European Union (Amendment) Bill

I should like to draw my hon. Friend back, I hope not too rudely, to his amendments, and to the point about subsidiarity and how it will play out. We discovered back at Maastricht—it has not really changed—that the concept of subsidiarity is completely alien to how we view our democracy. When it was being sold to us by the then Prime Minister, John Major, as a real breakthrough, none of the other countries translated subsidiarity in the same way. It is a peculiar continental concept that says that where power rests with those at the top, they will give back what they like to those down below. In this country, power is supposed to rest with the people, and we are only meant to borrow it. That has made the difference in how that concept has been interpreted. When Labour Members make ludicrous arguments about subsidiarity, they should read the debates; then they would realise that subsidiarity has used been in exactly the same way, and it has done absolutely nothing to return a jot of power to the nation states or the people.