European Union (Amendment) Bill

My Lords, we shall not know how necessary this amendment is until we hear from the Minister. The noble Baroness, Lady Quin, may be absolutely right that the amendment is completely unnecessary because this is the way in which things will happen. However, we need to hear from the Minister, which is why I warmly welcome the amendment—indeed, I put my name to it—as this is an important opportunity for the Government clearly to set out the position. I could not agree more with the noble Lord, Lord Lester of Herne Hill, when he described the wording of the treaty as ““opaque language”” and ““appalling drafting””. If he had attended all our debates, that is the message that he would have heard from this side of the House as we sought to improve the way in which this European Union (Amendment) Bill proceeds. We have heard a lot of versions of why the Irish voted as they did. The answer lies with the Irish people. They have expressed a view. We cannot start surmising why they did it in this particular way. However, I say to the noble Lord that this is not a problem for the Republic of Ireland alone. The plain fact is that this is a problem for the entire European Union and, consequently, any solution must involve the entire European Union.