Treaty on Stability, Co-ordination and Governance
Emma Reynolds Excerpts(12 years, 2 months ago)
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Emma Reynolds (Wolverhampton North East) (Lab)
I congratulate the hon. Member for Stone (Mr Cash) on his innovative use of House procedures to secure this debate. In fact, it would have been unnecessary for him to use such innovation if the Government had agreed to re-establish the pre-Council debates that Labour held when it was in government.
I welcome the opportunity to debate this important issue. The Opposition would not usually want to intrude on the private grief of the Conservative party, or indeed of the coalition, but we nevertheless have a duty to point out the inconsistencies in the Government’s position. I might not always agree with the hon. Gentleman, but I sympathise with him today, because the only thing that is clear is that the Government’s position is manifestly unclear.
The fighting talk we heard from the Government in December and January flies in the face of reality. Ministers loyally and repeatedly rehearse the script that the Prime Minister vetoed the use of the European institutions. The Foreign Secretary was categorical in his assertion that EU institutions were reserved for the use of the 27. He stated:
“What we are clear about is this, that the institutions of the European Union belong to the 27 member states”.
On the eve of the January European Council, the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, who is listened to closely on those issues by Conservative Members, could not have been clearer. He said:
“The fact is the prime minister vetoed them using the institutions”.
The Chancellor took to the airwaves just hours after the January European Council ended, saying, without hesitation and seemingly without equivocation:
“If we had signed this treaty…we would have found the full force of the…European Court, the European Commission, all these institutions enforcing those treaties, using that opportunity to undermine Britain’s interests…We were not prepared to let that happen”.
Martin Horwood
The hon. Lady makes a robust call for clarity on policy. Can she confirm whether the Labour party is in favour or against the use of EU institutions by the 26?
Emma Reynolds
If only the position of the Liberal Democrats were clear on that matter—[Interruption.] I will come to that.
There was a guarantee from the top of the Government that EU institutions would not be used—I hesitate to describe it as a “cast-iron” guarantee, because it might upset some Conservative Members, but none the less, the position seemed to be clear. The evidence seemed compelling and the Government seemed to be clear what they were saying, but how quickly things unravelled—on the European Commission, on the use of the buildings and on the role of the European Court of Justice. One by one, the Government’s guarantees faded into yesterday’s headlines, and their empty rhetoric was painfully exposed.
Mr Baron
The shadow Minister will accept that the fiscal compact is designed to save the euro. Could we therefore have clarity on the official Opposition’s position on the euro? Given that all the economic evidence and the 85 currency devaluations since the second world war show that countries that have left a currency bloc benefit, and given that Greece desperately needs a devaluation, will she explain why she supports the cry to save the euro when that policy serves only to make the austerity packages worse?
Emma Reynolds
Unlike the hon. Gentleman, the Opposition believe that the stability and preservation of the eurozone is in our country’s interests. If those countries took on their former currencies, there could be a disastrous impact on our economy. I do not agree with him.
David Cameron walked out of the negotiation at the—
Emma Reynolds
Not for a minute—I have taken a couple of interventions already.
The Prime Minister walked out of the negotiation at the December Council with no additional guarantees or safeguards to protect British interests; no protections on the single market; no additional safeguards for financial services; and not even a seat at the table of eurozone meetings to ensure that we had a voice, if not a vote. In short, he gained nothing apart from the short-lived praise of some Conservative Back Benchers, but even that is changing.
Article 8 of the new treaty states that the Commission, the European Court of Justice and the buildings will all have a part to play in the working of the fiscal compact. In fact, the Government’s representative in Brussels, Sir Jon Cunliffe, stated in a letter to the European Council that articles 3, 7 and 8 all make explicit reference to the role of the EU institutions in the fiscal compact.
Despite profound confusion over the Government’s interpretation of the legal basis for the treaty, the treaty is clear. According to the terms of reference set out in the text of the agreement to be signed tomorrow, the fiscal compact will rely on the operation of the EU institutions upholding the terms and workings of the agreement. The Europe Minister told the European Scrutiny Committee last week that one can argue about the politics of the terms, but they amount to a promise by 25 countries that they want to support doing certain things under the European treaties. He said that in those cases, the use of the European institutions is, by definition, already authorised.
Emma Reynolds
Not for a minute.
Will the Minister therefore state clearly, and once and for all, whether the Government believe the legal status of the agreement, as set out in the terms of the fiscal compact, and specifically in the articles I have cited, is wrong? If it is wrong, what will the Government do to correct it? If they will do nothing to correct it, are we right to assume that that is their way of quietly admitting that they have been forced into a humiliating U-turn?
Emma Reynolds
I will not give way. I have given way once to the hon. Gentleman already.
At least the leader of the Conservatives in the European Parliament, Martin Callanan, has been clear. He said:
“There is no doubt that the government’s position has altered since the December summit, when they were insisting the institutions could not be used…I blame a combination of appeasing Nick Clegg, who is desperate to sign anything the EU puts in front of him, and the practical reality that this pact is actually quite hard to prevent.”
Does the Europe Minister therefore agree with the analysis of his party’s leader in the European Parliament?
Emma Reynolds
Not for the minute.
