Europe: Renegotiation

William Cash Excerpts

Tuesday 10th November 2015 Commons Chamber

[Mr Lidington]

Of course, we were voting to give additional devolved powers to Scotland only yesterday in this House. I can tell the hon. Gentleman that I spoke to Minister Fiona Hyslop this morning, and the question of the reform and renegotiation is now on the agenda as the first item at every meeting of the Joint Ministerial Committee on Europe which I chair and which includes Ministers from all the devolved Administrations. I am visiting Edinburgh tomorrow when I will have further conversations with the Scottish Government of the type the hon. Gentleman urges upon me, and as I said to Ms Hyslop this morning, I remain open to listen to the views of, and make sure the UK Government take full account of the interests of, all three devolved Administrations as we take this negotiation forward.

[Sir William Cash (Stone) (Con)]

The Minister is, if I may say so, not correct in thinking that the legal mechanisms for delivery of these proposals are not part of the solution. Does he not accept that treaty change is needed for virtually every proposal and, furthermore, that treaty change is not on offer, so how are the so-called legally irreversible changes going to be made when even the legal expert from the European Commission says that the Danish and Irish precedents are not valid? How is he going to be able to sell this pig in a poke?

[Mr Lidington]

Some but not all aspects of the package of reforms that we are seeking will need treaty change. We are certainly looking at different models, including those that have been used by Denmark and Ireland in the past. The technical talks that have taken place in Brussels involving senior British officials have also involved representatives of the institutional legal services, so we are working closely alongside the current heads of the legal services of the institutions. We believe that we will be able to find an appropriate way forward on every one of the issues that I listed in my statement.

British Property Owners (Cyprus)

William Cash Excerpts

Tuesday 27th October 2015 Westminster Hall

[Andrew Gwynne (Denton and Reddish) (Lab)]

I beg to move,

That this House has considered the matter of British property owners in Cyprus.

It is a pleasure to see you in the Chair, Mr Gray.

I am grateful for the chance to raise this issue in Westminster Hall. I am not the first Member to take it up on behalf of their constituents and I begin by praising the work of the all-party group on the defence of the interests of British property owners in Cyprus. Under the chairmanship of the hon. Member for Stone (Sir William Cash), the group has done great work in raising the concerns of people caught up in property and banking problems in Cyprus. It has also provided a framework through which they can pursue justice and fairness in relation to their properties.

I have been contacted by a number of people in my constituency about the mis-selling of Swiss franc mortgages by Alpha Bank in Cyprus, and about the poor advice they had received from solicitors purporting to act on their behalf. Briefly, the background to this issue is that between 2003 and 2010 Cypriot banks advised buyers to take out a mortgage in Swiss francs, because the interest rates were lower and the currency was considered stable. However, when the value of the Swiss franc soared against the euro in the aftermath of the financial crisis, buyers found that their mortgage repayments had doubled.

Buyers have complained that banks often failed to explain the potential risks or that currency fluctuations could cause repayments to rise, which has resulted in property owners being left with unfinished and unsaleable apartments, huge loan obligations and negative equity following the collapse of the Cypriot property market, which saw property values in some areas plummet by as much as 70%.

In one case brought to me by a constituent, the developer went into liquidation before the property being built for my constituent and his wife had been completed, taking 85% of their mortgage fund and leaving them insufficient money to finish the remaining work. My constituent says that his solicitor and Alpha Bank allowed that to happen by permitting the developer himself to sign written confirmation that the various stages of work had been completed.

My constituent and his wife had to begin making mortgage repayments at a time when they did not have the land in their name and the property was not finished. Effectively, therefore, they were paying a mortgage on a property and land that was not legally theirs. When they explained to Alpha Bank that they were in a desperate situation, they were simply told that if they did not make their mortgage payments the bank would seek possession of their home here in the United Kingdom. Similarly, another constituent with the same Swiss franc mortgage with Alpha Bank spoke of what he believed to be collusion between the bank, the solicitor and the developer, leaving him threatened with bankruptcy.

I am sure that those examples will be depressingly familiar to anyone who has had dealings with people caught up in the fiasco.

[Sir William Cash (Stone) (Con)]

I am chairman of the all-party group on the defence of the interests of British property owners in Cyprus. The hon. Gentleman is a member of the group. Is he aware that we will have a meeting of those affected at 11 am on 12 November, at which the high commissioner for Cyprus, Mr Euripides Evriviades, will be present? There is also a Bill before the Cyprus Parliament, but I am sure that the hon. Gentleman will deal with that shortly, so I will not go into any more detail.

[Andrew Gwynne]

I am grateful for the hon. Gentleman’s intervention. He is absolutely right, and I commend him for his work in leading the all-party group. It is my intention to be at that meeting but, if parliamentary duties do not permit me, a representative from my office will attend. I am aware of the situation in Cyprus to which the hon. Gentleman refers.

There have also been allegations of Cypriot solicitors using invalid powers of attorney. The case I want to focus on, on behalf of one of my constituents, is an example of that, and it also highlights that constituent’s concern about his legal representation while seeking to obtain redress.

[Andrew Gwynne]

My right hon. Friend is absolutely right to ask that question, and I expect and hope that the Minister in his concluding remarks will be able to answer it. It is important that whatever pressure can be brought on the Cypriot authorities by Her Majesty’s Government in the United Kingdom, is brought, and that Ministers do all they can to raise the issue with their Cypriot counterparts.

[Sir William Cash]

May I quickly add that the Minister for Europe has been immensely helpful? He has been to two, or perhaps even three, of the meetings I have convened for the purpose. I pay tribute to him for his active interest in the matter.

[Andrew Gwynne]

The hon. Gentleman is absolutely right to highlight the work that the Minister has done, and will continue to do, in respect of the injustices that many of our constituents face. I look forward to the Minister’s reply.

My constituent does not want to be publicly named, so I will refer to him as Mr T. C. In 2007, Mr T. C. and his brother-in-law wanted to purchase a retirement property in Cyprus through a UK company called ROPUK. They met with the company’s representatives, who showed them impressive brochures and projections, and they decided to go ahead with the purchase. They paid a £25,000 deposit and understood that when the property was built they would go to Cyprus to have an inspection and then sign a mortgage agreement. They were advised by ROPUK’s representative that a Swiss franc mortgage would be best, but they did not sign up to any agreement except to give a Cypriot solicitor power of attorney in any transactions to which they agreed.

In 2010, when the property was due for completion, Mr T. C. visited Cyprus to monitor the progress of the build. He found that it was not even half finished; it is still in the same state today. He believes that the power of attorney was not executed in accordance with common or Cypriot law, rendering it illegal and anything signed using the power of attorney invalid.

My constituent and his brother-in-law first heard of Alpha Bank when it started to pursue them for payments. They had not signed a mortgage agreement themselves, but one was signed by a third party without their knowledge or consent, and they have never even seen the agreement with the bank, despite repeated requests. They believe that the bank released all the money from their fraudulently obtained mortgage to fund something that is simply not there.

The payments from the mythical mortgage should have been gradually disbursed as the build progressed, according to the progress certificates issued by the project’s architect. The bank’s surveyor should have been inspecting the development and issuing a report back to the bank, a copy of which should have been passed to the Cypriot solicitor, who was supposed to be acting in my constituent’s best interests, to verify build stage against the drawdown of moneys.

[Sir William Cash]

If the Bill to which I referred becomes law, it will give the Republic of Cyprus land registry the authority to exempt, eliminate, transfer and cancel mortgages and encumbrances depending on the case and under certain conditions. I do not have time to go into all the details, but I want to get that into Hansard.

[Andrew Gwynne]

I am grateful for that intervention. It is important that that is placed on the record.

I return to the case. None of what I just mentioned was ever done, which is why, years after the supposed completion, Mr T. C. and his brother-in-law still have absolutely nothing. They now owe the bank in the region of £257,000 plus interest—the original price they were quoted was about £140,000 minus their deposit—and they were issued a writ informing them that their case would be heard in the courts of justice in London in June 2014. They received the writ less than a week before the case was due to be heard and had no time to appoint a solicitor.

The case was heard at the courts of justice in front of Master Easton. He asked Alpha Bank’s solicitors, Stephenson Harwood, to shelve the European enforcement order pending ongoing legal discussions in Cyprus, but they refused. A European enforcement order was rubber-stamped subject to a second hearing in September. By that time, Mr T. C. and his brother-in-law had appointed Cubism Law to represent them and their case was led by Duncan McNair, who they understood to be an expert in the field.

His representation in the UK forms the second part of the concerns that Mr T. C. raised with me. He and his brother-in-law paid Cubism Law £2,000 up front to represent them. A barrister attended court, but they say that they were simply told that the European enforcement order had been ratified and that a charge had been placed on their UK properties. They then had to defend the European enforcement order in Cyprus, where they believed they would get less justice than they would here.

Prior to the first hearing and before becoming subject to the European enforcement order, Mr T. C. transferred the house he and his wife owned into her name, to protect her share of their UK property, which was their only substantial asset. His wife was not party to the property purchase in Cyprus. Following the second hearing, Mr McNair commented that the judge had not been impressed by the action Mr T. C. had taken. My constituent says that he asked for advice on whether he should change the title deeds back into his name and that all he was told by his solicitor was that he should let them work for their money, by which he understood him to mean Alpha Bank’s British solicitors, Stephenson Harwood. Mr T. C. says that they always made it clear to their solicitor that their priority was to get the European enforcement order overturned and for no further action to be taken until that was achieved.

Mr T. C. says that over the next few weeks much correspondence was exchanged between the two firms, but that that did not prevent Stephenson Harwood from continuing to threaten seizure of the properties. However, it did result in Cubism Law making regular demands for funds, which my constituents deemed unnecessary. At that stage, they became concerned about the costs that were racking up, and the date for the Cyprus hearing was still weeks away. Through Cubism Law, they had paid for solicitors in Cyprus to represent them at the hearing, which was subsequently postponed three times.

Mr T.C. asked his solicitor what the strategy was for their situation, as the costs were spiralling and all they had asked at that stage was for him to defend the European enforcement order in Cyprus. Mr T.C. says that they also informed Cubism Law on 28 October 2014 that they did not wish to incur any further costs, but that specific request was ignored and the costs continued to mount. Most of the costs related to correspondence between Stephenson Harwood and Cubism Law over the transfer of the title deeds. Mr T.C. states that if his solicitor had advised him immediately to transfer the title deeds back to his name, he would have done so. He was eventually advised to do that and for him the question remains as to why he was not asked to do that earlier.

During the time leading up to the hearing dates, Mr T.C. says that he and his brother-in-law were constantly subjected to requests from their solicitor—usually late at night by email—giving them deadlines for payments with what they perceived to be veiled threats of them “prejudicing their case”, or inferring that they would not be represented in this country or in Cyprus in the future. By that stage, their costs had increased to more than £12,000, which was approaching the 5% settlement offer Alpha Bank had alluded to for incomplete properties such as theirs. On 10 November 2014 they sent an email to their solicitor again instructing him not to incur any further costs and mentioning the 5% settlement offer. That request was again ignored and their solicitor entered into discussions with a barrister, for which they were charged.

Mr T.C. says that they have yet to be informed what the basis of those costs were and what the discussions were trying to achieve. He adds that at no point had they indicated that they wished to start proceedings against the bank, as Mr McNair had advised that they could not sue the bank if the European enforcement order was not overturned.

[Sir William Cash]

Listening to the hon. Gentleman, I wonder whether his constituents have taken the matter up with the Law Society and the Solicitors Regulation Authority.

[Andrew Gwynne]

Not only have my constituents done that, but I have done so as their MP. The response we got back was less than satisfactory. I am still taking that up with the various authorities, but my constituents feel that one form of redress is to place on public record the real injustice that they feel they have endured over the past few years.

Mr T.C. said that when he pointed out that the solicitor had stated it was not possible to sue the bank without the European enforcement order having been overturned, the solicitor changed his statement and said it would be possible, but with difficulty. The new date for the hearing in Cyprus was set for early January 2015, but that was postponed until late January, and the case was finally heard in February 2015.

--- Later in debate ---

[The Minister for Europe (Mr David Lidington)]

It is, as always, a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Gray. Let me start by congratulating the hon. Member for Denton and Reddish (Andrew Gwynne) on securing this debate and paying tribute to the work of the all-party group under the chairmanship of my hon. Friend the Member for Stone (Sir William Cash).

From the large number of items of correspondence that I get from Members from all parts of the House on property disputes, I am certainly aware of the kind of problems that the hon. Member for Denton and Reddish described and of the traumatic impact that property disputes often have not only on the finances, but on the mental wellbeing of the people we represent. Officials in our consular directorate in London are in regular contact with our high commission in Nicosia. Together they brief me and the Foreign Secretary on the scale of the property problems in Cyprus and the impact they are having on individuals.

While today’s debate has focused on the difficulties in Cyprus and the case of the hon. Gentleman’s constituent in particular, it is a sad reality that property disputes are common in other parts of the world. I have to be frank with the House: the ability of our consular staff overseas to help in individual cases is very limited. That is partly because millions of British citizens live overseas and many thousands of others visit foreign countries every year. It is simply not possible for the Foreign Office to become involved in private legal disputes to which British citizens overseas are party, whether they are related to property, commercial interests or family disputes.

Another issue is that property laws are the competence of individual sovereign states. We have no more authority to intervene in matters concerning Cypriot domestic legislation than the Governments of Cyprus, Spain, Greece, Turkey or Bulgaria—or any other nation where there are numerous property disputes—do to intervene in United Kingdom domestic legislation. Our position on property disputes is consistent with the approach taken by the US, Canadian, Australian and New Zealand diplomatic services. We will, however, do two things. We will continue to try to provide as accurate and up-to-date information as we can to our citizens about the risks involved in buying property overseas and about what they might do to manage those risks, and we will continue to lobby hard the Cypriot and other Governments to try to persuade them to address some of the generic problems that these distressing individual cases highlight.

[Sir William Cash]

Again, I just want to put something on the record. The Bill to which I referred, which was passed on 3 September in the Parliament of the Republic of Cyprus, is not yet available in English. I know the high commissioner has requested it, but it is taking some time. We are now almost in November. I am told that until it is provided, the general information—for the sake of those who read transcripts—can be found on the website of Nigel Howarth of Cyprus Property News. However, the Bill does not apply to mortgages that were dealt with in Swiss francs.

[Mr Lidington]

What my hon. Friend says is right. I want to refer to that Bill later, but we continue to urge the Cypriot authorities to publish an English-language version of the new law as soon as possible and to make available any guidance that might need to be issued in association with the statute itself. I am sure that the forthcoming meeting of the all-party group with the high commissioner for Cyprus to the United Kingdom will provide a further opportunity for such persuasion to be offered.

We publish information on the high commission’s gov.uk website and, more generally, the FCO publishes a guide entitled “Support for British Nationals Abroad”, which also provides general advice for British citizens who are thinking about buying a property in another country. Last month our consular officials attended “A Place in the Sun”, an exhibition in Birmingham, to talk directly to people considering going to live abroad. The purpose of these initiatives is to help to ensure that our citizens are better informed of the risks and challenges before they take the plunge. For example, we always urge people to take proper professional advice, including legal advice, before buying property.

In some cases, such as the one that the hon. Member for Denton and Reddish has described, part of the problem seems to derive from an alleged failure of the legal adviser to provide advice of a sufficiently high standard. In other cases, sadly, we have come across British citizens who have simply not taken adequate legal advice in the first place. Of course, there are others who, on the face of things, would seem to have been the victims of deliberate misrepresentation. Every case is different, which is why it is difficult to provide a template that will apply equally to every individual case.

European Union Referendum Bill

William Cash Excerpts

Monday 7th September 2015 Commons Chamber

[Mrs Cheryl Gillan (Chesham and Amersham) (Con)]

Will my right hon. Friend give way?

[Sir William Cash (Stone) (Con)]

rose—

[Mr Lidington]

If I may finish this point, I will then give way.

In addition, those areas of Government activity that are permitted by Parliament will be subject to guidance from the Prime Minister to Ministers and from the Cabinet Secretary to civil servants based on the purdah guidance issued before previous referendum campaigns. The Cabinet Secretary said in evidence to the Public Administration and Constitutional Affairs Committee that civil servants would not under any circumstances be permitted to support Ministers in doing things that Ministers were prohibited by statute from taking part in.

--- Later in debate ---

[Sir William Cash]

Of course my right hon. Friend has received legal advice, but legal advice can cut both ways. Indeed, Speaker’s Counsel has made it clear that he does not think there is much of a problem in respect of the issues the Minister has just been describing. Not only have the Electoral Commission and Speaker’s Counsel been clear on these points, but if regulations are introduced, they will come in by way of the affirmative procedure after the Bill has been enacted and there will be no opportunity to amend them, because regulations, being statutory instruments, can only be accepted or rejected in their entirety. Does my right hon. Friend not agree?

[Mr Lidington]

In answer to my hon. Friend’s last point, if the House is dissatisfied with any regulation that the Government put before Parliament, it can reject the statutory instrument. In that case, the default position under the package that I am proposing to the House would be to revert to section 125 without the exemptions being made by regulation. There is, therefore, the safeguard that Parliament will have the final say.

I hope that my hon. Friend will listen when I address the concerns in more detail, but I say to him first that I have been present at a number of debates in the House when he has said that a legal opinion that he has received is of weight and importance. I think that the Government are entitled to take seriously the arguments that Treasury counsel have put to them.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr McFadden]

Our concern is that, instead of reinstating purdah and then having an exceptions regime, the Government propose to both have an exceptions regime and change the definition of purdah in such a way that there might not even be a need for an exceptions regime.

