European Council

Charles Kennedy Excerpts

Monday 30th June 2014 Commons Chamber

[The Prime Minister]

I agree with the right hon. Gentleman that the enlargement process has been successful in driving the development and improving the democracy and governance of many of these countries. I further agree with him about engaging with them now, because a country like Albania has huge challenges in terms of tackling corruption, embedding its democracy and developing its economy. In that context it is very important that when new countries get to join—Albania is a long way from that process—there will have to be a totally new approach to transitional controls.

[Mr Charles Kennedy (Ross, Skye and Lochaber) (LD)]

Do not the antecedents of this problem go back to the fateful decision of the Prime Minister when he was running for his party leadership to approve the withdrawal of the British Conservatives from the European People’s party? Mr Juncker was the candidate of the EPP. Had the Prime Minister’s party been a member of it, it could have had influence in private, instead of impotence in public. That would have been good for the Prime Minister, good for his party, good for the Government and, my goodness, far better for Britain.

[The Prime Minister]

I have great respect for the right hon. Gentleman and it is good to see him in his place today, but I think he is profoundly wrong about this. Let me give two examples of why I think that. The Liberal Democrats are members of the Alliance of Liberals and Democrats for Europe, yet he was not able to stop the leading candidate process in that group; and the Labour party is a leading member of the Socialist Group, yet it was completely incapable of stopping the leading candidate process in that group. There were members of the EPP who did not approve of this but still could not stop it, so the idea that we would have been able to stop it within the EPP is complete nonsense.