Does the Minister agree with what the Deputy Prime Minister said on “The Andrew Marr Show” in December? He said:
“Well it clearly would be ludicrous for the 26, which is pretty well the whole of the European Union with the exception of only one member state, to completely reinvent or recreate a whole panoply of new institutions.”
Perhaps there is more agreement between Martin Callanan and the Deputy Prime Minister than first meets the eye. They both believe, as the Opposition do, that the Government have flip-flopped. Despite their initial bravado, they have been unable to veto the use of the institutions.
Henry Smith
I have waited patiently since the intervention from my hon. Friend the Member for Basildon and Billericay (Mr Baron) to hear exactly what the official Opposition policy is on the fiscal treaty. Incidentally, is it still official Opposition policy to join the euro?
Emma Reynolds
The shadow Chancellor has made it clear that we do not think we will join the euro in his political lifetime.
The ultimate irony is that the Prime Minister, who has previously been so scathing of the EU, has now been reduced to relying on that institution to be the last line of defence in the protection of British interests, because the EU, unlike him, will be in the room. The UK will be barred from key meetings, rendering us voteless and voiceless in future negotiations. Without being in the room, we stand little chance of knowing—let alone influencing—whether eurozone Ministers will stray into areas of decision making that affect the 27.
The Opposition are right to be concerned at that prospect and to doubt the effectiveness of such a system in protecting British interests, and we are right to ask questions on how that situation was allowed to happen.
Andrew Percy
The shadow Minister said strongly and clearly that she believed the euro needed to be saved, and that any country leaving the euro would have a negative impact on our country and economy. What evidence does she draw on to support that assertion?
Emma Reynolds
A disorderly default by any member of the eurozone could have disastrous implications for that country and knock-on effects for the rest of the EU. There would be a contagion effect that the hon. Gentleman would be naive to think would not take place.
We are right to stress that the response by the Government and centre-right Governments across the EU to the eurozone crisis has been economically inadequate, and any worsening of the crisis will have a devastating impact on our economies. Although we welcome the fact that in January the European Council spoke about the need for growth and jobs in order to ensure the recovery of the eurozone, we are concerned that this is merely an add-on to the current deal rather than an integral part of it. In the light of that, will the Europe Minister comment on the position of the French Socialist presidential candidate, who is visiting the UK today and urging EU member states to reopen the treaty to include more commitments to growth and jobs?
I will cite the words of one Member of the House who seems to share our deep scepticism about the consequence and cause of the Prime Minister’s diplomatic defeatism last December—the Deputy Prime Minister. Earlier this month, he explained:
“The language gets confusing. Veto suggests something was stopped.”
The phantom veto of December has now been exposed. He also said that over time the treaty would
“be folded into the existing EU treaties so you don’t get a permanent two parallel treaties working separately from each other…We all see this as a temporary arrangement rather than one which creates a permanent breach at the heart of the EU.”
According to him, the Prime Minister’s walkout in December was a temporary arrangement.
The crux of the issue was eloquently and pithily expressed by the hon. Member for Rochester and Strood (Mark Reckless) the day after the 30 January European Council, when he asked the Prime Minister:
“Will the Prime Minister explain what it is that he has vetoed?”—[Official Report, 31 January 2012; Vol. 539, c. 687.]
Nothing, it seems. The Government Back Benchers who gave the Prime Minister a hero’s welcome in December have now realised that he did not prevent anything from happening. We said at the time that his walkout was not an expression of the bulldog spirit but a form of diplomatic defeatism.
Mark Reckless (Rochester and Strood) (Con)
Is the hon. Lady aware of one thing that the Prime Minister seems to have achieved with this veto—as it has been described? In Ireland, the Irish Attorney-General has said that the fact that the compact is outside the EU treaties has influenced the advice that Ireland needs a referendum.
Emma Reynolds
That suggests that the Prime Minister’s influence is greater than it is. It is up to the Irish people to decide whether to accept the treaty, whether within the European treaties or outside.
Despite the penny dropping with everyone else, the Prime Minister resolutely clings to his phantom veto. At the press conference after the January European Council, he said:
“There isn’t an EU treaty because I vetoed it; it doesn’t exist.”
That flies in the face of the evidence. The European treaty involves 25 out of 27 of the member states. It involves the European Commission and the European Court of Justice. It sounds like a European treaty; it walks like a European treaty; it clearly is a European treaty. The Deputy Prime Minister is at pains to describe this situation as temporary, but in truth he was powerless to prevent the Prime Minister from putting the Conservative party interest above the national interest, as it was reported he was advised to do by the Foreign Secretary.
Bob Stewart (Beckenham) (Con)
Does that mean that the official Opposition would be happy with the treaty, leave it as it is and do nothing?
Emma Reynolds
We have made it clear that we are not happy with the treaty. We would not have walked out of the negotiations in December when a text was not even on the table. We would have negotiated a different treaty. We believe that this is a fiscal straitjacket like the one that the Government are putting on our country, and it is not in the interests of the eurozone or the UK.
