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The idea that this Government has never said over the decades where we were going is a myth, and to update the story I need to take us to why the TUC and the Labour Party were converted to a pro-Europe position in 1988 after Jacques Delors came to our congress in Bournemouth and after Mrs Thatcher subsequently made a speech at Bruges. Both the TUC and the Labour Party voted by big majorities—ex hypothesi, all the major unions voted—for a positive attitude. That was because of the social dimension and the nature of that concordat, that trade-off, that “concovenant”—to use a currently fashionable word. However, it took the best part of 10 years for the Labour Opposition to campaign with the TUC, and it was the Labour Government’s first act in 1997 to sign the Social Chapter removing the opt-out. That was the main thing on which we campaigned, and certainly Tony Blair and Gordon Brown were fully part of that.

In 1997, we had to deal with the acquis—an accumulation of measures, some of which were introduced through the earlier social dialogue provisions. Some

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more measures were then introduced. During the 1990s, we had a raft of draft workers’ directives, which were agreed with employers through the Social Chapter procedures. The first related to workers on fixed-term contracts. The CBI forecast a catastrophic fall in employment, but actually employment went up and has been doing very well. The second related to part-time workers. The CBI forecast catastrophic losses of employment, but actually it has been working very well. The third is the subject of current debate and relates to temporary agency workers. It has shot up the agenda, for obvious reasons, very strongly. Today—literally—the CBI has said on cue that, if adopted, it will lose Britain 250,000 workers. I would have been very disappointed if it had not said that. It would make my normal radar set look a bit out of date. But there the CBI is, and I was very pleased to see how predictable it has become, if not too big for its boots.

I am sorry, I thought that my noble friend wanted to say something.

Baroness Ashton of Upholland: My Lords, I was merely smiling at my noble friend.

Lord Lea of Crondall: My Lords, I thank my noble friend. I am unused to interventions of that kind. Some people say that the Labour Government must have made a secret concordat with the CBI; that although they signed the social chapter in 1997, they made a secret concordat to soften measures being adopted under it. I do not believe that. I think that this is relevant to the confusion in the Labour Party and public opinion on the message we are giving out about Europe.

We have done a tremendous amount for the quality of the contract of employment and so on. Although there may be something ambiguous about the European Charter of Fundamental Rights, as my noble friend Lord Wedderburn has said, there is nothing unambiguous about the problems in globalised markets of vulnerable migrant and other workers. Today, the British Government are trying to meet CBI demands, as well as trade union demands, on this vital dimension, without which we will not carry trade union and Labour opinion with us. That was the concordat in the 1980s and 1990s, and it remains as vital today.

The paradox is that Government and local party websites and so on parade the measures we have achieved through social Europe. I wrote a pamphlet on this question. The measures are equal pay, protection from discrimination, protection when a business changes hands, equal rights for part-time workers, maternity and paternity rights, equal rights for fixed-term workers, four weeks paid holiday, control of the working week, having a voice at work, European works councils, health and safety, and so on. The Government should parade these measures as an important part of our achievements in Europe. At the moment, there seems to be ambivalence about doing that.

As I understand it, today in Brussels, the Government have not been able to corral the votes sufficiently to kill the temporary agency workers directive. It is an important development in Europe. Whether or not there is a referendum, which I do not think that there

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will be, in terms of public opinion the treaty has to be seen to consider the support for internationalism which people feel is affecting the security of their working lives. Where will these protections come from? Where are the measures whereby the white working class can feel that it can co-operate with migrant workers, immigrants and so on? We are getting that message clearly from around the country.

In conclusion, surely we must move away from the sub-Churchillian rhetoric of fighting them on the beaches and fighting them in the air; there will be no surrender, with our red lines and fixed bayonets; and they shall not pass. This is a ludicrous characterisation to please bulldog Murdoch, the ridiculous Englishman who is not an Englishman, and who represents, but does not live anywhere near, middle England. The Government seem to have been bewitched by him. Will my noble friend take on board the fact that many of us believe that the Government are in too defensive a mode about the whole European question, particularly how it affects the attitude in the Labour movement? We have much to give to the world in business and the trade unions as leaders of European opinion, which should be communicated to the British people in a positive spirit from 10 Downing Street downwards. That is my message to this debate.

9.15 pm

Lord Blackwell: My Lords, we are near the end of the debate, and I pay tribute to the noble Baroness the Lord President, who has sat in her place, almost unmoving, for five hours. I am sure that we all appreciate that.

