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European Communities (Finance) Bill

Given that those on the Front Benches effectively made their Third Reading speeches in the debate on clause 1 stand part, we do not need to repeat them at great length. I shall simply describe myself as a leading light in the ““better off in”” group. The Liberal Democrats have no embarrassment in describing ourselves as pro-European. We support British membership and constructive engagement, and we have criticised the present Prime Minister for not being constructive enough. We support enlargement and the financial adjustments necessary to make enlargement possible and to support the weaker countries in eastern Europe. We have no problem with any of that. We also believe, however, that it is possible to hold those views while simultaneously believing that the British Government should be tough in defending British interests and British financial interests. Countries that have been in the European Union since its inception, including the Netherlands and France, have Governments who take a very tough line on budgetary matters, and there is no reason whatever why British Governments should not do the same. We also believe that the British Government have a particular mission and an obligation to pursue rapid reform of the common agricultural policy, which is damaging to British and European taxpayers and consumers and to the world trade system. They should be tough on those issues. Our criticism of the Government is that, in these negotiations under the previous Prime Minister, they were weak and made an unacceptable deal. That is why we intend to vote tonight alongside people with whom we would otherwise not share many common views on the European question. It would have been better if the Government had accepted new clause 1, which was objectively helpful. I do not know what their motives were in rejecting it, but if they did not like it, they could have produced their own version of a scorecard to help to strengthen their negotiating position. They did not do so, however. The outcome of all this is rather unfortunate. The Government will have made a substantial concession on the rebate. They will continue to be party to a European Union that is not reforming the common agricultural policy at anything other than glacial speed. We might well be confronted over the next few months with the collapse of international trade negotiations, caused at least in part by the intransigence of European agricultural interests. The British Government will have absolutely no leverage whatever to prevent any of those things from happening. The certain consequence of all those things is that British cynicism about the European project will grow. We differ from the British Government in that, although we are a strongly pro-European party, we do not believe that the European project can be advanced by stealth. It has to be advanced with the support of the British public—[Hon. Members: ““A referendum.””] That is why we support a referendum on British membership of the European Union—[Interruption.] Let me conclude my remarks. The danger is that we end up with the worst of all possible worlds, in which the Government win a Pyrrhic victory; they will of course push through the legislation, but in a context that will weaken overall British public support for the European project. That is a very negative outcome, and it is the main reason why we intend to vote against the Bill.