As a result of the Government’s actions, Britain has never been so excluded from decisions affecting its vital national interests. That is bad for British business, bad for jobs and bad for families across the country. No British Government, regardless of political colour, have been as complacent as this Government about the emergence of a two-speed Europe. By putting party interest above the national interest, the Prime Minister has rendered the Government dependent on what could be described, euphemistically, as the Conservatives’ least-favourite institution—the European Commission—to protect the UK from decisions being taken without us even being in the room. Even Baroness Thatcher, a staunch critic of the EU, understood that being in the room was of paramount importance. She would never have relied on the European Commission to defend the British national interest.
Andrea Leadsom (South Northamptonshire) (Con)
I find the Opposition’s stance rather astonishing, because it focuses only on micro-details and fails to address the big picture. As an eternal optimist, I feel that the big picture—the opportunity for Britain—has rarely been better, because real change is in the air. As a banker by background, I have very real concerns about the prospects for the euro’s survival, and I think that the European Central Bank’s long-term repo arrangements will not endure beyond the first roll-over and may well collapse long before then. But regardless of the outcome for the euro in the short to medium term, there is no doubt that change is in the air.
I should mention to the shadow Minister that, as I am sure she realises, the treaty is not an EU treaty but a fiscal compact treaty that does not include all the EU member states. She did not seem to make that clear. The fiscal compact treaty will create a euro summit for those who are part of the eurozone and those who have ratified that treaty. The euro summit will consider things such as competition and structures, and inevitably will, therefore, be a forum for caucusing. That is almost inevitable. So change is in the air.
I take great pleasure in the fact that, because change is in the air, there is the opportunity for change for Britain too. The prospect is no longer of a two-speed Europe but of a multi-tier Europe—in respect not just of those in the eurozone and those outside it but of those in the Schengen arrangement and those outside it, and of those great fishing nations interested only in the common fishing area and those who wish to be excluded from it. A multi-tier Europe in which member states can pursue their own particular interests but join together in areas of common cause is the opportunity facing us.
I am delighted with everything I hear from our Government about our approach to that. We should welcome and support those in the eurozone area who wish to work more closely together on further fiscal integration to support their currency, and we should also be pressing for change in the best interests of Britain. In that context, I want briefly to mention the work of more than 120 Conservative Back Benchers in forming the Fresh Start project. I pay tribute to my hon. Friends the Members for Daventry (Chris Heaton-Harris) and for Camborne and Redruth (George Eustice). The three of us, together, have been pulling together an enormous project that looks at every single policy area under the EU and attempts to determine where it acts in Britain’s interests, where it goes against Britain’s interests and what the options are for change. To my knowledge, such work has not been done for a good long time. It was astonishing that the shadow Minister could not come up with any detail, but could only nit-pick at what the Prime Minister has been doing.
I also pay tribute to the hon. Member for Dunfermline and West Fife (Thomas Docherty), who sits on the shadow Minister’s side of the House and who has become co-chair with me of an all-party group. That group has seen significant engagement from both sides of the House in the interests of EU reform and what could be a better deal for Britain.
Emma Reynolds
I would like to make it clear to the hon. Lady, who is making an eloquent speech, that the Opposition are in favour of European reform, but not the same kind that she is. For example, we are not in favour of repatriating European social policy, and we also think that, even were it desirable, it would be a pretty unrealistic aim.
Andrea Leadsom
I am glad that the hon. Lady made that intervention, because I can assure her that the all-party group on European reform, with which her hon. Friend the Member for Dunfermline and West Fife other Labour Members, Government Members and Members across the House are closely involved, is investigating the options for change. It is not a campaign group but an investigative group. It is a disappointment to me and to others that the hon. Lady has not engaged in that debate, because we have turned up some extremely interesting facts.
As the devil in the EU is in the detail, I would like briefly to mention three areas. The first is financial services. Before the financial crisis, the single market for financial services was a very good thing. It significantly added to British GDP, as well as the GDP of Germany, France and Italy. All the change at EU level was about creating a better single market, including in UCITS—undertakings for collective investment in transferable securities, the most successful financial services export from the UK ever.
Financial services had great legislation; however, since the financial crisis the EU has turned to stopping, slowing down, preventing and shutting down financial services, almost in a sort of act of revenge against the bankers. Indeed, I have heard many EU politicians talking about how City-style financial services are to blame for the problems they have found themselves facing. However, that is simply not true, and our Prime Minister did absolutely the right thing for British businesses and the British economy by standing up for financial services and seeking the safeguards that would enable us to protect the industry, which employs a total of nearly 2 million people in this country and contributes 11% of our GDP on an ongoing basis. He therefore did absolutely the right thing, entirely contrary to what the shadow Minister suggested.
Secondly, the shadow Minister mentioned social policy and the working time directive, and said that the all-party Fresh Start group would repatriate those powers. Not true: we are looking at what the options for change are. She will know, as do many people, that trainee doctors in the NHS are severely hampered. In fact, a coroner in the west country recently attributed the death of one elderly gentleman to the working time directive, which had meant that not enough doctors were on call and that the two doctors on duty were seeing 300 to 400 patients between them. Change is therefore vital.
My third and final point is about structural funds, where we now have a genuine opportunity. Back in 2003, the hon. Lady’s Government’s policy was to repatriate the local element of structural funds. In Britain we have been contributing €33 billion to structural funds over the past seven years. Some €9 billion comes back to the UK, but that is decided by the EU. What on earth is the point of that? We can decide best where to allocate that €9 billion. Interestingly, some of our poorest regions are net contributors to structural funds, not net beneficiaries, so the potential for reform is massive.
