Today I voted to give the British people a long overdue referendum on whether we should remain in the EU. Well done to my Conservative MP colleague Bob Neill MP (Bromley & Chislehurst) for introducing a Private Members Bill. Whether you are pro or anti EU, one thing is beyond dispute. It is unacceptable that we have had to wait 39 years for a vote. The EEC that the British people voted to join in a referendum in 1975 is now totally unrecognisable to the European Union that exists in 2014. An Economic and trading club of 6 members states has become a political and monetary union of 28 member states (although we thankfully stayed out of the disasterous Eurozone).
My view is clear. The EU is too big, too bossy and too interfering. It meddles in too many aspects of British day to day life that should be left to British politicians, British judges, and the British Parliament and Courts. With no referendum for 39 years, the democratic legitimacy of the EU is now wafer thin.
Conservative MPs have voted in large numbers (there are 305 of us) to give the British people the EU referendum that they deserve, but this Bill cannot become law without Labour and Liberal Democrat votes. Last year they played silly procedural games to prevent this from happening. The Liberal Democrats claim that the people should have a referendum on the EU, but as is so often the case, they talk the talk, but don’t walk the walk. I have highlighted below the pitiful turnout of Lib Dem MPs at the debate today.
Conservatives will vote again for this Bill next Friday at Third Reading – then we will see if the Labour and Liberal Democrats really trust the people and are willing to let them have their say, or whether they want to gag them and chain us to a bloated and inefficient EU.