Clause 1 - Electoral regions in the United Kingdom
European Parliament (Representation) Bill
6:15 pm
Mr William Cash (Stone, Conservative)
We have had a wide-ranging debate, and several useful and important points of principle and detail have emerged. I have not had much in the way of answers to some questions. With respect to the question of a referendum, my party said that we should have a referendum on the Nice treaty. We have a vested interest in ensuring that referendums are held in relation to the provisions. It could well be that if there were a referendum in the UK on that question, we would get a no answer. I am pretty confident that that would be the case.
The principle that lies behind my approach is consistent with what we would hope to see elsewhere in the EU. That does not prejudice the fact that we want enlargement. In 1990, when Lady Thatcher was Prime Minister, I wrote a pamphlet—it was one of the first pamphlets on modern European issues—that advocated a policy of unity in Europe, but was against federalism. That is possible to achieve.
What worries me about the Bill is that a lot of arrangements will be put in place based on hypotheses. The Minister made it abundantly clear in her reply that we do not have any options. Everything has already been prescribed and laid down in the—