Stephen Phillips (Sleaford and North Hykeham) (Con)
I rise not to detain the House, as I know that the Minister will shortly be on his feet, subject to other contributions, but because it seems to me, having listened to the majority of speeches in the debate, that the issue under discussion is extraordinarily important—so important, in fact, that I am disappointed not to see more Members on the Opposition Benches.
Be that as it may, and given that the Minister will, on behalf of the Government, shortly respond to the debate, I think it important that he give a direct response to three points that I have listened to during our proceedings. First, there is the point, which my hon. Friend the Member for Wellingborough (Mr Bone) made so ably, about the procedure by which the matter has come before the House. We are fortunate indeed that Mr Speaker yesterday acceded to the request from my hon. Friend the Member for Stone (Mr Cash), whom I too congratulate on securing this debate under Standing Order No. 24. It is perfectly right that he should have sought that liberty and, therefore, that we debate the matter today.
But for the fleet-footedness, as another hon. Member described it, of my hon. Friend, there would have been no opportunity for the House to discuss the matter before the end of the week, when the treaty will be signed by those who choose to do so. Given its provisions, to which I shall turn in due course, that would have been a matter of very grave concern not just to those of us on the European Scrutiny Committee, who look at such matters with great interest and, I hope, care, but to the whole House, albeit that it would have been in ignorance of some points that have been made about the importance of precisely what is going on.
It is a great shame in those circumstances that Government time was not scheduled in advance of the end of this week for the debate to take place. Although I know that it is not directly my right hon. Friend the Minister’s responsibility, I have no doubt that he, who will answer for the Government, has discussed the matter with the Leader of the House, and it is perfectly appropriate that the House be told why no debate was scheduled in Government time. That is the first point that he must answer.
The second point concerns the legality of using the European Union’s institutions in the context of the treaty to which those 25 countries will become signatories. We know, because the Prime Minister has told us, that the Government have their own concerns about whether it is appropriate that EU institutions be used outside the framework of the treaties that already exist for the governance of the European Union.
I understand and accept—the Government are entirely right—that there must be a degree of pragmatism in relation to the aims of the treaty, which we hope will succeed in stabilising the euro, although many Government Members, many Opposition Members, I suspect, and, indeed, many people in the country are concerned that it is just yet another piece of paper, and that all we are doing is putting off the evil day when the euro finally unravels and countries such as Greece, Portugal, Cyprus and perhaps even Italy have to drop out.
Let us assume in favour of those who have put the treaty together and framed its provisions and that it stands some chance of making things better in the eurozone. As my hon. Friend the Member for Stroud (Neil Carmichael) indicated, that is important to all our constituents, because we all want to be able to trade with a successful eurozone. Let us therefore make that assumption in favour of the treaty and those who have framed it.
Even in those circumstances, there still exists the problem of the legality of the use of the institutions of the European Union. I hope that my right hon. Friend the Minister will make it absolutely clear to the House, and through the House to the British public and our partners in Europe, that the Government will not countenance anything that not only damages this country and its interests but is unlawful under the treaties to which we have already subscribed. That is the second point with which he must deal.
The third point is the most important. The treaty is potentially the thin end of a very large wedge. Other Members have alluded to the fact that when the European Union and the faceless bureaucrats in Brussels do not get their own way, they simply look for a solution that is not necessarily lawful but is at least pragmatic, to ensure that what happens is precisely what they want, rather than what the people of Europe want. That has been the hallmark of European governance since the EU was established, and certainly since the Maastricht treaty. We see it very clearly in this case.
My right hon. Friend the Prime Minister was absolutely right to veto the suggestion of any further European treaty that would have damaged the interests of this country and the City of London. When Opposition Front Benchers ask, “What was vetoed?”, as they did earlier in the debate, I say that it is very clear. It was a further European Union treaty that this House does not want and that, more importantly, the people of this country do not want. It would have been damaging to the interests of Britain and all our constituents. It would have been extraordinarily straightforward for the Leader of the Opposition to stand behind the Prime Minister, but he chose not to do so. Perhaps he is fearful of Europe, and perhaps the fact that none of his Back Benchers and almost nobody from the Labour party is here for the debate indicates that Labour is perfectly willing to see imposed upon the British people the same sort of treaty that it gave us in Lisbon without a referendum, having promised one in the first place.
Emma Reynolds
Can the hon. and learned Gentleman explain to the House what in the fiscal compact treaty would have applied to the UK, and therefore why the Prime Minister felt the need to veto it?
Stephen Phillips
If the hon. Lady had actually read the fiscal compact treaty, and if she had been here when my hon. Friend the Member for North East Somerset (Jacob Rees-Mogg) made his speech—I do not think she was—she would know that article 8 of the treaty provided for penalties in relation to countries that are not eurozone members. She would also know that article 16 required the treaty to be rolled into the treaty on the functioning of the European Union within the next five years. That is the thin end of a wedge and indicates clearly to me and other members of the European Scrutiny Committee that in the current case it is possibly being contemplated that the provisions of the treaty will in due course become binding on the United Kingdom, notwithstanding the fact that the UK is not a member of the eurozone. That is the direct answer to her question.
