EU Withdrawal

My Lords, we all have our historical memories and interpretations of history. In 1990-91, I spent a lot of time in the transforming societies of eastern Europe—Poland, Hungary, Romania, et cetera. The first thing that their new Governments wanted to know was how soon they could join the European Community. It was partly the attraction of the European Community which had led those Governments, including that of Hungary—who were a good, progressive Government in those days—to believe that reform was possible. My participation in this was different from that of the noble Baroness, and I saw something rather different too.