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European Union (Amendment) Bill

The hon. Gentleman said that the Convention was a traumatic experience, and indeed it was for everybody, because it totally failed. It failed because it did not stick to its instructions, which were to create a more democratic and simpler Europe, and a Europe closer to its citizens. Instead, it went down the centralising route and it failed at the hands of the French and Dutch electorate. We all ought to be thoroughly ashamed of how that Convention was conducted and of its outcome. I was not traumatised—Europe was.