John Redwood: Line of defence for sovereignty and healthy democracy

Sovereignty should matter to all voters in the UK. The issue is who makes the important decisions that have such a big impact on our lives? Governments do so much, and impose heavy taxes. In a democracy, we expect to be able to influence the people who make these decisions for us. We want to be able to throw them out of office if they get it wrong or annoy us too much.

One of the problems with the UK's relationship with the European Union has been this very issue. If too many laws are made behind closed doors in Brussels through negotiations with other states, UK electors have no direct way to influence this or to remove the offenders if they do not like the legislation. So many people and institutions are involved that no-one is to blame for bad law. There is no one government to sack or individual to remove if we dislike the results of their legislation.

The same is true of the money. Now the EU budget is getting larger, no one government can limit how much is spent, or have undue influence on how the money is disbursed. The UK puts a lot in, and gets some of it back. The money comes back in the form of spending we might not choose for ourselves.

In the last decade there has been a transfer of substantial responsibilities from UK management to EU supervision. The Nice, Amsterdam and Lisbon Treaties all extended the range of areas where the EU can act on our behalf. It increased the number of areas where the UK can only stop something the EU wishes to do if it can find enough other countries to block the proposal in a weighted vote. The new government mainly comprises Conservative MPs who voted against these transfers of power, or new Conservative MPs who share the view that too much power has already been transferred to Brussels.

In recognition of the strong feeling within Parliament and amongst the electorate, the Government decided on two proposals. Firstly, it wishes to buttress its promise that it will not transfer new powers to the EU. It offers a legislative lock to prevent any government transferring more powers without first asking the British people in a referendum. The second is to legislate to remind everyone that EU law only works in the UK because Parliament in 1972 said it would, and passed legislation to that effect.

This was thought to be important, because some want to assert that EU law now is above UK law, and has a life of its own based on the Treaties and the European Court.

So far, so good you might say. Why then did leading Eurosceptic MPs complain about the Government's approach? There is clearly no disagreement about the stated aims. The Government says it wants to establish a referendum lock against new transfer of power, so do the Eurosceptic Conservative MPs. The Government says it wishes to make it clear that the UK Parliament is sovereign. So do the leading Eurosceptics.

The argument came down to how you do it. If you allow the courts in the UK to challenge or interpret the law of Parliamentary sovereignty, Parliament may no longer be sovereign. If the courts have too big a role, they may turn to other sources of inspiration like the EU Treaties, European Court judgments and European legislation.

If you specify what does warrant a referendum you may leave out other matters – like the accession of a large country to the EU or joining in bail outs for the euro – which some Eurosceptics think should be put to a referendum test.

It was such a lively and difficult debate because to the participants this all matters deeply. It should matter to all of us.

We were afforded the great privilege of being born into one of the world's leading and historic democracies. I am sure most of us wish to hand on our democracy in robust health to future generations. Both sides thought they were doing the right thing to make the sovereignty of Parliament and therefore the primacy of electors' views central to our constitution.

Unfortunately they just happened to disagree about how to do it. There will be more arguments about this as a result. The test of this legislation will be, can the British people keep control of their own affairs through elections and public opinion controlling their MPs?

John Redwood is a Conservative MP and former Cabinet minister.