It has been clear during the debate that there are many views around the Chamber, and that is healthy. A number of noble Lords have put forward the genuine view that they welcome the major steps in this treaty towards achieving an ever-closer union and see that as a positive move forward. I disagree with them, but I respect their views. Like others, however, I have less sympathy with the Government’s position. They simultaneously seem to hold that the treaty is vital for the future of the European Union and yet has no impact on the United Kingdom. In my view, the reform treaty is a bad treaty. Even at this late stage, the Government next week should refuse to sign it, in order to start afresh and negotiate a better treaty. There are two reasons for this. First, the provisions in the treaty create a significant shift of power to the European Union; and, secondly, the cumulative impact of this treaty on top of previous treaties amounts to a fundamental change in the nature of the European Union and our relationship with it.

As to the provisions of the treaty, the Government have sought to focus attention on—some might say, “divert attention from”—the opt-outs that they claim they have negotiated from provisions that even they admit would be damaging if enacted. I do not want to repeat the arguments put forward today as to why those are unlikely to hold, but I was particularly interested in some of the issues that the noble Lord, Lord Lea, raised. We will no doubt come back to many of those during more detailed debates.

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The red lines and illusory opt-outs are not the end of the story. My concerns start with the vast majority of the treaty changes which were conceded by the Government within the red lines. Let us be clear: the treaty provides for a substantial increase in the scope of European legislation to impact on UK citizens. Rather than limiting and containing EU legislation within tight boundaries, the treaty’s definition of “shared competences”, a new innovation, gives the European Union unlimited power to extend its directives in each of the 11 areas named, headings that together cover most of the domestic policy agenda. Furthermore, the treaty contains an explicit limitation on the powers of member states by declaring that they can only legislate in areas of shared competence where the European Union has chosen not to exercise its competence. That turns subsidiarity on its head.

On top of that, the European Union is given ill defined powers to co-ordinate policies and to take supporting actions in a range of more sensitive areas, including, as others have said, industry, education, employment and social policy. As the treaty provisions will be, by definition, part of UK law after the treaty is passed, the Government’s protocol on the Charter of Fundamental Rights cannot stop the European Court deciding that related parts of the charter—particularly those parts dealing with social rights—apply to the UK. That creates a fatal hole in the Government’s meaningless opt-out.

Furthermore, the treaty, for the first time, defines majority voting as the normal procedure for legislation; as others have said, more than 60 national vetoes are disappearing. That is not only about streamlining decisions; it includes important areas of national interest such as energy, transport and culture, as well as significant areas of foreign policy, justice and home affairs. Our power to block legislation under QMV will be reduced in 2014 by a reduction in the highest hurdle needed to pass legislation, from 74 per cent of weighted council votes to only 65 per cent of votes weighted by population. The ability of Parliament to block further treaty changes is eroded by the fact that this is, as the noble Lord, Lord Grenfell, pointed out, a self-amending treaty that can move to QMV in any area without further ratification by national Parliaments. Finally, the introduction of an exit clause means that, for the first time, any member state that chooses to withdraw will have committed itself by this treaty to face whatever penalties other member states may decide to impose.

As I said in my introduction and as the noble Lords, Lord Waddington and Lord Stoddart, and others have said, it is not enough to look at the treaty in isolation. To understand its impact and intent, one needs to view the incremental changes that have come about through successive treaties. Against that background, the notion that this treaty is the end of the process of ever-closer union, rather than the foundation for the next stage, is simply not credible. The same arguments were used at the time of Maastricht, which was billed as the end of the process because of the incorporation of subsidiarity and because of the UK opt-outs. In reality, looking back, it is clear that the process since then has been more intense than ever. Both Amsterdam and Nice added new competences and further extended QMV, as

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other noble Lords have said, in a wide range of areas. Justice and home affairs was added at Maastricht as a purely intergovernmental pillar. That was partly eroded at Amsterdam, and at Lisbon, as we have heard, it has been fully subsumed into the EU competences.

