European Union Bill

There is a lot with which I agree in what the noble Lord, Lord Wallace of Saltaire, has said. I agree with the basic analysis: that the question is of how the powers of the Union, as granted by the Lisbon treaty, should be used. What the noble Lord glosses over in his defence, as it were, of the Government is that the Lisbon treaty covers much of the ground that we need to cover but this Bill is designed to cramp the flexibility that it contains. That is the fundamental issue which noble Lords from around the House are trying to address. We are saying: ““Look, we're not asking for a mandate for vast new powers for the European Union. That isn't what the argument is about””. We are saying: ““The Lisbon treaty? Fine—but there is flexibility within it. Why are the Government ruling out using that flexibility where we, as the United Kingdom, think that it is in our national interest and where the British Government support it?””. Those are the conditions which would have to be met. I am not a great expert on the European Court of Justice, unlike other noble Lords who may be in the Chamber. However, in its analysis of that Court your Lordships’ own committee, under the noble Lord, Lord Bowness, pointed to the possibility of the need for some change in the treaty. We ought to be open to that possibility and to a little bit of give on this kind of thing. If the Bill is to have a less troublesome Report stage than it looks as if it might otherwise have, the Government have to find a way of accommodating the view that we need more flexibility on some of these more detailed provisions.