EU Referendum - January 2011

Almost below the radar as the daily life of the nation proceeds, parliamentary time has been given over to the Sovereignty and Referendums Bill. This piece of legislation has two functions: to remind our judges who interpret and apply the law,  that EU law is only valid in the United Kingdom because Parliament allows it to be; Second to prevent any further powers being ceded to the EU without a referendum. In 1995 all three main political parties promised at the election that the EU Constitutional Treaty would not be acceded to by Britain without a referendum.  

Then, once the election was out of the way, the last government agreed to the EU Constitution by signing up to the Lisbon Treaty, but without first giving the people the promised referendum. This bill currently going through the Commons is designed to prevent that from ever being allowed to happen again.

 So far the debate has focussed on two issues: first, should there be wider definition of the sovereignty of Parliament to prevent the growth of judicial power within the UK and not just vis- a -vis the EU. So far we have resisted amendments to that effect; Second, is there too much ministerial discretion on the question of what is significant enough to trigger a referendum? Actually, I think the lock is pretty strong and the wriggle room for ministers is tiny. Had the bill been in place from the outset then every EU treaty signed would have been caught by its provisions. Like the Irish we would always have got a referendum.

Next week some MPs will move an amendment to make the bill a vehicle to secure an ‘in or out’ referendum on the EU. They argue that because the last such referendum was in 1975 nobody under the age of 53 has had that choice presented to them. Many eurosceptic  MPs  will be tempted to vote for the amendment. I will not be one of them. I am still bruised at being on the losing side in 1975 and I have no enthusiasm to repeat the experience. When constituents complain to me that they were ‘robbed’ in 1975 when they thought they were only joining a free trade association, I tell them that Enoch Powell, Michael Foot and Peter Shore  all warned them during that campaign and that things have pretty well turned out as they predicted. Shouldn’t we take this opportunity to have another go?   I think not. The Daily Express is running a campaign but I have detected no change in the public mood. The same half dozen constituents continue to email me about it, but then they always have.  The Coalition has one overriding objective: to sort the public finances and put our economy back on track. To add a referendum on getting out of the EU would throw into an already difficult mix an enormously divisive distraction. Now is simply not the time.