Oral Answers to Questions

Andrea Leadsom Excerpts

Tuesday 12th February 2013 Commons Chamber

[The Deputy Prime Minister]

The hon. Gentleman always reads out his questions beautifully; I am sure it took some time to get that one right. [Interruption.] A little spontaneity from the hon. Gentleman would not go amiss from time to time. It is the Government parties that are repairing the banks that went belly up because of the irresponsibility of his party; it is the Government parties that ended the disgrace of the tax system under Labour, which meant that a cleaner paid more on their wages than their hedge-fund-manager boss paid on their shares; and it is the Government parties that are ensuring that someone on the minimum wage in Liverpool and elsewhere will pay the half the income tax that they paid under Labour.

[Andrea Leadsom (South Northamptonshire) (Con)]

T10. Does the Deputy Prime Minister regret telling Chatham House in November that there was “absolutely no prospect of securing a real-terms cut in the EU budget”?Does he now believe, in fact, that the Prime Minister is on a bit of a roll and may also be successful in achieving the real repatriation and renegotiation of powers from the European Union that will give Britain a better deal?

[The Deputy Prime Minister]

The lesson of the highly successful summit last week is that it is important to set out a tough but realisable negotiating position, as we did across the coalition—I spent months making the case for the tough approach that we took with politicians around the European Union—and then to reach out to create alliances with other countries, including the Dutch, the Swedes, the Danes and, crucially, the Germans, and then to win the argument. If we want to reform Europe, we have to get stuck in and win the argument, not simply withdraw to the margins and hope that it will be won by default.