European Union Bill

I was tempted to do so, but I shall resist. My frustration, after 17 years in the House, is that we still do not know how to discuss the EU. We are still frightened of going to the national capitals of Europe. Much of the information that the Bill calls for can be found if hon. Members are prepared to take the time to meet opposite numbers of all parties—the European debaters and deciders in the Bundestag, the Assemblée Nationale or wherever. Hon. Members could also easily find things out from civil servants in Brussels. Most of the information is available if they are prepared to take the time to find it. Our own negotiating functionaries, to whose extraordinary qualities I pay tribute, would be quite happy to discuss with Committees of this House what they do, but we have reduced European matters to adversarial, in-or-out, horrors-of-Brussels debates and all the drivel that one can read in the Daily Mail and similar papers, instead of accepting that we are in the EU and, as the Prime Minister has made very clear, that we are not leaving. The EU will come forward with new proposals, some of which will be tricky and some of which we will advance, and it would be much better if we could have a mature dialogue with other national parliamentarians. There are 9,700 national parliamentarians and 700 MEPs. We overreact to what the latter say, and ignore the need to connect to the national Parliaments and parliamentarians of Europe to debate decisions. That would mean a revolution in how we do business. Frankly, the Labour Government failed miserably in improving the quality of oversight and debate on EU decision making. I could publish some of the papers I wrote—if they are not locked away under some 30-year rule—to call for some of the measures that we are discussing. I wish the Minister and his team well in changing how we do EU business. The new clause is not the way forward, and I hope the motion is withdrawn after the debate, but it represents, and is a symptom of, a deep malaise in our nation and of the distrust of Europe that many people feel. I understand that fully, but I insist that parliamentarians can put it right. Hurling insults at the EU will never achieve that.