European Union (Amendment) Bill

My Lords, we have had an impressive debate with some powerful speeches, but the speech of the noble Lord, Lord Patten, was extremely impressive indeed. I am on record as saying in this House on 10 December 2003 that there was no case for holding a referendum on the constitutional treaty. My judgment was that, unlike under the Single European Act—a point made by the noble Lord, Lord Patten—or the Maastricht treaty, there was no major shift in powers between the nation states and the European Union and that there was therefore no case for referendum. Like the Foreign Secretary, I was surprised that the then Prime Minister, Tony Blair, promised in 2004 that we should have a referendum. When asked, the Foreign Secretary said that there was no way on the basis of constitutional significance that the treaty merited the decision that the Prime Minister took. If a referendum was not necessary for the constitutional treaty, as I do not believe that it was, it is certainly not necessary for the Lisbon reform treaty. That is the view taken by all other member states. Of course it is true that Ireland has yet to vote and we will see what happens—I will say a word about that in a moment. I agree with the noble Lord, Lord Blackwell, who made an excellent speech, that there are similarities between the two treaties, and I congratulate him on all his hard work, but my disagreement with him is that I do not believe that either the constitutional treaty or the Lisbon reform treaty merited a referendum. As the noble Lord, Lord Kerr, said, they are no big deal. A powerful argument was made by my noble friend Lady Symons when she reminded us that the constitutional treaty abolished all existing treaties. She was supported by the Dutch Council of State, of which the noble Lord, Lord Neill, was rather critical. I perhaps read what it said slightly more carefully than him, and there was a lot more than the bits that he quoted. It stated that, "““the proposed Reform Treaty is substantially different from the Treaty establishing a Constitution for Europe””." It also agreed that: "““The constitutional concept, which consisted in repealing all existing Treaties and replacing them by a single text called ‘Constitution’ is abandoned””." Instead of setting up a so-called constitution, the Lisbon treaty returns to the customary amendment procedure for existing European treaties, as applied in the treaties of Amsterdam and Nice. My noble friend has established a strong point there, which I do not believe has been answered during the debate. There is also the Danish Justice Ministry, which has produced a penetrating legal analysis—I do not know whether the noble Lord, Lord Neill, has read it—that said that, for Denmark, the Lisbon treaty does not transfer new powers to the Union. That must also be true for the UK, especially in view of the opt-outs and so on that we negotiated. The report concluded that Denmark could ratify the Lisbon treaty by normal procedure rather than by having a referendum. We should oppose the amendment moved by the noble Lord, Lord Howell, and settle the matter here in Parliament. It is true that an Irish referendum is being held tomorrow; we all await the result with interest—a matter which is a question for Ireland and for the EU. Whatever happens, Her Majesty's Government would be right to defeat the amendment, with the help of other parties and other noble Lords in the House, to hold a Third Reading in a fortnight's time, and to ratify the Bill.