European Union (Amendment) Bill

Let me finish my point about the Liberal Democrats before I take a further intervention. The leader of the Liberal Democrats should be true to his original conviction. When he wrote in The Guardian on 15 October 2003, as a Member of the European Parliament, he attacked the Government for "““dismissing all calls for a referendum””" and"““playing straight into the hands of the Eurosceptics.””" He said:"““Nothing will do more damage to the pro-European movement than giving room to the suspicion that we have something to hide, that we do not have the ‘cojones’ to carry our argument to the people.””" An explanation of why the Liberal Democrat leadership’s protests in the debates have become ever more shrill is that, at some point in recent months, they have become separated from their cojones. Those unfortunate objects are now to be found impaled on a distant fence. The argument that the Lisbon treaty is not only different from the European constitution, but so different that entire political parties are relieved of their commitment to hold a referendum does not stand up to much analytical scrutiny.