I should begin by apologising to the House for the state of my voice, from which it will be obvious that I will not be shouting in the debate. In view of the treatment that was given to my right hon. and learned Friend the Leader of the Opposition during his speech, however, I will not be shouted down.

The debate has taken place exactly because of the success of the Labour party in securing the inclusion of section 7 in the European Communities (Amendment) Act 1993. Throughout the long drawn-out process, our aim was always to secure the adoption of the social chapter for the benefit of the people of Britain and our economy generally. That was, and remains, our consistent view.

Two other issues have emerged subsequently—the attempt to use the courts to circumvent the decisions of the House of Commons, and the apparent unwillingness of the Government to accept decisions taken in the Chamber. Both represent fundamental challenges to democratic government and to the authority of the House of Commons.

593 It is important to deal with those matters in addition to the merits of the social chapter. First, I must congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Durham, North (Mr. Radice) on his speech. He is my Member of Parliament, and I am delighted to have his support in the Chamber this evening. I also wish to congratulate my hon. Friends the Members for Hartlepool (Mr. Mandelson), for Ashfield (Mr. Hoon), for Kingston upon Hull, West (Mr. Randall), for Hemsworth (Mr. Enright), for Derbyshire, North-East (Mr. Barnes) and for Barrow and Furness (Mr. Hutton), together with the hon. Member for Foyle (Mr. Hume), on their speeches.

The House is having the debate because the Government, in the person of the right hon. Gentleman the Foreign and Commonwealth Secretary, accepted the Labour new clause 74—now section 7 of the Act. He said at that time: If new clause 74 is accepted, we shall abide by it. There was no hint there that the Government would not accept the result of the debate which would ensue.

The Foreign Secretary also said: We have no difficulty in accepting the challenge with which the proposers of new clause 74 present us. Indeed, he implied in that speech that the vote tonight would be the definitive decision of the House, as we intended it to be. He said: That will enable the House to vote on the merits of the social protocol itself."—[Official Report, 22 April 1993; Vol. 223, c. 548–49.] Throughout the proceedings, the Foreign Secretary has repeatedly asserted that the House of Commons was the place where decisions should legitimately be made indeed, had to be made. He said: As Parliament is sovereign it is clear that it could decide … we owe our constituents our judgment, and if we decline to exercise that judgment we are to some extent damaging the authority of Parliament. In respect of the third stage of economic and monetary union, the Foreign Secretary said: the Government have specifically and successfully reserved the decision for the House of Commons … Governments are elected to govern and, in this case, to propose, just as parliaments in the United Kingdom are elected to decide and, indeed, to dispose … The decision for Britain lies where it belongs—in the hands of the British Parliament."—[Official Report, 21 April 1993; Vol. 223, c. 453 and 458.] So, throughout our proceedings, the right hon. Gentleman made it abundantly clear that he expected the House of Commons to take the decisions. That is the real reason why he is not here tonight and why he will not reply to the debate. What the Foreign Secretary said destroys the argument that the Prime Minister put to the House of Commons earlier today. The Prime Minister said that the debate was some sort of device and that the House had no business moving the amendment provided for in the Act of Parliament.

So the House is having the debate. However, no hint that the Government would not accept the result was given until it became apparent that the Government were in trouble. That is the reality. We agreed with what the Foreign Secretary had to say in his various speeches. Both Houses of Parliament agreed with him on the specific issue of the referendum. But now the Government are apparently saying, "We did not want a referendum. We did not want the people to decide, but now we shall not accept the decision of the House of Commons either."

594 In other words, the Government do not want anyone to decide but themselves. What duplicity. What hypocrisy. What a reneging on their fundamental position that parliamentary scrutiny and debate, and decisions in this Chamber, were the proper way and the only way to make decisions about the Maastricht treaty. Now that the Government have gone back on their word, I am not surprised that the Foreign Secretary is not with us tonight.

Like many others, on Tuesday I observed the Prime Minister wriggling under questions from my right hon. and learned Friend the Leader of the Opposition. The Prime Minister was unwilling to give a straight answer to a straight question. Earlier we witnessed his dreadful evasions when he was questioned by the BBC's Jonathan Dimbleby. It was pass after pass: clearly, the Prime Minister could never be a candidate for "Mastermind". It is as well for him that his Government have not yet abolished the right to silence. The Prime Minister seems determined to die in the last ditch of prevarication on this matter.

But now an entirely novel concept of parliamentary democracy has emerged. It is, apparently, that the Government need not accept a decision of the House of Commons because of the nature and quality of the majority. We know that the European Community already has qualified majority voting, but this is a new and ridiculous argument. It seems that, if this was a boxing match, we would have to knock the Government out to get a draw.

The theory has great flexibility. Governments need not accept defeat because there were too many Scots in the Lobby, or too many Irish, or too many Welsh people, or too many women, or too many people who write with their left hand. The possibilities are endless.

Perhaps I ought to remind the Prime Minister and his right hon. and hon. Friends that it was a Tory, Winston Churchill—and he was a Tory at the time—who said "One is enough." If we win the votes tonight, we shall expect the Government to accede to the wishes of the House of Commons.

The Government's argument on that issue—like their case against the social chapter—is bogus. Where were these people and arguments in November 1992? The Government did not care then who joined them in the Lobby, or how they got them there: all they cared about was a majority of the House of Commons.

