Europe: Renegotiation

Debate between Lord Lilley and David Lidington

Tuesday 10th November 2015 Commons Chamber

[Mr Lidington]

If there is one thing that does not change, it is the nature of the hon. Gentleman’s interventions on this subject. The Prime Minister, the Chancellor, the Business Secretary and I have spoken frequently on the agenda on competitiveness, and I would be happy to send the hon. Gentleman a sheaf of speeches if he would like me to. Broadly, this is about three things. It is about cutting the cost of unnecessary red tape and regulation on all businesses, particularly on small and medium-sized enterprises. It is about deepening the single market, particularly in digital and in services, where it is underdeveloped at the moment. And it is about forging ambitious new trade agreements with other countries and other regions of the world, for their benefit and ours. These are the opportunities that British business has urged us to take, and this Government are determined not to follow but to lead on these matters in the European debate.

[Mr Peter Lilley (Hitchin and Harpenden) (Con)]

Will my right hon. Friend avoid using up his limited bargaining power to obtain purely symbolic changes such as removing the words “ever closer union”, given that they have never been invoked by the European Court against Britain or used to require any other member state to move in an integrationist direction? They have even been dropped from the constitutional treaty. Will he instead focus on getting back any powers that are not required to run a common trading area, so that we in this Parliament can make more of our own laws and hold our lawmakers to account?

[Mr Lidington]

My right hon. Friend the Prime Minister has always said that he is seeking a deal on reform that is substantive. That will be challenging to negotiate, and I do not want any Member to think that these reforms will somehow fall easily into our lap. There will be some tough negotiations ahead.

The importance of the words on “ever closer union” is that they encapsulate the fact that the EU at the moment is insufficiently flexible, still thinking of a single destination on integration for all its member states. As the Prime Minister said in his speech this morning, we need to see a much greater acceptance of the diversity of Europe at the moment. We need to see a readiness to live and let live, accepting that some countries will want to integrate more closely but others will wish to stand apart from that and that the decisions of each group should be properly respected.