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Alistair Burt: With the leave of the House, Mr. Deputy Speaker, may I thank the Minister and both the other Front-Bench spokespeople for their support for the principle of the Bill? It reflects the sense of the early-day motion to which I have referred, which has the support of more than half the Members of the House. I am grateful for the support and I appreciate the Minister's comments. I think that the Bill will make a contribution to the changed architecture to which she refers. On the basis that it is unlikely that she and I will stand across
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the Chamber from each other again before she stands down, may I thank her formally for what she has achieved as Minister, both in this particular area of work and in her work in the east of England, where both of our constituencies lie?

Mr. James Arbuthnot (North-East Hampshire) (Con): I have come back from my constituency, where I was visiting schools, to support my hon. Friend's Bill. I congratulate him on the way in which he has approached it and on his success today. I particularly wish to congratulate the Minister on, and thank her for, the way in which she has approached the Bill. Her approach is the sort of thing that will restore trust in Parliament, and I am sorry to hear that she is leaving the House.

Alistair Burt: I thank my right hon. Friend for his kind remarks. He, too, has a good feel for and appreciation of the way in which grass-roots political activity contributes not only to this place, but to the success of local government and the like. I appreciate his comments and I am sure that they will be noted by the whole House.

We have had a robust debate in the time available to us. Disappointingly, we did not hear a great many contributions from Labour Members-the Labour Benches were empty-but Conservative Members engaged in a robust debate. I appreciated the support given to me by my hon. Friend the Member for Braintree (Mr. Newmark). I appreciated his comments about the Bill and how he made them, and his extensive knowledge of why this matters to local communities in his area and beyond.

My hon. Friend the Member for Christchurch (Mr. Chope) takes a slightly different view. His knowledge of and commitment to local government is considerable. I am with him in saying that what makes a difference to local government is having strong Conservative authorities-he is completely correct about that. However, I also think that because local government is moving on, engagement with the people, which perhaps he was able to engender in Wandsworth during his time there, is slightly different in many other ways now. The sort of engagement that is suggested through this Bill will assist in ensuring that strong local government and strong parties in local government will succeed and endure. I take what he says as a compliment, rather than something different, but our views differ and he has made it clear that he feels that this Bill should go into Committee to be considered further.

I accept my hon. Friend's judgment on that so, unfortunately, we will not be able to complete all the stages of the Bill today. However, we will seek to establish the Committee as soon as possible and I hope that we can resolve the concerns there. That will ensure that the commitment of all Opposition Members to the principle of the Bill remains intact. Although it cannot go through all its stages today, it can be refined very quickly, we hope, and we can then return and, I hope, get it on the statute book just before proceedings come to an end in this Parliament. Thank you for the time allowed to produce this Bill, Mr. Deputy Speaker, and I hope that it will now receive its Second Reading.

Question put and agreed to.

Bill accordingly read a Second time; to stand committed to a Public Bill Committee (Standing Order No. 63).


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Lisbon Treaty (Referendum) Bill

Second Reading

2.5 pm

Mr. Nigel Dodds (Belfast, North) (DUP): I beg to move, That the Bill be now read a Second Time.

I am grateful for the opportunity to speak on this important issue. Trust was mentioned in the previous debate-in the context of trust in Parliament-and trust, once lost, is a hard thing to regain. As we meet here today, we know that distrust of politicians of all hues and distrust of this House are, tragically, at historically high levels. For that reason, the House should support this referendum Bill on the Lisbon treaty. There are a number of constitutional arguments and imperatives, but restoring the public's trust in politicians and this House must be foremost in our minds.

The way in which the ratification of the European constitution and its identical twin, the Lisbon treaty, have been handled is symptomatic of a culture that breeds distrust and encourages cynicism among the people of the United Kingdom. Distrust and cynicism are impossible to counter when most people know that the refusal to allow a referendum on our relationship with the European Union is driven by fear. Too many of our political class believe that the people cannot be trusted to vote for a particular outcome, and so those people are denied any say at all. If the political class as a whole does not display a trust in the people, how can we expect the people to trust us?

Distrust and cynicism are impossible to counter when a referendum was once promised by all three main parties in this House. Support for a referendum on the European constitution was once a matter of British political consensus. I thank and acknowledge the support of hon. Members from various parties-Liberal Democrats, Conservatives, Labour Members and others-who have agreed to sponsor my Bill.

The principle of a referendum had been commonly accepted. It was a position endorsed by the people in the 2005 general election. Yet what do people see now? They see that a cosy consensus has emerged among all the main political parties in this House to deny the people their say through a referendum on the new fundamental changes that are being made through the Lisbon treaty to implement the provisions of the original European constitution.

