Multiannual Financial Framework

Conor Burns Excerpts

Wednesday 31st October 2012 Commons Chamber

[Kate Hoey]

I thank my hon. Friend for that intervention. Tonight, we have an opportunity to make it public that there is a united Parliament, for whatever reason and motive. The reality is that we are a united Parliament and we are saying, “We do not want one penny extra spent. We want to see a cut in what the European Union is spending.” I want to see more than that. I want a referendum on our relationship with Europe. I want an end to this nonsense, which we keep putting up with. We could make a decision tonight that says, “We do not want to see an increase—we want to see a cut.” However, come the end of the process, by majority voting, we could be outvoted, no matter how many diplomatic skills we use. I am sure that many hon. Members think that they could do better if they were negotiating, but no matter how good our negotiating skills we may not get what we have asked for. My view is that we should veto at that point and then, when we are sent our bill, we should say no and tell them that we will send what we agreed. We should tell them that we will not send them an increase.

[Conor Burns (Bournemouth West) (Con)]

Given that the Minister and the shadow Minister both said that it is the policy of the Government and Her Majesty’s Opposition that they would wish to see a reduction in the European Union budget and given that there is a motion before the House asking for such a reduction, will not the public find it bizarre if that does not go through tonight?

[Kate Hoey]

In my simple way, that is what I am trying to say. We are beginning to look really out of touch. It is beginning to look as though we are not interested in the people we were elected to represent. I believe that tonight is the night when we can make that difference and really change things.

I must make an apology. I am very lucky that my constituency is literally five minutes away and I agreed some time ago that at 6 o’clock I would light the bonfire on Hallowe’en night. I shall leave to light the bonfire and I shall come back to vote. I hope that on that bonfire there might be something to signify something about the European Union; it would be rather nice if there were. It is not likely, however.

Finally, I ask Members to realise that they should not worry about who is with them in the Lobby tonight. They should not worry about whether they are in the Lobby with people with whom they would rather not be in the Lobby. They should recognise that they are going into that Lobby to represent the people who elected them and should think about what they would want them to do.

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[Thomas Docherty (Dunfermline and West Fife) (Lab)]

I welcome the junior Minister of State and hope he will tell us where the senior Minister of State is this evening.

This has been an excellent debate and we have heard principled contributions from Members of all parties, who hold deep, long-held convictions about Europe and the direction of travel. Anyone who is aware of my view will know that I am the co-chairman of the all-party group on European reform and that I believe that Britain is better off in Europe but that the current organisation is not satisfactory.

To give an example, 1 January saw the introduction of a European-wide ban of battery eggs, for which the UK, under the previous Government, and many other countries had campaigned successfully. However, it became clear that a number of eastern and southern European nations would fail to meet the 1 January deadline. The Environment, Food and Rural Affairs Committee took evidence on the issue last year and, when we asked the European Commission what it would do if the UK chose not to allow these illegal eggs into the country, it said that it would prosecute the United Kingdom, which is an obscene and perverse position to adopt. Saying that it would prosecute a country for upholding Europe’s own laws shows that the Commission has got its priorities wrong.

The Minister discussed cutting structural funds, but I disagree. The solution, as explored by the all-party group, is that if we repatriated the structural fund powers and spent the same amount of money as we hand to Brussels, we would have hundreds of millions of pounds more to spend in Wales, Scotland, the south-west and the south-east.

[Conor Burns]

Given that the hon. Gentleman is going to vote in favour of an amendment calling for spending restraint, does he regret that his party’s Front Benchers did not follow that policy in their 13 years in government?

[Thomas Docherty]

I am surprised that the hon. Gentleman has not made it on to the Government’s Front Bench yet with that kind of devastating critique.

My hon. Friend the Member for Vauxhall (Kate Hoey) said that we will be voting alongside people whom we do not get on with or whom we do not particularly like, but I have been informed by one or two Conservative colleagues that that occasionally happens in the Government Lobbies anyway. I look forward to seeing which Lobby the hon. Gentleman enters later.

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[Conor Burns (Bournemouth West) (Con)]

I am grateful to you, Mr Speaker.

At the beginning of the debate, there was an outbreak of consensus between those on the two Front Benches, when the Minister and the hon. Member for Nottingham East (Chris Leslie) agreed that the Government and the Opposition shared the objective of achieving a real reduction in the EU budget. Such a reduction would not be possible if the EU had gone through the process that all our councils are going through by squeezing out all the fat and getting rid of all unnecessary expenditure, but both Front-Bench spokesmen could cite examples—not least the two Parliaments—of where the EU could still make plenty of savings.

My hon. Friend the Member for Banbury (Sir Tony Baldry) mentioned the experiences of Maastricht, but this is not Maastricht. The Conservative party is united on Europe. We are united in believing that it is doing too much and spending too much. We had the slogan, “We’re all in this together.” How will we be able to go back to our constituencies and look in the eye our electors who are paying hugely more for petrol, food and rail fares?

This House matters again. As a united House of Commons, we have the opportunity to back the Prime Minister by sending him emboldened to the European Council with the clear message from the British people that enough is enough. If we are taking cuts, the European Union must take them, too.