In the end, the various amendments and new clauses tabled set out three possible ways to deal with this issue. The first is simply to reinstate the purdah regime with no exceptions or modifications—the route perhaps favoured by some in this House. The second way is to reinstate the purdah regime but have a mechanism for exceptions that are subject to the approval of the House through regulations. That is the approach we have set out, and that the Government have, we acknowledge, moved a considerable way towards with the tabling of new clause 10. The third option, which is the one the Government seem to want to pursue, is both to water down the definition of purdah and have an exceptions regime; that is the combined effect of new clause 10 and amendment 53. We believe that the second approach—to have purdah, with exceptions where there is the approval of this House—is the right one.

[Sir William Cash]

If the vote on amendment 53 is successful and it is knocked out, there will be a vote on amendment 4. Does the right hon. Gentleman accept that the consequence of that would be to go back to the full purdah arrangements without any let or hindrance?

[Mr McFadden]

That would be the case if we did not have new clause 10; yes, amendment 4 would reinstate the full purdah regime, but new clause 10 allows the Government to come forward with regulations dealing with the points the Minister has made about the need for exceptions to this. In that regard, new clause 10 has a lot in common with Opposition new clause 6.

[Mr McFadden]

As I have said, there is a great deal of overlap between new clause 6 and new clause 10. As I indicated, our voting position is that we will support using new clause 10 to deal with these issues because there is so much overlap between it and our new clause 6. We will oppose Government amendment 53, and we will support our amendment 4.

[Sir William Cash]

The right hon. Member for Gordon (Alex Salmond) made a very sensible point on the differences between my amendment 78 and amendment 4, because mine takes account of this issue, as the right hon. Gentleman conceded by saying it could be dealt with subsequently with regulations in relation to Scotland, Wales, Northern Ireland and Gibraltar. I cannot understand why the Opposition cannot take that on board.

[Mr McFadden]

The hon. Gentleman is entitled to speak to these issues later in the debate, if he decides to move his amendment 78.

Many other Members will also want to speak in this debate. However, for all the heat generated by this issue of purdah, we should not mistake it as being more important than the issues of substance that this referendum is about. The Bill before us by definition focuses on the rules of the referendum, and there has been a great deal of heat about that, but the arguments about our future place in the EU and the world are a lot more important, and when our debates here are done we should focus on those, rather than the process and the rules and regulations surrounding the poll.

It is important that the referendum be conducted fairly. The objections to the Government position have been made because people want to ensure that it is conducted fairly. While we want change in the purdah regime, we should not be drawn into one process argument after another, which always sets this up as being an unfair referendum process. As I said at the beginning, the Government have probably got themselves into a fight that they did not entirely intend to get into. Some of the suggestions as to what is caught by section 125 make it look too widely drawn. The approach that we have set out is to reinstate the purdah regime, but allow the Government to bring forward regulations to deal with the problems that the Minister set out. That is a sensible way forward that would neither give too much latitude nor ignore the issues that have been raised in today’s debate.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Jenkin]

That is absolute nonsense. Even in a general election, Ministers can get advice from their Departments. Ministers also take advice during local government elections. If something happens that is unconnected with the referendum, Ministers will be able to take advice. I have heard it said that Ministers want to use their private offices to organise their speaking tours and to use their special advisers, who are paid for by the taxpayer, to campaign in the referendum. That is not an acceptable use of public money. What is the point of placing spending limits on the yes and no campaigns if the Government are going to avail themselves of all those advantages? My right hon. and learned Friend could persuade the Government to produce a White Paper to set out their case well in advance of the purdah period. That is an unimpeded advantage of which the Government can avail themselves. All we are saying is that there should be something of a level playing field in the last 28 days.

I regret that the Opposition accept new clause 10; nevertheless I am grateful that they support amendment (a) in order to create a framework for the creation of regulations. I am very unhappy with amendment 53. As the Opposition spokesman, the right hon. Member for Wolverhampton South East (Mr McFadden), made plain, to have amendment 53—which already adulterates section 125—without the scrutiny process of regulations and a specific debate about what Ministers actually want to exempt is a shot from a double-barreled shotgun against section 125 of the Political Parties, Elections and Referendums Act 2000. If the Government want to provide exemptions, they should introduce the amendments under regulations rather than under amendment 53.

The advantage of defeating amendment 53 is that we will be able to have amendment 4 instead. It was the unanimous view of the Public Administration and Constitutional Affairs Committee that section 125 and its effect on this referendum should be restored unimpeded. That would be the effect of amendment 4, but there may be some tidying up to do.

[Sir William Cash]

Does my hon. Friend accept that, while we may end up voting for amendment 4, amendment 78 is better, simply because it deals with the problems of the devolved territories? As I put it to the Opposition’s Front-Bench spokesman, the right hon. Member for Wolverhampton South East (Mr McFadden), even if we end up with amendment 4, the consequence will be that we will still be thrown back by new clause 10, which will leave it all to regulations. As far as I am concerned, that is highly unsatisfactory.

--- Later in debate ---

[Alex Salmond]

I wish to speak to amendment 11, tabled in my name and those of my hon. Friends.

The Chair of the Public Administration and Constitutional Affairs Committee, the hon. Member for Harwich and North Essex (Mr Jenkin), had my rapt attention and much of my agreement until he produced the remarkable argument that if purdah was good enough for Tony Blair, it should be good enough for the House now. I am afraid that the alliance of scepticism against the Government’s motives was dissolved as a result of that one phrase, that one single disastrous rhetorical flourish.

The hon. Gentleman made another point with which I disagreed, and I want to put this on record before I come to the points on which I agreed with him. He wandered into a period outside the purdah and asked whether at that point the Government had the right to publish a White Paper giving their point of view, backed as a democratically elected Government by the civil service. Of course they have the right to do that, but the House should be concerned about whether the restrictions should apply during the 28-day purdah period, or perhaps for a week longer were the Electoral Commission to have its way. I think that they should, and I shall illustrate that view with a cautionary and moral tale from the Scottish referendum.

The Scottish referendum was regulated not by the Political Parties, Elections and Referendums Act 2000—PPERA—but by the Scottish Independence Referendum Act 2013. The Act made provision for a statutory purdah period in Scotland during the 28 days leading up to the referendum. According to the explanatory notes, part 4 of the Act provided that,

“for the 28 day period ending with the date of the referendum, the Scottish Ministers and certain public authorities in Scotland cannot publish any material providing general information about the referendum, dealing with issues raised by the question to be voted on in the referendum, putting any arguments for or against a particular answer to the question to be voted on, or which is designed to encourage voting in the referendum.”

In other words, acting in their capacity as Ministers, they were not allowed to use the Government machine during the purdah period to advance the yes cause to which they were all committed. I must point out to those on the Government Front Bench today that nobody interpreted that to mean that this First Minister or any other Scottish Minister should not take part in the referendum campaign. The explanatory notes to the Act went on to state:

“However, this rule does not apply to information made available following a specific request; specified material published by or under the auspices of the Scottish Parliament Corporate Body; any information from the Electoral Commission, a designated organisation or the Chief Counting Officer or any other counting officer; or to any published information about how the poll is to be held.”

In a situation that was every bit as disputatious in regard to the arguments for and against, those measures in the Act were passed with hardly any dissent, rancour or suspicion of motives. It was accepted that that was the right thing to do. Perhaps the Government should have suggested something similar for this referendum, instead of doing whatever they were doing during the recess, unless they are seriously arguing that the constitution of this country involves a much simpler process for a European referendum. Had they done that, they would not now find themselves in this embarrassing position.

[Sir William Cash]

Does the right hon. Gentleman recall that the EU dimension of the Scottish referendum was pretty hot? I seem to remember President Barroso and others making statements about the single currency, for example. I speak now as the Chairman of the European Scrutiny Committee. Does the right hon. Gentleman agree that the arguments about the EU business that have been put forward by the Government are rather specious, given that the EU dimension of the Scottish referendum was really very volatile?

[Alex Salmond]

Yes, indeed it was, but we are discussing the 28-day purdah period at the moment. It has been suggested to me by a knowledgeable European that President Barroso, as he then was, harboured ambitions to be the Secretary-General of NATO and was hoping for support from Ministers—perhaps not those in the Chamber tonight, but those who are none the less not too far from us. Who knows why President Barroso made those interventions, but they were not made during the 28-day purdah period.

The cautionary aspect of this tale is that that purdah period, enacted in legislation, bound the Scottish Government and their agencies and public bodies in Scotland but it did not bind the United Kingdom Government. The UK Government were bound not by statute but by the Edinburgh agreement of 15 October 2012. That was what we used to call a gentleman’s agreement; it had no statutory basis. Paragraph 29 of that agreement stated:

“The Scottish Government will set out details of restricted behaviour for Scottish Ministers and devolved public bodies in the Referendum Bill to be introduced into the Scottish Parliament. These details will be based on the restrictions set out in PPERA. The UK Government has committed to act according to the same PPERA-based rules during the 28-day period.”

Now, I do not think that they did that. I do not think that most reasonable Members of this House believe that that is what was done. I will give two examples from among the many that I could use.

The first is, I admit, arguable, but it has already been raised on the Conservative Back Benches. It relates to the production of the vow when there were 10 days of campaigning left. The vow was described by the Chancellor of the Exchequer on “The Andrew Marr Show” on 7 September 2014 in this way:

“You will see in the next few days a plan of action to give more powers to Scotland, more tax powers, more spending powers, more powers over the welfare state.”

One of the arguments in favour of purdah is that the arguments should be laid out and set before the campaign period, and that during the campaign the politicians can debate them and the people can participate in the debate—as they did in huge numbers in Scotland—and make up their minds. It is not meant to be a period during which politicians can say, “Here’s a fresh initiative that we forgot to mention earlier.”

A comparison could be made with the European referendum if, for example, what used to be called the no side were to take the lead, unexpectedly perhaps, with 10 days to go and the German Chancellor or the President of the Republic of France were to suspend Question Time in the Bundestag or the National Assembly, get on a plane and rush across to say that the Prime Minister’s renegotiations of our position had suddenly found more favour with them than had previously been the case.

I accept that this point is arguable. Others could argue that the vow was not really a Government announcement from the Chancellor of the Exchequer, and that he was just speaking off his own bat as a politician. I am not sure that that is a good argument, but it is certainly a cautionary tale.

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[Alex Salmond]

That question was some time in the gestation, and I had moved on from what I described as the “arguable” case of the vow. The vow was not a single appearance on “The Andrew Marr Show”, and I used the quote from that show just to demonstrate to the House that the vow was presented as a new initiative, something different, a last-minute offer. The argument about whether the vow breached purdah has been made well by the hon. Member for Shipley (Philip Davies) and the analogy in a European referendum would be a re-presentation. Presumably, the idea in the European referendum is meant to be that the Prime Minister renegotiates this country’s relationships with the EU and then presents that to the people for consideration of whether they want to be in or out on that basis. The equivalent idea here, therefore, would be that he finishes that renegotiation but things are going badly in the campaign and so there is a further renegotiation and re-presentation. I certainly do not believe that is within the spirit of a purdah regulation, although people might argue that it meets the letter of it.

I accept that that point is debatable—I am pretty clear which side I am on—but there is no debate whatsoever about the behaviour of officials in Her Majesty’s Treasury in the referendum unit who were actively briefing and intervening during the campaign. The reason that was allowed to happen is that, as the Chair of the Select Committee said, the civil service code does not specify referendums in the way that it does elections and there was no statutory basis for the enforcement of purdah in the UK Government as there was for the Scottish Government.

[Sir William Cash]

In the light of the interesting argument and the factual information that the right hon. Gentleman is giving the House, I wondered whether he had had an opportunity to discuss these matters with the Opposition and what the outcome of those discussions might be as to whether they would support the kind of enforcement arrangements he has in mind.

[Alex Salmond]

I have had some chats through informal channels, but I was hoping that the hon. Gentleman’s warm reception to my point might convince those in all parts of the House that there was something sensible in not just talking about purdah but actually having an organised enforcement mechanism and putting in place my amendment’s suggestion of

“measures to determine breaches of purdah and penalties for such a breach”.

As I say, I am open to the suggestion from the hon. Member for North Down about involving the Electoral Commission or about its involving a committee of Privy Counsellors—just so long as there is an enforcement mechanism. The evidence from last year, when there was no statutory basis or enforcement mechanism, was that there are people who will drive a coach and horses through a purdah period.

I am pro-European to my fingertips. I am more pro-European than I suspect most Conservative Members will ever be and certainly more than the Prime Minister will ever be, but I want to see this referendum conducted on a fair and proper basis. That includes a purdah period and, when it has been agreed, everybody sticking by the rules and there being an enforcement mechanism to make sure that they do so.

[Sir William Cash]

I would just like to take up the point that the right hon. Gentleman ended on. For all the reasons that I gave in Committee, when I put the case for going back to section 125 in its complete integrity, in order to have fairness it is essential that we have something by which people abide. A lot of this debate tends, from time to time, to move between what the Conservative party says or what Labour, the Liberal Democrats or the Scottish National party say. First, it was decided that we were going to have a European Union referendum Bill, and now the Electoral Commission has changed the nature of the question, with the consent of the Government. The question now is, “Do you, the voters of this country, want to remain in or do you want to leave?” This has cut completely across all political parties. Therefore, although this debate is taking place in this Chamber, the nature of this debate involving the Conservatives, Labour and the SNP must not be allowed to distort the fact that this is a vote about the real future of the individual people of this country. It is about the voters deciding for the first time since 1975 whether they are going to stay in what I regard now as a dysfunctional European Union—the immigration issue has recently made that even more obvious—or whether we are going to continue to argue that we should leave, because we can make that case. That is to come and the bottom line is that this Bill is not about “Conservative versus Labour”; it should be about the positions adopted across the Floor of the House. I know for a fact that many Labour Back Benchers agree with those who share my view on the Conservative Back Benches—and there are some on the Front Benches, too. It may well turn out that we will need to address the question later of whether or not Ministers should be allowed to participate on either side of the debate in the national interest.

I was particularly taken by and interested in the recent article the Minister wrote on “ConservativeHome”, in which he rather gave the game away. He and I have been discussing this since 1990, when he was special adviser to no less than the Foreign Secretary and other people in No. 10 were desk officers for the Government position at that time under John Major. Let me read what he said right at the end of his article, because I want to concentrate on the reasons for purdah. We have heard so many arguments in relation to the process. I have made my position quite clear, which is that amendment 78 is more comprehensive than amendment 4. Let me bypass that argument for the moment in the interests of trying to achieve the best result, but without prejudice to coming back to the matter at a later date.

In the final paragraph, the Europe Minister said:

“Ultimately, this is about the EU’s effectiveness as a whole. We want”—

whoever we may be—

“a dynamic, competitive, outwardly focused Europe, delivering prosperity and security for all of the people in the EU, not just for those in Britain.”

Actually, that is not what this debate on the referendum will be about. Elements of the argument will demonstrate that there are certain advantages in having a degree of alliance and co-operation in Europe, which I am in favour of, but not on the basis of the status quo of the treaties, or of the tweaking of negotiations that do not make any substantial difference to the basis on which those treaties are conducted. That is why I have firmly concluded that we must leave the European Union. I have just come back from Luxembourg—[Interruption.] The Foreign Secretary can ask me any question from the Dispatch Box. I have just come back from Luxembourg where the national chairmen of a whole raft of EU committees were debating questions relating to migration. I can only say that the trend of the arguments was not at all in line with many of the things that we in this House would have expected had those arguments been put forward by our own Ministers.

Basically, I am cynical, to say the least, about the outcome of this debate. The trouble is that we are being invited to cut across the fact, as my hon. Friend the Member for Harwich and North Essex (Mr Jenkin) has said, that there have been four referendums without any legal problems. Furthermore, the Electoral Commission has backed amendment 78—it did not mention amendment 4 because it knows that my amendment deals with the devolved territories as well—and we have Speaker’s Counsel on our side. We are told by the Minister that, as far as he is concerned, there are a number of legal opinions, including from two leading counsels, that have indicated that there could be legal problems. Well, that is not what the Speaker’s Counsel says. His advice relating to the Political and Constitutional Reform Committee is on the website for anyone to see. He has reinforced his view in the light of the remarks made by the Europe Minister on “ConservativeHome”. I expressly sent the Speaker’s Counsel a copy of that article and asked him whether he would revise his legal view. He is very distinguished and was the legal adviser to the European Scrutiny Committee for many years. He has also been involved in the legal service of the European Commission. He knows what he is talking about, and I take these other legal opinions that we are being offered with a pinch of salt.

Finally, I say to the Foreign Secretary, who is chuntering quite a lot—I say that with great respect because I rather like him—that if those opinions are so important, let us see them. Let us see the basis on which the advice was given, and we will hear the same old arguments that we heard about the Iraq opinion. At the end of the day, however, we did get the Iraq opinion. This issue may not be quite so momentous, but none the less to fall back on the old canard that we should not publish opinions is not actually an answer to the questions that we are asking. We want to know the basis on which the advice was given.

I just do not believe that the Government’s arguments add up. A lack of trust has been generated, which goes deep into the past—right the way back to the White Paper of 1971 when we were promised that we would have a veto, which has now been overridden. We have not been given a referendum since 1975, and it is essential that we have a fair referendum that people can trust. I fear that the outcome of the vote this evening will be that new clause 10 goes through, perhaps with an amendment that might make a marginal difference. A vote against amendment 53 will simply allow a vote on amendment 4, which takes us back to a kind of purdah, but not the complete purdah that I and I think the British people want under amendment 78. We are the representatives of the people, which is why I wish to speak so candidly on this matter.

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[Mr Paterson]

I am grateful to my right hon. Friend for that helpful intervention. I would like the Minister to try to cite a single example of purdah rules infringing the ability of the Minister with responsibilities in the areas affected by those referendums to act effectively.