When the Leader of the Opposition says that he would have negotiated further on the treaty, Conservative Members are entitled to ask with whom he would have negotiated. The negotiations had come to an end. Is the hon. Lady saying that the Leader of the Opposition would have negotiated with himself? The Opposition need to stop opposing just for the sake of opposition, and instead stand behind the Prime Minister and his veto and behind debates such as this. With that said, I hope that the—
Oral Answers to Questions
Emma Reynolds Excerpts(12 years, 2 months ago)
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Mr Hague
To put it in a slightly more balanced way, I have pointed out for many years that one of the disadvantages of the euro is the loss of national sovereign decision making to the countries concerned. However, there is one flaw in my hon. Friend’s argument, which is that it is very clear that not only the representatives but, at the moment, the people of Greece choose to try to stay in the euro. That is the democratic choice that they are making, and we should support them in it if that is their choice.
Emma Reynolds (Wolverhampton North East) (Lab)
The European Union is our biggest trading partner, and a resolution to the eurozone crisis is clearly in our national interest. Given that our bilateral relationship with France is central to that, why is it being reported that the Prime Minister has refused to meet one of the leading presidential candidates, François Hollande, when he visits London tomorrow?
Mr Hague
Yes, the bilateral relationship with France is of great importance, and it is true that our co-operation, particularly on foreign and security policy, is the closest that it has been at any time since the second world war. Relations with France are very good and very close. Of course, the Prime Minister sometimes meets opposition leaders and sometimes does not, but I am not aware of governmental leaders across Europe taking a different approach from his.
European Council
Emma Reynolds Excerpts(12 years, 3 months ago)
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Emma Reynolds (Wolverhampton North East) (Lab)
The debate comes at a crucial time for the eurozone and the wider European Union. Last month’s European Council could and should have taken the vital decisions needed to stabilise the eurozone and boost growth and jobs in the EU, but it failed to do so. Monday’s European Council is a vital chance to make up for previous lost opportunities, but I fear that the Prime Minister’s diminished position in Europe has jeopardised the Government’s ability to achieve and influence that. His walk-out at the previous European Council was a spectacular failure to engage with our European partners. We have a world-class diplomatic service, but the Prime Minister refused to use the talent, professionalism and experience of the Foreign Office and opted instead to let the Treasury run our foreign policy. He decided that keeping his Back Benchers happy was more important than helping our main export market resolve the eurozone crisis. He in fact followed the advice of the Foreign Secretary who, according to various reports, before the last European Council told him:
“If it is a choice between keeping the euro together or keeping the Conservative party together, it is in the national interest to keep the Conservative party together.”
That is the only thing that the Prime Minister did achieve, because he did not stop anything happening. His diplomatic defeatism was accurately summed up by the Deputy Prime Minister earlier this month, when he said:
“The language gets confusing. Veto suggests something was stopped. It was not stopped.”
I could not agree more.
Martin Horwood
The hon. Lady makes some of the points that I made several months ago and that other hon. Members sympathetic to the pro-European cause made at the time of the summit. Surely we have now moved on. The Prime Minister, in his remarks today at Davos, quite clearly stated:
“It fundamentally reflects our national interest to be part of the single market on our doorstep and we have intention of walking away. So let me be clear: we want Europe to be a success.”
The process of re-engagement is under way.
Emma Reynolds
The process of re-engagement might be under way, but the Prime Minister’s decision to walk out of a summit that did not have a text to it has undermined our influence in the EU. His spectacular mishandling bought him short-term political respite from the pressure of his Back Benchers, but they will always want more, and we heard that in today’s debate.
Mr MacShane
May I pray in aid the Deputy Prime Minister, who said that the Conservative party in the European Parliament is now allied with “nutters, anti-Semites and homophobes”? The right hon. Gentleman has not resiled from that. That is walking away from Europe. As long as the Conservative party is in alliance with those weirdos, it loses a good part of the political traction that it should have in Europe.
Emma Reynolds
My right hon. Friend makes a valid point. If the Prime Minister had not pulled his MEPs from the mainstream centre right in the European Parliament when he was Leader of the Opposition, he would have found that he had much more influence before the summit, because he would have been in Marseille for the European People’s party meeting in preparation for the European Council summit.
It is of real concern to the Opposition that by isolating the UK the Government have lost influence with our European partners and could lose influence over the single market. Deeper fiscal integration by the eurozone countries does not necessarily lead to the development of separate trade policies or separate decisions on the single market, but that could come about if the UK continues to lose influence.
I understand that the Polish Government are now seeking to secure a seat at the frequent eurozone summits—a logical negotiating position. If they are successful, they would then have a voice, even if they did not have vote, at eurozone summits. As it stands, our Government will be barred from such meetings, leaving the UK without a vote and without a voice, unable to guard against eurozone Heads of State and Government straying into areas of decision making that are relevant to the EU of 27.
Mr Redwood
Will the hon. Lady bring us up to date with Labour’s thinking on any vote that we might face in this House on money for the IMF to lend on to euroland countries in trouble?
Emma Reynolds
As the right hon. Gentleman knows, the Opposition voted against the IMF contribution last time. I think that he might have been in the Lobby with us. We think that the European central bank should be the lender of last resort and that IMF money should concentrate on countries with severe economic problems outside the eurozone.
