Why was the 1975 referendum held

This was caused, first, by an easing of the situation for Catholics, both in terms of economic discrimination and in terms of stable and safe housing after the forced population movements of the early period, which meant they were more likely to make a living and therefore stay in NI, and second by differential emigration from Protestants getting the hell out of Northern Ireland in the early years of the troubles.

As is clear from the referendum results , a referendum rather than an election will pull out many more voters in areas which are not really hotbeds of support for a united Ireland. Opinion polls likewise show that support for a united Ireland runs well behind support for Nationalist parties.

One cannot exclude the kind of sudden mood change which hit Slovenia in , but it hasn't happened yet. Strange though it seems now, at that time the Conservative Party was generally in favour and the Labour Party generally against.

Labour leader Harold Wilson promised a nationwide referendum on whether or not to stay in the EEC provided that he was able to renegotiate more favourable terms. Ireland, Denmark and Norway had all put the issue to the popular vote - unlike the UK - before joining, Norway voting against. The antis had mostly a negative rating, except for Enoch Powell, who had a small positive rating — very divisive of course.

The pro campaign was very skilful because they tarred all the opponents of the European Union as extremists, and they said this is a question of whether you are a moderate or extreme. So, the fear factor worked again. It was not just fear of what happened economically if we left Europe, but the kinds of politicians it would benefit, the fear of extremism.

I do not like the look of some of the prospective wardens. So, people took their cues from what you might call the Establishment, and once the issue was polarised as moderates versus extremes, the antis had not much of a chance.

The financial and business establishment was strongly in favour, and the pros had about 10 times more in money than the antis, and outspent the antis in press advertising by over three times. The antis could legitimately claim unfairness in terms of spending and media coverage. Of course, there is much more balance in spending and much more balance in press coverage, and there are a large number of popular papers that are anti — the Sun, the Daily Mail, and also the Daily Telegraph.

There was a further positive reason for voting yes, that people remembered the War, and they thought about the Cold War, and said there would be no more wars.

Now, of course, memories of that have faded, the War and the Cold War, and there is no longer so much fear that if Britain left Europe, the danger of war would increase. So, that was a further factor at that time. Those who studied the referendum said it was an unequivocal result, two to one, but also unenthusiastic.

Support for membership was wide but did not run deep. It was not an expression of confidence, that Europe was a good thing, but fear that we should not leave, so difficult to argue much enthusiasm for Europe. There was one dog in the referendum that did not bark and it was this: that what united Enoch Powell and his largely working-class Conservative support, and the left of the Labour Party, was a hostility to the Establishment, united by nationalism.

That movement had come about in Norway and had been responsible for Norway voting no, although the elite in Norway, all the main political parties, wanted a yes vote, and that referendum wrecking the governing party. Enoch Powell, in particular, tried to arouse this grassroots feeling. We discover these are the very people who have always been wrong.

Not one horse they have tipped has ever won! Will it be more successful today than it was? People later said they were deceived, that they were voting for a free-trade area and nothing more.

Now, were people deceived? I think, on that issue, they were not. The political purpose was to absorb the new Germany into the structure of the European family, and economic means were adopted for that very political purpose.

The Government pamphlet to every household did mention sovereignty and the need to share it, though it did not say the European Union was a superior legal order and was superior to Westminster. In defence of the Government, you might say that they did emphasise the national veto which then existed for most policies, so it was not misleading to say what they said, that no important new policy can be decided in Brussels or anywhere else without the consent of a British Minister, answerable to a British Government and a British Parliament.

We can see Edward Heath saying that, before we entered the European Community…. Now, I must tell you that if one of the members of the Community has something which it regards as vital, the others are not going to overrule it. And why? Because they know it would break up the Community. The Anti market pamphlet, which was also distributed to every household, did point out that European law was superior to Westminster, but it said the Common Market sets out, by stages, to merge Britain with France, Germany, Italy and other countries into a single nation, which was, I think, absurd.

But the Anti marketeers themselves did not say that Heath and others misled the British people, and you can see that from the following video, from a leading Anti marketeer, Enoch Powell. Yes, but you, with respect Mr Powell, you have picked out one sentence from a passage which deals with the constitutional position…. But of course! Of course!

This is like September Well, let us have first, when we decide that we have to fight. You see, I simply do not believe, although — and I make no complaint of the Pro marketeers, particularly people like Edward Heath and Peter Kirk. They have been beyond criticism in that they have made it perfectly clear that to remain part of the Common Market is to renounce national status for Britain. They say the nation state is obsolete and we are to recognise it.

Who are you going to get to support you in your continuing parliamentary struggle to get Britain out of the Common Market, Mr Powell? Well, as the House of Commons, week by week, has to debate the consequences of being in the Common Market, it will, as it tends to do, filter through to wider and wider areas that they were rightly told by people like Edward Heath that this did in fact mean that they would become a province in a new state.

I do not believe that when that it is realised that it will be assented to. May I put one point to you, Mr Powell? I remember you, two or three years ago, when you were still in the Conservative Party, at the Party Conference in Brighton, predicting, with total conviction and certainty, that this country would not go into the Common Market.

