Gibraltar and Spain

Christian Matheson Excerpts

Wednesday 14th October 2015 Westminster Hall

[Mr Lidington]

I had better move on to the subject of the debate. Although I want to concentrate on the border, the naval incursions and the economy of Gibraltar, which have been the mainstay of today’s speeches, I will first try to respond to a couple of other points that have been raised. I was asked about Gibraltar and the EU negotiations. As all Members will know, the Government have included the people of Gibraltar in the franchise for the proposed referendum on our membership of the European Union. The European Union Referendum Bill received its Second Reading in the House of Lords yesterday. Members are right to emphasise the importance of the United Kingdom Government’s consulting Gibraltar very closely on the negotiations to ensure that we take Gibraltar’s interests fully into account. I formally wrote to the Chief Minister at the start of the negotiations following the Government’s election in May—[Interruption.]

[Christian Matheson (City of Chester) (Lab)]

I apologise for arriving late. I will give the Minister a moment to catch his breath. I was also at the Guildhall celebration to which he referred. Does he feel that there is a new sense of confidence not just from the Chief Minister but from all Gibraltarians about their prospects for the future, which is clouded by their relations with Spain? I hope I have given the Minister a chance to find his voice.

[Mr Lidington]

I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman. I feel that on Monday night there was a real sense of economic optimism about Gibraltar’s future, based both on the economic success that Gibraltar has achieved and on the way in which Gibraltar has organised itself—I will return to this in more detail—so as to meet global standards, particularly in the provision of financial services, which match the best in the world.

Before the intervention, I was saying that I wrote to the Chief Minister of Gibraltar after the Government’s election in May to tell him that we were about to embark on the European negotiations and that he should let the Foreign Secretary and me know at any time of any matter in the process that is of concern to Gibraltar. Since then, there have been regular contacts at official level between the United Kingdom Government and the Government of Gibraltar, as well as conversations at ministerial level. I last discussed EU matters with the Chief Minister in Manchester last week. The Government will hold to that commitment.

I was also asked about the Government’s attitude towards Spanish hospitality to Russian warships in its Moroccan exclave of Ceuta. The fact is that that is ultimately a matter for the Spanish Government to decide. I find it extraordinary that such hospitality should be shown at a time when Russia is not only engaged in a campaign of aggression and destabilisation in Ukraine but has acted in a way that threatens the security of a number of our EU and NATO allies, particularly the Baltic states, but this is ultimately a matter for Spanish Ministers to consider.

The UK has promised to protect the right of the people of Gibraltar to determine their own political future. We stand by our assurance never to enter into arrangements in which the people of Gibraltar would pass under the sovereignty of another state against their wishes, and we will never enter into a process of sovereignty negotiations with which Gibraltar is not content. I want there to be no misunderstanding of our position: Gibraltarians will be British for as long as they wish to remain so. We regard Gibraltar as including the isthmus and British Gibraltar territorial waters, as well as the Rock itself.