I do not have much time, but I want to mention one interesting organisation, the European Commission for Democracy through Law, which is better known as the Venice Commission. It is the Council of Europe’s advisory body on constitutional matters. My interpretation of its guidelines on referendums is that they seem to be breached by the current UK Government’s stance on purdah. I would be very interested to hear my right hon. Friend the Minister’s comments on that. To help his team, the guidelines to which I am referring are the “Guidelines for Constitutional Referendums at National Level”, which state that

“public authorities (national, regional and local) must not influence the outcome of the vote by excessive, one-sided campaigning.”

In 2005 the commission published “Referendums in Europe: An Analysis of the Legal Rules in European States”, which noted approvingly that countries such as Ireland, Portugal and Latvia have strict provisions for electoral neutrality. Even the Russian Federation has neutrality rules. It would be interesting to know where we feature in that regard. Also, have the Government looked at the most recent code of practice on referendums from 2007, which makes it very clear that respect for equality of opportunity is crucial for referendums and elections?

The most recent endorsements of the proposals are in amendment 4 and in amendment 78, which was tabled by my hon. Friend the Member for Stone, and which I have signed. It is worth noting that the Electoral Commission has stated:

“We have not identified problems with the workability of section 125 of PPERA applying to governments at previous referendums, and so we think that it should be workable in relation to this referendum.”

I am afraid that everything I see this evening will be a mess. The only really clean solution is to go back to purdah, as outlined in the debates when we reluctantly agreed 28 days, and we can do that with amendment 78. I would like to hear what the Minister’s legal advice is. The Speaker’s Counsel—this has been mentioned twice, but I will mention it a third time—has said clearly that making statements on European Councils and putting them in press releases is allowed because they do not infringe section 125. Let me just put that on the record. Section 125 refers to material that

“(a) provides general information about a referendum…

(b) deals with any of the issues raised by any question on which such a referendum is being held;

(c) puts any arguments for or against any particular answer to any such question”.

As a layman, I just do not see how a Minister going to a Council, putting that into a statement and then repeating it in a press release can infringe section 125. I would really like the Minister to put the legal advice he has received in the Library.

I will bring my remarks to a swift conclusion. I do not like new clause 10. We will have to trust the Government to produce a list of exemptions. It is entirely black and white; we either accept or we reject. It would have been much better if the Government had put those exemptions in an amendment, as they have done with amendment 53. Why not consider the other exemptions in a full debate such as this, rather than a take-it-or-leave-it statutory instrument? I am convinced that the only real solution is to go back to the proper purdah that we thrashed out previously, which worked in previous referendums.

[Sir William Cash]

Does my right hon. Friend have some sympathy with the amendment tabled by the right hon. Member for Gordon (Alex Salmond) on the enforcement of purdah, because we are getting into a bit of a mess on this, as my right hon. Friend has said? If there was some means of enforcing the purdah that is left, we might have at least some leverage over what happens later.

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[John Redwood]

I rise to speak on the issues of the independence of broadcasting and campaign funding covered by two of the new clauses. It is most important that we should have a fair referendum and I think that the House has made a wise decision this evening to further that aim. I hope that the nation’s leading broadcaster, the BBC, will enter into the spirit of wanting that fair campaign and will study and understand where those who wish to stay in and those who wish to leave are coming from. It needs to learn that in the run-up to the referendum campaign proper as well as in the campaign itself. My hon. Friend the Member for Stone (Sir William Cash) has tabled a suitable new clause to try to ensure that that happens and I hope that the Minister will share our wishes and might have something to say on this point.

I notice that in recent months it has been absolutely statutory for practically every business person being interviewed on business subjects and subjects of great interest to consumers and taxpayers to be asked for their view of whether their business would be ruined if we left the European Union. The question is always a leading question and they are treated as somewhat guilty or suspect if they do not immediately say yes, of course, their business would be ruined if we were to leave the European Union.

[Sir William Cash]

Does my right hon. Friend sometimes wonder how these people come to be asked to go on the programme?

[John Redwood]

It would be far too dangerous for me to speculate on that without more factual information at my disposal. My hon. Friend is being slightly mischievous. I could not possibly agree with him and call into question how people are invited to BBC interviews. However, it is interesting that the one argument that the campaign to stay in the EU seems to have—that leaving the EU would be bad for business and jobs would be lost—has become a constant refrain in all BBC interviews.

The BBC seems devastatingly disappointed when a lot of businesses take the opposite view. It was fascinating to hear the wonderful interview with Nissan last week. The whole House will welcome the great news that Nissan has a very big investment programme for the United Kingdom’s biggest car plant, which will carry it through the next five years and beyond with a new model. When the BBC tried to threaten that investment by asking, “Wouldn’t you cancel it if the British people voted to come out of the EU?”, Nissan said, “No, of course we wouldn’t.” It is about the excellence of the workforce, the excellence of the product and access to an extremely good market here. It is in no way conditional upon how people in Britain exercise their democratic rights.

It is that spirit—the spirit of Nissan—that I hope the BBC will wish to adopt when contemplating such interviews in future. I hope that it will understand that most business interviews over the next few months should not be about the politics of the EU; they should be about whether the company is doing well—creating jobs, making profits and investing them wisely. If the business is misbehaving, then by all means the interview should be about the allegations.

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[John Redwood]

That is a good point. The other constitutional point I would make about businesses is that in an entrepreneurial business where the entrepreneur-owner-manager owns 51% or more of the shares, of course they speak for business, so if they say, “I want to stay in,” or, “I want us to pull out,” that is not only their view but the view of the whole business. I can understand that and it is very interesting, but quite often the people being interviewed are executives with very few shares in very large companies, who have not cleared their view through a shareholder meeting or some other constitutional process. The BBC wishes to give the impression that that is the view of all the members of the company, whereas in fact it is just the opinion of an executive. It is interesting, and the executive may be quite powerful, but he does not necessarily speak for the company, and that is never stressed in the exchanges.

[Sir William Cash]

Does my right hon. Friend accept that, quite often, what is interesting is which questions are not asked, as well as those that are asked and the people who are put on? For example, some of us have for a long time been making the argument, based on House of Commons Library statistics, that we run a deficit with the other 27 member states of about £62 billion, whereas the Germans run a surplus with the other 27 member states of about the same amount or more. Why does that sort of argument never get aired or heard?

[John Redwood]

I am being tempted into byways on the substance of the debate in the forthcoming referendum, but my hon. Friend is absolutely right. We would like to hear more questioning of our deficit and a reminder that we are the customers more than the producers; it is the other way round for the Germans. It is unusual for the customers to be in a weak position and the producers in a strong position.

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[Mr McFadden]

My good and hon. Friend anticipates my reply. He is right that history comes into play here, and not always in a linear manner. The thing that unites citizens of the Republic of Ireland and the other examples he mentioned is that they are part of the parliamentary franchise. He is right to say that it is not strictly about citizenship, but about who can vote to elect a national Parliament.

It remains the case that throughout the European Union when countries have had referendums of this type they have not extended the vote to citizens of other countries. It is important to state that, because too often the debate becomes about the value of the contribution of those citizens to the UK. That is not in dispute at all. The issue is having consistency in how we take decisions on our nation’s future.

The exchanges that took place on broadcasting impartiality showed the dangers of those proposals. We should allow broadcasters to do their job. The Opposition do not favour the appointment of a broadcasting referee. I do not think that the finest moment in the Scottish referendum was the mass demonstration outside the headquarters of the BBC in Glasgow, calling for the head of the political editor. I hope that we do not see that in this referendum. I am therefore not in favour of proposals that seek to set up some kind of referee to go through BBC news bulletins and second-guess who should and should not be interviewed. We should allow our broadcasters to do their job.

[Sir William Cash]

The right hon. Gentleman is clearly referring to my new clause. He ought to take into account the fact that that the Secretary of State, in correspondence with the chairman of the BBC Trust and Ofcom—the right hon. Gentleman may or may not have seen it—has quite a lot to say about the necessity of improving the manner and process of adjudication. I will deal with that in a moment.

[Mr McFadden]

I look forward to the hon. Gentleman’s speech, but it will take more than a letter from the Secretary of State to the BBC to convince us that some kind of broadcasting referee is needed to adjudicate in this process.

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[Mr McFadden]

I will just say that if the hon. Gentleman takes a sense of pride from the demonstration that took place in Glasgow, he is entitled to his view, but that is certainly not something I would feel. I do not think it was the finest moment in that referendum campaign.

On the date of the referendum, we have said all along that it should not be held when other important elections are taking place. In Committee, the House accepted a Government amendment ruling out the date of the elections due in May 2016. Our amendment 15 would also rule out holding it on the date of the elections due on 4 May 2017. I am glad to see that the Foreign Secretary has added his name to amendment 12, which would have the same effect.

Government amendment 23 deals with the new question wording put forward last week by the Electoral Commission. The Opposition respect the work of the Electoral Commission. Its job is to examine referendum questions and to comment on them. We therefore accept the change it suggests, but may I ask the Minister a couple of questions? Has he asked the Electoral Commission why it was appropriate to approve the question “Should Scotland be an independent country?” on a yes/no basis without an alternative statement about remaining part of the United Kingdom being deemed necessary? Has he asked why a yes/no question was approved for the referendum on the alternative vote a few years ago, but is not deemed appropriate this time? Does he know if this decision should be considered a one-off for this referendum, or whether we should expect all future referendums to be a choice between two alternative statements, rather than yes/no in answer to a proposition, as has often been the case in the past? As I said, we accept the new wording, but would like to know more about the reasons behind it and the contrast in the approach taken with other recent referendums.

Amendment 16 calls for a White Paper to be published outlining the terms of any renegotiation settlement the Prime Minister has reached and the consequences for the UK of leaving the European Union. We believe this is important because the referendum needs to examine not only our current relationship with the EU but what leaving might mean for the UK. This, too, was touched on in Committee. The Minister for Europe indicated at that point that the Government might produce a White Paper. May I press him on this tonight? Has further thought gone into that, and can he tell the House definitively that that will be the case? This is important, because voters deserve as much information as possible about what the decision on Britain’s future means. This will in the end be a choice between two futures and there should be information about both of them. Our amendment states that such a White Paper should be published at least 10 weeks before the poll, well away from any of the discussions about purdah, which applies to the final 28 days of the referendum period. We are not calling for Government information to be sent to every household, or for this to be a last-minute intervention. We are saying that at least 10 weeks from the poll it will be important to have a proper view on remaining and leaving. What does anyone advocating leaving have to fear from the consequences of doing so being set out in a White Paper?

This section of the amendment paper contains many other amendments, a lot of them dealing with technical points about registration, reporting and other issues, but the amendments on 16 and 17-year-olds, the White Paper and my other comments touch on the issues that we believe we should focus on in the period available to us.

[Sir William Cash]

I begin by referring particularly to my amendment on the impartiality of broadcasters. It will be observed that I have not confined my remarks exclusively to the BBC. I am aware, having been on the Broadcasting Bill in the 1990s, that the broadcasters have different regimes: the BBC has a royal charter and the other broadcasters are regulated by statute. I introduced an amendment to the second of the two Broadcasting Bills to ensure impartiality that was accepted by the now Baroness Bottomley when she was Secretary of State. Impartiality is a fundamental necessity in relation to the function of broadcasters. Given that £3.7 billion—I think—of the BBC’s total annual income of over £5 billion comes from the taxpayer, I think the taxpayer has an absolute right to be certain that there is no manoeuvring and completely unbiased reporting and comment.

I was deeply disturbed, as Chairman of the European Scrutiny Committee, when I set up an inquiry into the BBC’s handling of European issues, against a background that I will explain in a moment, when the right hon. Lord Patten, then BBC Chairman, refused three times to appear before the Committee. I had effectively to require him to do so through the aegis of the Liaison Committee, which unanimously supported my proposal. I had exactly the same experience with Lord Hall, who also refused three times. I again had to use the aegis of the Liaison Committee to ensure he appeared, which eventually he did. On the other hand, Rona Fairhead, who is now the Chairman of the BBC Trust and who did not have the protection of being a Member of the House of Lords, did appear. The correspondence, which is set out in our report, is interesting to read. Whatever the excuses given, both Lord Hall and Lord Patten, as Members of the House of Lords, were in a position to refuse a summons from a Select Committee. This seemed completely extraordinary, and eventually, through the good offices of the then Chairman of the Liaison Committee and others, both of them did eventually acquiesce, although Lord Patten subsequently resigned because of ill health. The bottom line is that it was a very serious situation.

It has been claimed in evidence to us, which I am now slightly paraphrasing, that the BBC is effectively completely independent. This is simply not the case. First, it has to report to Parliament. Secondly, its representatives ought to appear in front of Select Committees. I have to say that they do appear before the Public Accounts Committee and the Culture, Media and Sport Committee, but I am talking about the European dimension, which is my main concern and which is relevant to the conduct of the Bill, and to how the taxpayer will be affected if there is not complete impartiality

The late Hugo Young, whom I knew extremely well, wrote a book called “This Blessed Plot”. I knew him since we were about 10 years old. We both lived in Sheffield and more or less grew up together in our respective ways. We were not very close friends, but knew one another well enough. He went to Oxford as I did: he went to Balliol, I went to Lincoln. We used to speak to each other. He went on to become one of the most celebrated journalists in our time.

[Mr Speaker]

Order. I hope that the hon. Gentleman will not be too modest or self-effacing to inform the House that there is a chapter in that book named after him and devoted to a study of his activities.

[Sir William Cash]

I do not know what to say. That is true. I did not know it was going to be written. In a discussion over lunch during the Maastricht period, I heard Hugo Young, one of the greatest journalists of his generation, say “Bill, you’ve got The Daily Telegraph, The Times, the Daily Express and the Daily Mail; we’ve got the BBC.” I thought that was pretty revealing. The bottom line is that there is a serious concern here, although I believe it is now potentially capable of being remedied.

The BBC remains the most important source of news for the country. An Ofcom survey in 2013 noted that 34% of those who consume news named BBC 1 as the most important news source to them. According to Ofcom’s calculations, the BBC has the highest share of each of the platforms on which it has a presence— 56% on television, 64% on radio and 27% on the internet. As reflected in the conclusions of the European Scrutiny Committee report, after evidence was taken from wide sources, 58% of the public look to the BBC for the news they trust. This is very important, and we need to be certain about the degrees of impartiality maintained during the referendum campaign—not only for taxpayers and licence payers, but for voters, 58% of whom, as I say, look to the BBC for the news they trust. It is a hugely important issue.

Correspondence published recently by the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport, following the report of the European Scrutiny Committee, is also important. I sent a copy to him as well as to the Prime Minister and others. The Secretary of State wrote to the chairman of the BBC Trust, which has the responsibility for enforcing BBC standards. He said that the corporation’s coverage of Europe had not been “faultless” in the past. A committee had been set up—in 2005, I believe—called the Wilson committee, which was extremely critical of the manner in which the BBC covered European issues. I was not surprised when I discovered from another source—I hope I am right in quoting it—that when it comes to newspapers, people in the BBC tend to come from what might be called The Guardian stable. The figures on that were interesting.

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[Philip Davies]

My hon. Friend rather glossed over the Wilson report, but it is important for us to remind people what Lord Wilson said. He said:

“While we have found no evidence of deliberate bias in BBC coverage of EU matters, we have found that there is a widespread perception that it suffers from certain forms of cultural and unintentional bias…The problem is complex. In essence it seems to be the result of a combination of factors including an institutional mindset”

and a lack of knowledge about the European Union. He also said:

“The BBC needs to take more care in the selection of interviewees.”

Does my hon. Friend agree that all the problems that Lord Wilson identified about the BBC coverage, whose existence the BBC itself accepted, are still there today?

[Sir William Cash]

There is a case, which my right hon. Friend the Member for Wokingham (John Redwood) touched on earlier, relating to the business news. In its report, our Committee referred to the business section which comes on at about six o’clock in the morning, and to what I hope will not continue to be a stream of people putting forward the pro-EU case. Given that the charter itself is under review and a consultation period is in operation, we look to the Secretary of State to ensure that the opportunity is taken to address this question as part of the review, and that includes addressing the question of public purposes.

The basis on which a chartered body operates is by reference to the objects of the charter, and those public purposes do not specifically include the impartial delivery of commentaries and news. The question of the charter is linked to the guidelines, and the guidelines are rather like a statutory instrument: they must have regard to what the charter says. On the other hand, the charter itself should specifically ensure that in its wording impartiality is an absolute.

[John Redwood]

Has my hon. Friend ever heard a BBC journalist ask someone how they would like to spend all the extra money we would have if we did not make a contribution to the EU, or is it just my bad luck that I have never been around when they asked that?

[Sir William Cash]

There have been suggestions, of course, that the BBC has been in receipt of money from the EU. My hon. Friend the Member for North East Somerset (Mr Rees-Mogg), who is not in his seat at the moment—he usually is—put that question to Mr Harding, and we were hoping we would get further information on the matter. We have, however, invited Lord Hall to return and he will be coming back to see the Committee quite soon. He has accepted the invitation this time—he has not been required to appear—and we are looking forward to getting an answer to that question, and many others.

[Mr Nuttall]

Perhaps when Lord Hall does appear, we might put a point to him about choosing interviewees, which is just as relevant in respect of businesses. We might suggest that when the BBC is seeking an anti-European Union viewpoint, it should not always go to members of UKIP, because there are members and supporters of all parties—not just the Conservative party, but the Labour party, too—whose views it could, and should, be seeking.