May I suggest to you that your prediction now is no more right than that one was? You have two events, if I may say so, slightly confused. One was the Conservative Party Conference where I said that I would never assent to the act of abnegation involved in Britain joining the Common Market, and a meeting in East Ham, in September , when I said it will not happen.

I am still convinced that it will not happen. I am still convinced that the people of this country cannot be absorbed into a European state. May I just point out that Wiltshire has said yes and Oxfordshire has said yes, and could I point out to Mr Powell that he did say, as he has confirmed, that we will not go into the Common Market and we did go into the Common Market, and are you not just as wrong now as you were then?

No, Sir, the British people do not mean it because they still have not been able to credit the implications of being in the Common Market. They still think they will be a nation. They still think they will govern and tax and legislate for themselves.

They are mistaken. Well now, what do you say to that, a parliamentary struggle, led or perhaps solely carried on by Mr Powell, to get Britain out of the Common Market, on the basis of this clear and unequivocal statement in the Government pamphlet that our membership will depend on the continuing assent of Parliament? What I would hope is that now the British people have voted, or look like voting anyway, overwhelmingly, for staying in the European Economic Community, we can put all the uncertainty of the past behind us and we can now go forward as constructive partners in that Community, sharing with our partners exactly how that Community should develop in the future to the benefit of all its peoples.

Do you think, Mr Whitelaw, that this Common Market campaign has perhaps had some effect in re-opening the question of how the Conservative Party should be led, because many people are remarking on the tremendous personal resurgence and revival of popularity of Mr Heath?

May I point out that Durham has said yes? And come back to the point that people are saying Mr Heath is making a tremendous political comeback and who can know what will happen?

Well, of course, the first thing I think one ought to say is that the Conservative Party, as a whole, has overwhelmingly supported Britain staying in the European Economic Community. Indeed, an enormous part of the result and what has been achieved is due to those people who normally support the Conservative Party. I am delighted. I am delighted about that. I think it is very important indeed.

That is what our Party has done. Certainly, Ted Heath has had an enormous success in this campaign. He is the person who, as Prime Minister, took us into Europe. I was proud to be one of his Cabinet Ministers at that time. He did it, and he has shown to the country the great conviction he had behind doing it, and it is an enormous achievement. Well, there is a lot in that, but you can see that Enoch Powell did concede that the pro-Europeans had not said we were just joining a free-trade area, that they had put the argument fairly.

He said that they were wrong, but that they had not tried to deceive people, and I think that is right. You may say, now, the case for the second referendum is that most of the Establishment remain in Europe but it is doubtful, and we need to test perhaps, whether the people are still in Europe. Now, Wilson said, after the referendum, and this is where Powell contradicted him, the referendum had settled the issue. Nobody in Britain or the wider world should have any doubt about its meaning.

It was a free vote, without constraint, following a free democratic campaign, conducted constructively and without rancour. It means that 14 years of national argument are over.

It was clear, indisputable, and an endorsement of the view of the majority in the Cabinet — a large majority and a high turnout, a yes in Scotland. Only two parts of the country voted against: the Western Isles and Orkney and Shetland. It seemed to hold Labour together.

I read it loud and clear. That had been the principle of all of us who advocated the referendum. Can Parliament and Government carry through a policy to which they are opposed? The antis want to restore parliamentary sovereignty, but if they succeed, parliamentary sovereignty would be limited not by Brussels but by the people because Parliament will have to carry out a policy it does not agree with, both in and That would be the first time in British history and it shows that the referendum can be a new method of making laws, a new way of making laws, in which the people are the third chamber who can overcome the first chamber, that is the House of Commons.

Could the Government have gone on? The failure of devolution in destroyed the Callaghan Government. The Government in Norway resigned after its recommendation that Norway should join Europe in was rejected. Cameron said that he would have resigned in if Scotland had voted for independence. Can he stay on if there is a Brexit? I want to conclude with two paradoxes. You had members of the Cabinet arguing with each other in public, in an unseemly way, as you can see from the third episode….

Tony Benn: Cut the umbilical cord that links the lawmakers with the people and you destroy the stability of this country. Jenkins said he found it increasingly difficult to take Benn seriously as an Economics Minister and that he should resign in case of a yes vote in the referendum. You may say if you thought the policy was so disastrous of staying in, why are you remaining in the Cabinet?

This shows I think that collective responsibility is not just an abstract constitutional principle but a maxim of prudence for any public body. What confidence would we have in a board of directors which disagreed on fundamental matters in public, or any public body, any public organisation that squabbled in public amongst themselves?

So I think collective responsibility, the undermining of it, causes trouble. It did not matter in the short run, but it did later on because the referendum pre-figured the split in the Labour Party in when the SDP was formed, and the referendum had loosened tribal loyalties in the Labour Party.

Will it do the same with the Conservatives, not perhaps for a new centre party but perhaps encouraging people to join UKIP? Analytical cookies are used to understand how visitors interact with the website. These cookies help provide information on metrics such as the number of visitors, bounce rate, traffic source, etc. The cookie is used to calculate visitor, session, campaign data and keep track of site usage for the site's analytics report.

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