It is not just competences that concern me; it is the gradual evolution of the institutional structure of the European Union away from nation states, slowly but surely building and reinforcing the idea of democratic legitimacy exercised independently of the nation state by European-level institutions. At its heart is the concept of European Union citizenship, which was added, I suspect, as a purely rhetorical flourish—by the UK, at least—in the introductory declarations at Maastricht. Now, in this reform treaty, the European Union has put the EU citizen, rather than the nation state, at the centre of its mandate, declaring in Article 8A that the union is founded on representative democracy where citizens are represented directly at Union level in the European Parliament and have rights and responsibilities defined by the Union itself. That direct European mandate is reinforced by the encouragement that the same article gives to the development of European-level political parties and by the responsibility given to the Commission in Article 8B to bypass national Governments and undertake direct dialogue with citizens and representative associations.

With the right to initiate legislation resting firmly with the Commission, the Council, by contrast, has shifted from being the directing mind of the European Union where nation states acted largely by unanimous agreement to becoming merely the second chamber where national representatives meet to cast votes on European legislation predominantly through majority voting procedures. We have also seen the growing role, as others have said, of the European Court. On the other hand, the role of the European Parliament has been elevated in successive treaties so it now has a co-decision-making power that puts it on at least equal terms with nation states in ever more areas, including the election of the Commission president.

As part of that evolution, under this treaty the president of the Council is no longer a rotating head of government, an arrangement that emphasised the primacy of nation states, but becomes a permanent EU official. Crucially, the treaty enables that role to be combined with the role of the head of the Commission. The noble Lord, Lord Wallace, said that he thought that was unlikely but, as others have said, the clause in the early draft prohibiting it was deleted, against the UK’s objections. The noble Lord wants to look at people who see where that will go. It will be but a small step, as President Sarkozy and others are already pressing for that powerful head of government role to become a directly elected president claiming his own direct mandate. I can refer to other people who are putting that forward as the way they would like to take things.

Alongside that, the definition of “shared competences”, the incorporation of the charter, the expanded role of the ECJ into justice and home affairs, the scope for the EU to amend its own treaties without reference back

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to national parliaments—all of these increasingly make the EU an autonomous power that is directing, rather than serving, the nation states. National Parliaments are relegated to the role of waving yellow cards that the Commission, having considered them, can choose to ignore. We are asked to believe that that is a great concession to national Parliaments. I thought that national Parliaments in the past had a role in holding to account Ministers who could go to Europe and say no. Now legislation from Europe bypasses not only Ministers but Parliament, and we are offered the option of waving a yellow card.

The creation of a single legal personality is the final step that allows the European Union to operate as a legitimate Government in its own right, signing and enforcing treaties and agreements on the international stage with its own Foreign Minister, who, according to the treaty, has the right to usurp the place of national representatives at the United Nations on any matter where the European Union has defined a common position. Many noble Lords may greatly welcome that, but it is difficult to deny it. It is not surprising that other continental leaders hail the treaty as preserving all the essential ingredients of the constitution. According to the Spanish Prime Minister, it is more than just a treaty; it is a foundation and a treaty for a new Europe.

This is a fundamentally different European Union from any to which the UK population has signed up. It is not a direction that is sensible for the UK or a direction that the UK electorate supports. On the basis of recent experience, it is simply not credible that the UK can sign up to this onward sweep of European political integration and then preserve the status quo or maintain a separate direction through a few opt-outs. Nor is it true to assert that we have no other option. If the UK were to veto this treaty, we would be in a powerful position to negotiate a different and better relationship for the UK.

Lord Tomlinson: In a minority of one to 26.

Lord Blackwell: My Lords, I say to the noble Lord, Lord Tomlinson, that my personal view is that we should seek what all polling shows is the mainstream view of the British electorate. What it clearly wants is a looser relationship that preserves free trade and the economic prosperity that goes with it and co-operation between Governments but allows the UK properly to opt out of the process of economic and political integration. That is the prize which, if we veto the treaty, we could pursue.

If the Government sign the treaty, they should at least open up an honest debate. When I asked the noble Baroness the Lord President a few weeks ago to set out the differences between the reform treaty and the constitution, she refused to answer. I said then that I could find one article in the constitutional treaty that was not replicated in the reform treaty; I have now found two. If the noble Baroness would like to tell me how many she has found, I would be delighted. The Government cannot expect to be taken seriously when they assert that two nearly identical texts are different just because they have changed the name.

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This is a bad treaty; it has been falsely represented; and the Government should reject it. If they do not, I stand shoulder-to-shoulder with my noble friend Lord Leach in agreeing that the House should hold them to their promise to hold a referendum and explain their decision to the people.

