My Lords, I rise to support a referendum and to concentrate some of my remarks on those made by the noble and learned Lord, Lord Howe, and in particular his assertion that a referendum is an alien concept. I am afraid that history is important to this issue. In March 1972, the other place was faced with an amendment for a referendum before we could accede to the treaty to join the European Community. There was considerable debate. On 15 March, the Labour Party leadership came out against a referendum. On 16 March, President Pompidou declared that there would be a referendum in France on the question of enlargement from six to nine and taking in the United Kingdom. On 24 March, the then Prime Minister, Edward Heath, announced that there would be a periodic referendum in Northern Ireland to decide the question of whether Northern Ireland would ever join with the Republic. On 29 March, the Labour Party’s leadership decided that there would be a referendum and that they would vote for the amendment. That amendment was not carried, but the Labour Party, in its manifesto for the 1974 election, made a commitment to a referendum and faithfully carried that out and legislated for it. It may have been reluctantly, but the noble and learned Lord supported that referendum and, I might add, he was a member of the Government in 1972 when the pledge for the Irish referendum was made. Indeed, he was a distinguished legal adviser of that Government.
We then persisted to a situation where the Labour Party in opposition decided that it would come out from the European Community without even a referendum. I diametrically differ from the noble and learned Lord in his view that that 1975 referendum was irrelevant and damaging. In my view, it was the central issue that meant that when the Labour Party went to the country on that manifesto in 1983, it was rejected. Having been given the chance to decide whether to stay in or stay out, the British people wished to retain that choice. It was a fundamentally stabilising and welcome factor in changing the mind of the Labour Party to become, as it is today in Government, an enthusiastic supporter of the European Union. It also laid the foundation for a broad consensus on European Union membership which still lasts across the parties, for all the divisions, today. History will show that Harold Wilson showed a lot more courage than he was given credit for in 1972—more courage than I was ready to give him credit for in 1972, when I voted for Britain's membership.
It goes on longer than that. This is not an alien concept. We have had three general elections—in 1997, 2001 and 2005—in which all three parties committed themselves to a referendum on the question of whether we should join the euro-zone. My views are well known in the House. I have campaigned against that on economic and political grounds but fundamentally on economic grounds. As we now face the downturn in the world economy and the problems of adjustment for the UK economy there must be pretty few people in this House who are not glad that we have the compensating measure of being able to devalue and are not held in a fixed exchange rate.
It goes further than that. The noble Lord said that he had disagreed with the decision of the then Prime Minister, Tony Blair, to have a referendum when he announced it in 2004. That is not really the important decision. Of course he was Prime Minister but he went on to compound that judgment by putting it in his manifesto in the 2005 election. So did the other two parties; all three parties fought that election on a referendum. This is, with respect to the noble Lord, not an alien concept. He may fundamentally disagree with it and there may be many people in this House who believe that this is a parliamentary democracy and they do not wish to see referendums. Yet that commitment in Northern Ireland has been a positive one. I have profound doubts whether we would have been able to have the successful negotiations that started under the noble Baroness, Lady Thatcher, as Prime Minister and went on through her successor John Major and then on with Tony Blair. Those who feared that they would be forced against their will by a government who were not prepared to listen to them found solace and satisfaction in that there would have to be a referendum.
As people have become more alienated for many complex reasons from what I call representative government, the sort of democracy which I support, from time to time it is necessary to accept that there are some issues which split parties and families and are easier and better dealt with by a referendum. Having defended the constitutional place of referendums—not frequently, I do not want to become a plebiscitary democracy—I want to retain the concept that a government are elected on a manifesto which they broadly speaking maintain for a four-year or five-year term and are judged overall during that period when they come back to the electorate. However, from time to time, and particularly when they promise in an election to have a referendum, that new way of democratic expression should be maintained, honoured and not spurned or despised.
On the present referendum, it is extraordinary that we should be debating this in the House when tomorrow the Republic of Ireland will be holding a referendum. Two days ago the Financial Times wrote an editorial. There is a letter in today’s Financial Times from which, in that to some extent the Irish now hold this issue in their hands, it might be worth reading just a few lines: "““On what basis do you””—"
the Financial Times— "““assert that putting the Lisbon treaty to a plebiscite is absurd? Surely the great strength of the European project is maintaining and enhancing peace while promoting a common prosperity in a democratic way. If so, let us ensure that the emerging entity is grounded in Pericles’ observation: ‘Although only a few may originate a policy, we are all able to judge it’””."
That Irish correspondent goes on to say something else. He does not go to the classics, he invokes another wise statement: "““As citizens in a republic governed by a written constitution, we have voted frequently on proposals to manage the world’s largest trading bloc””."
He means the European Union. "““The only absurdity in this referendum is that those who drafted the Lisbon treaty ignored Jonathan Swift’s observation: ‘Providence never intended to make the management of public affairs a mystery to be comprehended by a few persons of sublime genius’””."
When we decide in an election, the vast majority of the public have not the slightest idea of our various manifestos, commitments and the detail of the legislation. They make a broad assumption, a broad judgment, about who is competent, who they trust, and whether they need an alternation of power to ensure the best aspect of democracy—that power changes at fairly frequent intervals.
The key question today is this: no one denies that they were promised a referendum; the defence is that this treaty is different. I personally think that it is different and I can point to different elements, subsections and clauses with which I agree. But in view of the fact that there has been a manifesto commitment, our judgments are not anywhere near as important as those of the people. Opinion poll after opinion poll shows that the majority of the people of this country do not see any fundamental difference between the constitution and the treaty. The people also tell us something else, which is profound. They want to be able to express their views on this.
I do not know what will happen in Ireland tomorrow. Just as the Dutch and the French people held the destiny of the European Union in their hands and voted ““no””, on—whatever may be said and wherever you sit—a treaty which was great deal better than that put forward by Giscard d’Estaing, which the then Prime Minister said he would have supported, it is much easier to look at this treaty. Nevertheless, the people think that this is still an issue on which they should have the last word.
I would go further if the Irish were to vote for this treaty and if Britain were to be alone in making a decision. I must say something that will probably annoy and surprise quite a number of people. For many of the reasons that were made clear by the noble and learned Lord, Lord Howe, I still think that it is in Britain’s interests to play a full and constructive role. Despite my anger that the Government have not taken the opportunity to put in some of the parliamentary brakes that have been discussed on restricting the competence of the European Court of Justice to do exactly what is in the treaty and try to narrow down the interpretation of the treaty in the law courts of this country, and despite my belief that there will come a time when the new Supreme Court will be given the powers that the German people have retained in their constitutional court—we will create something similar in this country and the sooner, the better—I would campaign for the treaty, because I do not want us to be put on the margins of Europe. That is a personal decision. It would be one vote in a referendum. It might not win it or it might.
It is defeatism for those who support this treaty to say that they cannot win a referendum. If you are democrats, you should have the courage of your convictions and go out and win it. I, for one, would support it in those circumstances.
European Union (Amendment) Bill
Proceeding contribution from
Lord Owen
(Crossbench)
in the House of Lords on Wednesday, 11 June 2008.
It occurred during Debate on bills on European Union (Amendment) Bill.
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Proceeding contribution
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702 c597-600 
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2007-08
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