Political parties and politicians cannot themselves decide whether or not the UK should either remain or pull out of the European Union, according to Michael Ancram, the former Tory MP for Devizes.
Using his inherited Scottish title as Marquess of Lothian, he told the House of Lords yesterday (Friday): “The thing that I have learnt in my political career is that this issue, however hard we have tried, is irresolvable by political parties.
“It is irresolvable between political parties and within them. In the end, when you have a situation like that, the only answer is to let the people themselves decide.”
Taking part in the great debate on a EU referendum to be held before 2017, he said that after 40 years the only way ahead was to re-establish the rights of the British people to decide their own future in or out of Europe.
“This is to be welcomed,” declared the 68-year-old Marquess, who was deputy leader and chairman of the Conservative Party – and a Cabinet minister – before standing down at the last general election.
“Never in the history of democracy has there been such a large bureaucratic empire built over nearly half a century without once consulting the peoples who are affected by it as to whether they wanted it or whether they liked the shape of it. The Bill really establishes a principle which has to be welcomed…
“Some of us who have fought many general elections know that a general election cannot be fought on a single issue. There are many issues, so to say after a general election, “Part of our manifesto touched on Europe, and you voted for us and have therefore made your decision”, is actually nonsense.
“We have to have a clear decision taken, and I believe that this is the right way to do it.”
The millionaire Marquess, whose parliamentary career was shattered by the expenses scandal in 2009, was one of 68 peers taking part in the debate on a Private Member’s Bill, opposed by both Lib-Dem and Labour members of the Lords, who see it as a Tory ploy against the rise of UKIP.
“The second reason I support the Bill is that it gives us time,” he said. “It gives us until 2017 to prepare. That is the one distinction between the 1975 referendum and this one. In 1975, we had very little time to prepare…
“We were told, if I remember rightly, that there had been a renegotiation. In fact, when we look at it in retrospect, the renegotiation was not worth a row of beans, but some of us were taken in.
“We regret that now, and we voted yes in that referendum.”
There was a need for the British people to be given the opportunity to make “a sensible decision” and, he pointed out: “The argument so often used on Europe is, ‘You may not be very happy with Europe, but look what it will be like if you come out. You will be cast into the outer darkness of isolation’.
“Well, we must fill that outer darkness of isolation over the years between now and 2017 by exploring what other arrangements can be made.”
And the Marquess, who still has a home in the constituency, added: “We also have to start discussing with our European partners what trading arrangements we can have with them if we did come out of Europe.
“There is no question that they are going to need to continue to trade with us just as much as we are going to need to continue to trade with them.
“We have the ability over three years to start filling that vacuum. If we do that, when we get to the referendum—and I think we will, because I am confident that there will be a Conservative government which will deliver a referendum—then, for the first time, we will be able to ask a sensible question of the British people, to make a decision between two viable alternatives: ‘Which way do you want to see your country going?’
“I hope that, if we do that, they will decide that governing our own destiny must be the right answer.”
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