European Union (Withdrawal) Bill — House of Commons, 2018-01-17
Topic: International Affairs
Kenneth Clarke (Conservative, Centre-right): I entirely agree with my right hon. Friend on that. One extraordinary thing about the division of opinion is that I have never known it to be so much on generational lines. There are some zealot young leavers and there are one or two, like me, old fogey, very sound remainers, but otherwise the public have not usually been divided so fiercely on generational grounds. In my limited experience—I do spend a lot of time in London’s House of Commons—I would have thought places such as Richmond and Putney would underline that very heavily. My experience of young, ambitious, professional business and other people in London has been that for the first time in my life I have had complete strangers from that category walk up to me in the streets just to thank me for taking part in this campaign. [Interruption.] I see that other Members have exactly the same experience. I am sure the silent people who walk by deplore my views, but this just brings home to me how divided the nation is and, curiously, it is on generational grounds. Therefore, unless something happens, the pro-remain sentiment is likely to increase as a proportion of the country as we go on. But if we leave and are then forced by events to start going back again, I cannot think of a more chaotic situation. That is why we need the information to make a proper assessment when eventually the Government, as they will have to and are entitled to, come back to this House to present the proposed deal—not a deal they have already done and signed up to—for approval The Government have vast amounts of material on this subject and vast access to resources, and they have no reason for excluding the House of Commons totally. I am talking not about their negotiating position, because of course they will exclude us from that, but about the basis of the objective, independent advice they have received. That is why I thought it was wise for the House of Commons to pass the motion, which the Government allowed it to do, asking them to produce papers, after Ministers had rightly said that there were all these impact assessments and so on. I bow to the Select Committee, to which we rightly transferred responsibility for looking at that and considering the matter, but I agree with the intervention I took from the hon. Member for Glenrothes The Government escaped from that position by suddenly taking the most narrow interpretation of the words "impact assessment". Apparently, civil servants, who are always capable of coming up with helpful advice, said, "Strictly speaking, Minister, in Whitehall, ‘impact assessment’ means this." That is not quite how we set it out, so that was refused. Then this was all edited, probably with large parts of it rewritten. What we do not have is what we undoubtedly require: an impact assessment, by whatever description, using the advice that comes to the Government from the Treasury, the central Bank, the Office for Budget Responsibility and any consultants they have taken in, of the basis on which this deal is being proposed and what the best advice they can obtain about its impact is. I am astonished that we have got so far into the proceedings and the debate on our future relationships with Europe and we still do not seem to be any nearer to persuading the Government ever to divulge any of this. I do not think we should wait for the 20-year or 30-year rule before we are allowed to see on what basis the Government were proceeding. As I began by saying, I agree with new clause 17 that we should specify that proper, full information is shared by the Government with this House before they come for our approval.