European Union (Amendment) Bill

Clearly the hon. Gentleman was not listening to the points that I made earlier. I hope that my constituents will pay me a bit more attention than he has. We made the promise in relation to the new constitutional treaty, which is no longer in place, and we shall see whether people are prepared to accept that. The hon. Gentleman confirms my point about the nature of our democratic accountability as Members of Parliament. I do not think that every single issue must be subject to a referendum, because referendums can be an excuse to hide divisions in political parties. I agree very much with the point that the right hon. and learned Member for Rushcliffe (Mr. Clarke) made last year:"““It always was crackpot to argue that it was transferring great powers to Brussels and there’s an important constitutional change. It doesn’t justify a referendum and it never did.””" I agree absolutely with that statement of the position. We need to take a decision here in Committee and be accountable for so doing. The debate has shown the divisions in the Conservative party and, more importantly, the failure of its leader to bring it into the centre ground of British politics. He is a hostage to his Eurosceptics, and it is interesting to see that the hostility towards Europe in the Conservative party is still so powerful that a new leader, who is trying to remodel and reposition the party, has totally failed to do so on Europe. As time goes by, the other policy areas on which he has failed to move the party will be revealed. We need Europe more than ever at this time of globalisation and rising protectionism, which we are seeing in the American presidential debates. We need measures to tackle climate change and deal with mass migration, and we need a functioning and effective EU to meet those challenges. Now is not the time to walk off the stage; it is the time to be at the heart of Europe arguing for our national interests. That is what Labour Members intend to do, and that is why the treaty should be ratified by this House.