European Union (Withdrawal) (No. 5) Bill

I have the greatest respect for my noble friend. He is of course right that that was the founding vision of the European Union, and that has been its great justification. However, I put it to him that today’s European Union is not an agent for peace and social harmony. If he looks at the levels of unemployment across the Mediterranean countries, the rise of neo-fascism in eastern Europe and the palpable tensions and indeed hostilities within the European Union, I fear that the model that attracted his idealism is no longer the European Union we have today.