[Sir William Cash]

The hon. Member for Luton North (Kelvin Hopkins) and other Labour Members on my Committee put that very question to the witnesses—Lord Hall and Mr Harding in particular, as well as Rona Fairhead—because it is essential that all sides of the arguments are heard. As I have said repeatedly in this debate, this is not a party political issue in the sense that it is not Conservative versus Labour. The very fact that the referendum has been set up and the question is “Do you want to remain in or leave?” means that it is a national issue and therefore all the broadcasting authorities, including the BBC, must have regard to the fact that we are passing over in this Bill the entire conduct of the referendum. That means it must be conducted not on a party political basis, but on yes versus no and on the question: “Do you want to remain in or do you want to leave?” Therefore there must be impartiality. We do not just want a Eurosceptic view. Some might think, “I would want that, wouldn’t I?” but actually, no; it must be done on an impartial basis.

It is rather strange that the BBC was somewhat dismissive of News-watch, an organisation that runs a comprehensive analysis of all news programmes—who goes on, what questions are asked and the whole conduct of the BBC output. I am afraid that it seems to me that the BBC was somewhat dismissive of that, to say the least. I believe from what I have heard that the BBC does not in fact have its own monitoring system. If it does not have its own monitoring system, how is anybody to know whether or not it has been impartial, because that is like looking for a needle in a haystack? We do not have the facilities to be able to conduct the analysis for ourselves, but the BBC has £5 billion and I would have thought that was the least it could do.

[John Nicolson]

May I ask the hon. Gentleman the same question I asked earlier—although I might of course have overlooked his comments on this on billcash.com? Does he now regret the fact that the Conservative party acted as a cheerleader for bias during the Scottish independence referendum, and does he accept that that set something of a precedent for one-sided BBC coverage in referendums?

[Sir William Cash]

I do not blog so I am not in a position to answer the hon. Gentleman’s question. All I can say is that I would deplore any bias whether in the Scottish referendum or the European referendum, or indeed in just normal current affairs.

To return to my point, there is the facility for this if the BBC steps up to the mark and does in full what the Wilson committee report recommended and, more than that, what is in line with what the Secretary of State is now proposing. This is a hugely important question given that according to the BBC 53% of the British people depend on it for the news they trust.

[John Nicolson]

Would the hon. Gentleman accept, however, that apparently with the sole exception of the right hon. Member for Wokingham (John Redwood), there was broadcast silence from Conservative Members when there were dramatic examples of corporation bias during the Scottish referendum coverage? With all due respect, I never heard the hon. Member for Stone (Sir William Cash) utter a cheep in complaint about that, which makes us feel a trifle cynical about his motivation. One feels that it might just be about Europe rather than bias.

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[Sir William Cash]

I do not want in any way to sound as though I am drawing on the fact that I have been in the House for 30 years, but with great respect, the hon. Gentleman ought to know that I am not known for dodging issues or not taking a serious point seriously. If I did not say anything at the time, I do not regard that as a fault on my part, but if he is right about how the BBC dealt with the issue, I deplore it. I think that is all I can say on that subject for the moment.

The BBC recently published an annual report that was rather critical of the fact that Select Committees ask questions about the BBC’s performance on so-called editorial independence. I am not denying that it is important that the BBC should have a degree of independence in order to be impartial, but I think I have made the case that there has not been the complete impartiality that we believe the BBC should deliver to the British public. That is perhaps the result of the lack of a monitoring system, or perhaps because of a certain cultural bias of the kind that my hon. Friend the Member for Shipley (Philip Davies) mentioned, and we can see it in the evidence that we have accumulated in the European Scrutiny Committee and in the reports of News-watch.

What I read in a recent article by Rona Fairhead, the chairman of the BBC Trust, was peculiarly unsatisfactory. She stated in that article, published in the past week or two, that

“the BBC needs to be driven by evidence and fact, not by prejudice”.

However, in addition to what the annual report had said, she effectively stated that the BBC should not be subjected to Committee questions in the way that it is. I can only assume that she meant the European Scrutiny Committee, but perhaps she meant the Culture, Media and Sport Committee as well—my hon. Friend the Member for Shipley asks some tough questions when people from the BBC appear in front of that Committee. Rona Fairhead stated:

“Research carried out for the trust”—

on what basis I do not know—

“shows clearly that the public see a need for independent scrutiny and regulation, but they want this done by a separate body representing licence fee payers, not by politicians.”

However, we have overarching responsibility for the accountability of Ministers, and of the BBC, which has to appear in front of the Public Accounts Committee and so on. Rona Fairhead’s article continued:

“That independence has needed defending over decades, not just from governments but also from parliament, with a growing tendency in recent years for select committees to question BBC executives about detailed editorial decisions.”

That is quite an extraordinary statement.

We took evidence and legal advice, and the bottom line is that the BBC does not have complete, unfettered independence, editorial or otherwise. It has to comply with the charter. We make it clear in our report that we expect the impartiality requirements that are embedded in the framework agreement and other documents to be complied with in the light of what the charter states. The first port of call is what the charter says and unfortunately we felt, very strongly and unanimously, that the BBC had fallen short. We look to it to remedy that. I have referred to the correspondence on 15 and 18 June between the BBC Trust, Ofcom and the Secretary of State. I do not have the time to go into its recommendations in detail, but there seems to be recognition that something has to be improved.

[Philip Davies]

Does my hon. Friend agree that the BBC Trust is not good enough to regulate and monitor the BBC’s coverage, because not only does it regulate the BBC, but it is a cheerleader for it as well? That means that it is not in the best position to be an independent monitor of the BBC’s output, and the BBC Trust chairman’s rather snooty view of politicians having any say in what goes on is undermined by the fact that she herself is appointed by the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport.

[Sir William Cash]

From what I have observed from press reports and elsewhere, she appears to have accepted that the BBC Trust is in need of significant reform. The general thrust is that the BBC Trust is bust. Basically, there will have to be a new system, and that is what the correspondence to which I have referred indicates.

Former BBC commentator and employee Robin Aitken’s book, “Can We Trust the BBC?”, covers many matters related to the European Union. I also recommend Peter Shore’s book, “Separate Ways”, the introduction of which contains some extremely pertinent views of the BBC as being deeply biased on EU matters, going back to meetings in the Connaught, alleged connections with the CIA and other similar issues.

News-watch has demonstrated the truth that

“in crucial respects, the BBC has not provided the Committee clear evidence that its EU-related output is properly balanced, informative and wide-ranging across all its platforms—or that the Corporation has raised its game in the ways urged by the Wilson report.”

I have given many of the reasons for that, and more will have to come out in our next inquiry.

[John Nicolson]

What would the adjudicator’s role be vis-à-vis the BBC Trust? Would the adjudicator have primacy over it? Would the trust’s power to make a ruling on the issue of bias be removed, or would the two compete with each other, giving perhaps contradictory rulings?

[Sir William Cash]

New clause 1 states:

“Notwithstanding any enactment or legal instrument”,

so that would affect the Broadcasting Acts and the charter. Under my proposals, the Secretary of State would make provision by regulations

“to ensure the impartiality of broadcasters during the referendum period.”

There would also be a requirement for

“the appointment by the Secretary of State of a referendum broadcasting adjudicator”,

who would be completely separate. In effect, during the referendum period, the adjudicator’s arrangements would take the place of those of existing broadcasting authorities and the BBC. I do not dispute the fact that the Government do not want to go down that route, but it has emerged from the correspondence between the Secretary of State, Ofcom and the BBC Trust that serious discussions are taking place to make sure that the BBC and broadcasting authorities generally are properly impartial during the referendum campaign. There are those who do not think that there is a problem, but there are many who think there is, and that it needs to be rectified.

Even if the Government do not accept my amendment, the elements that I have described will need to be addressed in the charter review. The problem is that it is highly possible, if not probable, that the conclusions of the charter review will emerge after the referendum. It is therefore a matter of urgency that we sort this matter out in the run-up to the referendum, and before the charter review is completed. We shall look into this in the European Scrutiny Committee proceedings, to which we have invited Lord Hall, and we will continue to look into it because we believe that it could have a significant bearing on the outcome of the referendum if the situation is not remedied. If, on the other hand, the matter is taken seriously by the BBC and the broadcasting authorities, we will be able to find a solution in the framework of the existing legislation. This is a really serious matter.

I will not spend too much time on the other amendments, except to say that I think I will get an interesting response from the Minister to my amendment 1, which proposes a referendum period of not less than 16 weeks. I shall therefore not dwell on that one. We have to have a proper length of time for the referendum, so that the arguments can be properly put and understood on all sides.

New clause 11 deals with the limit on the expenditure of registered political parties. We have taken advice on this, because it is a matter of grave concern that the political parties, three of which are known to be pro-EU in the broadest sense, might find that they had too much money at their disposal, or at any rate have what we think is too much money if we look at this from the point of view of those who wish to leave. We have proposed a cumulative limit of £14 million. We have also proposed:

“Each political party’s share of the cumulative limit shall be determined in proportion to its share of the total votes cast at the general election that took place on 7 May 2015.”

The new clause also proposes that

“the Electoral Commission shall calculate and notify each political party of its share of the cumulative limit.”

For practical purposes, I look to the Minister to give me his view on that one.

In addition, I have tabled amendment 3, which states:

“Regulations made under this Act or the 2000 Act in respect of the referendum must be made and come into force not less than six months before the start of the referendum period.”

We discussed some aspects of that in the debate on the previous group of amendments. A further amendment relates to the question of permitted participants and the European Union. I should add that quite a lot of my amendments have been endorsed by the Electoral Commission. The Minister can no doubt refer to that body as he goes through the amendments. This is not just a matter of Back Benchers coming forward with proposals; I have been in discussion with the Electoral Commission on many matters, including my amendment 78, which we covered in the previous debate. The commission endorsed that amendment, but unfortunately it was not accepted by the Labour party.

A significant number of Members have signed my amendment 2, which proposes that

“a permitted participant must not accept a relevant donation, irrespective of whether or not it meets the requirements of the 2000 Act and this Act, if the donation is funded directly or indirectly in whole or part from moneys, resources or support disbursed or allocated by or at the direction of the European Commission, its agencies or any related European institution to the donor or via other parties to the donor.”

The object is to ensure that no funds come from the European Union for the purposes of promoting pro-European arguments, including, obviously, the yes vote. It is an important amendment, and my hon. Friend the Member for Wycombe (Mr Baker) has sensibly suggested that we add the words

“Notwithstanding the European Communities Act 1972”,

just to make sure we do not slip up by finding that there is some law in the European Union that would contradict our proposals.

[Mr Baker]

rose—

[Sir William Cash]

Before my hon. Friend intervenes, I ought finally to add that the Electoral Commission does not agree with this.

[Mr Baker]

My hon. Friend has taught me many things, one of which is the importance of brevity.

[Sir William Cash]

I entirely agree with that, which is why I will now sit down.

[Mr Speaker]

The hon. Gentleman has concluded his speech. We are grateful to him.

--- Later in debate ---

[Sir Edward Leigh]

I wish to support my hon. Friend the Member for Stone (Sir William Cash) and his new clause 11, but the House will be relieved to hear that I shall do so rather more briefly. There is a quote by Sir Winston Churchill in the No Lobby, which says that he wanted to spend the first million years in heaven painting. As much as I love my hon. Friend, I fear that I might spend the first million years in purgatory listening to his speeches.

[Sir William Cash]

Shame. You might learn something.

[Sir Edward Leigh]

My hon. Friend has identified an important point. The Minister will remember that I made precisely this point in my amendment 53 in Committee, before our summer break.

Although there has been a lot of fire and emotion and a vote tonight about purdah, the question of spending by both sides is probably more important. Lord Lamont, the former Chancellor, has written a number of articles about it. It is incredibly important when we have the referendum that we get a sense of closure. At the end of this, whatever the result, people should feel that it has been broadly fair. Otherwise, we might reap the whirlwind. We should remember what happened after the Scottish referendum. If the yes campaign should win, we do not want to create a sense of unfairness for the other side.

I know that my hon. Friend the Minister has taken seriously the points I have put to him. In our earlier debates, the way he put it was that there should be a “broad equality” of forces, but we fear that that simply will not happen. Although there are sensible, firm and clear limits on how much public money will be available to the no and yes campaigns—say, £600,000 or something on each side—and that is completely fair, the party establishment of the main political parties, the Conservative party, the Labour party, the Liberal party, and the SNP, will almost certainly campaign to stay in Europe. Their ability to spend will be based on the votes that they got, with the Conservative party allowed to spend £5 million, the Labour party £4 million, the UK Independence party only £3 million—they will be the only people on the other side—and the Liberal Democrats £2 million. We could reach a situation in which the yes campaign is spending up to £17 million and the no campaign only £8 million.

That has already happened once before. In 1975, the no side was outspent 10:1, which simply cannot be fair. When I put those points to my hon. Friend the Minister in the past, he said that although he accepted that morally and logically there was force in my arguments, that was not in our tradition, as we do not have limits for general elections. I am sure that he will make the same argument again tonight. However, a general election is somewhat different. Separate political parties all have their own position that they are putting forward, rather than ganging up, in a sense, on one side of the argument. There is no sense of unfairness at the end of the process, or a sense that one important political point of view has been massively outspent by the other side.

Although I accept that the Minister will make those arguments, I hope he will feel that there is some sort of moral force in what we have said. For instance, the official yes side in the AV referendum spent £3.436 million and the official no side spent £2.995 million. There was a broad equality in what the yes campaign and no campaign were spending on the AV referendum, was there not? I think we all felt it was a fair referendum. The arguments were put, there was a clear decision and people accepted it. Surely we do not want to be in the situation that has arisen with so many other referendums in Europe, in which there is a sense that the political establishment—the European establishment—has a massive imbalance of resources on its side when it comes to spending. That creates a sense after the referendum that it has somehow been unfair.

Our sole UKIP Member is not present for this important debate, but we do not want to create a situation like the one that existed after the Scottish referendum, do we? There was suddenly a great surge in support for the SNP, and we would not want to recreate that position. [Hon. Members: “Why not?”] There will not be a surge in support for the SNP after this referendum; there might be a surge in support for somebody else, which SNP Members might not welcome.

I hope that when the Minister replies to the debate he will try to convince us that the Government do want a broad equality of resources during the campaign, so that we can feel that the yes and no campaigns have put their points of view fairly, that the public have listened to their arguments and that a fair decision has been made.

European Union Referendum Bill

William Cash Excerpts

Thursday 18th June 2015 Commons Chamber

[Mr Lidington]

Obviously, what we discuss on Report will be in the hands of Members who table amendments. I have known my hon. Friend the Member for Stone (Sir William Cash) for many years, and I know that he is ingenious and creative in finding opportunities for parliamentary debate on subjects that are close to his heart.

[Sir William Cash (Stone) (Con)]

With great respect, may I be ingenious for one moment, as I wish to put amendment 8 on the record? The amendment is supported by the Electoral Commission. Given the time that is available, I just want to say that the Electoral Commission supports the proposal, which is that the detailed regulations required to administer and regulate the referendum

“must be made and come into force not less than six months before the start of the referendum period.”

We do not propose pressing the amendment to a vote, but we would like to return to it on Report. I know that the Minister understands it, and that the Electoral Commission supports it.

[Mr Lidington]

My hon. Friend’s amendment proposes that the legislation be put in place at least six months before it is required to be implemented or complied with by campaigners or administrators. Although it is not necessary or appropriate in this specific case to set an arbitrary timeframe in statute, I can offer him some reassurance on the point. The reason for the Electoral Commission’s recommendation, to which he alluded, is that it is important to ensure that the people who are responsible for organising and administering a referendum and the people who will be responsible for accounting for expenditure on behalf of campaign organisations are clear about the rules that apply. To some extent, as I said a few minutes ago, the general framework of those rules is set out in the body of the Bill. The more detailed rules on conduct will be provided for by regulations that the Government will have the power, under the Bill, to table.

I can assure the Committee that it is the Government’s intention to publish the conduct regulations this autumn. That will mean, especially given the decision that the Committee took on Tuesday not to combine the referendum with the devolved local elections in May 2016, that there should be plenty of time for the Electoral Commission, and returning and counting officers and campaigners to familiarise themselves with the detail of the rules under which the referendum will be conducted. We would expect those detailed rules to cover such matters as the referendum timetable and the key stages within that; the provision of polling stations; the appointment of polling and counting agents; the procedure for the issue of ballot papers and for voting at polling stations; the arrangements for the counting of votes and declaration of results; the disposal of ballot papers and other referendum documents; arrangements for absent voters and postal and proxy votes and so on.

There will be a great deal of information, which it is our intention to have publicly available for everybody to see in the autumn of this year, well ahead of the referendum date. I hope that on that basis my hon. Friend the Member for Stone and others who have signed his amendment will be reassured that the Government are fully committed to our declared intention of ensuring that the referendum is conducted in an way that is not only fair but that is seen to be and is accepted as fair by everybody who takes part on both sides.

European Union Referendum Bill

William Cash Excerpts

Tuesday 9th June 2015 Commons Chamber

[Mr Hammond]

The answer to question No. 1 is no and the answer to question No. 2 is that the Prime Minister has set out in a series of speeches, articles and interviews, and in the Conservative party manifesto, the key areas where we require change to the way that Britain’s relationship with the European Union works if we are to be able to get the consent of the British people to our future membership.

Conservative Members have long been clear that the European Union needs to change and that Britain’s relationship with the European Union needs to change. Unlike the Labour party, we believe that Brussels has too much power and that some of those powers need to be brought back to national capitals. In a world whose centre of economic gravity is shifting fast, Europe faces a serious challenge. If we are to continue to earn our way in the world and to secure European living standards for future generations, the EU needs to focus relentlessly on jobs, growth and competitiveness. Bluntly, it needs to become far less bureaucratic and far more competitive.

With the European electorate more disenchanted with the EU than ever before and with anti-EU parties on the rise across the continent, it is time to bring Europe back to the people, ensuring that decisions are made as close to them as possible and giving national Parliaments a greater role in overseeing the European Union. Such issues resonate across all member states. Change is needed for the benefit of all to make the EU fit for the purpose of the 21st century.

