European Union Committee Report

Lord Roper Excerpts

Monday 26th November 2012 Grand Committee

[Lord Roper]

My Lords, I begin by thanking the noble Lords, Lord Boswell and Lord Foulkes, for their very kind remarks. I wish the noble Lord, Lord Boswell, well in his time as chairman. I also thank the members of the committee and its staff for having made my time as chairman so agreeable. It has been a very pleasant job. Listening to the eloquence of the noble Lord, Lord Foulkes, at the end of his remarks reminded me of the speeches that he made in 1975 during the last referendum. He has been campaigning on this issue for a year or two.

I have three brief points, which overlap to some extent with the remarks of the two previous noble Lords. I begin with the reference in paragraphs 8 and 9 of the report to a decision to reduce the number of our sub-committees from seven to six. This was the most disappointing thing that occurred during my chairmanship. Although I am sure that the six sub-committees do their best to cover the substantial flow of European Union legislation—the noble Lord, Lord Boswell, made clear just how much flows in and is sifted to the sub-committees—the loss of the sub-committee so ably chaired by the noble Baroness, Lady Young of Hornsey, inevitably means a reduction in the effectiveness of our scrutiny of European proposals and of the Government’s position on them. I very much hope that in due course consideration can be given to returning to seven sub-committees.

Secondly, during the discussion on the number of sub-committees at the beginning of this year, it became clear that the work of our committee is not as well understood within the House as it should be, not only among Members of the House as a whole but among members of the Liaison Committee, which made the recommendation to the House to reduce the number of committees. I am extremely glad that the present chairman of the Liaison Committee has had recent experience as chairman of one of our sub-committees and as an active member of the committee over a long period.

As has been suggested, the debate today is one way in which we try to make the work of this committee better known, but, alas, as has been said already, relatively few non-members of the committee are present. I wonder whether the committee can think of other ways of doing this, perhaps through a wider circulation of our monthly newsletter, certainly to people who have served on the committee or one of its sub-committees, whom I sometimes refer to as our alumni, or your alumni—I am sorry; I slip into “our” all too easily.

It is extremely sad that, as has been said, the committee’s work is very widely recognised in Brussels, in Whitehall, as one sees from the correspondence which we have with Ministers, who are very much aware of the questions that we ask, and, indeed, as the noble Lord, Lord Boswell, said, as we find when we go to the meetings of COSAC, where other European member states’ parliamentary European committees are represented, but it is not sufficiently noticed in Westminster. We need to think about that.

The third point concerns our relations with those in this country who are affected by the matters that we are considering. The report contains two examples of seminars that were held during the two-year period. One is referred to in paragraph 47 by the sub-committee on social affairs under the noble Baroness, Lady Young of Hornsey; the second is referred to in paragraph 76, and the sub-committee on agriculture, fisheries, environment and energy had a very interesting seminar following up one of its reports.

More recently—last week—the Sub-Committee on External Affairs held a most useful seminar on the European External Action Service. I believe that this form of outreach is mutually beneficial. It is beneficial to our sub-committees to learn from those affected by European legislation in the more informal setting of a seminar rather than in more formal meetings or, indeed, in written evidence. It also enables those affected by the legislation and activities of the European Union to discover the way in which this House addresses European issues. I realise the significant additional burden that organising such seminars places on the hard-working staff of the committee, but I hope that they can be continued because I believe that they are a very useful part of the committee’s work.

In conclusion, while I do from time to time get disheartened by the state of the European Union and the relations of this country with the Union, I am always heartened when I think of the effectiveness of your Lordships’ committee. I wish it well in its future work, which I shall certainly watch with interest.