EU: Balance of Competences Review

Lord Barnett Excerpts

Tuesday 5th November 2013 Lords Chamber

[Lord Wallace of Saltaire]

My Lords, I am pleased to hear my noble friend echoing the speech that the Prime Minister made to the CBI only yesterday. The balance of competences review is only one of the things that the coalition Government are undertaking on European issues. It is intended to be an evidence- based review, and we have so far had well over 1,000 contributions to the reports published and under consideration.

[Lord Barnett (Lab)]

My Lords, could the Minister tell us how many of these competences he expects the Government to have agreed by 2017?

[Lord Wallace of Saltaire]

My Lords, it is not a question of which competences we agree. We are asking various stakeholders, and getting very large pieces of evidence from producer groups, about the current balance of competences. I think that the Scotch Whisky Association has produced the most pieces of evidence so far—clearly a stakeholder. As Ministers have said before from this Dispatch Box, the current Lisbon treaty has a lot of headroom on competences, not all of which are currently exercised by the European Union. We are asking stakeholders to say whether they are happy with the current balance, whether there are areas in which they would like the balance to be tipped back towards the national level or whether there are areas in which they would like the balance to be tipped further towards common European policies.

EU: Reform

Lord Barnett Excerpts

Thursday 16th May 2013 Lords Chamber

[Lord Wallace of Saltaire]

I welcome the noble Lord’s support for a reasoned debate. The question is not about unilateral repatriation but about the multilateral reform of the EU.

[Lord Barnett]

My Lords, I am not sure whether the noble Lord can speak for the Prime Minister on this occasion, but will he tell us whether the major changes that he said he was looking for will require treaty change and the agreement of all 27 member states?

[Lord Wallace of Saltaire]

Of course, many things require the agreement of nearly 28 member states—Croatia is about to join. There is a great deal that we can achieve without treaty change; the Lisbon treaty has considerable headroom in it. The question of whether we are likely to face treaty change in the next five years is much more to do with what form banking union takes—I am sure that the noble Lord read Mr Schäuble’s article in the Financial Times the other day—and with other areas of management of the eurozone.

Retail Prices Index

Lord Barnett Excerpts

Wednesday 24th April 2013 Lords Chamber

[Lord Wallace of Saltaire]

My Lords, they should not be unclear. The decision to maintain the RPI was taken precisely to leave clarity on the various forms in which the RPI is used as a reference point. I am quite clear from what I have read that the RPI as measured has an underlying upward bias of currently about 0.9% a year above CPI. That means that the Government end up paying more for index-linked bonds and elsewhere, which, in the long run, is against the interests of taxpayers although very much in the interests of investors and pensioners.

[Lord Barnett]

My Lords, the problem is not whether the Minister agrees with my noble friend Lord Peston. Is not the real problem with all these statistics whether anyone believes any forecast of anything? Is not the problem therefore not which is used but believing them?

[Lord Wallace of Saltaire]

My Lords, we could try giving up and steering in the dark if we want to, but trying to assess as well as we can what is happening in our economy and in the economies of our partners is a necessary part of the way we have to operate. We recognise that all measures will be imperfect. The decision to make changes in the RPI was taken to make it a little less imperfect than it was.

Armed Forces: Accommodation

Lord Barnett Excerpts

Thursday 15th September 2011 Lords Chamber

[Lord Wallace of Saltaire]

As I have indicated, the MoD recognises the importance of this to service welfare and is doing everything it can to ensure that the programme continues.

[Lord Barnett]

The Minister referred to what the Deputy Prime Minister said about increased expenditure, capital matters and infrastructure. Did the Deputy Prime Minister have the agreement of the Chancellor?

[Lord Wallace of Saltaire]

The DPM, as others do, speaks for the coalition Government as a whole.