[Sir William Cash (Stone) (Con)]

I applaud my right hon. Friend’s opening remarks and the Prime Minister for making certain that we had the Bill. May I ask the Foreign Secretary one question? In the last statement made by the Prime Minister in the previous Parliament, he clearly said that he wanted reform and a fundamental change in our relationship with the EU. Will he explain what the second part of that means in practice and in relation to the debate?

[Mr Hammond]

My hon. Friend’s question is germane to the point I am making.

For the good of all 28 countries, there are things that need to be done to reform the way in which the European Union works to make it more competitive, effective and democratically accountable. However, the British people have particular concerns, borne of our history and circumstances. For example, we are not part of the single currency and, so long as there is a Conservative Government, we never will be. We made that decision because we will not accept the further integration of our fiscal, economic, financial and social policy—[Hon. Members: “We made it!”] The hon. Member for Eltham (Clive Efford) says that Labour made that decision. Is it the position of the Labour party that we will never join the single currency? I have not heard that position being articulated from the Labour Benches. It would be a seminal moment in our parliamentary history if Labour was able to make that commitment today.

We made that decision because we will not accept the further integration of our fiscal, economic, financial and social policy that will inevitably be required to make the eurozone a success. So, in answer to the point raised by my hon. Friend the Member for Stone (Sir William Cash), we need to agree a framework with our partners that will allow further integration of the eurozone while protecting Britain’s interests and those of the other “euro-outs” within the EU. Because we occupy a crowded island with a population that is growing, even before net migration, and a welfare system that is more accessible than most and more generous than many in Europe, we are far more sensitive than many member states to the impact of migration from the EU and the distorting effects of easy access to benefits and services and of in-work welfare top-ups to wages that are already high by comparison with many EU countries.

In the Conservative party manifesto, we therefore committed to negotiate a new settlement for Britain in Europe—a settlement that addresses the concerns of the British people and sets the European Union on a course that will benefit all its people. The Prime Minister has already begun that process by meeting 15 European leaders, and at the European Council in June he will set out formally the key elements of our proposals.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Clarke]

My right hon. Friend appears to believe that we can somehow have all the advantages of the European Union and the market without complying with any of the obligations. I know of no trading bloc that allows anybody entry to its markets on the basis that they will decide whether to comply with its rules.

I approve of the form of words in the Bill for the question but I hope, as the campaign goes on and we all form all-party campaigns, it becomes crystal clear what the question actually means. It is not solely about the negotiations for reform. Personally, I completely concede that the European Union has a lot of defects and is ripe for reform, and I approve very strongly of some of the measures, particularly those in the Bloomberg speech, which my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister is pressing for—if he can achieve them. However, the yes vote involves a decision on the future role of the United Kingdom in the modern world: how we are best able to further the interests of our citizens, defend our security, develop our economy and bring prosperity. That is the big question.

[Sir William Cash]

Will my right hon. and learned Friend give way?

[Mr Clarke]

I will not, because we are under a time limit and other people want to speak. I apologise to my hon. Friend. He and I have debated this frequently.

We are 1% of the world’s population and we represent 3% of the world’s GDP. As a proportion, we are declining yet further. On the question of being in the European Union, we need to get across to people that our effective voice in the world, insofar as we have one, is best deployed as a leading and influential player in the European Union. There will be less interest taken in British views by the United States, Russia, China, India and other emerging powers if we go into splendid isolation. As I have already said, the idea that we can somehow advance our future prosperity by withdrawing from the biggest organised trading bloc in the world, while at the same time, as a Conservative party, advocating wider free trade wherever it can be obtained, is an absurdity.

That leads me to the other argument: what does “out” mean and what does a no vote mean? I look forward to my Eurosceptic friends providing an answer to that, because Eurosceptics have always given different answers. My former hon. Friend who is now in the UK Independence party, the hon. Member for Clacton (Mr Carswell), has a quite different view of what a no vote means compared with some of my no voting colleagues on the Government Back Benches. Does it mean the Norwegian option? Do we stay in the trading area? That would mean we pay a large subscription, accept free movement of labour—Norway has a higher proportion of other EU nationals compared with Norwegians than we have compared with Brits—and comply with all the legislation, rules and regulations of the single market without having any say in them.

Do we go further than that and have the Swiss model? The Swiss model means we would have some access to the single market. However, in those areas we would have to comply with all the laws and rules that would be directly applied and have no influence on what they are.

--- Later in debate ---

[Sir William Cash (Stone) (Con)]

This referendum Bill, which I in principle strongly applaud, is the culmination of over 20 years of campaigning, which commenced with the Maastricht referendum campaign in 1993. I congratulate the Prime Minister on carrying out his commitment, which disproves the allegations and claims made not only by our opponents but even by some of his friends. The reason for the Bill was that he listened. He listened to Back-Bench opinion, and in particular to the amendment that we put forward resulting in 81 colleagues voting for a referendum on the EU issue on 24 October 2011. I urge him to listen again now and ensure that this referendum is fair in its procedures, in its governmental and EU involvement, and in the impartiality of the broadcasting authorities. I also ask him to properly address the question of fundamental change in our relationship with the EU, as I mentioned in my intervention on the Foreign Secretary.

It was Churchill who said:

“Why be afraid to tell the British public the truth?”—[Official Report, 18 July 1946; Vol. 425, c. 1451.]

That is what we have tried to do since those Maastricht days. When I am under attack not only by Nigel Farage but by my right hon. and learned Friend the Member for Rushcliffe (Mr Clarke), which I was recently, I know I must have got something right. Since Maastricht, we have moved the terms of trade on all essentials in respect of the historic question of “Who governs this country and how?”, which in one form or another has recurred throughout the centuries—about every 50 years from time immemorial. This decision will now lie with the voters, but for it to be conclusive, it must be a fair referendum.

I now turn to what the Prime Minister clearly stated on 23 March, in the full knowledge that it would be part of the general election. In the last week of the last Parliament, he said:

“we have the opportunity to reform the EU and fundamentally change Britain’s relationship with it.”

He then referred to the referendum and added:

“If I am Prime Minister, that is what I will do.”—[Official Report, 23 March 2015; Vol. 594, c. 1122.]

I referred to this in the meeting of the 1922 committee immediately after the general election.

[Kelvin Hopkins (Luton North) (Lab)]

May I take up the hon. Gentleman’s point about the need for a fair campaign on the referendum? It is very important for there to be a balance of voices, representing both sides, in the broadcasting media in particular. Does he agree that for too long the BBC has tended to see the issue of the European Union as purely a Conservative party matter, although people on the left as well as the right take sceptical views?

[Sir William Cash]

I entirely agree. The European Scrutiny Committee was unanimous in its report, which was severely critical of the BBC’s failure to be sufficiently impartial in relation to European matters. There will be further discussion of that issue as we continue to debate the Bill.

At the 1922 committee meeting, I made it clear that we would engage not in wilful opposition but in a process of mutual respect and debate. In plain English, what the Prime Minister said on 23 March boils down to the following. He said that he wanted to change the basic principles by which the United Kingdom is connected to the European Union. He carefully distinguished between “fundamental change” in our relationship and mere reform of it. Reform may include some treaty change to include issues relating to benefits and so forth, but they pale into insignificance by comparison with the Prime Minister’s own assertion that he wants “fundamental change” in our relationship with the EU.

In its report on referendums, the House of Lords Constitution Committee made it clear that a referendum would be primarily necessary in the event of a proposition that we leave the European Union, as opposed to mere nibbling at the treaties. I have said repeatedly for years that if we do not achieve this fundamental change, we will have to leave the European Union. That becomes essential if we are to govern ourselves in line with the wishes of the voters in general elections. In his Bloomberg speech, the Prime Minister said:

“It is national parliaments which are, and will remain, the true source of real democratic legitimacy and accountability in the EU.”

Nothing is more important than that when it comes to the government of our country and its freedom.

Other member states may seek to block this action, but they do so at their own peril. They need us politically and economically, and they repeatedly say that they want us to remain in the EU; but then the handouts, the bail-outs, the subsidies and the ideology of political union get in the way. We have positive alternatives to the European Union. Our democracy and our national Parliament are what people fought and died for in two world wars, and it was through their sacrifice that we saved Europe in those two wars. It is not in the interests of Germany, Europe or ourselves for us to remain in the second tier of a two-tier Europe dominated and profoundly affected by a de facto eurozone, which is in reality at the epicentre of the legal framework of the European Union itself, in which we have been embedded by successive treaties and which does not work.

[Mr Jenkin]

That is the most fundamental point that must be addressed by those who want us to remain in the EU on the present terms. For 20 or 30 years we have had a dysfunctional relationship with the European Union because we do not want to be in political or monetary union, and do not want to be absorbed into something that looks more and more like a state. If those people cannot answer the question how we can be at the heart of this Union on a completely different basis, we will indeed end up as a second-tier member state of an increasingly centralised European Union.

[Sir William Cash]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right.

Removing the words “ever-closer union”—which have never been specifically adjudicated on by the European Court of Justice, and merely form part of the preamble to the treaties—will not solve the problem. It does not change the legal obligations of the accumulated treaties, from Maastricht to Lisbon. Notwithstanding their protestations, it will not be the establishment, the EU, the BBC or the self-appointed multinationals with vested interests who will decide these matters. None of those multinationals has advanced a rational argument to support their determination to stay in the EU. That is my response to what was said by my right hon. and learned Friend the Member for Rushcliffe, who asked the same question of us from the other side of the argument. They were hopelessly wrong about the euro, and have been hopelessly wrong about so many aspects of European debate.

It is the voters who will give their verdict by the end of 2017. It is the voters, and the voters alone, who will decide it, not the massed ranks of the Europhiles. The rolling back of the treaties is imperative to our national interest. Indeed, the 1971 White Paper, on which the European Communities Act 1972 is still founded, clearly stated that we must keep the veto precisely because it was in our national interest to do so. It went on to say that to do otherwise would

“imperil the very fabric of the Community.”

I look at my right hon. and learned Member for Rushcliffe because he knows that he supported that at the time, in 1971.

[Mr Kenneth Clarke]

My hon. Friend is quite right. In 1971 we had unanimity when making European laws, but once made, they were directly binding. It is the second issue that my hon. Friend is trying to reopen. In the Lisbon treaty, we went for weighted majority voting, because, with 28 member states, giving every Government the right to block any proposal would prevent any decisions from being made.

[Sir William Cash]

It was for precisely to deal with that problem that I set up the Maastricht referendum campaign. My right hon. and learned Friend and others have persistently and continuously opposed a referendum, because they have not wanted these matters to be reopened. However, they have been reopened by virtue of this Bill.

I was concerned to hear the Foreign Secretary say on Sunday that the unilateral repeal of EU legislation at Westminster was unachievable, and would lead to our leaving the EU. Of course, the second part of that proposition is inherent in the referendum itself; the voters will decide. The Foreign Secretary invoked the analogy of the yellow card, which has been a dismal failure. When it was applied in relation to the the European Public Prosecutor, the Commission simply ignored the result.

During the Maastricht debates, we were told by the then Foreign Secretary that the Maastricht Treaty was the

“high water mark of federalism”.

That was patent nonsense, as has been demonstrated by so much of the Europhilic commentary that has poured out in a relentless tide of enthusiasm for European integration, and which has engulfed the United Kingdom and Europe as a whole, causing protests, riots and massive unemployment. It will drag Europe down, and will create the very instability that the project after 1945 was intended to avoid.

We need amendments to this Bill, relating to matters such as the purdah arrangements, the question of prohibiting European or governmental money, the question of the impartiality of the broadcasting authorities, the level of expenses, the timing and also, perhaps, the question in the referendum. According to recent opinion polls, trust among the European voters is at an all-time low, and that trust is what lies at the heart of the whole debate. In the words of Lord Randolph Churchill, we must trust the people.

[Several hon. Members]

rose—

--- Later in debate ---

[Damian Green]

Our Government are represented in the Council of Ministers and the Parliament; that is the democratic check. It can of course be improved—nobody is saying that the EU is perfect—but there are many institutions that need improving. Indeed, Parliament needs improving, but that does not mean we should give up on the many and manifold advantages of parliamentary democracy. That is the attitude with which we should approach the EU.

I am also in favour of the Bill because I am happy to take on in friendly public debate those who want to cut our close ties with friendly neighbouring democracies, and because I believe it is appropriate to have this debate now. The subject of Europe is a curious one in British politics. For a small number of people—some of whom have spoken today—it is an all-consuming passion. For the vast majority of the British people, however, it rarely features in the top 10 things they want Governments to get to grips with.

I will be happy to play a part in persuading the British people that the risks of turning our back on our democratic neighbours massively outweigh the benefits, but I will do this in the spirit of removing a cloud that has hung over politics for too long. Having the in/out debate always hovering around adds an unnecessary level of uncertainty to our national debate on many subjects, and it leaves the rest of the world, particularly our friends, unsure about Britain’s view of its own place in the world.

It has been clear for some time that we are going to need a referendum to clear up this uncertainty. It has been 40 years since the last one. The world has changed, the UK has changed, the European Union has changed. So let’s get on with it. Let us focus the British people’s minds on the choice before us, and see what they say.

[Sir William Cash]

rose—

[Damian Green]

I will, with some trepidation, give way to my hon. Friend.

[Sir William Cash]

I am glad my right hon. Friend has chosen to give way; my right hon. and learned Friend the Member for Rushcliffe (Mr Clarke) did not, so I am going to ask the same question. Does my right hon. Friend agree with the Prime Minister when he says that he wants not only reform but a fundamental change in our relationship with the EU?

[Damian Green]

I will talk about the change in the relationship in a few seconds, but first I want to turn to the Bill itself.

The Government are to be commended on passing the first and most important test in any referendum, which is that it asks a sensible and fair question. Asking whether we want to remain in the EU makes it clear that we are not starting with a blank sheet, but that we have an existing web of relationships, rules, and habits that would be put at risk by a no vote in the referendum.

Those who are most vocal in pointing this out are British businesses. They make the point that for the vast majority of our businesses the EU is not a straitjacket; it is a springboard to the opportunities provided by the global economy. This is as true for small businesses as it is for big ones.

The most recent CBI survey was interesting. It often says that eight out of 10 CBI members support our continued membership, and those who are against membership say it is just the voice of big business. However, if we drill down into that finding we discover that 77% of small and medium-sized businesses said that they support the UK’s continued membership of the EU. All of us on both sides of the House who recognise the importance of small businesses for prosperity, entrepreneurship and job creation should listen to their voices. People often complain that politicians do not listen.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Baker]

My hon. Friend knows my view about money and banking, which is that we should have market-based moneys. That is one of the things that has gone profoundly wrong. He prompts me to say, however, that we are very clearly, across the world, in the midst of a profound crisis of political economy, and that is what we must wrestle and cope with. Some of the old, simplistic and unpleasant arguments of the past must be put to rest. We need to rediscover a true liberalism, one in which people are accepting of one another.

[Sir William Cash]

Does my hon. Friend also accept that the eurozone is a de facto entity, whereas the question before us in this referendum is about being part of the European Union? The eurozone is a basket case, but at the same time it is dominated by one country which causes a lot of distortion to the way in which it works.

[Mr Baker]

Indeed. It is important that there is a degree of flexibility in currency systems, and Alan Greenspan’s wonderful book on gold and economic freedom is something I commend to everybody.

As the Minister knows, I have misgivings about some of the details in the Bill, which some of my colleagues have already fleshed out. But it is a happy occasion today, because our party is wholly united in supporting the principle of the Bill. It is long overdue. We are delighted that it has come forward and we look forward to its progress.

In due course the people will decide. On the one hand they have the choice of radicalism—political union across Europe. That is the radical choice. The moderate, conservative choice is trade and co-operation among friendly nation states. People in the end will choose either for the European Union, or for Britain.

Commission Work Programme 2015

William Cash Excerpts

Monday 9th March 2015 Commons Chamber

[The Minister for Europe (Mr David Lidington)]

I beg to move,

That this House takes note of European Union Document No. 5080/15 and Addenda 1 to 4, a Commission Communication: Commission Work Programme 2015–A New Start; and supports the Government’s view that the most significant initiatives are those that focus on the strategic priorities set out by the European Council in June 2014 to promote jobs, growth and investment in the EU.

This is the fourth such debate in which I have taken part as Minister for Europe, but I think it is the first time I can say that the European Commission has sent a strong message that it intends to do things in a different fashion from how its work has been carried out in the past. The clear message from President Juncker and his team is that they want to focus on a smaller number of key priorities and that they wish to set limits on the degree to which the Commission, and the EU collectively, can interfere in matters that are often better handled at national or local level.

Of course, the test of that message will be what happens in practice; it is actions that will count, not words. However, I am encouraged by the creation of the powerful post of First Vice-President of the Commission, which gives Frans Timmermans, the former Dutch Foreign Minister, an overarching power to veto any proposals that do not meet the requirements of subsidiarity and proportionality. He is already making it clear that a key element of his responsibility is to say a firm no to fellow commissioners, to the European Parliament and to outside lobbyists and to focus only on those matters where the Commission judges that European action would genuinely give Europe added value that could not be achieved by other means.

[Sir William Cash (Stone) (Con)]

I have spoken with Mr Timmermans a number of times in COSAC meetings with the chairmen of the 28 member states. On the question of national Parliaments, which is the key question in relation to subsidiarity—it is the question of what should be done best at the appropriate level—is not it the case that, for all the words about involving national Parliaments, we will not get much change out of Mr Timmermans, any of the Commissioners or the European institutions if we insist on national Parliaments at the expense of the European Parliament?

