Convention on the Future of Europe

Part of the debate – in the House of Lords at 5:06 pm on 2 April 2003.

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Photo of Lord Stoddart of Swindon Lord Stoddart of Swindon Independent Labour 5:06, 2 April 2003

My Lords, the noble Lord, Lord Norton, is right: we have almost—perhaps certainly—left it too late to understand exactly where we are going in the European Union. I want to join other noble Lords who have spoken in thanking the noble Lord, Lord Blackwell, for introducing the Motion and for the way in which he did so. It was lucid and dealt with the problem very firmly indeed. He was right in saying that if the proposals in the convention were adopted, they would mark the end of Britain as a sovereign and independent nation. I believe that to be absolutely true.

I suppose that I am one of those people who the noble Lord, Lord Maclennan, describes as having a carping, backward-looking attitude to the European Union. I would not describe it quite like that. My attitude has always been that when we were told we were joining a Common Market, we were joining nothing of the sort. We were in fact joining an organisation which had as its final objective a United States of Europe—and so it has proved. Unfortunately, the road has been gradual and built on a number of treaties and misleading information, to say the least, if not downright lies about where we were heading. It is therefore right that we have people in this country who query what is being done by government and in the name of the British people.

I heard for the first time today what is almost a seditious speech from the noble Lord, Lord Hooson. He goes further than anyone I have ever heard on the subject in that he wants us all to swear an oath of allegiance to the European Union. When I came here, I affirmed an oath of allegiance to Her Majesty the Queen. How many oaths of allegiance do I have to swear in order to satisfy the noble Lord, Lord Hooson? I am satisfied with one. Indeed, our system of government over many hundreds of years has proved to be superior to many whom the noble Lord so admires.

Since the debate on 7th January—I said pretty much of what I want to say then, but perhaps I had better say a few more words at this stage—the convention has been grinding on, wallowing in an ocean of paper, to produce a constitution and a system of European government which will be more powerful, more centralised and less democratic than ever before. Indeed, as the noble Lord, Lord Howell of Guildford, said in his excellent speech, it gives the European Union a new legitimacy, imposed from above. We are not talking about building a federal state; we are talking about building a unitary state, and we should remember that. This is not a federalist convention; it is a unitary convention.

What is taking place is being done ostensibly to accommodate a United States of Europe of 25 countries and is precisely the opposite of what many of those favouring enlargement sought to achieve. They believed that the more countries that joined, the greater would be the push for decentralisation and the return to the nation states of powers lost to them. My own view has always been the opposite. The more countries that join the European Union—or the United States of Europe—the more centralised it would have to become, and so it has proved. The convention is working towards just that. The final building blocks of the European super-state are being put into place, aided and abetted by the Tower of Babel that the convention has become, in an attempt to hoodwink people into believing that there is a democratic element in putting the final touches to the United States of Europe.

Incidentally, the term "United States of Europe" is not mine. It was coined by Giscard d'Estaing. In his first draft he proposed that one of the names might be the "United States of Europe". Perhaps the noble Lord, Lord McIntosh, who at Question Time today accused me of fantasising, ought to read that draft and apologise for his remarks.

What is even worse is that this huge project, further to deprive nation states of their sovereignty, is being driven forward to accommodate an unrealistic timetable. An attempt is being made by the Italian Prime Minister to speed it up even further in order to meet his silly, vain and arrogant ambition to have the new treaty, constitution or whatever it is called, signed during his country's presidency. When we are dealing with something like this, we need all the time it takes. It is too serious to rush and we should make sure that we have all the time it takes, irrespective of the wishes of the Italian Prime Minister.

As we know, the new constitution will involve ceding more powers to the Union, increasing the competences and influence of its institutions and enabling it to intervene in and make decisions about virtually every aspect of policy, from foreign affairs, defence, economic policy, taxation to social and environment matters—and even the electoral arrangements and financial assistance for political parties. It will interfere in every nook and cranny of our national life. What is more, as the noble Lord, Lord Blackwell, pointed out in his opening remarks, it will be able to alter things as it goes along. Under Article 16, it will be possible for the Union to put right things which perhaps it got wrong at the beginning. Even Gisela Stuart, one of Parliament's representatives at the convention, is very concerned about that and, it is to be hoped, will be able to do something about it.

What is not understood is that, due to the qualified majority voting system, which the Prime Minister wishes to extend—he said so in his Cardiff speech—great decisions will be made not by Her Majesty's Government or our Parliament, but by a gaggle of 25 countries whose interests are so often inimical to those of our own. But the Prime Minister, who claimed to be a British patriot in an article in the Sun, in March 1997, believes in more integration—again, in his Cardiff speech he said that he wanted to see more integration; that is, a stronger Commission and the President of the Council to be elected for four years, who would co-ordinate the European Union, speaking and acting for it not only on the home stage, but on the world stage as well.

Of course our friend Mr Prodi, the President of the Commission, and, since last week, Mr Solana, have agreed that we should go even further. They are demanding a single European Union voice in the United Nations and other international bodies. Let us face it, they are simply taking a common foreign policy, which Mr Blair supports, to its logical conclusion; that is, if we have a common foreign policy, it cannot be effective unless it has a seat and a voice in the councils of the world.

There is yet another serious aspect to what is being proposed in the draft constitution: the requirement for loyalty to the institutions and decisions of the new order. Even the proposers do not suggest that an oath of allegiance should be taken, but nevertheless they are demanding that loyalty should be given to the decisions that are taken. That will apply not only to governments, it will extend to individual citizens, who will also owe that loyalty. Although it might appear at present to be somewhat innocuous, the long-term aim is to transfer loyalty to one's country to loyalty to the European Union. We know now that some Members of this House believe that that would be a good thing.

In the face of all that, it is difficult to understand the policy of the Official Opposition and the Conservative Party, which is to be in Europe but not governed by Europe. They must surely now recognise that that position is untenable and that you cannot remain in Europe if you do not agree to be governed by it. If they stick to that policy, it will be hung around their necks, as was their policy on the pound; that is, their commitment to retain the pound only for one Parliament instead of insisting that the pound was a symbol of our independence and sovereignty and would never be relinquished. If they have any sense, the Opposition and the Conservative Party will say that they will resist the convention proposals and that, if they are returned to power, they will repeal them, even if that means leaving the European Union, or whatever it may then be called.

If the Conservatives really want to hold a referendum—and I am not at all sure that I agree about that because it needs to be thought through—unless they are prepared to take that kind of policy to a referendum, I think that they will not win it.

Finally, I have to say that the Prime Minister seems to be suffering from a diplomatic and political dose of schizophrenia. At the same time as wanting to be at the heart of Europe, he is also desperate to be a junior partner in the new world construct of the United States of America. Recent events must surely have convinced him that he cannot have both and that the cure for his schizophrenia is to become a real British patriot, which demands that Britain's position as a free and democratic nation is to be safeguarded at all costs. That cannot be achieved by even further European integration, but only by disengagement from the process of creating a United States of Europe.