European Union (Withdrawal Agreement) Bill — House of Lords, 2020-01-16
Topic: Immigration
Robin Teverson (Liberal Democrats, Centre to centre-left): My Lords, I very much support Amendment 37, tabled by my noble friends, but I want to talk to Amendment 44, which is in my name and in this group. It concerns retaining European citizenship for UK nationals. I do not expect this provision to appear in the final version of the Bill when it becomes an Act, as in a way this is a probing amendment, but it is of huge importance and something that many people feel strongly about I remind the House of the privileges that come with European citizenship. We know about the freedom of movement, which is often discussed, but there is also the freedom to establish a business. There is the freedom to carry on your education in the whole of the European Union, and there is the freedom of being able to buy property without permit within the European Union. On the health side, we have our European health cards. We also have consular protection from other EU member states, should we need it. We have visa-free travel in 153 other nations. We have no customs queues as we come into the then-to-be 27 member states and, of course, we have voting rights in a number of elections. Those are fundamental rights that we have had as European citizens and that we will lose as UK citizens once we leave the European Union, which we will do on 31 January By an accident of birth in the 19th century, I am able to retain my European citizenship, as I think a number of Members of the House are through various other historic reasons. But that ability is entirely random and not available to the vast majority of our citizens who wish to do that. I recognise entirely, as the constitutionalists will say, that it is generally agreed that it would require a treaty change for full European citizenship to be bestowed upon UK citizens once we are a third country. However, there are perhaps alternatives to that, such as associate citizenship, and there is a will among certain European institutions to allow it or to find a way for it to move forward over time, once we have left I thank the Government in that, when I have raised this in the past, they have been very open and said, "It’s not within our power as such, but if that offer came to the United Kingdom then we would not necessarily shy away from it". I congratulate the Government on that quite brave statement, and I hope that they will continue to have that attitude in future. I also think, perhaps strangely and counterintuitively, that if a way were to be found for some form of associate citizenship, it could be one way in which the country could come back together again, because it would clearly not be compulsory. Those who do not want their European citizenship—I recognise that, for many years, many people have treated that status with disdain and have said they do not want it—can keep that "non-citizenship". Only those who want to volunteer for this citizen status need take up the offer This is perhaps a way forward; it is one method by which the country could come together, so that people feel that they have not lost all of those rights that are so important to them. Yet those people who feel strongly, and who were the majority in the referendum who wanted to exit their citizenship, will indeed still be in that position. I would like to hear from the Minister that this is something on which the Government will keep their mind open, should such an approach ever come from the European institutions—many of us may continue to encourage that.