[Mr Lidington]

I do not want to pre-empt tomorrow’s debate on the European Union’s relations with national Parliaments and the principles of subsidiarity and proportionality. My hon. Friend is right to identify this as a challenging agenda and to indicate that the European Parliament, in particular, is likely to be resistant to the idea of a stronger voice for national Parliaments, but I think that he is too pessimistic in his assessment of Frans Timmermans. After all, it was during Mr Timmermans’s tenure as Foreign Minister of the Netherlands that the Dutch came forward with a number of specific proposals for strengthening the role of national Parliaments in holding EU decisions to account. I take heart from the fact that we have in this powerful role within the Commission somebody who has previously gone on the record to say that the guiding principle should be, “Europe where necessary, but national where possible”, and who has been very sympathetic to ideas for strengthening the role of national Parliaments.

The Commission has set out a clear intention to be more strategic and to act in a smaller number of areas where there is real added value for the EU. It has also said that it wants to demonstrate a particularly strong focus on jobs, growth and European competitiveness, which are objectives that the Government strongly support. The Commission has pledged to create a closer partnership with member state Governments and national Parliaments. We can see some evidence of the Commission’s approach by looking at some of the numbers in the work programme. The work programme includes just 23 legislative and non-legislative policy initiatives and—importantly— 80 measures proposed for either withdrawal or modification.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Lidington]

I can check the precise date and let the right hon. Gentleman know. There has been a delay, which I regret, because it has taken time to get collective agreement on this and on a number of other debates that the European Scrutiny Committee has referred. Originally, we considered having this debate in Committee, but, having discussed the issue with my right hon. Friend the Leader of the House after he had given evidence to the European Scrutiny Committee, the Government decided to have a debate on the Floor of the House. I am just glad that we are having this debate relatively early in 2015.

[Sir William Cash]

I suspect that that is an invitation to say that the amendment that I and many other members of my Committee have tabled, which I hope the Minister will accept, deals with free movement—a massive issue that affects immigration. The fact that it has been not merely delayed, but stalled for more than a year must have been a coalition decision, but we have not been told who was behind it, so who was it?

[Mr Lidington]

As I told my hon. Friend when I last gave evidence to his Committee, the Government take decisions collectively and it would not be right for me to go into detail about internal Government communications. I will come to the issues raised by the amendment shortly, but first I want to say more about the importance of the proposed work on economic affairs and competitiveness.

The United Kingdom has long argued for ambitious trade deals. The ongoing Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership and EU-Japan negotiations could benefit this country annually by more than £15 billion, so the comprehensive stocktake of trade policy proposed by the Commission is welcome.

The EU’s greatest achievement—the single market—is still very far from complete, so we are pleased that the Commission plans to push liberalisation in sectors that could boost GDP the most, such as construction and professional services. We want EU legislation to enable the dynamic development of the future economy by supporting and not hindering a continent-wide digital single market. If that is done right, in a way that encourages the growth of online trade—both retail and business to business—it could generate €250 billion over the lifetime of this Commission.

We also support the Commission’s vision of a well-regulated and integrated capital markets union of all 28 member states that maximises the benefits of capital markets and non-bank financing for the real economy. Lord Hill’s recent Green Paper on the subject spelled out the approach he plans to take, and the Government will, of course, engage with his team as the policy is developed further.

We welcome the fact that the Commission intends to consider a range of approaches, and not just legislation, to develop Europe’s capital markets, and that much of that will be delivered through member state and industry action, rather than through EU-level law or regulation.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Lidington]

In fairness to President Juncker, with whom I do not agree on that point, it is not a secret that he has held that view for a long time and I suspect it is held by pretty much every leading politician in Luxembourg. [Interruption.] That is the reality. A small European country would see an obvious benefit to its national interest from that sort of greater European action. The British Government do not share the view that a European army would be helpful or necessary. We believe that NATO is and should remain the centrepiece of our collective defence and security arrangements.

Were there to be any move towards establishing greater European military integration, it would first require consensus among member states, because such matters cannot be determined by a qualified majority vote under the treaty. Moreover, as I am sure my hon. Friend will recall, in passing the European Union Act 2011, this House required that there would have to be both an Act of Parliament and a referendum of the British people before any British Prime Minister could give consent to a proposal for the establishment of an EU army or armed forces in some hypothetical future.

[Sir William Cash]

Of course, if we were no longer members of the European Union by that time, we would not need to give consent because we would not be in the position to do so.

[Mr Lidington]

We can argue about all sorts of improbable hypotheticals, but the key point is that, while President Juncker was expressing a view that he has made no secret of holding in the past, this is not a live issue for debate around the table in Brussels at the moment. In fact, both President Juncker and others who have spoken in support of a European army or defence force have said that they see it as being a very long-term objective.

Turning to the amendment tabled by my hon. Friend and a number of other members of the European Scrutiny Committee, the Government recognise public concerns about immigration from other member states and the need for the Commission to do much more to address the abuse of free movement rights and the problems to which it gives rise. That is why this Government have gone further than any previous Administration to try to tackle the problems associated with free movement both domestically and at the European level.

We have acted domestically to tackle abuse and ensure that the rules governing access to our welfare system and public services are as robust as possible. Only today, my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions has laid regulations in Parliament to ensure that EU jobseekers have no access whatsoever to universal credit.

At European level, we secured language in last June’s European Council conclusions on the need for the Commission to support member states in combating the misuse of free movement. We continue to work both with member states and the Commission to reform EU social security co-ordination rules so that they better reflect current migration patterns and the divergent, diverse nature of member states’ welfare systems, while ensuring that member states can maintain effective control of their own welfare systems. Welfare provision is of course set down in the treaty as belonging to the competence of member states, rather than that of European institutions.

We welcome the proposal in the work programme on the labour mobility package—it covers several such items—which will assist us in carrying forward our ideas. However, we are very clear that there is much more to do, as my right honourable Friend the Prime Minister made clear in his speech on 28 November. I therefore have no problem in welcoming the amendment tabled by my hon. Friend the Member for Stone (Sir William Cash), which will be agreed to at the end of the debate.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Pat McFadden (Wolverhampton South East) (Lab)]

This is the first of two debates on the European Union over a couple of days—a double-header, as it were. It is a bit like Davis cup tennis, the only difference being that those involved are playing exciting, edge-of-the-seat tennis, and we are discussing the work programme of the European Commission.

As the Minister was speaking, I was struck, as I have been before, by how often such debates are taking place inside the Conservative party rather than more widely. It seems to me that the debate inside the Conservative party has governed much of our positioning in recent years, but not to our national advantage.

[Sir William Cash]

Is the right hon. Gentleman effectively saying to UKIP in his constituency that he does not regard the free movement of people and immigration as of any interest to his constituents?

[Mr McFadden]

I do not believe that that is what I said. I am interested in the hon. Gentleman’s intervention, because I thought that the issue for him was principally parliamentary sovereignty, rather than the free movement of people. Perhaps he has shifted his position, and I should stand corrected.

The Minister outlined the position on the numbers in the measures. I noted the scepticism with which the right hon. Member for Wokingham (Mr Redwood) greeted the numbers. I do not propose to go over that ground as the Minister has done so, but on the face of it the Commission is proposing a narrower, more focused programme—under 10 headings and 23 specific measures —than it has in the past.

At the top of the Commission’s agenda is something we would all welcome—an emphasis on growth and jobs. In a continent still struggling to recover from the financial crisis, it is right to have such an emphasis and focus on the very high level of youth unemployment, on doing what is right on the big issues, and on less interference in and over-regulation of issues that do not need it.

In his speech in London last week, Mr Timmermans, the vice-president of the Commission, said:

“It is incredibly important that we follow through on limiting the initiatives we take to those areas where EU action is urgent and needed. For too long we worked on the premise of doing things because they were nice to do; I want to work on the premise that we do it because we need to do it, because Member States can’t do it by themselves alone. There needs to be added value of acting on a European scale.”

I very much welcome that emphasis from Commissioner Timmermans, and I hope that it is followed through in reality as well as in the written plan.

--- Later in debate ---

[Sir William Cash (Stone) (Con)]

I beg to move amendment (a), at end add

‘; and urges the Government to encourage the Commission to develop policies during 2015 relating to the free movement of EU citizens.’

It is truly shocking that it took more than a year for the Government to bring forward a debate on the free movement of EU citizens, given that the document in question was recommended as long ago as January 2014 regarding a matter of enormous significance that was discussed on 5 December 2013 in the Justice and Home Affairs Council. This issue goes right to the heart of the immigration question, which in turn lies at the heart of the European question as it applies to the United Kingdom, and it is a matter of intense political and controversial debate. It is inconceivable that this matter should have been so shockingly delayed, and that led the European Scrutiny Committee to ask the Leader of the House to give evidence and be cross-examined on why these important matters, including free movement as well as things such as the EU budget and the charter of fundamental rights, are outstanding. We were told by the Minister and the Leader of the House that they could not disclose how that decision had been arrived at because it was a matter of collective Government responsibility. The Committee is glad that by tabling the amendment it has forced the Minister to welcome it.

[Jacob Rees-Mogg]

I wonder if I might add to what my hon. Friend is saying. Although the Minister and the Leader of the House said that they could not possibly tell us who was blocking the provision, the Home Secretary, the Foreign Secretary, the First Secretary of State and the Minister for Europe all intimated that they were very much in favour of having the debate, and wished that it could be brought forward as a matter of urgency although forces beyond their control prevented it.

[Sir William Cash]

My hon. Friend is right in every respect and we have all the transcripts to prove it, including from various Secretaries of State. It is effectively an example of decisions being taken behind closed doors in smoke-free rooms. Those are the new modernising methods of government. I disapprove of them and so does my Committee, as shown by the fact that we tabled this amendment.

Let us move on and accept that we are now able to debate free movement; I particularly want to concentrate on EU migration and benefits in that context. I wrote a letter to the Prime Minister on 18 November, which was 10 days before he made his speech at JCB in Staffordshire on the question of free movement, and I drew attention to the fact that I believed we were faced with a real problem. However much we might want to make certain changes, unless we were prepared to dig in and make this Parliament supreme on matters of such vital national interest, we would not get the necessary changes because some of them required treaty change and others required overriding the charter of fundamental rights. Although the Prime Minister accepted in questions after his speech that some of those matters would require treaty change, in reality that is not on offer in any substantial way from the other member states.

The principle of free movement is embedded in the ideology and principles of the other member states, and particularly the European institutions and European Commission, despite how that may affect us as a small island with a greatly increasing population and pressures on social housing and education—the list is endless. Unlike other member states such as France, Germany and Spain that have large land masses and can absorb many more people, we simply cannot do so. It is therefore a matter of vital national interest—quite apart from questions that I will mention in a moment about abuse of the system—that has led us to a position where we have desperately wanted to put our foot down. Some of us believe that we should override European legislation and the charter of fundamental rights by using the “notwithstanding” formula—that is notwithstanding the European Communities Act 1972, which is past legislation as I have said many times before—so that we can ensure that our Supreme Court obeys the laws of this Parliament which is elected by our voters in general elections.

When the election comes—it is only a matter of 60 days or so—this issue will be at the centre of gravity in that election, and we will be asked whether we will take the necessary steps in line with what voters insist on. I am afraid the answer to that question is that there will be no treaty change or overriding of the charter, and when I have asked Ministers and the Prime Minister whether they will use the “notwithstanding” formula, I have been told no.

[Mr Redwood]

On the narrower point of benefits, the Minister gave us encouraging news that we have control of our benefits system, as that is a reserved matter under the treaties. Does my hon. Friend recollect that on several occasions Ministers have been unable to change our benefits system in the way the British public want because of European legal blockages?

[Sir William Cash]

That is completely right. People think—in elements of the BBC and elsewhere, I suspect—that this is somehow a matter of policy, and that by using the right words one can change the effect of European law. No, we cannot. We have to pass legislation. There has to be a majority in this House to override European laws and regulations. It is, ultimately and tragically, a legal framework rather than just simply a question of policy based on the wishes of voters, as expressed by their representatives in Parliament. This has only fairly recently begun to gain traction with some people in the public arena, but not sufficiently, I am afraid, to achieve the kind of impartial analysis I believe is needed, for example in the BBC. Without going into this now, I have invited—in fact, I have effectively forced—the director-general and the editor-in-chief of the BBC to appear before my Committee to explain this problem in the kind of language that ordinary people can understand. That will take place on Wednesday afternoon at 2.30 pm, for those who want to take note.

The Prime Minister’s speech had a lot in it, which demonstrated the extent to which he wants to try to resolve many of these questions. That is undeniable, but the question we have to address, and to which I now turn, is the extent to which it would require treaty change or otherwise—that is the acid test.

My first general remark is that the package includes only one proposal that directly limits or imposes a quota on the number of EU migrants. This would relate to future accessions and so could be part of normal negotiations. However, to impose a direct limit on migration from existing member states would certainly require treaty change.

My second general comment is that many of the relevant treaty obligations have already been interpreted in this context by the European Court of Justice. The Court plays a huge, vital and exceptional role, and cannot be appealed against. It has already interpreted these matters as providing limitation on the action that member states can take in this area. Indeed, the recent case of Dano, which is frequently referred to—the Foreign Secretary referred to it on “The Andrew Marr Show” only this weekend—demonstrates that the Court can change its approach.

However, some of the judgments mentioned are long-standing, well-entrenched and engage charter rights. Any change along the lines suggested by the Prime Minister would therefore not be sufficiently strong, to the extent that they rely on the Court of Justice changing its established jurisprudence. That is why we want the Commission to take account of these points—these are the issues. The European Commission is the legal guardian of the treaties. The point I am making in this speech is that, in order to change the law to ensure that we can actually deal properly with the problems that come from free movement, we have to persuade the Commission, in its work programme, to take account of such relevant questions. It could be inferred from what the Prime Minister had to say that he accepted that some treaty change would be required—and in fact, when he was asked questions, he accepted that towards the end—but there are a number of real problems, and I will now turn to them.

The first problem that the European Commission will have to consider in its work programme is a stronger power to refuse entry and to deport criminals. The free movement directive, which the European Commission has to enforce, requires decisions to be taken on a case-by-case basis on the grounds permissible by the treaty. That provision reflects Court of Justice jurisprudence extending across a wide range of treaty rights, including the freedom to travel to other member states to receive services, which is highly relevant to the work programme. It is likely that any significant stronger action will require treaty change, particularly if it detracts from the requirement derived from the principle of proportionality to look at each individual case.

Secondly, I believe a ban on re-entry for those who have abused EU rights may be possible, as this falls within the public policy exception to the treaty right of free movement. However, there are again questions of proportionality.

[Mr Chope]

Is this not all pie in the sky? There is no way in which the Commission or other member states will agree to these fundamental changes. Is that not why we need to go back to basics and have a free trade organisation without the free movement of people, just as we have free trade agreements with other countries without having to take in all their people as a right, without any control over them? Would it not be better to work towards, for example, visa waiver systems?

[Sir William Cash]

I very much agree with what my hon. Friend says. In fact, if I may say so, I have said it many times in the past myself. However, we have to be able to identify the problems that have been presented by making assertions that we want this and we want that, in order to demonstrate the fact that it cannot be done before we move to the next step, which is of the kind that he and I would want: to address this on a realistic footing and to say to the European Commission, the European institutions and the Government that these proposals are simply not going to stack up because they are not going to happen. There is no chance of a treaty change as far as I can see—my hon. Friend and other hon. Members in the Chamber obviously agree—that will result in getting rid of the dangers presented to the United Kingdom as a result of imagining we will be able to do things, when in practice we know perfectly well it is not going to happen because we will not get the treaty change.

There is also the problem of access to tax credits, housing benefits and social housing for four years. The law of the Court of Justice indicates that an attempt to do this would be contrary to the treaty rights of free movement insofar as the limits on benefit extend to benefits for jobseekers linked to labour market participation and benefits to those who are classified as workers. Such persons are entitled to equal treatment as a treaty right. There is another problem. These things are not going to go away. My hon. Friend is completely right, as I have said so often, not to allow ourselves to be induced to believe that because we say something it will happen, particularly when we are dealing with the acquis communautaire and the rules and regulations that are imposed, which we voluntarily accepted in this House under the 1972 Act. We are the only country of the 28 member states that has the right, because of our constitutional arrangements—we do not have a written constitution—to make changes and override that legislation if we so wish to do. We can do it. The question is: have we got the political will in relation to matters of vital national interest?

Any restriction on access to social housing would likely be regarded as discrimination on the grounds of nationality. Thus, that too would be contrary to the treaty. There is then the question of removal if jobseekers do not find a job in six months. The law of the European Court of Justice overrides even this Parliament, by our voluntary agreement, but we can unwind it if we wish to do so by using the notwithstanding formula to override it and pass a law in this place. If jobseekers do not find a job in six months and are faced with removal, we could legislate. Under sections 2 and 3 of the European Communities Act, however, Court of Justice law prevents it, on the grounds that it interferes with the treaty right of free movement—insofar as a jobseeker can demonstrate that he or she is continuing to seek work and has a genuine chance of being engaged. Thus—again—treaty change is likely to be necessary.

Then there is the requirement for a job offer before entry—the same case law points to the requirement for treaty change on that account, too. Then there is the further restriction on the entry of non-EU family members. The rights of family members to enter with someone who has rights as an EU worker are set out explicitly in the free movement directive and could in principle be adjusted by amendment to the directive, but limits to wholesale change are set by the requirements not to undermine the essence of the treaty right of free movement and to respect human rights.

As I mentioned in my lead letter in yesterday’s The Sunday Telegraph, there is also the problem of human rights issues in respect of the deportation of terrorists, who can also insist on the right to family life under the present arrangements. We have to get real about this. We have to change it. So far, the Court has taken a consistently firm approach in favour of ensuring family life where these matters arise in the context of free movement, and it is likely to continue to do so—with huge implications for the number of people who can enter.

