Dear Dr Gabb,

I have recently joined the candidates' list. My views on the euro are that I support unreservedly William Hague's policy of ruling out UK entry to the ERM for the duration of the next parliament. After that I would be amazed if my opinion changed. I believe that entry is primarily a political decision and not an economic one. I do not agree with Franco-German aims of deeper union and would like to see Brussels return many of current areas of competence to national government control.

Whether that makes me a question mark or a sceptic in your estimation I do not know and I leave it up to you.

Yours sincerely,
James Browne

Dear Mr Browne,

Many thanks for your e-mail dated the 28th of last April.

On the basis of your e-mail, I have added you to the Candidlist with a don't know classification.  However, to ensure that this is entirely fair, let me submit to you the Candidlist Test:
 

Do you answer in the affirmative both of the following:

1) If elected or re-elected to Parliament, would you oppose our joining the Eurozone even if joining were to be recommended by the Party leadership?

2) If elected or re-elected to Parliament and required to choose between accepting the supremacy of European Union law in this country and leaving the European Union, would you vote for British withdrawal?

If you cannot answer both of the above in the affirmative, do you accept the line currently taken by William Hague, which is to oppose our joining the Eurozone for this and for the next Parliament and to resist any further British integration into the European Union?

Yours sincerely,

Dr Sean Gabb,
Candidlist Webmaster

Dear Dr Gabb,

Thank you for setting me the test. My replies are as follows:

Question 1: Unless the rules of membership of the eurozone were drastically changed to a more flexible framework, I would certainly vote against joining.

Question 2: I consider that by virtue of the European Communities Act 1972 English law is already subject to European law. My answer would therefore be No, unless the EU tried to foist upon the UK a matter which
I considered to be fundamentally unacceptable, and there was no prospect of compromise.

Question 3: I wholly support William Hague's policy.

Yours sincerely,

James Browne

Dear Mr Browne,

Many thanks for your e-mail of last Monday, setting out your answers to the Candidlist Test.

I am glad that you are willing to vote against membership of the Euro, even if advised to vote for it by the  leadership of the Conservative Party.  That is an excellent sign of principle.  I must, however, clear up a misconception that is distressingly common about the "supremacy" of European law.

It is not true that European Union law is supreme in this country.  A supreme law is one that proceeds from a sovereign lawgiver.  None of the institutions of the European Union can be called sovereign under the laws of this country. Undoubtedly, European law has a primacy that requires our courts to apply it even when it overrides laws made by Parliament.  But this is a primacy that derives wholly from the European Communities Act 1972. Parliament has chosen to allow other bodies to exercise a wide jurisdiction under that Act.  But it can repeal the Act as any time it feels inclined.

This, at least, is the view taken by Mr Justice Hoffmann - the Pinochet Judge! - in the cases of Stoke-on-Trent City Council v B & Q plc and Norwich City Council v B & Q plc (Chancery Division), reported in The Daily Telegraph, 18th July, 1990. See also per Lord Denning MR in Macarthys Ltd v Smith: "if the time should come when our Parliament deliberately passes an Act with the intention of repudiating the Treaty [of Rome] or any provision in it or intentionally of acting inconsistently with it and says so in express terms then I should have thought that it would be the duty of our courts to follow the statute of our Parliament" ([1979] 3 All England Reports, 325).

You may object that these are cases decided before the Maastricht Treaty was incorporated into British law.  I therefore refer you to the 12th edition of Constitutional and Administrative Law by A.W. Bradley and K.D. Ewing (Longman, London, 1997):

...[w]hat would be the position in the (admittedly unlikely) event that Parliament should say expressly (or by clear implication) that a statutory provision should apply notwithstanding any Community obligation to the contrary?...  As a matter of British constitutional law (and regardless of what the ECJ might say), it would appear in such an eventuality that Parliament had repudiated the 'voluntary' 'limitation of its sovereignty' which it accepted when it enacted the 1972 Act.

This is my understanding of the legal position.  I suspect the judges and other constitutional authorities are deliberately avoiding a final ruling until public opinion has settled one way or the other.  But, since European law is not surpreme in the sense that you imagine, I look forward now to an unambiguous yes to the second Candidlist question.

Yours sincerely,

Dr Sean Gabb
Candidlist Webmaster

I agree with your analysis of the position in that, were the UK parliament to repeal, as it could, the European Communities Act of 1972 that would be an end of the supremacy of EU law in this country.

Were I elected to Parliament at the next election and were a private members' bill introduced to repeal the Act of 1972 I would not at present support such a bill. However, if the EU continues on a course of further integration, and the options on offer to the UK were either to sign up or else to withdraw from the EU, a point will come at which I would prefer withdrawal to a federal superstate. I hope that point will not come & that is why I support William Hague's policy of trying to stop the federal juggernaut in its tracks before it forces this country out.

Yours sincerely,

James Browne

Dear Mr Browne,

Many thanks for your e-mail of yesterday's date.  Personally, I would like you to vote as soon as possible to repeal the European Communities Act 1972.  However, the Candidlist Test was drafted to determine who is a Eurosceptic, not who agrees with my own views in every jott and tittle; and so I have reclassified you as a sceptic.

We thank you for helping to make the Candidlist more accurate.

Yours sincerely,

Dr Sean Gabb
Candidlist Webmaster