European Union (Amendment) Bill

I agree with my hon. Friend, and I remember voting for his very good amendment to the Bill that he mentions. It follows from what he says that he would agree that when the Criminal Justice Act 2003 was enacted, and reference was made to articles 31 and 34 of the existing treaty, Parliament did not think that instead of the treaties, there would one day be the treaty of Lisbon, which would take criminal justice and policing out of the intergovernmental pillar and collapse it, and instead make the issues subject to the mainstream Community method, with all that that implies. I hope that I have demonstrated that the Bill will give the Executive—specifically, the Secretary of State or the Treasury—a wide power to make amendments. Those amendments can cover primary, as well as secondary, legislation. I think it wrong in principle that the negative procedure should be used to amend primary legislation, unless there is good reason for doing so. I have shown that we are talking about matters of substance. I gave a number of examples, from a previous Act, of provisions that would have incorporated the constitutional treaty, if it had gone ahead. Those examples must endure as proposals that the Government identified as requiring amendment. I have shown that the Bill does not simply make technical adjustments; we are dealing with significant changes that touch on the powers of the European Court of Justice, the scope of, and powers under, the common foreign and security policy, and the collapse of the intergovernmental pillar governing criminal justice. Those are material changes, and they affect the powers of the House. In conclusion, I repeat that the amendment would make a modest change. It is not a wrecking amendment. If it is made, it does not destroy, or even modify, the treaty; our other amendments do that. It simply concerns an internal matter to do with the powers of the House. I therefore commend it to hon. Members in all parts of the House.