Bone aiming to trigger EU membership referendum
Wellingborough MP and Euro-sceptic Peter Bone says he has cross-party support in the House of Commons
He is hoping to attach a rather complicated amendment to the Europe Bill currently going through parliament which could trigger a referendum.
At the moment the government's bill proposes holding a referendum on any attempt by Brussels to take more powers from Britain. Mr Bone's amendment proposes a second referendum, this time on leaving the European Union altogether, if the first delivered a "no" vote.
In other words if the EU proposed (and this is just an example) taking control of some tax raising powers from Britain, under the government's new bill a referendum would be held to see if the British people approved.
If a majority said no, under Mr Bone's amendment we would then all get a say on whether we wanted to leave the EU altogether.
"This will be the first time that parliament has had an opportunity to consider this question and we could actually get on statute a procedure where the British people - not politicians - get to trigger a vote on whether they want to leave the EU."
Mr Bone says at the moment its left to politicians to decide when to call a referendum and no government will do that if it feels the vote won't go its way.
In the past the politicians have been reluctant to do that even though the British people have clearly shown that they want one. This takes it out of the hands of politicians
"I have support from all political parties in the House (of Commons) so I'm hopeful we'll be allowed a free vote," he said.
So once again Mr Bone is trying to influence the debate on Europe - an issue he strongly believes in, as mentioned in earlier blogs. There are some in his party who call him a member of the awkward squad.
His reaction: "It's quite a compliment. Our job as parliamentarians is to scrutinise the government, not to be cheerleaders for the government."
- On 1 February Mr Bone's amendment was defeated by 295 votes to 26
Welcome to the political blog for the East. I'm Deborah McGurran, the Â鶹¹ÙÍøÊ×Ò³Èë¿Ú's Political Editor for the region. From Lowestoft to Luton, this is the place for politics with an eastern twist.
Comment number 1.
At 25th Jan 2011, wilkinson wrote:Good on you Peter
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Comment number 2.
At 29th Jan 2011, rolymo35 wrote:This is really excellent news, the sooner we get to grips with this EU problem the better,having lived, worked and run a small/med sized business in the EU (FRANKFURT am MAIN)for 14 years. I am very aware of the set-backs,restrictions,controls and burocratic nonsense that continues to emerge from this totally disfuncional organisation.Because so few brits have been exposed to the evils of actually trying to make a decent life under this regime there is no sense of urgency to reject the advances of EU integration.Unfortunatly it will probably be too late when we finally realize the folly of our none action.
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Comment number 3.
At 29th Jan 2011, rolymo35 wrote:We are very lucky to have an MP that takes an interest in EU matters, most of the MEPs seem to be a total waste of space, The volume of information being dissimulated is virtually zilch !!. How can we be expected to make decisions when there is a vacuum of knowledge about EU procedures. Mr Bone should be highly commended for taking this action and deserves every bit of support we can give him. PLEASE!!! can we have our referendum ?.
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