9.28 pm

The Archbishop of York: My Lords, I shall speak in the gap on the speakers list and will not detain the House long. I arrived in this country in June 1974 and participated in an election for the first time—the 1975 referendum on whether the United Kingdom should stay in Europe. In those six months, I listened to the debates and arguments. Therefore, it is not true to suggest that the public were deceived. The message was very clear. As a newcomer to the country, I knew what I was voting for and voted yes. East Africa’s own economic community had been destroyed by Idi Amin; Uganda would have been much better off in it. So I thought to myself that the European Economic Community would probably be a good thing. It is not true to argue that the public were deceived and did not know what they were doing. It is an insult to the British public to suggest that they do not know about an issue on which they vote. So that is what I did in 1975.

The noble Lord, Lord Watson of Richmond, asked a question that those who oppose ratification of the treaty must answer. I pose the question in my own way, but he asked whether the country could cope with a break-up of the Union and how we would deal with it. I suspect that we would be in a very different place. East Africa never coped with the break-up of that union. While we wanted our sovereignty, we thought that we could always get the union back. However, it is not always easy to do that, and the noble Lord, Lord Watson of Richmond, was not scaremongering. The noble and learned Lord, Lord Howe of Aberavon, put the question even more sharply by looking at the actual benefits for this country and many others in the Union. Those two people, then, were not scaremongering but facing reality. We need to find out what would actually happen to us. Tanzania and Kenya have tried to get that union back, but getting it back is very difficult.

Secondly, may we please stop blaming the EU for all our ills? We are responsible for our economic policy, education, health, security and international affairs. If those policies are not working out, please do not look over the border and blame others; what we are not doing is our own fault, because we are responsible here. May we stop the blame culture? I call it BSE—always blaming someone else, instead of taking responsibility for ourselves.

There is a story that I love of a little man who was standing outside a church, crying his eyes out. Someone came to him and asked, “Why are you crying? Who are you?”. He said, “My name is Satan, and everybody in that church blames me for things that I have not done or even thought about. If they only blamed me for things that I was responsible for, I would stop the crying”. It is easy to look over the waters and to think that them out there are responsible

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for all kinds of things. Our duty is to be resolute, to hold on to our red lines, to engage and participate, standing together in Europe, otherwise we shall in the end hang separately. So, let us swim together. If our neighbours behave badly, our duty is to draw a big enough circle to include them so that we can transform their lives—in terms of justice, relationships and working together.

We have fostered two children, and when they came into our home it was not easy for the first three years. Their behaviour and attitude was so different, yet over time they have become beloved members of our family. I support the ratification of the treaty.

Lord Pearson of Rannoch: My Lords—

9.32 pm

Lord McNally: No, my Lords, for we are in the gap.

First, I hope that the noble Lord, Lord Howell, will tell the noble Lord, Lord Strathclyde, what a treat he has missed. We hope to see him in the debates on this treaty and in the Bill’s Committee stage, which he will surely enrich. After all, this debate has been a bit like those posh restaurants where they let you have a little nibble of the banquet that is to come. We can all look forward to the banquet of seeing this treaty through, sometime in early spring, I suspect. I welcome the constructive tone of the opening speech made by the noble Baroness the Lord President, who has now had my support and the strictures of the noble Lord, Lord Stoddart. Hers must have been a good speech.

I cannot mention all noble Lords who spoke, but I will refer to the fact that the noble Lord, Lord Campbell of Alloway, suggested a Conservative manifesto commitment to withdraw from the treaty. I do not want to pick at old scabs, but that is not without precedent. In 1983, the Labour Party had a clear, unequivocal manifesto commitment that, if elected, it would withdraw from the European Community; it recorded its worst result since 1918. That 1983 election is also worth remembering because some people who hark back to the 1975 referendum forget that that election was another consultation of the British people, in which they gave just as resounding a result as they did in the referendum, voting two to one in favour. I was delighted to hear that the most reverend Primate the Archbishop of York was on the “yes” side then, as he was tonight.

The discussion tonight, as I suspect it will be in those long weeks in the early spring, has been a battle of lists and of judgments. I am not sure whether so many obscure—at least to our ears—European politicians will ever be quoted with such authority again on both sides of the argument. From our point of view, the position is clear. The Liberal Democrats and our predecessor parties have been committed to the European ideal for 50 years with a consistency that I submit has not always been true of the Labour or Conservative parties.

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