For a very long time we have been told by Brexiteers that we were misled in 1975 about the nature of the European project. We were all assured, so they say, it was only ever about trade when really it was a secret, diabolical plot to enslave us Brits and drown us in a sea of red tape. Of course, we remainers now say the opposite, that leave voters were misled in 2016. I found the website of Richard Corbett MEP (yes, I know he will be denounced as a stooge of the EU but just wait a moment) extremely helpful (HERE).
He has carried out some research and has some fascinating stuff, firstly from Harold Wilson in Hansard no less, in 1967:
“Whatever the economic arguments, the House will realise that, as I have repeatedly made clear, the Government’s purpose derives above all from our recognition that Europe is now faced with the opportunity of a great move forward in political unity and that we can — and indeed must — play our full part in it”.
The government of the day spelled out clearly (HERE Hansard Column 1003) in a White Paper that said:
“if the political implications of joining Europe are at present clearest in the economic field, it is because the Community is primarily concerned with economic policy. But it is inevitable that the scope should broaden as member countries’ interests become harmonised […] What is proposed is a sharing and an enlargement of individual national sovereignties in the general interest”.
The Daily Mail (The Daily Mail, it seems barely believable) in a leader dated 4th June 1975 referred explicitly to the goal of “political union”, saying that this was no “dark secret”. It asked whether the anti-Europeans hadn’t been listening “to the visionary words of European leaders for the past twenty-five years?”:
So the idea we were ever misled in 1975 is palpable nonsense. As for 2016, I still think we were.
