UK’s Withdrawal from the EU

Debate between David Lidington and Nick Boles

Wednesday 27th February 2019 Commons Chamber

[Mr Lidington]

In the absence of either an agreement to extend article 50, to leave with a deal or to revoke article 50 all together, the default legal position under the treaties is that the exit date is two years after article 50 has been triggered; that is a matter of European law. The hon. Lady asks a perfectly serious question. I do not believe that the other Governments of the European Union have either an economic interest or a strategic interest in seeing a chaotic departure of the United Kingdom from the European Union. My belief is that there would be a negotiated agreement in those circumstances. But as I said earlier, the new obligation that the Prime Minister announced yesterday is in addition to the ones that would already flow in those circumstances as a result of section 13 of the withdrawal Act—that is, section 13 as modified by the two amendments successfully moved by my right hon. and learned Friend the Member for Beaconsfield (Mr Grieve). Therefore, the matter would come back to the House and there would be an opportunity for right hon. and hon. Members to table amendments to urge particular courses of action.

[Nick Boles (Grantham and Stamford) (Con)]

Will my right hon. Friend give way?

[Mrs Anne Main (St Albans) (Con)]

Will my right hon. Friend give way?

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[Mr Lidington]

My hon. Friend is asking me to go deeper into the realms of hypothetical speculation. Tempting though that is, all I can say is that a lot would depend on where we had got to in the negotiations, the reasons for which the House in these hypothetical circumstances had rejected the revised agreement and so on.

[Nick Boles]

Nobody has a better understanding of these issues than my right hon. Friend and there is nobody whose word I would trust more completely at the Dispatch Box. But this is very important detail, and he has referred to the fact that the Prime Minister made commitments yesterday that replicated the provisions in the draft Cooper-Letwin Bill, which we are hoping not to have to move as a result. Now, that Bill very specifically sets out what would happen if, having consulted with Parliament and received Parliament’s approval, the Government proposed an extension to the European Union and the European Union came back and said, “We’re not happy to grant that extension, but we suggest a different length of extension.”

The Bill makes provision to come back to the House with whatever had been negotiated with the European Union to seek the approval of the House for that actual extension, and it is extremely important that we have that same provision confirmed here today at the Dispatch Box. If we do not, I for one will feel bound to continue with the process of supporting amendment (c) in the name of my right hon. Friend the Member for Meriden (Dame Caroline Spelman), and then tomorrow supporting the Bill. If we can have that reassurance from the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster that the House will get a chance to approve whatever final extension length is agreed between the Government and the European Union—if it were different from the one to which the House had previously consented—I will be happy.

[Mr Lidington]

The straight answer is yes, of course. Frankly, I just do not see any circumstance in which, if a period had been agreed with the European Union or had the potential to be agreed, the Government would not bring this back to the House. Were the Government not to bring it back, it would be brought back anyway under the provisions of section 13 in the way in which I described in response to an earlier intervention, so I think I can give my hon. Friend that clear reassurance on that point.

European Union Bill

Debate between David Lidington and Nick Boles

Tuesday 1st February 2011 Commons Chamber

[Mr Lidington]

My hon. Friend makes a valid point. It is right that in drafting legislation, particularly on a matter as important as democratic representation, we make provision even for unlikely eventualities. If my hon. Friend will bear with me for a few seconds, I shall come to precisely the point that she identified.

When the returning officer has sent copies of the documents to the Secretary of State, the candidate will be confirmed and will be free to take up their seat as soon as the transitional protocol has entered into force. That depends on ratification having taken place in every member state.

Here I come to the point raised by my hon. Friend the Member for St Albans (Mrs Main). Schedule 2 also provides that, in the event that none of the candidates on the relevant 2009 list was available or willing to be returned as an MEP, as a last resort a by-election would be held to fill the seat.

[Nick Boles (Grantham and Stamford) (Con)]

Will my right hon. Friend tell us whether these provisions are to apply only once, in one particular case at one particular time? Is it not the case that we know perfectly well who would be most likely to benefit from the provisions? Is it not also the case that we know that she is alive and wants to be a Member of the European Parliament? Would it not be quicker just to elect Anthea McIntyre as a Member of the European Parliament for the west midlands and move on to the next clause?

[Mr Lidington]

My hon. Friend, as always, reminds us of practicalities and of the real world. As I said to our hon. Friend the Member for St Albans, the legislation for democratic representation must make provision for all conceivable eventualities, even if they seem highly improbable to us.

European Union Bill

Debate between David Lidington and Nick Boles

Tuesday 25th January 2011 Commons Chamber

[Mr Lidington]

We will not give a commitment about specific dates for referendums that are not going to be held before 2015 at the earliest. There are advantages and disadvantages to holding referendums on the same days as other elections, and it is certainly considerably less expensive to the taxpayer if a referendum can be combined with a ballot for other purposes.

[Nick Boles (Grantham and Stamford) (Con)]

In the United States, where much more use is made of local referendums in states such as California, do not such votes almost always take place on the same day as gubernatorial, mayoral or House of Representatives elections? What America understands, which we somehow fail to understand, is that people are perfectly capable of distinguishing between different questions and quite like being asked to go to the polls only once.

[Mr Lidington]

My hon. Friend makes a good point, and I suspect that a number of Members of all parties can recall occasions when both a general election and a local government election of some kind have been held on the same day in the same place. We have found that our electors have been perfectly capable of deciding to split the ticket if that is what they wish to do.

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[Mr Lidington]

Although one can never guarantee against the utterly implausible happening, the scenario that my hon. Friend describes would require a commitment of political energy on the part of every EU member state, because the decisions subject to a referendum require unanimity among member state Governments. Furthermore, he assumes that the UK Government of the time would be prepared to accept and recommend to the people three different treaty changes, or the implementation of three different passerelle clauses, or some combination of those on a single occasion. That is unlikely in the extreme.

A more plausible scenario—although I do not think, from talking to my colleagues on the Council of Ministers, that people have any appetite for this at the moment—if European countries wanted an ambitious treaty change covering a number of different competences, would be to seek treaty amendment through the ordinary revision procedure. That is the instrument available to the EU for an ambitious, wide-ranging treaty change along the pattern of Lisbon, Nice, Amsterdam and Maastricht. In those circumstances, the total proposal for a treaty amendment—regardless of which city it was named after—would be the subject of a single referendum question. It is most unlikely, therefore, that there would be a multiplicity of narrowly focused referendum questions, given the availability of that instrument.

[Nick Boles]

On a related point, it is dangerous ever to underestimate the deviousness of those who wish to build the grand European project—of course, they are entirely honourable in this, because they believe that their aims are honourable. However, would it not be conceivable that a Government—a future Labour Government, probably—who wanted, for example to set up a set of common European defence forces to replace our national defence forces, might agree a treaty in which they also agreed to repeal the common fisheries policy, which Conservative Members would strongly support? Would we then have a single vote on a single treaty that combined some elements that this country would strongly support and other elements that it would find very difficult? Or would the Government still be able to separate the different elements of the treaty and ask separate questions?

[Mr Lidington]

No, in the circumstances that my hon. Friend describes, in which an omnibus treaty amendment is delivered under the ordinary revision procedure, there would be a single question. It would be ridiculous for the Government to present that to the people as a number of different questions, because the Government, on behalf of the United Kingdom, would have to ratify the entire package en bloc, or refuse to ratify it en bloc. The negotiation would have resulted in a compromise among member states on something to which they all felt able to give their assent, and they would all have to be accountable to their respective electorates for that overall decision.