EU Council

Caroline Lucas Excerpts

Monday 12th December 2011 Commons Chamber

[The Prime Minister]

I am grateful to my hon. Friend for his support. The key issue for me was not whether this would be popular today, tomorrow or next week, but what was the right thing for Britain, and I judged that a treaty without safeguards was not right for Britain. [Interruption.] For all the interruptions from Opposition Members, I think that until they answer the question “Would you sign this treaty?”, a little bit of silence is needed.

[Caroline Lucas (Brighton, Pavilion) (Green)]

Given that it was precisely the City of London’s deregulated recklessness that did so much to exacerbate the impact of the financial crisis in this country, can the Prime Minister tell us why he persists in behaving as if the interests of the City were synonymous with the national interest, which they clearly are not?

[The Prime Minister]

I am not sure that the hon. Lady was listening, but the point is that there are some ways in which we actually want to regulate banks and financial institutions more, but are not able to because of the European Union rules. Some of the other issues that I was considering were specifically about discrimination: it is quite wrong that we, as a member of the single market, are not able to deal in euros in the same way as we are able to deal in dollars and yen.

This was a very straightforward set of undertakings, and it was not about special protection for the City. I hope that I got that across in my statement, and I hope that the hon. Lady will support us when we reach those regulations.