Oral Answers to Questions

Maria Miller Excerpts

Tuesday 20th January 2015 Commons Chamber

[Mr Ellwood]

It is for the United Nations and the UN special representative to lead on this. We are supporting the UN in its endeavours. The hon. Lady simplifies the situation, however. She seems to suggest that it is just two sides acting against each other, but that is not the case. The country is made up of 35 main tribes and 100 other tribes. We are dealing with a complex history, and we simply cannot expect that, after 40 years of misrule, all parties will suddenly come together, because Gaddafi did not take advantage of that period to build the infrastructure and the political basis on which to move forward.

[Maria Miller (Basingstoke) (Con)]

5. What steps the Government are taking to promote human rights in Belarus.

[The Minister for Europe (Mr David Lidington)]

We make our concerns known through regular meetings between the British embassy in Minsk and the Belarusian Ministry of Foreign Affairs and through representations by our senior officials in London to the Belarusian ambassador based here.

[Maria Miller]

I thank the Minister for that reply. There are likely to be Belarus presidential elections this year. Last time, such elections led to candidates being arrested, beaten up and even imprisoned. On this day, which is, after all, the birthday of our Parliament, what encouragement can he give to those who want to see free and fair elections in Belarus, which is such an important part of Europe?

[Mr Lidington]

We will continue to speak up publicly as a Government and through the European Union and other international organisations of which we are a member to draw attention to the continuing abuse of human rights within Belarus, to urge the Belarusian authorities to take the path towards European and democratic values of pluralism and the rule of law, and to speak up for individual Belarusian human rights defenders—men such as Mikola Statkevich, still in prison in Belarus today—and demand that those prisoners be not only released but fully rehabilitated.

Oral Answers to Questions

Maria Miller Excerpts

Tuesday 2nd December 2014 Commons Chamber

[Miss Anne McIntosh (Thirsk and Malton) (Con)]

2. What steps he has taken to prepare for renegotiation of the terms of the UK's membership of the EU with his EU counterparts; and if he will make a statement.

[Maria Miller (Basingstoke) (Con)]

12. What assessment he has made of the scope for reform of the EU under the new European Commission.

[The Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs (Mr Philip Hammond)]

I have already visited 10 member states over the past few months to discuss EU reform with my counterparts and others. More and more leaders across Europe agree that the EU needs to change. We have already made progress: the June European Council agreed that EU reform was necessary and that the UK’s concerns should be addressed.

[Mr Hammond]

I agree that we should be optimistic about the scope for achieving change in the European Union because more and more of our EU partners agree with the agenda that we have set out. They agree that the European Union must reform to survive and prosper in the future. But it goes further than that. We have already had success: our Prime Minister is the first one ever to have negotiated a reduction in the EU budget; we have opted out of the eurozone bail-out fund; and we have secured vital protections for non-eurozone countries in the banking union. I am confident that we will secure the reforms that the EU so urgently needs to be more competitive and more democratically accountable and, crucially, to make it acceptable to the British people, who, under a Conservative Government, will be the ones who have the last say in 2017.

[Maria Miller]

The British people should have the final say on the UK’s relationship with the EU, and I applaud the Prime Minister’s approach on an in/out referendum. The constituents who contact me support a trading partnership with Europe, but not a political union. Will the Secretary of State emphasise the vital importance of trade when discussing the future of the UK in the European Union? My constituents who work for major multinational companies headquartered in Basingstoke want to know that that is at the forefront of our negotiations.

[Mr Hammond]

I could not agree more with my right hon. Friend. Trade is at the heart of the European Union. Completing and deepening the single market and extending it into the digital, energy and services markets—areas on which we have scarcely scratched the surface—is the way to deliver economic growth in the European Union in the future, together with completing international trade treaties such as the transatlantic trade and investment partnership that will also hugely expand our opportunities.