European Union Bill

My Lords, is that not one of the disadvantages of this amendment? It does nothing to prevent competence creep. If the noble Lord does not agree with that, would he care to comment on the remarks made by the noble Lord, Lord Waddington, earlier this evening and indeed by myself about the way the European Court of Justice has permitted and supported the abuse of Article 308 of the treaty of Nice, as it then was, which allowed Brussels to get involved only, "““in the course of the operation of the common market””." That was the wording in the original treaty, which lasted right through until Lisbon when it was strengthened in the Court’s favour. The noble Lord, Lord Waddington, mentioned aid to Outer Mongolia as being justified by the Court in this matter. There was urban renewal in Northern Ireland, the co-ordination of our social security systems—quite a big one that—the prevention and aftercare of terrorism, establishing the EU’s agency for fundamental rights and a £235 million ““information campaign””, which to those of us who understand these things is of course propaganda. The European Court has been able to abuse the treaties in these ways and there are many other clauses such as flexibility clauses which the European Union has abused. Indeed, in 1996 when the use of Article 308 was taken to the Luxembourg Court, in its judgment the Court said that the point of this article was to pursue the interests of the Union. In its judgment it did not mention the first words of the clause: "““If in the course of the operation of the common market””." I really do not see how this amendment is going to do anything to stand up to that sort of behaviour. There is no appeal against the judgments of this so-called Court, the quality of whose judges, I repeat and I am not trying to be amusing, is extremely low and unacceptable. I really do not see why we should have anything in this Bill which enforces the powers of this particular creation. As the noble Lord said when he introduced his remarks, those of us of a Eurosceptic bent would rather they had nothing to do with us or our law at all.