EU Council

Chris Bryant Excerpts

Monday 12th December 2011 Commons Chamber

[Mr Speaker]

Order. If I am to accommodate the large number of Back Benchers, as I always wish to do, we will require brevity, a textbook example of which will now be provided by Mr Chris Bryant. [Laughter.]

[Chris Bryant (Rhondda) (Lab)]

I think, Mr Speaker, that that was an example of irony.

The single most important thing that our voters have seen over the past weeks and months has been the crisis in the economies across the whole of Europe, which is depressing the economy in this country as well. They want to ensure that they have jobs to go to next year. Last week, the Prime Minister surrendered an opportunity to do that; he surrendered his seat; and he surrendered to his Back Benchers. Is he not ashamed of himself?

[The Prime Minister]

And it all started so well! The hon. Gentleman is right to say that there is a crisis of jobs and opportunity across Europe, and a lot of that is linked to the chilling effect of the eurozone crisis. Some of that crisis needs to be resolved by better fiscal integration, and we can argue about whether that requires the treaty change being pushed for by France and Germany, but the real agenda—to help the eurozone and to help growth and jobs—is about competitiveness and the single market, and about ensuring that, even in the short term, there is the big bazooka, the re-capitalisation of the banks and the proper programme for Greece, which are all things that Britain has been pushing for.