European Union (Amendment) Bill

My Lords, as a member of the Constitution Committee, too, I will explain where I stand on the position presented to us by the Minister. From my parliamentary experience, the best possible Report stage of a Bill genuinely reflects the deliberations in Committee and consequently tries to address the issues that have arisen there. The process in Committee and between Committee and now is in the best possible tradition of a Committee-cum-Report stage. It is not only for the Minister to reflect on and address the issues, but for those of us who have spoken and who have argued the case, as I did in Committee, for the amendment. We must reflect on what we know. Do we know anything different? Do we know better? Do we need to adjust our position as a result of knowledge or experience gathered since? I therefore draw the attention of the House to a couple of things that are influencing my thinking and my position. First, I frankly confess, although I am sure the vast majority of Members here today are not in my state of ignorance, that I did not fully appreciate the nature and number of these opt-in, opt-out decisions. Apparently they are nothing new. I have the list here. Since 2000, some 56 decisions have been taken to opt in and opt out. I had the view, like the noble and learned Lord, Lord Lyell, that there were just three or four major issues on which we should focus and on which we should ensure that Parliament could decide. The truth is that this whole curious process, which I had not fully appreciated, is very different in character and content. There is a variety of opt-ins and opt-outs, many of them routine, technical or constitutional. It is therefore not feasible, as our committee originally suggested, that every opt-in and opt-out that the Government bring up can or should be subject to a parliamentary vote of approval. In one sense, therefore, the amendment does not make provision for the difference between the variety of opt-ins and opt-outs that are routine and technical and the select number that may or may not come before the House and that give rise to serious issues of sovereignty and parliamentary accountability. That was my revision. I now understand rather more about this opt-in, opt-out procedure. I therefore welcome the Minister’s concept of an annual report, because frankly most of the opt-ins and opt-outs passed me by, and as a long-standing Eurosceptic I have tended to watch these things rather vigilantly. I have a track record that goes back to voting for a general election before the 1972 Act ever came into force. I also have a track record, as Members opposite will know, on Maastricht; I belonged to a minority in the other House on the Maastricht treaty. I therefore address this issue as a Eurosceptic, but I genuinely do not think that it is feasible or possible for the House to consider and approve every opt-in and opt-out that comes before us. That is why there must be a fundamental filtering system that is run by our European scrutiny committee. Once we have had that scrutiny and our scrutiny committee has, I hope, identified serious issues with serious consequences that carry issues of sovereignty, the question is: what should be the procedure of the House? I do not believe that scrutiny for its own sake makes any sense. The whole idea is that it should inform the House so that it can make a better decision. But the House has to have the right to make a decision. Does my noble friend’s proposal make that possible? I understand why she has rejected an affirmative resolution procedure as exists in Clause 6. I assume it exists in Clause 6 because that clause deals, in passerelles and simplified procedures, with amendments to the treaties themselves. It is a treaty-amending process and, presumably, has a dimension of its own. I am very encouraged that my noble friend and others have included those provisions so that we cannot be bounced into treaty changes without the full knowledge and, indeed, the pre-knowledge, of both Houses. Since that case has been made, should that procedure be applied to opt-ins and opt-outs? Opt-ins and opt-outs are matters of important public policy—for example, law and order, justice and home affairs—which governments should bring to the people and to both Houses. Like the noble Viscount, Lord Bledisloe, on reflection, I do not support the principle that this House should have a unilateral veto over such procedures, which is what we have recommended until now. They are matters of public policy and the view of the other place should prevail if there is a difference. Therefore, I do not think that I can support a total old-fashioned affirmative resolution procedure, which puts in the possession of this House a veto over opt-ins and opt-outs. I am waiting for my noble friend to clarify further the process by which noble Lords at least will have the right to test the opinion of the House and to express an opinion in the House. I believe that that will be built into my noble friend’s provisions and will be made available to the House. If the committee recommends that this issue is of sufficient importance, we are guaranteed two things in this code of conduct; first, that the matter will come before the House and, secondly, that it will be brought before the House in such a manner and way that it can be voted on and amended if need be. That means that this House would have the right to express its opinion on any issue of consequence that the noble Lord, Lord Grenfell, and his committee might bring to our attention. In this provision, we have at least the guarantee that noble Lords will be able to test the opinion of this House on a serious issue of opt-ins and opt-outs, and to vote on it. Therefore, I do not believe we should demand that further step and say that we should have a veto over such a proposal, especially if the other place goes another way. We are not just looking at issues of scrutiny. We are looking at scrutiny-plus, as my noble and learned friend Lord Morris suggested. Another of my concerns and why, initially, one may have looked at putting a provision in the Bill and, therefore, enshrining it in statute is the concept of a code of conduct. Codes of conduct do not have the same binding force, et cetera, as a clause in a Bill or a section of an Act. But my noble friend again has come a long way to what members of the Constitution Committee pressed her on when she came before us last week; namely, that a code of conduct should be embedded by parliamentary procedure to ensure that it cannot be unilaterally changed or altered by this Government or future Governments. If it has to be changed, the Government should have to come back to this House and the other place and seek to amend it properly. That provision was not in the original draft. I think that the noble Lord, Lord Norton, proposed it specifically and the rest of us supported it. If the code of conduct was embedded in the process, it would give an extra assurance to both Houses that no Government could change or alter the process without agreement. It is not feasible for this House to deal with every opt-in and opt-out that comes before us, but given a proper degree of scrutiny, a process by which the opinion of this House can be tested and voted upon and therefore exercised, and the embedding process that will ensure that this code of conduct can and will be truly accountable in parliamentary terms, I feel that I can support my noble friend’s proposals. In Committee, I gently suggested to her that the kind of proposal that was in our amendment, and is now in her proposal, chimed in with the Government’s attempt to bring constitutional renewal. We are doing so many other things to improve parliamentary accountability. I believe that my noble friend’s recommendation chimes in with, and is part and parcel of, a process of parliamentary accountability. As someone who has been around in one way or another since 1966, and has seen parliamentary accountability wane and wax under governments of all complexions, I believe that, with this and a number of other suggestions, we are enhancing our parliamentary accountability. For that reason, I shall be supporting my noble friend.