The Government broke the original consensus, arguing-incorrectly in my view, in that of the vast majority of the people of this country and, indeed, in that of august organs of this House-that the Lisbon treaty and the European constitution were two fundamentally different documents. Of course, that does not make the decision of others to follow suit the right choice. Some might think that I exaggerate, but the reversal by Her Majesty's Opposition on the subject of Lisbon was marked by a drop in support for them and in confidence in their leadership, neither of which they have since managed to restore. I believe that that shows that, beyond the merits of this issue, it is fundamentally an issue of trust as far as the public are concerned.

During the debate on Second Reading of the European Union (Amendment) Bill on 21 January 2008, the right hon. Member for Richmond, Yorks (Mr. Hague), made the issue for a referendum, saying that it rested


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He referred to the fact that he goes around

Then he posed a salient and important question:

That question can be applied with great force today, in the light of the decision of the right hon. Gentleman and all the main parties in the House to set aside their solemn commitments made at the time of the 2005 general election to allow the people to vote on these fundamental changes in the relationship with the European Union.

Distrust and cynicism are impossible to counter when people see power and influence slip further away from them. There is clearly a disconnect between the people and the institution of Parliament that must be repaired as quickly as possible-hopefully, during the next parliamentary term. However, that gulf between the voters and the House pales in comparison with the chasm between the people and the institutions of the European Union-the Commission and the Parliament.

The message of power in the hands of the people appeals, and it is used time and again, and will no doubt be a repeated theme during the coming general election, yet time and again Governments of every hue propose handing more powers over to the European Union. If they say that power will be restored to the people, yet send it in the opposite direction, how can we expect people to trust political parties or politicians?

Supporting the Bill fulfils the promise made by politicians and political parties in the House to the British people. The Government said in the Labour party's 2005 manifesto:

That was in relation to the outcome of negotiations on the European constitution. The Prime Minister said just before taking office that he would regard honouring that manifesto as a matter of trust with the British people-that word "trust" again. That is what is at the centre of the denial of the people's right to have their say.

The Government have now resorted to saying that things are different. The red lines have been drawn, despite the fact that these are almost exactly the same as they were in 2005, when we were promised a referendum. That matter was examined in great detail by the European Scrutiny Committee. Its Chairman, the hon. Member for Linlithgow and East Falkirk (Michael Connarty), said that the proposed safeguards would "leak like a sieve". It has been made clear that the red lines make no real difference to the terms of the original European constitution.

Various peoples of Europe in various countries were asked to have their say. In May 2005 the French people had their say and rejected the constitution. In June 2005 Dutch voters swiftly followed suit. For once, the standard European tactic of calling a second referendum to get
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the right result was not chosen. Our referendum was postponed, not cancelled. In the aftermath the pro-constitution leaders and bureaucrats regrouped so that they could plan not how they would abide by the express will of the people of those countries and the clear view being expressed throughout Europe, but how they could develop a strategy to get around it-the Lisbon treaty strategy, a strategy to produce a new document that made the same changes as before, but essentially hid them.

Why do I claim that there is no substantive difference between the constitution as originally set out and the Lisbon treaty? I do so because Prime Ministers and Presidents across Europe queued up to tell us that the treaty and the constitution were the same in substance-from Angela Merkel, who said:

to the then Danish Prime Minister, now the Secretary-General of NATO, who told us that

We heard it from others as well.

The European Scrutiny Committee Chairman informed the House that

The Foreign Affairs Committee said:

However, disguising the true meaning was not enough; it was necessary to avoid a referendum. State after state that had planned a constitutional referendum participated in a willing charade that the Lisbon proposals were somehow not as substantive as the constitution and need not be put to a vote. Frankly, it is a national disgrace that we in the United Kingdom were not only associated with but full participants in such a process, joining in with a near total democratic shut-out of people throughout Europe.

Mr. Douglas Carswell (Harwich) (Con): For decades it has been left to the political elite-if one can call them that-in SW1 and professional diplomats to decide our relationship with Europe. We need to give the people a say. Does the hon. Gentleman agree that we need to go even further and allow the people of the United Kingdom a vote on the UK's entire membership of the EU?