Finally, there is the question of whether there should be no child benefit for non-resident children. The requirement to pay child benefit for children in another member state is currently in the social security co-ordination regulations. It is theoretically possible to amend the regulations to end these payments, but it would raise the serious question of indirect discrimination on nationality grounds—again contrary to treaty free movement rights— and the same would apply to the proposal to limit child benefit paid abroad to that paid in the child’s country of residence.

I do not mean to criticise for the sake of it. I have tried to present the House with a proper examination and legal analysis of the problems, which would not have been the case had we not been able to debate the amendment, and it is now on the record that these are serious problems that cannot simply be washed away with fine words and which in most cases will require treaty change. When I wrote to the Prime Minister 10 days before his speech, I asked if he would be good enough to seek the advice of the Attorney-General and Government lawyers on the questions I raised. I trust that the House, the Minister and the Prime Minister will listen, and that we will take the steps necessary to deal with the vexed issue of immigration in a manner that overrides the treaties and the charter, as and when it is in our vital national interest to do so.

[Several hon. Members]

rose—

--- Later in debate ---

[Jacob Rees-Mogg (North East Somerset) (Con)]

Let me begin by talking about the way in which we have arrived at this debate, and also about the amendment that has been tabled by my hon. Friend the Member for Stone (Sir William Cash) and all the other members of the European Scrutiny Committee who were present at Wednesday’s meeting. It is highly unusual for a Select Committee to table a cross-party amendment on a subject that was recommended for debate nearly 14 months ago.

The Government should bear it in mind that no Government are in office for ever. They should bear it in mind that the great protection of our liberties is the House’s entitlement to debate what it wishes to debate, and that they should treat that entitlement properly and respectfully by allowing such debates to take place. They should also bear it in mind that delaying deliberately, for 14 months, a debate on the free movement of people—a subject which, as we heard from the hon. Member for Luton North (Kelvin Hopkins), is being discussed on every doorstep in the country—shows a contempt for the House of Commons that constitutes a grave error.

When things change and another party is in government, that party too will notice that it is possible to ignore the Standing Orders of the House. That party too will notice that it is easy to clamp down on discussion in what ought to be a hotbed of democracy, and our freedoms will ebb away.

The Government ought to be ashamed of themselves for their delay, and the Ministers who claimed to be so much in favour of the debate when they appeared before the European Scrutiny Committee—or on the Floor of the House during questions to the Leader of the House—ought to recognise that they are powerful figures. When the Home Secretary, the Foreign Secretary, the Minister for Europe and the First Secretary of State all want a debate, it is extraordinary that we do not get that debate. Who is the mystery figure, hidden somewhere in the corridors of Whitehall, who vetoes debates?

[Sir William Cash]

Clegg.

[Jacob Rees-Mogg]

Is it our right hon. Friend the Member for Sheffield, Hallam (Mr Clegg) who vetoed the debate, or is it simply some mystery in the machine? Is it some faceless bureaucrat, some poor fellow sitting patiently in the officials’ Box?

Ukraine (UK Relations with Russia)

William Cash Excerpts

Thursday 11th December 2014 Commons Chamber

[Mr McFadden]

My hon. Friend is right to draw attention to the recent £7 million loan to the French National Front party, and to return us to the question of who would cheer if the European Union were to fall apart at the hands of nationalist movements and parties. For the rest of us, such comments and actions are a reminder that we should not be cavalier in dismissing the importance of the security side of a strong and united European Union which believes in democracy and freedom, and stands opposed to Russian aggression. That is well understood by Angela Merkel, who, a few days ago, told Welt am Sonntag:

“Moldova, Georgia and Ukraine are three countries in our eastern neighbourhood that have taken sovereign decisions to sign an association agreement with the EU”.

She added:

“Russia is creating problems for all three of these countries”.

We cannot regard those countries’ actions as poking the bear with a stick. They have a right to sign such agreements if they wish.

[Sir William Cash (Stone) (Con)]

I want to ask a very simple question, namely whether and to what extent the right hon. Gentleman agrees that it is necessary to take action along the lines of that suggested by my hon. Friend the Member for New Forest East (Dr Lewis). Does he think that the European Union will actually decide that it will regain Crimea, and if so, how? Does he also think that we will effectively back up the threats that are being made with real action?

[Mr McFadden]

I think that the unified European Union response on sanctions has been helpful in that context, but, as I have said, NATO is our principal source of collective defence. Let me also say to my hon. Friend that if he secures the policy for which he has worked for many years, he should bear in mind who will be cheering most in the context that we are currently discussing.

EU Reform

William Cash Excerpts

Tuesday 18th November 2014 Westminster Hall

[Sir William Cash (Stone) (Con)]

It is a great pleasure, Mr Robertson, to serve under your chairmanship. In 1997, shortly after the Maastricht rebellion, Thomas Kielinger of Die Welt wrote a pamphlet entitled “Crossroads and Roundabouts” about Germany and the United Kingdom in Europe—the contrast between the German vision of Europe and the UK’s commitment to its Parliament and its own national interest. We have done the roundabout; now we are truly at the crossroads of the EU and perhaps even of our relationship with Germany. Is it really the case that in this country we are disproportionately preoccupied with our own national concerns?

I am introducing this debate about the UK and Germany in the EU—the first devoted specifically to the subject, I think—about which, in the interests of our mutual relationship, we must be both realistic and straight with each other, as we were yesterday in discussions with the Bundestag European affairs committee.

I warned John Major before Maastricht that the treaty, which I urged him to veto, would lead to a European Government and a German Europe. I campaigned for a referendum on that and the petition to Parliament received many hundreds of thousands of signatures. In my book of that time, “Against a Federal Europe”, I wrote:

“The answer to the German question lies primarily in Germany itself and that to hand her the key to the legal structure of Europe with a majority voting system gravitating around alliances dependent on Germany simply hands her legitimate power on a plate.”

That is now becoming clearer by the day. I also wrote then:

“Britain wants to work together with Germany in a fair and balanced relationship, based on free trade, cooperation and democratic principles. She does not want to be forced into a legal structure dominated by her. Plans for a united Europe stray into the darkest political territory, and must be firmly rejected.”

I wrote that in 1991. In 1990, I had written that

“if Germany needs to be contained, the Germans must do it themselves…now is the time for the Germans to prove themselves”.

In the words of the German philosopher, Thomas Mann, in 1953:

“We do not want a German Europe, but a European Germany.”

I argued that we were embarking on

“a European Germany and a German Europe”

because the two ran together after Maastricht. As Bismarck himself said:

“I have always found the word ‘Europe’ on the lips of those politicians who wanted something from other Powers which they dared not demand in their own names.”

He meant their own national interests. It is also to be recalled that, as Friedrich Karl von Moser stated:

“Each nation has its main characteristic. In Germany it is obedience. In England it is liberty.”

[Mark Field (Cities of London and Westminster) (Con)]

My hon. Friend and I have talked many times about these matters, for obvious reasons. Does he accept that a British exit from the European Union would be the single most likely thing to provide the German dominance of Europe to which he refers? Is it not very much within the modern German mentality to see the European Union as a way of containing elements of some chapters of their history—of which, understandably, they are not proud? They see a strong European Union as being the way in which the dominance of Germany can be kept at bay.

[Sir William Cash]

I understand that point and my hon. Friend has made it to me before. All I can say is that it depends on the structure being created and the irreversibility established by the treaties themselves as put into legislation. As I shall explain in a moment, the consequence of the existing structure is to create an imbalance in favour of Germany and a disadvantage for the United Kingdom in several areas. That is what we must evaluate because we want a peaceful and stable Europe; unfortunately, however, what is happening now is creating instability, and I believe the European Union as it was conceived will ultimately be undermined. Our parliamentary system is the bulwark of the liberty and democracy that saved us and Europe. That is no anachronism today.

The problem we now face in an increasingly assertive German Europe is one increasingly at odds with British national interests. For me, that was one of the mainsprings of the Maastricht rebellion and it has been exacerbated by successive treaties, including Lisbon—against which, notably, the Conservative party was united.

The situation is getting worse. For example, we are told that the single market is the prime reason, or certainly one of the prime reasons, for our engagement in the European project. Although more than 40% of our trade is with Europe, our trade deficit with the other 27 member states is £56 billion, whereas the German surplus with the same member states is £51.8 billion. At the same time, we have a substantial surplus with the rest of the world with the same goods and services. I fundamentally disagree with the CBI’s analysis.

A host of individual problems give rise to concern—for example, the regulatory system in the City of London. I wrote about that in the Financial Times, warning the City against the consequences, and we have lost case after case in the European Court of Justice. There is the ports regulation, opposed by port employers and the trade unions. There is the change in the patent courts system. There is the lack of a reciprocal policy of liberalisation in relation to energy, professional services and other matters. There is over-regulation, particularly of small businesses, on which no substantial progress is ever made, and which is calculated to cost about 4% of EU GDP.

The effect on our economy is deep. Our growth is being dragged down by the sclerotic eurozone, whose problems in many countries, such as Italy and Greece, are blamed on German currency and export manipulation.

[Mr Jim Cunningham (Coventry South) (Lab)]

The hon. Gentleman mentioned the single market. Logic says that anyone signing up to a single market gets a central bank and a single currency. Surely the horse has bolted. I remind the hon. Gentleman that it was the Labour party that gave the British people a referendum and the five economic tests.

[Sir William Cash]

I entirely accept the hon. Gentleman’s second point about the referendum; I have never disputed that. Far from it—it was an extremely good thing, although back then it was about a kind of Europe different from the one we are now experiencing.

I voted for the Single European Act, but I tabled an amendment to preserve the sovereignty of the Westminster Parliament. If that amendment had been allowed for debate, which it was not, it would have changed the whole nature of the matter. I was strongly supported by Enoch Powell, who understood that if we were to have a single market that did not work, the only way to retrieve the situation would be through some form of “notwithstanding” formula of the sort I have returned to over and again in subsequent years.

German economic policy is obsessed with fiscal discipline and large current account surpluses. Without the euro, currency adjustments would control Germany’s ability to export cheaply. German economic efficiency, combined with the single currency, allows for artificially cheap German exports at the expense of Mediterranean countries, which can deflate their currencies to offset cheap German goods, drawing money and jobs north and leaving the southern Governments unable to finance their deficits through economic growth.

German insistence on fiscal discipline is, as Wolfgang Munchau made clear in yesterday’s Financial Times, ideological and a deeply held response to the crisis of the 1930s. The result will be the destruction of the Mediterranean export economies while simultaneously deepening the damage through austerity on a massive scale. An attempt to impose German-style labour laws and fiscal discipline on those countries will fail and will not bring the required efficiency to compete with Germany.

The eurozone, which is dominated by Germany, is a disaster, as is increasingly recognised publicly by some of my Labour colleagues, and it seriously damages our economy. Furthermore, although we are told that consensus is the norm, the political consequences of the present treaties mean that, as of 1 November this year, the majority voting system in the EU Council of Ministers has been profoundly changed, subject only to a compromise transitional arrangement called the Ioannina compromise.

Germany and France with two small states can now effectively determine European decision making. The consensus is insufficiently transparent and is achieved primarily because the member states know the outcome of a given vote, which in any case does not sufficiently correspond to our concerns. In my European Scrutiny Committee, we have been very critical of how Coreper functions and the manner in which we are unable to achieve our objectives. We also have some critical things to say about UKRep.

Indeed, VoteWatch Europe has demonstrated that when the UK has voted between 2009 and 2012, it has done so in favour with the majority of member states in 90% of all votes. That strongly suggests that most European Commission proposals go through in practice. Therefore, the change in the voting system will tend to affect British interests increasingly adversely.

Professor Roland Vaubel of Mannheim university has examined the voting system and argued that the outcome is one of regulatory collusion, favouring Germany in particular. One must recognise that Germany makes a very substantial net contribution—£13 billion in 2013 compared with our £8.6 billion, although our contribution is rising. In return, Germany now acquires disproportionate advantages under the voting system and through its economic influence in Mitteleuropa.

In his speech in Berlin on 13 November, John Major reinvoked the concept of subsidiarity and he did so again on “The Andrew Marr Show” on Sunday. He said that subsidiarity is the answer and that we must

“nail it down as a matter of European law”.

I do not know which planet John Major has been living on since Maastricht, but that is already a matter of EU law. When he promoted subsidiarity in the Maastricht treaty, I described it as a con trick. In my 30 years on the European Scrutiny Committee, I have never come across a single example of the direct application of subsidiarity. Even John Major now reports its failure, and his speech in Berlin was a catalogue of the failures of his European policy at Maastricht.

The European Union is not an abstract concept. It is about the daily lives of our voters, to whom we are directly accountable, across a vast range of matters. The list of chapters in the consolidated treaties sets out the immense impact that the European Union now has on us all.

The European Scrutiny Committee, of which I was elected Chairman in 2010, argued strongly and unanimously in November 2013 that the Government should reintroduce the veto. We were promised that the veto would never be abandoned when the White Paper was issued in 1971; that was the basis of our voluntary acceptance of the treaties by our Parliament in the passing of the European Communities Act 1972, yet so many other additional competences have been added since. That paper described the veto as being in our vital national interest, and stated that to abandon it would even endanger “the very fabric” of the European Community itself. Somebody out there understood where all this could lead, as it has.

The Prime Minister, to his credit, did veto the fiscal compact, although my right hon. Friend the Member for Wokingham (Mr Redwood) will remember a conversation that we had with him shortly beforehand. My Committee proposed the application of the formula

“notwithstanding the European Communities Act 1972”

to our Westminster legislation when it is in our national interest to do so. We could thereby override European laws and the European Court of Justice when necessary, as we can and should, under our own flexible constitutional arrangements unique to the United Kingdom among the 28 member states, thus regaining our right to govern ourselves in matters of vital national interest.

Those proposals were rejected by the Government, which shows how weak our negotiating stance really is in relation to the need to change fundamentally our relationship with the EU in the interests of our parliamentary democracy and the needs of our voters.

[Dr Julian Lewis (New Forest East) (Con)]

Am I right in thinking that my hon. Friend has referred to the fact that Germany—the country on which this debate is focused—has a sort of parliamentary supremacy as a safeguard in its legislation, and that that is what he has tried to introduce for the United Kingdom? Can he tell us how well it works for Germany?

[Sir William Cash]

The short answer is that in the German constitution, in the preamble to the Basic Law of 1949, an assumption is built in for a united states of Europe. Unfortunately, therefore, a change in the German constitution would be required to enable the Karlsruhe court to override the provisions of the Basic Law. Therefore, Germany faces a real constitutional question that we do not, because we do not have a written constitution and we have the inherent right, within our own Parliament, to make the kind of adjustments that we want in this area.

To refuse to accept our Committee’s proposals—I say this with great respect to the Minister—is not merely walking away; it is not even engaging with the real problem, which is the dysfunctional structure created by successive treaties and the disadvantages that that creates for the United Kingdom.

All that demands a direct return to democratic accountability at Westminster—not the Maastricht-based co-decision with the European Parliament, which I opposed at the time, and not the manner in which the majority voting system and the so-called consensus have led to us being put at significant disadvantage from time to time in matters of our national interest. Those are increasingly becoming a matter of concern following the change in the voting system as of 1 November.

[Mark Field]

Does my hon. Friend not accept that many in continental Europe would say that Britain has a permanent exclusion from the single currency, is not signed up to the Schengen agreement, and in fact, under Maastricht, was also exempt from the social chapter, although that exemption has now gone? He talked about the fiscal compact, which technically speaking was not a veto, but essentially was done at eurozone level.

If we are going to continue to opt out, does my hon. Friend not recognise the concern that, as we become ever more marginalised from the centre of Europe, the case for staying in the European Union will become ever weaker? Is that the path down which he now wishes to take us, and if so—

[John Robertson (in the Chair)]

Order. The hon. Gentleman will have the chance to make a speech later.

[Sir William Cash]

I have said many times on the Floor of the House that I think we have reached the point where we will have to leave the treaties, for all the reasons that I have given and will give. The opt-outs are merely indications of the profound uncertainty with which Britain entered the European Union in the first place. As I pointed out, the veto was a completely unconditional promise for the future, and that has now been whittled away. As I will explain, there are more and more reasons why we are at the exit door. Those are not purely economic, but political.

The European project, based on Maastricht and the successive treaties, has undermined the credibility and efficacy of European integration. That is now reinforced by the practical and visible impact of endemic protests and riots in the streets of European cities and by vast unemployment in several member states, in which youth unemployment has reached obscene levels of up to 60%. I predicted that when I wrote about it in the early 1990s, and I added that it would be followed by massive waves of immigration from central and eastern Europe when the Maastricht system failed, with the consequent emergence of the far right. No one can say that that has not happened now.

[Mr John Redwood (Wokingham) (Con)]

Does my hon. Friend agree that the Germans’ problem now is that to make a success of their single currency, they need a political union with massive transfers of money from the rich parts to the poor parts of the union, as we have in the sterling currency union or as exists in the dollar currency union, but that is exactly the kind of system that the United Kingdom would never accept, and that is why, at the crossroads, we need a different relationship?

[Sir William Cash]

That is completely right. We need a different relationship with the EU as a whole that also includes the eurozone, because the eurozone, which is causing so much of the dislocation in Europe, is dominated by Germany, and the German financial and fiscal policies, which I have described already, have that enormous impact in destabilising the eurozone.

This is where I really part company with statements made by some members—senior members—of our Government. I am referring to the consequences of the eurozone. We were told at the time when it was evolving, with the banking union and all the rest of it, that it was, in effect, a natural course of events that we could not prevent. Actually, it has created the very instability that is most likely to lead to the destruction of the European Union itself. That is the problem. It is not just a negative view that I am trying to put across; it is the fact that it is destabilising Europe. It is creating problems of a kind that can get completely out of control, with catastrophic consequences not only for this country but for Europe as a whole. That is why the argument that I am seeking to advance is that actually this is a real problem for Europe as a whole. It is not anti-European to be pro-democracy.

