I thank the hon. Gentleman for his intervention.
On the question of EU citizens, there is a very good organisation called New Europeans. I was privileged to be involved when it launched exactly two years ago on 18 June 2013 in the Boothroyd Room. I spoke at the launch. It brings together EU citizens living in the UK. New Europeans has just sent to the Prime Minister a letter signed by a large number of people. I will not list them all, but Nishan Dzhingozyan from Bulgaria, Monika Tlacyt from Poland, Anastasios Vourexakis from Greece and Dean Domitrovic from Croatia were the four main signatories. It was signed by a representative of each of the other EU countries resident in the UK. These are people who are paying taxes, studying, working and living here. Many of them have children born here.
In my recent general election campaign, I met a couple on the street: he was British, she was French. She has been living in this country for many years, and they have children at a school in my constituency. In the referendum, however, one of them will have a vote and the other will not. We have the interesting scenario whereby Commonwealth citizens can vote. A person from Jamaica can vote in the referendum. A person from India or Bangladesh can vote in it. However, someone from Italy or Spain who may have lived in the United Kingdom for longer than people from those other European countries that I mentioned cannot vote.
1 pm
During the general election campaign, a man stopped me in the street and said, “I am not sure whether I can vote.” I asked, “What is your nationality?” He said, “I am an Italian citizen.” I said, “In that case, you will not be able to vote in this election.” He then said, “I am originally from Bangladesh, and I have dual citizenship.” I told him, “Well, in that case you can vote.” But if that man had been a Somali with Italian citizenship, he would not have been able to vote. Someone in a similar position who had come to this country in similar circumstances, as a migrant or an asylum seeker, with the nationality of another European Union state such as Sweden or the Netherlands, could not vote, but if that person had come from a Commonwealth country in such circumstances, he could vote. It is an absurdity.