Mr. Dodds: I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman and thank him for his support. Others in the House would advocate a referendum on our whole membership-whether we should be in the European Union or not. My Bill, however, is about people fulfilling their 2005 general election promise, which was a specific commitment to a referendum on the new European constitution, and about trying to ensure that all the main parties honour that commitment. I have focused on that issue because it is a matter of restoring trust in politicians and this
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House. That specific issue must be addressed, and no doubt hon. Members will wish to say why-if this is still their position-they want to deny the people their say on the constitutional changes, and do not want to fulfil their manifesto commitments.

Mr. Christopher Chope (Christchurch) (Con): Does the hon. Gentleman not accept that one of the biggest travesties is that during the most recent general election people did not engage in a debate about Europe because they thought they would have one in a referendum? Cynically, the Government then denied the people a referendum, so does he share my hope that Europe will feature prominently in the forthcoming general election campaign?

Mr. Dodds: I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman, who is absolutely right. I well remember the 2005 election campaign, when the Government told the people that there was no need to concentrate on such a debate during that period because the subject would be debated in a referendum. That was clearly a means of getting the subject off the agenda, and I suspect that the same thing is happening in respect of the coming general election, because the Government do not want it to be a matter of public debate, and, sadly, neither does the leadership of the Opposition.

We have examined the Government's position, but let us examine that of Her Majesty's Opposition. In 2007, the right hon. Member for Witney (Mr. Cameron) made it absolutely explicit in his personal promise of a referendum, come what may, that there was no wriggle room. He offered a "cast-iron guarantee" that he would put any treaty in front of the voters and said that

meaning negotiations on the Lisbon treaty.

Significantly, the right hon. Gentleman also focused on trust. In an article in T he Sun newspaper, he said:

We need to recall that a reference to the promise of a referendum was made again as late as May 2009, during the European election campaign. Yet in November 2009, the promise was dropped.

I could go on to deal with why a referendum is a perfectly acceptable means and device for dealing with this issue. Some argue that in a parliamentary democracy such as ours, we should not revert to the concept of a referendum, which is foreign to our tradition. However, a referendum can be entirely reconciled with the principle of parliamentary sovereignty: we have had one national referendum on membership of the Common Market, as it then was. The tradition has been well established in other areas of the United Kingdom, where polls have taken place and people have been asked their views when constitutional change has been brought about or considered.

The real reason, however, why we need a referendum is not only so that the people of the United Kingdom could be sure the issue was being taken seriously, but
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that it is the only way of ensuring that those with whom we have to negotiate in Europe, and the EU Commission, will take us seriously.

Rather than have a referendum, it has been suggested that the way forward is to have a plan for the repatriation of powers from the European Union back to the United Kingdom. The suggestion could be put into a party manifesto that would be voted on in the general election. It is suggested that that would be an effective means of giving the necessary strength, power and authority to those who will negotiate on behalf of the Government with the other EU member states and the European Commission.

I leave aside the issue of why people should be expected to vote overwhelmingly on the basis of manifesto promises when previous clear-cut and "cast-iron" guarantees have already been set aside. The fact is that such a way forward would in no way give strength to the hands of negotiators as a clear referendum undoubtedly would. Without a referendum, it will be extremely difficult-impossible, I would say-for other EU states to agree unanimously, as they would have to, to accede to British wishes on the repatriation of powers.

Mr. Ian Davidson (Glasgow, South-West) (Lab/Co-op): Does the hon. Gentleman agree that the concept of the repatriation of powers is no more than hot air? In reality, many decent long-serving Conservatives are flooding off to other parties such as the UK Independence party because they have no trust in the Conservatives' proposals to repatriate powers.

Mr. Dodds: I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for his intervention and his sponsorship of the Bill. People have a lot of distrust not only of the Conservative party but of the governing party and others. People see that instead of being given a clear say, as they were promised, they get vague notions about people going off to negotiate or hold the line. The Prime Minister said that there would be no further transfer of powers for two Parliaments. The Opposition said that they would go off, negotiate and introduce other measures. I shall come to those.

Compared with the clear-cut commitment to a referendum, all such notions make no impression on the British people. They want their say in a referendum, as they were promised. A referendum has the effect of ensuring that the political classes-the Government-carry out the wishes of the people. Frankly, it is a lot harder to fudge the outcome of negotiations that have been entered into following a massive referendum result, because the people would clearly hold the Government and their negotiations to account.

Some argue that as the Lisbon treaty has already been ratified, there is no point, value or efficacy in a referendum. If we take that view, then we might as well not have had the Irish referendum, and Harold Wilson's holding the referendum in 1975-after the United Kingdom had entered the Common Market-was pointless and without validity. Of course a referendum is still valid, and it is only because of a lack of political will that parties are now withdrawing from it.


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