Tag Archives: john lee

The Lib Dem Lords have made some cracking contributions to the debate on the Article 50 Bill. Ahead of its next Lords stages, we’re bringing you all the Lib Dem contributions over the course of this weekend. That’s no mean feat. There were 32 of them and cover more than 30,000 words. You are not expected to read every single one of them as they appear. Nobody’s going to be testing you or anything. However, they will be there to refer to in the future. 

Our Lords excelled themselves. Their contributions were thoughtful, individual, well-researched and wide-ranging and it’s right that we present them in full on this site to help the historian of the future. 

Former Tory MP John Lee slammed the government over its failure to offer the right to stay to EU nationals.  He also became one of the few Lib Dem rebels. He doesn’t support our position on a referendum although that seems to be because he thinks the right wing press would stir up trouble.

My Lords, increasing anti-European sentiment was a prime reason for me to bid farewell to the Conservative Party in 1997, 20 years ago, after 13 years as a Member of Parliament, from 1979 to 1992. That sentiment continued unabated, and finally resulted in the 2015 Conservative manifesto commitment, and of course the 23 June referendum. At the referendum, a simple question was put: in or out? There were no sub-questions on hard or soft Brexit, the single market or the customs union. Of course, there were exaggerations and untruths, many voted for all sorts of reasons, and many did not realise all the implications. But all that, I am afraid, is true of all elections and referendums. As we now know, there was a clear, albeit small, majority to leave—a decision I bitterly regret in so many ways, and a tragedy both for our country and for Europe. Looking back, the referendum was fundamentally flawed. Clearly, we should have given young people a vote—after all, it is their future—and I suggest that a higher barrier to leave than just a simple majority would have made sense. However, all that is hindsight; we are where we are.

It is fair to say, as a remainer, that our economy and financial markets have held up rather better than expected in the short term, but we are just in the foothills of negotiations. Tortuous paths lie ahead. I fear that Europe will ensure that we pay a heavy price for leaving, not least to discourage other countries from following us. However, we are already experiencing some of the negatives: a fall in sterling, resulting in rising inflation, which increasingly pressurises family budgets; a vile rise in hate crimes; uncertainties over future investment plans of major international companies; and a question mark over London as the dominant financial centre. However, one plus is that cosmetic surgery, apparently, has fallen 40% since Brexit, although I know of no reason for that and will not go down the route of speculation.