Is this the same Prime Minister who said to my right hon. Friend the Member for Chesterfield (Mr. Benn) in June 1992: common consent in this country is exercised through a parliamentary democracy and through the voices and words of Members of Parliament in this House."?—[Official Report, 3 June 1992; Vol. 208, c. 832.] Or is it, more accurately, really the kind of Government described by Disraeli, who said: A Conservative Government is an organised hypocrisy"? This is dangerous and unacceptable behaviour. If the Prime Minister and the Government ride roughshod over the decisions of the House of Commons, how can they call upon the people to accept other decisions of the House? The authority of this place would be seriously undermined. The reputation of the House is already too precarious for us to accept any further serious damage to it.

Is it not the inevitable outcome of the Government's position that other tangled webs of wealthy people, whether living in Britain or abroad, would seek to 595 circumvent or undermine in the courts the decisions of the House? Would they not always be able to produce sanctimonious dupes such as Lord Rees-Mogg to give a superficial but threadbare respectability to their plans?

We should not accept these developments, Madam Speaker. Your ruling yesterday, in response to the important questions raised by my right hon. Friend the Member for Chesterfield, is of fundamental importance to the House, the nature of our democratic decision making and its future well-being. You deserve the thanks and support of everyone here—and, more important, of our constituents.

Rarely in my experience have a Government used such bogus arguments to avoid defeat on such a bogus case. The Tory case against the social chapter is a ragbag of half-truths, deceptions and downright fabrications. The dishonesty of the Government's case has been completely exposed in this as in earlier debates on the subject.

At Maastricht, the Prime Minister erected the social chapter as a threat to Britain and Europe. He was isolated —no one else agreed—and he planned the opt-out as a political insurance policy to ease the passage of the legislation. He failed. Even a superficial examination of the social chapter demonstrates that the claim that it is a charter for industrial unrest is completely untrue.

Article 2.6 of the chapter says: The provisions of this Article shall not apply to pay, the right of association, the right to strike or the right to impose lock-outs. It applies to working conditions, information and consultation of workers on the basis of qualified majority voting. It applies also to social security, protection from dismissal, collective bargaining, employment conditions and job creation, but on the basis of unanimity.

The social chapter includes the novel provisions drafted by unions and employers, including the TUC and the CBI, enabling flexibility to be built in by collective agreements, replacing or complementing legislation. As we have all pointed out again and again, pay, the right to strike or impose lock-outs are explicitly excluded from legislation agreed under the social chapter.

As yet there is not even an action programme of legislation for the social chapter. The Commission is currently putting together a Green Paper on the future of social policy. All Governments are invited to make submissions. Perhaps the most interesting question will be how far the legislative route will be used and how much use will be made of the more flexible procedure, leaving those involved—unions and employers—to reach agreement on common standards.

What is clear is that the British Government will be excluded from those deliberations. British Commissioners, Members of the European Parliament, trade unionists and employers, as members of the economic and social committee, will have a formal role, but Britain's Government will be excluded from all the deliberations.

The only people who oppose the social chapter are the British Conservatives and the French neo-fascists: by their friends shall ye know them. Try as they might to dupe the British people or garner support for their reactionary views, the Government have totally failed. The European summit in Edinburgh at the end of the British presidency reaffirmed the commitment to the social chapter and urged Britain to join. That remains the unanimous view of It partners in spite of ministerial allegations, including those to the contrary from the Foreign Secretary.

596 Tories in Britain want Europe to be simply a big business club. We want a Europe with a continuously developing social dimension in the interests of greater efficiency and social cohesion. Our view is supported by industrialists such as Mr. Peter Wickens and others at Nissan who gave evidence to the Select Committee on Employment earlier this year. In March, he said: all I know is that any company that seeks to pay low wages ends up receiving low-quality, low-calibre employees. What we have got to do, in this country … is to be high-wage with a high-quality workforce, achieving high productivity and high quality products; that is the equation that we need, not low wage, low quality, low productivity. That is the route that is doomed to failure and disaster". The House should also know that, when taking evidence in Japan, the Select Committee received exactly the same opinion from Aiwa, Fujitsu, Komatsu, Nissan, NSK and the Sony Corporation.

Another myth is that small businesses would be hit by the social chapter, yet article 2.2 of the social chapter specifically says: To this end, the Council may adopt, by means of directives, minimum requirements for gradual implementation, having regard to the conditions and technical rules obtaining in each of the Member States. Such directives shall avoid imposing administrative, financial and legal constraints in a way which would hold back the creation and development of small and medium-sized undertakings. The social chapter specifically recognises the need to maintain the competitiveness of the Community"; and Labour certainly wants to see a successful, efficient, productive Community.

The truth is that the Government do not want, as the Prime Minister claims, a nation at ease with itself. Unlike us, the Government do not want more equalities in British society. They want to return to an era where there was little social protection for millions of British workers, but they are not supported by Britain's best employers in that aim. My hon. Friend the Member for Stockton, North (Mr. Cook) in particular exploded the myth that British companies such as ICI would be badly affected if the social chapter was implemented.

The Government want a labour market that exploits young people, women and ethnic communities in particular—in short, a deregulated labour market. But Britain can never succeed on that basis. Hong Kong has labour costs only 25 per cent. of those in Britain, and the figure for Taiwan is 35 per cent. and for Korea 35 per cent. They will always undercut our labour costs. Our failure is on unit labour costs compared with the United States of America, Japan, Germany and France. Our failing is because of low skills, low investment and low productivity.

As ever, the Tory party emerges from these debates as what it always has been—the party of exploitation of ordinary people. It is the party that always wants to pay those at the top more, to to give those at the top more power and more security to make them perform better, but those at the bottom are denied support and protection: they must be paid less, trained less, protected less and made less secure to make them perform better.

So we ask the House to join us in the Lobby tonight to give British people the advantages, the support, of the social chapter and to ensure the British people the support of a House of Commons that protects them, upholds its decisions and requires Governments to act upon them.