The Prime Minister’s walk-out also resulted in risks to foreign direct investment. Businesses investing from the US and Asia have chosen the UK for their operations because it gives them access to European markets. But if the UK’s position in the single market were in doubt, foreign direct investment would also be under threat. Moreover, as the Deputy Prime Minister rightly said on the Sunday after the December Council, if the UK stands tall in Brussels, we stand tall in Washington. It is also true that if we stand tall in Brussels, we also stand tall in Beijing and the other major emerging economies. With economic power moving south and east, to countries the size of continents, it is nostalgic longing for the empire to think that the UK can go it alone. It was the Minister for Europe, in a recent Opposition day debate, who said that
“without the size of the EU behind us, the United Kingdom on its own is unlikely to be able to secure the same deep and ambitious free trade deals with other regions or trading countries around the world.”—[Official Report, 13 December 2011; Vol. 537, c. 724.]
Emma Reynolds
I will in a minute.
The task of Monday’s European Council is both urgent and long term—urgent in that it must address the lack of confidence in European markets, but alongside that the EU must enhance the resilience and capacity of the single market to get back to a sustainable footing in the long term.
We welcome the intention to focus on jobs and growth on Monday, as well as agreeing a fiscal compact. We would prefer the Government, rather than merely commentating on the outcome of the European Council, to be setting the agenda. We hope that their failure in diplomacy will not involve a failure of policy and economics. After all, in the coalition agreement, the Tories and the Liberal Democrats stated that Britain should play a leading role in the EU. The Prime Minister clearly did not have that in mind in December.
Emma Reynolds
When the Minister replies, will he clarify one issue? The Deputy Prime Minister has been organising his own meetings, and in some cases he seems to be running his own parallel foreign policy. While it is right for the Government to be building bridges, it is disappointing that the Deputy Prime Minister has thus far chosen not to report the outcome of the meetings to Parliament. Would the Minister therefore confirm whether the Deputy Prime Minister was speaking for the Government when, at the recent European Liberal forum, he said that:
“We believe—
the treaty—
“should, over time, be folded into the existing EU treaties so you don’t get a permanent two parallel treaties working separately from each other”?
At next Monday’s European Council, the British Government at least have observer status, but that is thanks to Chancellor Merkel and Prime Minister Monti, who want the UK back in the room. They see the UK as a leading member state, advocating an extension of the internal market. It is testament to past British diplomacy and previous Governments that many other member states share the view that, with Britain isolated and excluded from these talks, the push for further liberalisation and reform becomes harder.
Emma Reynolds
The hon. Gentleman is frustrated, but he will understand that because interventions eat into my time I will continue.
Britain’s standing in the world—economically and politically—must be reinforced and strengthened, not weakened. The resolution of the eurozone crisis is manifestly in our national interest. It is also in the national interest for the UK to be at the heart of the EU, a large member state with an open economy, arguing for and securing an extension of the single market, arguing for and securing reform of the EU. The UK now needs to regain that position and start rebuilding bridges.
On Monday the Prime Minister should seek to undo the damage caused by what he did in December, diminishing our standing in Europe and the world. It might not please his Back Benchers, but it would be of benefit to businesses, jobs and employees throughout the country. The Prime Minister must start to put the national interest before his party’s interest.
Oral Answers to Questions
Emma Reynolds Excerpts(12 years, 3 months ago)
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Emma Reynolds (Wolverhampton North East) (Lab)
It has been reported that the Foreign Secretary advised the Prime Minister before the European Union summit in December that if it is a choice between keeping the euro together or keeping the Conservative party together, it is in the national interest to keep the Conservative party together. Can the Minister confirm that the Foreign Secretary regards the unity of his party as more important to the national interest than the success or failure of our largest trading partner?
Mr Lidington
I really had hoped that the hon. Lady would have something a bit better to say than that. What the Government are determined to do is to support our allies and neighbours in the eurozone in their efforts to restore economic stability to their currency union, and also to press for the measures to promote job creation and economic growth which the whole of Europe desperately needs. We are not prepared to take lectures from the Labour party that signed away £7 billion of the British rebate and denied the people of this country the referendum on the Lisbon treaty, which it had promised.
European Union
Emma Reynolds Excerpts(12 years, 5 months ago)
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Emma Reynolds (Wolverhampton North East) (Lab)
It is clear that the Government are deeply divided on this issue. It is also clear that the Prime Minister and the Deputy Prime Minister are at odds, that Back Benchers are divided and that the Cabinet is divided. Perhaps the Prime Minister and the Deputy Prime Minister have more in common than we think, however, given that the Deputy Prime Minister empty-chaired the Prime Minister’s statement yesterday in much the same way as the Prime Minister walked out from the summit last week. It seems that the Deputy Prime Minister could not stomach listening to the Prime Minister trying to justify his position to relegate the UK to the outer fringes of the EU in the early hours of Friday morning. I believe that the Deputy Prime Minister was right to say on Sunday that the outcome of the summit was “bad for Britain” and bad for jobs and growth. If only he had been able to convince the Prime Minister of his opinion before the summit.
Emma Reynolds
I am not giving way for the moment.
