European Union (Amendment) Bill

My hon. Friend is tempting me down not a passerelle, but a cul-de-sac. I am happy to go down it, however, as it is highly relevant to my points. I heard what the hon. Member for Linlithgow and East Falkirk said, and he was right to an extent, but we must remember this: there was no change—or very little change, and only change that was adverse to this country—between the intergovernmental mandate in June and the intergovernmental conference in November. No Community-wide change was brought about in the form of additional safeguards in the treaty itself; there was nothing like that. All that the Government have offered us is what they have put forward as a safeguard before making decisions with which the treaty deals. The Government have not had any negotiating success in building more safeguards into the treaty of Lisbon itself.