Labour defeats bid for EU treaty referendum

By Toby Helm and James Kirkup
Last Updated: 7:01am GMT 06/03/2008

Campaigners for a referendum on the new EU treaty suffered a potentially fatal setback tonight when Labour and the Liberal Democrats united to block a national vote.

After a day of internal party rebellions that saw three Lib Dems resign their front-bench posts, ministers eventually won the day.

Gordon Brown at PMQs
Watch: MPs reject a referendum on the EU Treaty

They secured a Government majority of 63 and defeated a pro-referendum Tory amendment.

A total of 25 Labour MPs defied Gordon Brown to demand a national ballot in what was the biggest rebellion on Europe since the party came to power in 1997.

In all, 13 Lib Dems refused to back Nick Clegg, their party leader, whose authority has been severely dented by bitter rows over European policy after just two months in the job.

Mr Clegg, who wanted a referendum on whether the UK should stay in the EU rather than one on the treaty alone, lost David Heath, his justice spokesman; Tim Farron, his environment spokesman; and Alistair Carmichael, the Scotland and Northern Ireland spokesman.
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All three feared a backlash from euro-sceptic voters in their constituencies if they failed to support a referendum on the treaty.

Several other Lib Dem frontbenchers rebelled but it seemed they would not be disciplined.

Referendum campaigners admitted they had suffered a setback. But they refused to give up and said they were pinning their hopes on the House of Lords taking on the Commons and backing a referendum.

William Hague, the shadow foreign secretary, said after the vote that he hoped peers in the Upper House would reverse the Commons vote and ensure Labour and the Lib Dems honoured their election promises to hold a referendum.

"We hope that in this case the Lords will hold the Government to their manifesto commitment," he said.

Earlier, Mr Brown said the promise of a referendum applied to the Constitutional Treaty, not the Lisbon Treaty which replaced it.
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"If this was a constitutional treaty, we would hold a referendum. But the constitutional concept was abandoned," the Prime Minister said.

David Miliband, the Foreign Secretary, warned that a referendum which led to a No vote would consign the UK to the "margins of Europe".

A national vote was not necessary because the way the UK would be governed would not change fundamentally.

Mr Hague told MPs that those politicians who had broken their promises had undermined public faith in democracy and the country as a whole.

"The damage to their own standing and to the politics and reputation of our country and parliament is something on which for many years they will have to reflect and repent," he said.

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Ken Clarke, a former Tory Chancellor and one of a handful of Conservatives to rebel against his party's line, said referendums had their roots in the policies of dictators such as Napoleon and Mussolini.

A Tory amendment for a referendum was defeated by 311 to 248 votes (Government majority 63) while a Labour amendment, which also offered the possibility of a vote on whether to stay in the EU, was lost by 311 to 247 (Government majority 64).

Euro-sceptics, who believe the treaty gives too much power to the EU, will also be hoping that the Irish vote No in a referendum in June.

An unidentified Labour MP is to be reported to the Commons Speaker after being accused of photographing Liberal Democrat MPs refusing to vote on the issue of a referendum on the EU reform treaty.

Anne Main, the Tory MP for St Albans, said she spotted the MP taking a snap of the Liberal Democrat benches during their "principled abstention" over the issue.

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