[Mr Jim Cunningham]

It was remiss of me not to congratulate the hon. Gentleman on acquiring the debate. I know the views that he has held over many years. My point is this. During the last economic downturn, the Germans, for example, did not dictate British economic policy; it may be argued that British economic policy was dictated to Europe. I do not see the hon. Gentleman’s logic. If he feels that the European market as it is constructed now is causing major problems in Europe, why should we pull out of that situation, rather than rebalancing Europe? That is what I do not understand about the argument that he is making.

[Sir William Cash]

The short answer to that is that we do not need to be in the European Union to trade with Europe, because it needs us—for example, in relation to Germany’s export of cars—on a monumental scale. I have already given the figures for the surplus that Germany runs with the other 27 member states. Furthermore, we have a global economy to which we can address our economic and trading concerns, and we are achieving a substantial surplus with the rest of the world, selling the same goods and services. What I am arguing is on the balance of judgment as to whether it is in our interest to subordinate our parliamentary system of government and the democracy that goes with it in order to achieve a trading relationship that at best is extremely debatable and, in certain instances, is positively disadvantageous.

Let me turn to the issue of defence, which is so fundamental to our national interest. Unlike John Cleese’s immortal words in “Fawlty Towers”, “Don’t mention the war”, we must never forget the reasons why we were confronted in two successive world wars by unprovoked aggression from Germany. We must look to the greater historic landscape in our mutual interests and we must look to resolve our real differences about the structure as well as individual issues within the EU.

Ten days ago, at a formal conference in Rome under the Lisbon treaty, comprising chairmen of national parliamentary committees for all 28 member states and the European Parliament, the German delegation formally proposed a defence Commissioner and a defence Council of Ministers and reinvoked the idea of an EU military headquarters. As Chairman of the European Scrutiny Committee, I argued passionately against that, as did the right hon. Member for Gordon (Sir Malcolm Bruce) and the hon. Member for Ilford South (Mike Gapes), the former Chairman of the Select Committee on Foreign Affairs. The British delegation defeated the proposal, but the German delegation insisted that

“it will have to be put back on the agenda at the next conference”

and added ominously that

“Great Britain will simply not be able to maintain their line”.

That harks back to previous German attempts to establish a European defence policy with majority voting and must be repudiated once and for all.

[Sir Gerald Howarth (Aldershot) (Con)]

My hon. Friend is making a very important point because, as he knows, defence is the only area of European activity—I will not call it policy—where the United Kingdom still has a veto, a veto that I twice used to prevent any increase in the budget of the European Defence Agency. But is he also aware that the former Foreign Secretary, our right hon. Friend the Member for Richmond (Yorks) (Mr Hague), and I, at the Foreign Affairs Council meeting, vetoed the idea of an operational headquarters for the EU, because it would have served further to undermine the cornerstone of European defence, which is the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation? We must resist any further attempt by the Germans, the Poles or the French to create a defence identity within the EU.

[Sir William Cash]

We are all indebted to my hon. Friend for his time in the Ministry of Defence. What he said is well known to me, but ought to be better known outside the House. This is crucial. The question, whether we have an EU military headquarters moves us into very dangerous territory. I will show my hon. Friend the full transcript of the exchanges between me and the German delegation on this matter. I do not have time to go into it now, but I can assure him that I set out some very powerful arguments, including by making reference to article III of the 1990 treaty, which dealt with the question of the restrictions on Germany in relation to the manufacture and distribution of nuclear weapons, which went back to the original NATO treaty of 1949. Also, of course, I mentioned in particular the role of NATO in relation, for example, to the Baltic states and the rest of it. NATO is there; it is the cornerstone, as my hon. Friend rightly says.

[Mark Field]

I very much agree with what my hon. Friend has said and with the intervention by our hon. Friend the Member for Aldershot (Sir Gerald Howarth), but does he not think that we would be greatly assisted in making the case for ensuring that there is no change in the European defence mechanism if we honoured our own commitments to ensure that at least 2% of our GDP is spent on defence and, given the insecurities of this world, rather more in the years to come?

[Sir William Cash]

I very much agree with that. Of course, there is this wave of counter-cyclical agreement and disagreement between my hon. Friend and me. Actually, that is encapsulated in a personal matter. We were, through our respective families, involved in the battles in Normandy, which I will not go into now, but which he knows about and I know about and which were extremely poignant and extremely relevant to what went on at that time.

[Mark Field]

My hon. Friend is far too modest to go into great detail or perhaps did not want to embarrass me, but I should point out that although his father served in the British Army, my great-uncle was serving in the Panzer regiment for the opposite side during that particular battle.

[Sir William Cash]

That was on 10 July 1944. My father got the military cross, and my hon. Friend’s great-uncle was on the other side, but there we are.

We must also—this is very delicate territory—remain clear that the United States, which has for more than 50 years impressed on the United Kingdom the importance of a more integrated Europe, must not be allowed to persuade us against our national interest in relation to the question of defence. However, this is not by any means only about defence. As I have explained, it is also about our economy and our trading relationships, which are punctuated by constant tensions embedded in our European relationship that, to a greater or lesser degree, are based on our alleged obligations under European law.

Most recently there was the budget surcharge issue, but there are also disputed areas of policy such as the European arrest warrant and, of course, the current wave of concern over immigration and freedom of movement, on which we are warned against infringing European law and on which we had very interesting exchanges with the Bundestag’s European affairs committee yesterday. It takes the view that one has to distinguish between workers and people, and that it is our fault that we have ended up where we are now, but as the shadow Minister, the right hon. Member for Wolverhampton South East (Mr McFadden), heard me say last night, of course we believe that that was the consequence of decisions taken by the former Labour Government. But there we are.

It must be said, however, that the European rule of law is itself a moveable feast at the whim of certain states. For example, in 2003, Germany and France themselves broke the stability and growth pact with impunity when it suited them. We are currently reminded by a proliferation of articles and books about the collapse of the Berlin wall that the German question, and its embodiment in European and our own and their political history, remains a constant national interest. In fact, very rarely do we talk about Germany in this country, but in Germany and in France they talk about it almost incessantly. Indeed, I recall taking part in a debate on the future of Europe in the then dilapidated Reichstag when the Berlin wall was still up, and putting my hand against the wall itself, and I recall a member of the German delegation vigorously waving his arms as I heard him through the Bakelite headphones vociferously remonstrating that, as he put it,

“my heart and soul rages with fervour and passion at the thought of a single government and a single parliament in this Reichstag.”

I warned the meeting that such language would merely rekindle old tensions—and that was before the wall came down.

As Peter Watson, who rightly reminds us in his book “The German Genius” about the great contribution of Germany to industry and art, said in a book review last week,

“no one has yet succeeded in explaining the collapse into barbarism that followed the First World War.”

I would add that nor has sufficient attention been given to the question of how to deal with a European Union—created to avoid everything that had happened in the aftermath of the first and second world wars—dominated, as it now is, by a peaceful but assertive Germany, based on a framework delivering supposedly irreversible policies that have delivered instability throughout Europe and vitally affected our own economy, our national interest and Westminster democratic accountability. Insufficient attention has been given to how we deal with that problem, and it is not just for us but for all the European member states, and Germany in particular.

Furthermore, far from containing German domination of the EU, the treaties have stimulated it. For all the protestations, the European Union has morphed into an increasingly undemocratic Europe, with Britain unacceptably relegated to the second tier and with Germany largely predominant over the whole, as well as the low-growth eurozone.

The Prime Minister was entirely right to state in his Bloomberg speech:

“Our national Parliament is the root of our democracy.”

We must address the question of a fundamental change in our relationship with the EU and the reassertion of sovereignty at Westminster and in our democracy. Those are the reasons why we were able to prevail in the dark days from 1940 to 1945, and we must not underestimate their importance today. Now we must do so again on those principles, but in very different circumstances. It is not enough merely to reform at the margins. We must resolve the European, and therefore the German, question in our own time. If negotiations for that purpose, above all else, cannot be resolved, we must leave the treaties and lead Europe on the right road to stability and peace, both for ourselves and for Europe—including Germany—as a whole. We must be, as Churchill said, “associated, but not absorbed.” For that purpose, we must pursue a policy of an association of nation states.

The Prime Minister’s purported renegotiations do not, at present, tackle the fundamental structural question of the treaties. The Foreign Secretary is right to indicate that we must never go into a negotiation unless we are prepared to get up from the table and walk away, but it is essential that we are told what our red lines are, and that they address the fundamental changes that we need within the EU. Immigration is, of course, a major issue, but the question of our borders is not simply a question of immigration. It is a question of parliamentary democracy and jurisdiction, and therefore it is about more than the symptoms of our problems with European integration and its impact on our entire political and economic national interest. Trade alone is not the arbiter of freedom and democracy; it flows from them, as do the laws that affect our economy and that have been so disadvantageous to us, as I have indicated already, in many areas.

The renegotiations cannot be successful in our national interest without a fundamental change in the architecture of the European Union. If we do not renegotiate and achieve such fundamental change, Germany’s predominance in the project will increase and the United Kingdom will be required to leave the EU. We must not be continually subjected and subordinated to being in the second tier of a two-tier Europe.

We are now at an historic moment at the crossroads of the European Union, which can be evaluated only on a broad historical landscape. I voted yes in 1975, and I attempted to reserve our Westminster sovereignty in the Single European Act in 1986. Maastricht and European Government changed all that. Britain and Germany have historically had, and still have, very different visions of Europe. We look to our borders, and Germany looks towards a broad, roaming European vision—a political union without borders.

Not so long ago, I referred in the book I mentioned, “Against a Federal Europe”, to Hans-Dietrich Genscher, who was Foreign Minister of Germany for 15 years and was one of the most powerful architects of reunification and the current European Union. Although he repudiated his former loyalties, Genscher stated:

“We Germans can be the architects of a united and indivisible Europe”

and that a strong Germany was good for Europe. In my analysis in 1999, from which I do not demur, I said that the assertion of a strong Germany being good for Europe

“begs many questions. Germany’s economic strength derives from the fact that she saturates the EC”—

as it was then—

“and Eastern Europe with her exports; if as seems likely, she consolidates this position via the single market, while gaining de facto control of the single currency, one could well envisage a scenario in which a strong Germany was bad for Europe. If industries in other countries were weakened or depleted by German domination and if the single currency removed the competitiveness of weaker economies, while the social charter…insulated German workers from competitively low wages abroad, then one could well imagine economic decline and rising unemployment on the periphery of the EC financing the German stranglehold.”

Who would argue today that that has not happened? I noted that at the 25th anniversary of the collapse of the Berlin wall, when Dr Michael Stürmer was asked on “Newsnight” how Germany had achieved such predominance, he indicated that it was “by default”. I reserve judgement on that.

Furthermore, we are not simply talking about Germany’s economic impact on other member states, whatever subsidies or defensive alliance through NATO they may receive in return. As I have said, the preamble to the German Basic Law of 1949 includes a policy leading to a United States of Europe as one of the constitutional foreign policy goals of Germany. As all those factors have aggregated, it has become ever more important for the United Kingdom to look to its own future. To that we must turn our determined attention, while seeking peaceful co-operation and trading relationships within Europe and with Germany. There will be no peace in an unstable Europe, which will implode with disastrous consequences. Such instability is inherent in the imbalanced structure of the whole, not only of the eurozone. We all want peace in Europe, but to ensure such peace we must restructure the treaties, not simply tinker with them.

We must clearly put this to Germany and the EU as a whole. The United Kingdom cannot and must not allow our democracy, in this Parliament, from which all political and economic action flows and which has saved Europe and herself for generations, to be in any way compromised. As William Pitt stated in his Guildhall speech in 1805:

“England has saved herself by her exertions and will, as I trust, save Europe by her example.”

[Several hon. Members]

rose—

--- Later in debate ---

[The Minister for Europe (Mr David Lidington)]

Mr Robertson, I welcome you to the Chair this afternoon. I also welcome the right hon. Member for Wolverhampton South East (Mr McFadden) to his first outing in Westminster Hall with his new responsibilities. In addition, I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Stone (Sir William Cash) on securing the debate. He and I have been discussing these issues for about 25 years—

[Sir William Cash]

Since 1990.

[Mr Lidington]

“Since 1990,” my hon. Friend reminds me. And as I will make clear in my remarks, there are some things that we agree upon and other things where there are perhaps some divergences in our respective approaches.

I will start with those areas on which I can find ready agreement with what my hon. Friend said in his opening remarks. I agree with him and other hon. Members when they say that the current levels of unemployment and low growth in Europe are a scandal and a cause of human misery, as well as an important cause of the widespread public discontent and anxiety that we see right across the continent. I also agree with those who have argued today that those economic challenges need to be addressed by a vigorous programme, primarily of supply-side reform, at both national and European level, focusing on the liberalisation of markets, especially in services, on deregulation and on embracing the opportunities offered by free trade. Those economic reforms are right not only for the UK but for Europe as a whole. I also say to hon. Members, frankly, that whether this country were in or out of the EU, endemic low growth and high unemployment in the rest of Europe are very bad news for businesses in this country, given the high proportion of our trade that is done with other EU companies and member states.

I agreed with what my right hon. Friend the Member for Wokingham (Mr Redwood) said when he expressed relief that this country had decided not to take part in the euro. I agree that that would not have been in this country’s interests and I continue to believe that it is not a project that it is in our interests to take part in.

I also agree that for those partners that have committed themselves to membership of the euro, the logic of a single currency and a single monetary policy must be for closer integration of economic and fiscal policy decisions, and in turn for there to be political arrangements to hold such decisions accountable. One of the central political questions for the EU in the years to come—the next decade or so—will be whether we can construct arrangements within Europe that permit those who have committed themselves to a single currency to integrate more closely, while genuinely respecting, and in full, the rights of those who choose to remain outside the euro. That also means ensuring that the EU, in both its rules and its working culture, guards against the kind of caucusing that my hon. Friend the Member for Stone warned us might be a possibility—a caucus among eurozone countries, effectively to write the rules for everybody else regardless of others’ interests or views.

I also agree with the case for more wide-reaching political reform at European level. The EU is too centralised, and is often too bossy. As the hon. Member for Strangford (Jim Shannon) said, we need to have an EU that shows greater flexibility and that is better able to accommodate the diversity that is needed among the 28 member states that there now are, rather than the six member states the EU started with.

There was some discussion about defence. I agree with those who argued that it is NATO and not the EU that is, and should remain, the key alliance for the maintenance of the security of this country and of Europe as a whole. As my hon. Friend the Member for Aldershot (Sir Gerald Howarth) said in an intervention, we still have a veto in regard to Europe’s common security and defence arrangements and we have exercised that veto in the way that he described.

Ukraine

William Cash Excerpts

Monday 28th April 2014 Commons Chamber

[Mr Hague]

The hon. Gentleman makes a good case for that. We have those more far-reaching sanctions in preparation. It is very important to keep like-minded countries together on this—that is a major consideration for us. That means the whole of the European Union and G7 acting together. It is certainly the majority consensus opinion that targeted sanctions—followed later, if necessary, by the more far-reaching measures—is the way to do this. Hon. Members on both sides of the House have advocated taking more far-reaching measures now, but I think on balance it is right to stick to the calibrated approach that I advocate and that the right hon. Member for Coventry North East (Mr Ainsworth) has commented on. It makes it clear to Russia that such measures will follow a further serious escalation of this crisis.

[Mr William Cash (Stone) (Con)]

Does the end game of the Foreign Secretary and the European Union include the requirement on Russia to disgorge Crimea, given the arrangements under the association agreement that were agreed in the conclusions of the EU summit a few weeks ago?

[Mr Hague]

The association agreement and any other actions or documents of the United Kingdom and the European Union are not going to recognise the annexation of Crimea. It cannot be accepted internationally. That is why we are also looking in Europe at the economic measures we are going to apply to Crimea in its current condition, annexed by Russia. The only agreement we have with Russia on these matters is the Geneva agreement, which relates to de-escalating tensions in Ukraine. That is what the international community has come together to require.

Ukraine

William Cash Excerpts

Tuesday 4th March 2014 Commons Chamber

[Mr Hague]

We are working on two things in the OSCE, and I mentioned that urgent consultations are taking place in Vienna. One is the deployment of monitors to try to avoid the flashpoint we have been talking about. So far, Russia is refusing to accept such monitors in Crimea, but perhaps we can do more in other parts of Ukraine. We are also working on the creation of a contact group to try to open a new diplomatic channel and a forum for Russia and Ukraine to discuss things together. So far, Russia has not accepted that idea either, but we are continuing to pursue both ideas.

[Mr William Cash (Stone) (Con)]

Given what the Foreign Secretary said about his recognition of the sensibilities of Russia in this situation, does he recognise that the EU’s ambitions for the Eastern Partnership and the association agreement over the past 18 months have borne some responsibility for the relationship between Russia and Ukraine? That is especially so given, for example, the express views of an EU diplomat last November, who stated—even threatened—that the Ukrainian leadership would have to come to the EU on their knees if they did not do what the EU wanted.

[Mr Hague]

We are talking about an association agreement that remains on the table between the EU and Ukraine, and a deep and comprehensive free-trade area. That is similar to something that Ukraine would willingly enter into. There is no requirement from the EU that it does that, and it is a very different thing from EU membership. It was being discussed with the Yanukovych Administration, because they wanted to discuss it with the European Union. I assure my hon. Friend that from everything I have seen in Ukraine, having been there on Sunday and Monday, there is strong political unity in that country that welcomes seeing the back of President Yanukovych, and that wants to enter into closer association with the European Union. That is its sovereign right and decision, and we should be prepared to defend its right to make those decisions.