I had just turned six years old when the last referendum on Europe was held and that was, we were told at the time, to join a free trading area (although anyone who read the Treaty of Rome at the time would have seen that was deceptive).
Since 1975 the Common Market turned in to the EEC, evolved to EC and now the centralising, fundamentally undemocratic, political construct of the EU.
I sit on the House of Commons European Scrutiny Committee and see with my own eyes, and often with dismay, the significant level of directives and legislative demands emanating from the EU.
It is often said that people care more about health, employment, the economy, education, taxation and so on more than our relationship with the EU. Yet what the EU does effects almost every aspect of our lives, therefore, on this fundamental constitutional question we need the British people to decide.
I have repeatedly lobbied the Government in support of an EU referendum and have consistently voted and spoken in favour of one in Parliament over the past three years.
I was delighted when the Prime Minister set out his position earlier this year on Europe and made clear that the EU needed fundamental, far reaching change - and that Great Britain would lead the way in negotiating that reform.
The Prime Minister has pledged that he will commit to an in/out referendum by the end of 2017.
Much has been made of division within the Conservative Party, this could not be further from the truth – the Conservative Party is united behind the Prime Minister’s commitment to hold an in/out referendum.
Indeed, during a recent motion that I supported in the House of Commons expressing ‘regret’ at the absence of an EU vote bill in the Queen’s Speech, it was Labour which was split with some supporting the notion of a referendum and others fundamentally opposed to allowing the British public their say on the matter.
Our commitment to a referendum is absolute. Before the 2015 election, Conservatives will do everything we can to make it the law, in spite of opposition from Labour and the Liberal Democrats. That is why last week the Conservative Party published a draft bill that would legislate for a referendum by the end of 2017.
For too long the British people have had no say about their future in Europe. The Prime Minister and I are absolutely determined to put that right.