European Union (Amendment) Bill

The defence of the provisions that we are seeking to amend has so far fallen to the hon. Member for Eastleigh (Chris Huhne). He speaks with some authority since, if the Liberals applied proportional representation to themselves, he would be leader 49 per cent. of the time. His defence—I take it that he is acting as an outrider for the Government—was that the measures are essential in order to export some good higher standards from this country to other countries in the European Community. Up to 750,000 ex-patriot Britons live in those countries, many of us travel to them, and many of us work in them. It is normally said that Eurosceptics take a rather negative view of foreigners and foreign Governments. On this occasion, the Liberal Democrats and the Euro-enthusiasts were working on the assumption that Johnny Foreigner needs a little help from us and that the benighted populations of our fellow member countries of the European Community do not have adequate legal systems but need them to be overridden by a supranational authority. In the interests of those countries and of the British people living in them, we must therefore hand over power over our own legal authorities to those supranational bodies: the European Court of Justice, the Council of Ministers and the European Parliament. Unfortunately, that cuts both ways. If we can export the superior systems of this country—that is the view of the Liberal Democrats—to those partner states, presumably they can export their power and influence to us. That has been a concern to my party.