As I understand it, the Secretary of State for Energy and Climate Change has just this evening added his voice to the chorus of criticism of the Prime Minister from Liberal Democrat Ministers so I will be interested to see whether, given that the Liberal Democrats have had three different positions in five days on this issue, they have now come to a settled position. I hope that they will oppose the motion. How could they vote for it when they are on record as saying that what happened is a bad deal for Britain?
Emma Reynolds
Yes, we are going to divide the House, and if the hon. Gentleman had let me get to the second page of my speech, which I intend to be shorter than that of the Minister for Europe, he would have found that out.
I oppose this motion—we oppose this motion—as it bizarrely commends the Prime Minister for the outcome of last week’s summit. The truth is that it was the worst possible result for the country. We have never been so isolated: 26:1. I say to the right hon. Member for Belfast North (Mr Dodds) that there is a difference between us and the other nine non-eurozone member states because the other nine are at least in the room, contributing to a decision that will have an impact on our economy. If the eurozone crisis deepens, it will have profound implications for our economy.
Emma Reynolds
Now we find that the UK is in a position whereby decisions affecting us could be taken without us even having a seat at the table.
Madam Deputy Speaker (Dawn Primarolo)
Order. I think that the hon. Lady has indicated that she is not giving way until she has made some progress in her speech. I heard it and I am sure that hon. Gentlemen did. Perhaps they could remain in their seats for a little while, and the hon. Lady will make it clear when she wants to give way.
Emma Reynolds
I promise hon. Gentlemen that I will give way, but I am attempting to give a shorter speech than the one we just heard.
Sometimes a veto is necessary as a last resort, but it is a negative device that can be used to prevent change that we oppose. Back in the early 1990s, John Major used the veto at the Maastricht treaty summit. He got something in return—an opt-out from the single currency, which the Labour Government used to full effect while we were in office. However, the veto cannot be used as a positive device to force change that we want, as the Prime Minister demonstrated last week. He failed not only to secure the changes he demanded, but to stop the changes he opposed. The former Prime Minister got something in return for his veto; the current Prime Minister got nothing in return. It was a phantom veto; it failed to stop anything.
The truth is that the UK has never been outvoted on financial services in the 38 years during which we have been a member of the Common Market. The Prime Minister has defended nothing—walking out of the summit, leaving us weaker, not stronger. It is the greatest failure of peacetime diplomacy in more than half a century. Our partners do not recognise the Britain that walks away from a battle. As one French woman said in a vox pop to The Observer at the weekend:
“I’ve never seen the British give up.”
This is not the bulldog spirit; it is a form of diplomatic defeatism.
It is not surprising that other European leaders did not even give the Prime Minister a hearing. They were completely taken by surprise by a list of demands that did not seem to have anything to do with the discussions in the summit. Not one single line in the summit’s conclusion refers to financial services. Baroness Thatcher pioneered a single market to be decided by qualified majority voting and signed the Single European Act in 1986. The Prime Minister sought to overturn that decision last week, arguing for a removal of qualified majority voting in single market decisions. Needless to say, the Prime Minister’s handbag was not as powerful as Baroness Thatcher’s.
Emma Reynolds
First, had we been in government, we would not have been asleep at the wheel for the first nine months of this year. Secondly, we would have built alliances, not burned bridges, and we would not have found ourselves in a situation at the summit in which nobody agreed with us. We had no support from any of those member states.
It is clear that the Prime Minister spectacularly mishandled the summit by failing to prepare the ground, failing to talk to European leaders in advance and failing to build alliances. The Foreign Minister of Poland, until fairly recently one of our strongest allies, singled out the UK for criticism in a recent speech. It now transpires—[Interruption.] Conservative Members might be interested to hear about this. It now transpires that even our lead diplomat in Brussels, the British permanent representative, learned of the Government’s negotiating position only 48 hours before the summit. What a cack-handed way to prepare for important negotiations. No wonder the blame game has started in Whitehall between the Treasury and the Foreign Office.
Mike Gapes
My hon. Friend should also be aware that none of the ambassadors, based in London, of the other 26 European Union states knew in advance what the British Government were trying to get out of this summit. How on earth could they report back to their countries in advance what might be the necessary concessions to get agreement if they were not told in advance?
Emma Reynolds
As my hon. Friend has eloquently pointed out, the Government’s attempt to get agreement at the summit was amateur—they did no preparation. As a result of the Prime Minister walking out of negotiations, it is even more likely, not less, that vital British interests will not be taken into account when key economic decisions are taken at EU level. The eurozone 17 and the other nine non-eurozone countries will meet more frequently and take decisions that affect the UK, without the UK being in the room. How on earth do Conservative Members think that is a success? Without a voice, British business is more vulnerable to decisions that our Government are powerless to change or influence.
Dr Julian Lewis
I much admire the hon. Lady’s verve and style, but everything that she says points to the conclusion that, given a choice between the only two options—to sign or not to sign—she would have signed. Is that conclusion right or wrong?
Emma Reynolds
I point out to the hon. Gentleman that nothing was signed at the European summit and negotiations are ongoing. A likely text might appear at the March European summit, but a text is not yet on the table. Yes, we would have stayed in the negotiations, because it is not in the national interest for decisions to proceed without us.
