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European Union (Amendment) Bill

Let me finish my speech, and then there will be time for everybody else. The hon. Member for Stone, who you rightly did not call to order, Mr. Deputy Speaker, said—I hope that I am not doing any injustice to his argument—that it was somehow treasonable to vote for the ratification of the treaty of Lisbon. Well, I hope that I am not a traitor to myself, my country, my party, my constituency or any of the other areas that he listed. Much of this rather lurid language does not help; it neither heats up nor illuminates. We have had in our past distinguished Members of this House making this point. Here is the former Prime Minister, Clement Attlee, in 1960:"““I'm not very keen on the Common Market. After all, we beat Germany, and we beat Italy and we saved France, Belgium and Holland. I never see why we should go crawling to them.””" That from a man who is a hero for many of us on my side of the House, but it is, frankly, a ghastly point of view. Alternatively, going to the heart of the point made by the hon. Member for Na h-Eileanan an Iar (Mr. MacNeil), here is Churchill speaking in this House in June 1950:"““we are prepared to consider, and if convinced to accept, the abrogation of national sovereignty””." He went on to say that"““national sovereignty is not inviolable, and…it may be—" safely—"““diminished for the sake of all the men in all the lands finding their way home together.””—[Official Report, 27 June 1950; Vol. 476, c. 2159.]" I would argue that 27 European nation states are now trying to find their way to a 21st- century home together that was certainly not on offer when Churchill made that speech.