Taking leave of their senses
Peter Hoskin 4:57pm
Fraser told us to "stay tuned" to the Lib Dems' continuing efforts to force an "in or out" referendum, and now we've been rewarded with a spot of Parliamentary drama.
Ed Davey - the Lib Dem Foreign Affairs spokesman - was ejected from the Commons for his angry insistence on the matter. The rest of his party then walked out in protest.
It's difficult to see what the Lib Dems hope to gain from their bizzare behaviour. Of course, they're trying to present themselves as staunch defenders of the British public's rights. But their actions will most-likely deny that same public a referendum on the Lisbon Treaty, whilst achieving nothing by way of compensation. It's one thing to enshrine a red herring as party policy, but running round and slapping everyone in the face with it is quite another.
I've been praiseful of Nick Clegg in the past. But now he's shuttled from the sublime to the ridiculous at supersonic speed. One wonders whether he'll be able to find his way back.
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Comments
Denis Cooper
February 27th, 2008 2:27amIn fairness to the Speaker, the Liberal Democrat amendment was irrelevant to the Motion. That related only to specific changes included in the Lisbon Treaty, not to the totality of all the EU Treaties from the 1957 Treaty of Rome up to and including the entire Lisbon Treaty. They'll have to try harder than this, if they hope to get away with wriggling out of their manifesto pledge The Motion proposed by the Prime Minister: "That this House approves the Government’s policy towards the Treaty of Lisbon in respect of provisions concerning the effectiveness of the EU institutions and EU decision-making." The amendment which the Liberal Democrats tabled: "Line 3, at end add ‘except that this House considers that, in the light of Article 1, paragraph 58 of the Treaty of Lisbon, inserting into the Treaty on European Union Article 49A which provides for Member States to withdraw from the Union in accordance with their own constitutional requirements, the Government should declare its intention that, once the Treaty of Lisbon has come into force, there will be a referendum on the United Kingdom’s continuing membership of the European Union.’."