Europe: Renegotiation — House of Lords, 2015-11-10
Topic: International Affairs
Julie Smith (Liberal Democrats, Centre to centre-left): My Lords, like the noble Baroness, Lady Morgan, I welcome the Statement. I also had the good fortune—I think—to have been at the speech this morning. Having also read the letter, I feel as if I have read and seen the same thing three times, so at least there is consistency in the letter that, finally, we have seen. Members of your Lordships’ House called at Second Reading of the European Union Referendum Bill to see the letter at the same time that it was sent to President Tusk, so that is clearly very welcome There is probably nothing terribly surprising in the letter. When I was in Brussels at the end of September, people were saying, "Where is the letter? What does the Prime Minister want?". Fellow leaders and members of the permanent representations in Brussels were told, "Look at the Bloomberg speech; look at the Conservative Party manifesto". The Prime Minister was certainly very keen this morning to keep sending us back to his Bloomberg speech, as many of the issues that he raised in January 2013 have reappeared in the letter. Many of them appear to be very sensible: non-discrimination against non-eurozone countries is something that everyone in this country can welcome. The idea that the Prime Minister and the United Kingdom generally accept that there should not be a unilateral request for changes for the UK but that whatever we negotiate should benefit the European Union as a whole is clearly welcome. Several of the areas covered seem to be straightforward, and Liberal Democrats would not object to the requests or the issues for negotiation in terms of economic governance or competitiveness. Indeed, competitiveness and the digital single market are areas where we are already seeing progress on reform, even before we get to more formal renegotiation On the sovereignty side of things, although some of us might still quite like to be committed to ever-closer union, we recognise that the issue is totemic for some. However, for some of the Eurosceptics in another place, that already seems to be a bit of a problem in that they seem to think it does not really matter. One omission seems to be proportionality. There is a reference to subsidiarity, but can the Minister say whether the Government will also look at the issue of proportionality, which links with wider questions about the role of national parliaments Finally, there are questions on immigration and fairness of the system. Nobody favours abuse of the system, but can the noble Earl tell us what sort of abuses the Government seek to rectify? Can he clarify how the Government propose to address ECJ judgments that have widened the scope of free movement? I understand that he cannot get into the technicalities of negotiation, but from listening to the Prime Minister this morning and hearing the Statement, it is not wholly clear what is meant there I, along with other Liberal Democrats, very much look forward to campaigning with the Prime Minister to keep Britain in the European Union—which, if this renegotiation is satisfactory, I believe that he will be doing, and I hope that the noble Earl will be joining us.