Enoch was right

In Mum and Dad’s library, I recently found Reflections, a book containing some of Enoch Powell’s speeches, interviews and essays. It was sandwiched between several books by or about Maggie on one side and Confessions of a Political Maverick by Austin Mitchell, a friend of Arthur Scargill’s, on the other. I’m wondering whether my Sis bought them this book as a joke. Can’t imagine why else they’d have a copy. Anyway, I commandeered Powell and Maggie while sorting stuff to go to the local hospice charity shop. Much to Hubby’s Horror, it was one box of books for the hospice, and one for me; one for the hospice, and two for me, etc.

One speech of Enoch’s in particular grabbed my attention, the one he gave in the House of Commons on 17th February 1972 during the Second Reading of the European Communities Bill. Reading this speech made me realise that my memories of that embarrassing episode in Britain’s history might not be 100% accurate.

The UK joined the European Economic Community on 1st January 1973, but it wasn’t until 5th June 1975 that there was a referendum. How about that for putting the cart before the horse. Of course, I was much too young to vote. I do remember Mum and Dad voting, with trepidation, to stay in the EEC and, some time later, they were in a permanent state of ire because they said the Europeans and the British Government had lied in order to secure the result they wanted. Or had they?

Enoch was very clear that the Great British Public weren’t lied to before joining the EEC. We simply weren’t asked if we wanted to join, nor if we wanted to approve or otherwise any of the terms and conditions. He pointed out that the Bill’s Second Reading was the first occasion that the House had been able to consider a specific proposal of EEC membership, a previous debate in October 1971 being just about the principle of joining. He homed in on the fact that:

1) Parliament would lose its legislative supremacy

2) The House would lose its exclusive control over taxation and expenditure

3) The judicial independence of this country would be no longer

4) There would be a progressive strengthening of the European Executive and the consequent diminution of the power of the House of Commons

5) There would be a progressive political unification of the UK with countries of Western Europe

6) The decision to join could not be reversed by the House in the future (thank goodness he was wrong about that).

He was right. One of the aims of the 1957 Treaty of Rome that established the EEC was to serve as a step towards the closer political unification of Europe. Woops! Why have I bobbed along quite nicely believing that the EU and its goal of political union was a lie and a fraud? Probably because it seemed to take Maggie by surprise as well, which is the bit I really can’t get my head around. She was such a bright cookie and, love her or loathe her, you must admit that her misreading of the Treaty of Rome is astonishing, and if it seems too astonishing to be true then it probably is. I’ll come back to that. 

What irked Enoch as well was that during the 1970 General Election campaign, the electorate wasn’t told of the fundamental constitutional consequences of membership. All we could consider, EEC-wise, was whether we retrospectively approved Parliament’s 1969 decision to enter into negotiations to join. Approving the act of negotiation and approving or otherwise the outcome of those negotiations are two different things.

He additionally pointed out that the October1971 proposal-in-principle had been passed by a vote of seven-twelfths in favour of joining, saying, “In no country with a written constitution … would such a proportion justify the major step which is involved in joining the [EEC].” To rub salt into his open wound, the 1972 Second Reading was approved by just eight votes.

So apoplectic was Enoch that, despite being a lifelong Tory, he exhorted the electorate to vote Labour in the 1974 General Election because, “This is the first and last election at which the British people will be given the opportunity to decide whether their country is to remain a democratic nation … or whether it will become one province in a new European superstate … [without] the slightest regard … to the House of Commons or to the wishes of the electorate.”

The Labour Party under Harold Wilson duly triumphed over Edward Heath and called a referendum for June 1975 on whether to stay or leave the EEC, having renegotiated the terms of membership. Wilson was bolstered by (most of) the Tories, who joined forces with big business and the Daily Mail (was it ever thus) to campaign for a remain vote. The referendum result, on a 65% turnout, was a victory for remain with 67% of the vote.

There’s no doubt in my mind, having read Enoch, that our initial entry into the EEC was a travesty of democracy. But were we lied to?

Fullfact.org says that the aims of the EEC were presented to the public as bringing together the peoples of Europe, raising living standards and improving working conditions, promoting growth and boosting world trade. One false campaign-claim was that English common law would not be affected.

Smoking gun! The British Government DID lie to we the people. Was Europe in on it?

Another Government argument during the referendum campaign was that the British representatives on the Council of Ministers could veto any European legislation considered to be against the UK’s interests. Enoch described the situation differently, pointing out that new laws would be increasingly drafted and scrutinised in Europe, not in Britain. That is to say, issues that were currently debated and passed by Parliament would instead be made by Europe, with minimal input or debate by Parliament. Further, these decisions could not be reversed by Parliament. Ever. While Britain would be represented round the European table when decisions were made, delegating such magnitude of responsibility to a small number of representatives without real-time scrutiny by all our elected MPs was a joke.

To try and assuage such fears, the Government argued that the British representatives on the Council of Ministers could veto any European legislation considered to be against the UK’s interests. Gee. That’s nice. But conversely, doesn’t it mean that other member states could vote against legislation that would be to our benefit? 

Regardless, the voting rules have been changed since then – the goalposts have been shifted – removing the veto in certain cases.

But did the Europeans lie to us about this either before or after we joined the EEC? I admit I haven’t found a smoking gun for such a lie, but when it comes to other ‘character flaws’ I have a whole arsenal. I need to do some research to fill in some of the detail, so here’s my working hypothesis in the meantime. It certainly explains why Maggie wasn’t originally on the same page as Enoch:

In the 1960s and 70s, the British establishment believed that joining the EEC would be good economically and socially for the country as well as cementing world peace. Very few of them wanted a federal European state, but they felt that this would be a long time in coming and there’d be plenty of time and opportunity to reassess the goal of a union in the light of future world events and how the EEC worked in practise. We could therefore have a seat at the table to redefine and shape Europe into a more suitable partnership for changed circumstances and more to Britain’s benefit. However, it became increasingly clear that the European goal was union or bust – on the terms of the most powerful states (France and Germany) – and the ‘bloc’ was not for turning regardless of world events and the concerns of individual members. Therefore, while I can’t (yet) find a big whopping lie by the Europeans, I am lobbing alternative charges at them, of obduracy, nepotism, bullying and totalitarianism.

Yes, I know the British Government these days isn’t great either, but at least we can vote them out at an election, whereas real EU power is firmly in the hands of unelected Uncivil Servants, unaccountable to we the people. We couldn’t kick them out, so in 2016 we voted to take ourselves out of the game, which was the only option open to us to re-set and protect our democracy. 

I wonder what Enoch would think about how things turned out.