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European Union Bill

We are in Committee and I do not think that I even have to say, ““Before the noble Lord sits down””. I was going to thank the noble Lord for the compliment that he paid my noble friend and me, but is he aware of one of the very few jokes about the European Union that is going about in Eurosceptic circles? I ask this given that he extolled the virtues of democracy which the EU brings to its new members. The joke is that if the EU were to apply to itself to join the EU it would fail on the grounds of its total lack of democracy, its bureaucracy with its monopoly on proposing new legislation—what body that pretends to be vaguely democratic can do that?—and, as we know, the secret process with COREPER, the Council and so on. How can he extol the virtues of the EU’s democracy, given that background?