Oral Answers to Questions

Baroness Ritchie of Downpatrick Excerpts

Wednesday 16th January 2013 Commons Chamber

[The Prime Minister]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right to raise this question. I am well aware of how bad the flooding was and I went to Buckfastleigh to see how badly the town had been flooded for myself. I know that my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Transport has discussed the recent flooding with Network Rail’s chair and chief executive, and he will visit the area soon to look at this. We are working with Network Rail to improve the resilience of the overall network and we will do everything we can to ensure that these important services are maintained, even when they are challenged by floods such as those we saw last year.

[Ms Margaret Ritchie (South Down) (SDLP)]

Does the Prime Minister accept that a statement on Europe designed to be populist runs the risk of polarising this House, undermining key UK relations with America, confusing and alienating our friends and partners in Europe and, disastrously, starting a process that sleepwalks the UK out of Europe?

[The Prime Minister]

I think the most dangerous thing for this country would be to bury our head in the sand and pretend there is not a debate about Britain’s future in Europe. The most dangerous thing for this country would be to see the changes taking place in Europe because of the single currency and to stand back and say that we are going to do nothing about them. What Britain should be doing is getting in there and fighting for the changes we want so that we can ask for the consent of the British people to settle this issue once and for all.