend the Member for Burton (Sir I. Lawrence) and the hon. Member for Dagenham (Mr. Gould). I am sure that my hon. Friends will not take it amiss if I say that the most impressive was the speech made by the hon. Member for Dagenham. It was a remarkable exposition of the truth about the state in which this country now finds itself, with the prospect of being taken yet another step down the road to European union. My right hon. and hon. Friends on the Treasury Bench and others of my hon. Friends should breathe a sigh of relief that the hon. Gentleman was not successful in his attempt to become Leader of the Opposition. Had he been, the British people might have been offered the opportunity to choose between Europe and the sovereignty of the United Kingdom. As it is, as as most of those who have spoken tonight have said, no such choice existed at the last general election and, sadly, no such choice exists now. There is a unity of purpose between the two Front
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Benches, supported by the Liberal Democrats. They are determined to take us down a route that will be a disaster for the future of the United Kingdom.Unlike the hon. Member for Dagenham, I do not for a moment believe that those who are leading us down that route know what they are doing. It is tragic that my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister and those right hon. and hon. Friends who have spoken from the Front Bench during our debates clearly do not understand the consequences of the treaty or what European union means. They do not understand the consequences of citizenship of that union. It is a tragedy for all our people.
They are getting advice from many well-meaning and erudite lawyers, but that advice is wrong. The hon. Member for Dagenham, as an ex-teacher of constitutional law, is as qualified as any in the House to criticise what those lawyers advise. It would be otiose of me to add my voice to his. However, I have no doubt that he is right in what he has said--that the union proposed in the treaty is a union in fact, not a union in name.
The wording of article 8 commits nations within the Community to move towards an ever closer union. I know that mathematically it may be possible always to move towards each other but never meet--but in practical terms, that is not possible. Although I do not entirely agree with the hon. Gentleman's remarks about the stage that we have reached, there is no doubt that the definition of union that he gave is the one that we are heading towards and the one that will ultimately be our fate.
My right hon. and hon. Friends on the Front Bench deny that. They say that the union has no legal personality or meaning and that, therefore, to be a citizen of it does not matter. Having heard the arguments against the proposals made by my right hon. and hon. Friends, I want to hear their arguments--because they are flying in the face of something that common sense and our constitutional history and law tell us is fact.
The European union defined in the treaty has a legal reality, because it is justiciable by the European Court of Justice. As the court is supreme, the British Government alone can do nothing to go against the court's findings on matters concerning the rights and duties of a British citizen.
I have exchanged extensive correspondence with my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister, and clearly he has been advised that the duties under the treaty do not exist. My right hon. and learned Friend the Home Secretary said as much earlier, when he claimed that the duties added nothing to those that already exist under our domestic law. Clearly that is untrue. As was rightly pointed out earlier, the European Court is not answerable to any nation state--in fact, it is answerable to no one--in the findings that it reaches. It decided of its own volition to see itself as a tool for the creation of that which other member states would describe as a federal Europe, and which we call a united Europe or a union of Europe.
As that tool, for that purpose, the European Court would not be an independent judicial body. It would be unfit to sit as the ultimate arbiter in legal disputes between nation states or individuals within them ; yet, under the treaty of Rome as amended in 1986 and again now, the European Court will enjoy that status.
The duties to which we as citizens of the European union will be subject have yet to be decided. They will not be decided by my right hon. and hon. Friends on the Front Bench, Whitehall, the Government's legal advisers, any
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system of British justice, or the terms of any British constitutional past and historic tradition. Instead, they will be decided by a European Court determined to develop the European union-- and in so doing, it will supersede and crush the independence of the union's member states. It will be extremely difficult for my hon. Friend the Minister to argue otherwise, but I look forward to hearing him try to do so later.As to voting in municipal elections, I should like a proper answer from the Minister to the question that was twice asked and twice dismissed with laughter by those who see themselves as European fans. "Municipal" has been determined by the European Court before as meaning "national". That may seem absurd to the Committee, as it does to me, but that is a fact. I do not believe that my hon. Friend the Minister can guarantee that, when the European Court considers the treaty, it will not decide likewise. If it decides likewise, voting rights will be extended to national parliaments as well as, in British terms, to municipal elections.
It is wholly illogical that someone can reside in this country and vote in all municipal elections and in the elections for the European Parliament yet not be permitted to vote in the parliamentary elections for Westminster. Where on earth is the logic in that? What advantage does article 8 offer the British people? It gives them rights exercisable in other countries--the right to vote in municipal elections in France, Greece, Italy, Germany, Ireland, or Luxembourg. Marvellous. I cannot see any use to the British people in that right. Where is the advantage to counteract the many disadvantages and dangers described this evening? Where is the advantage to the British people in agreeing to become citizens of Europe?
Mrs. Currie : Is my hon. Friend's argument influenced by the fact that there are far more British citizens living in France than there are French citizens living in Britain, and far more British citizens in Spain than there are Spanish in Britain--and that they want to retain their national citizenship but pay national and local taxes, and would like a say in the local councils that govern them?
Sir Nicholas Bonsor : No, I am not in the slightest moved by my hon. Friend's argument. I believe that British people living in Spain are happy to vote in British parliamentary elections. Many do so, and all those who corresponded with me want to do so. If they live in Spain as British citizens, their allegiance should still be to Britain. Neither their allegiance nor their voting rights should be transferred.
Mr. Ian Taylor (Esher) : There is a distinction to be drawn between a national and a local election. The reason is at the heart of the European Community's constitution, in which the Council of Ministers is the pre- eminent institution. It is therefore the expression of and subject to the views of the national Parliament--through its Ministers, effectively making decisions.
On the other hand, those of our own citizens who can, under the Single European Act, live anywhere in the Community have a right to protect their interests in terms of local voting. I see no danger or difficulty about voting
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