European Union (Amendment) Bill

My Lords, I do not want to speak for long on this issue, but the noble Lord, Lord Dykes, has brought me to my feet. He told the House that this was the only country where this sort of debate takes place. Well, he is wrong. In Denmark, there are frequent debates, and indeed referendums, on the important issues in treaties. In Sweden, there is an argument going on, with a threat from the trade unions that, unless the Swedish Government can deal with a wages problem that has been caused by a ruling of the European Court, they will be against the Lisbon treaty. When I was in Estonia some while ago, I did not get the impression that there was no dispute about membership of the European Union in that country. We are not alone in querying our membership of the European Union and its cost and benefits; that is the sensible thing to do. In any event, if we were the only ones doing so, why not? Let us not make any mistake about the fact that we are different in many respects, probably most of all because we are an island that has been successful over a long, long time—much longer than any other European state, except perhaps France. It is perfectly in order for us to have such a debate. Indeed, it is a recommendation of our democracy that we have such debates. I say to the noble Lord, Lord Dykes, and to the Liberal party that I can respect their position. There is no doubt that their position is that we should have in Europe a fully federal state. That is a perfectly respectable view to hold and I do not criticise them for it, but they must allow other people to have a different point of view. I have a different point of view, which I have held for a very long time. On the cost-benefit analysis, other parties, unlike the Liberal party, say that it is about trading. They say that it is not about a country called Europe, although I believe that eventually it will be, and the Lisbon treaty takes us another big step towards that. If it is about trading, and if it is about the benefits to the British people, it is sensible for the country to have regular cost-benefit analyses. If the Government do not do that, they are not properly serving their people and indeed they are cheating their people. Therefore, the suggestion that is being put forward by the noble Lord, Lord Pearson, is sensible and should be accepted by the Government. The noble Lord pointed out that the Prime Minister, when he was Chancellor of the Exchequer, produced a paper that showed that our membership of the European Union, in economic terms, cost us £28 billion a year. That being so, I would have thought that the Government would want to look at it to see whether that figure could be reduced and whether the books could be better balanced. On the question of our net contribution, I am not at all sure that the noble Lord, Lord Dykes, got his figures right. The last figure that I saw was that the present net contribution was £4.5 billion but would rise by 2010 to £6.2 billion. If you add the £3.5 billion rebate that we get at present and which we would perhaps lose if the noble Lord, Lord Dykes, had his way, the net contribution would be £9.7 billion a year. That would exceed that of Germany and make us the highest contributor in net terms to the budget of the European Union. Then let us take trade. That was the basis on which we went into what was then called the Common Market. Last year the deficit in trade was £40 billion, rising from £32 billion in 2006. That is an enormous gap in trade and loses the country jobs. With a proper cost-benefit analysis to try to correct that situation, far from losing jobs we might gain them. Then there is the cost to the consumer, estimated by the Treasury to be £20 per week per family. That cost ought to be taken into account for the sake of the families in this country, whom the Government ought to be protecting. Finally, if this is really about trade, there are many good places to trade with other than Europe and without having the trappings of a full-blown state—a president, foreign minister, Parliament, currency and goodness knows what. I recommend the House sometimes to agree with the noble Lord, Lord Pearson, and indeed with me that this is too important a matter just to be left to the economic superstition that it is good for us. We ought to have a cost-benefit analysis. It would be beneficial to the country and make a contribution to the good debates that we have in this House about our membership of the EU.