It is no wonder that businesses are concerned about what has happened over the last few days. Terry Scuoler, chief executive of EEF, the manufacturers’ organisation, underlined the point:
“We need the government to develop a clear strategy for engaging with other member states when in theory it could find itself isolated on occasions.”
John Cridland of the CBI has called for the Government to
“redouble its efforts to ensure that the UK is not put at an economic disadvantage”.
Angela Knight—a former Conservative Member of the House—chief executive of the British Bankers Association, has stressed:
“We do not know yet what impact this new arrangement is going to have on the UK’s ability to secure agreements on sensible regulation—but that is critical.”
The penny is also starting to drop with some parts of the British press that originally welcomed the outcome of the summit. Even The Daily Telegraph states in its editorial today that it is unclear
“whether threats to the City really have been deflected”.
The Times laments in its editorial that the Prime Minister
“has not set out a vision of where Britain now stands in the world”.
In grave economic circumstances, the prospects for families, jobs, businesses and banks across our country are now all the more stark. Growth is flatlining and unemployment is at a 17-year high. Against the backdrop of that dire economic situation, the Conservatives want us to be further isolated, as if the reckless action of the Prime Minister at last week’s summit was not enough to isolate the UK from its largest export market.
Glyn Davies (Montgomeryshire) (Con)
I am trying hard to understand the Opposition’s position on this complicated issue, but that is incredibly difficult without knowing whether they would have taken an affirmative or negative stance. We want not clever words about whether they would have signed, but a yes or no.
Emma Reynolds
It is terribly complicated, because the Government have two positions rather than one. Some hon. Members want the UK to cut itself loose completely. They will be happy only when the UK leaves the largest single market in the world. The Government’s policies are already choking off the recovery and have made us more vulnerable to the eurozone crisis. Were our membership of the European Union also in doubt, the economic consequences would be devastating. In a recent written answer to my right hon. Friend the Member for Paisley and Renfrewshire South (Mr Alexander) about the economic benefits of the EU to Britain, the Foreign Secretary replied:
“European markets account for half of the UK's overall trade and foreign investments and as a result, around 3.5 million jobs in the UK are linked to the export of goods and services to the EU.”—[Official Report, 12 July 2011; Vol. 531, c. 256W.]
Isolation could also threaten foreign direct investment.
Emma Reynolds
I have given way to the hon. Member for Wellingborough (Mr Bone) already, so I give way to the hon. Member for Peterborough (Mr Jackson).
Mr Jackson
In passing, let me say that the hon. Lady owes an answer to the millions of patriotic Labour voters in the country on whether she would have signed. Is she aware, however, of a recent Civitas report, “A Cost Too Far”, which estimates the current recurring annual cost to the UK of EU membership at between at 3% and 5% of GDP, a likely figure of £40 billion a year?
Emma Reynolds
I say to the hon. Gentleman that all our voters are proud patriots, and so are Labour Members. In constituencies across the country, foreign companies have invested in manufacturing facilities that support millions of jobs—Nissan, Honda, Bombardier, Airbus, to name but a few. In my constituency, Indian-owned Tata Jaguar Land Rover is building a new multi-million-pound engine plant, bringing hundreds of jobs. Those companies see the UK as a useful avenue into the single market. Those investments would be at risk if the UK continues to be on the sidelines, as Martin Sorrell, chief executive of WPP, stressed only yesterday when he recounted that he had spoken to an Indian investor who is considering where to locate a plant, and it was already the investor’s perception that the UK is outside western Europe.
George Eustice (Camborne and Redruth) (Con)
Is the hon. Lady not aware that all the arguments about inward investment leaving Britain were made when we decided not to join the euro, and they were all proved entirely incorrect?
Emma Reynolds
If the hon. Gentleman remembers, it was our Government who kept this country out of the euro.
The UK’s isolation is bad not just in economic terms, but for our influence in the world. Even the Deputy Prime Minister said on Sunday that when we stand tall in the European Union, we stand tall in Washington. But it is not only our standing in Washington that is now of concern. Political and economic power is rapidly moving south and east, to Brazil, India and China. In this new multi-polar world, it is those who harbour a fanciful, nostalgic longing for the empire who naively think that the UK could be more powerful standing alone. The only game in town to further prise open markets in emerging economies and to change the rules of the trade game, is for the UK to act within the European Union—a Union that magnifies our influence. Only this weekend, at the climate change summit in Durban, we saw that by working together with our European partners, we amplify our voice on key global challenges.
Andrew Percy
I have been very patient; I am the last one to get in.
The hon. Lady talks about the issue of clarity. Will she tell my constituents what the Labour party’s position is? Would they have agreed to what was asked on Friday? Do they support further European integration? Will they rule out membership of the euro for ever? Three simple questions, to which they want three simple answers.
Emma Reynolds
Last but not least, a simple answer—we are not in favour of joining the euro.
The cheerleaders who toasted the Prime Minister at the welcome home party at Chequers last Friday want out of the European Union. What was once the Eurosceptic fringe of the Conservative party has now become the mainstream, as has just been demonstrated. The Prime Minister is clearly following, rather than leading, his party. Naturally, Conservative Members are happy, albeit only for the time being. The right hon. and hon. Members who now back the Prime Minister do not agree with him that our membership of the European Union is vital to our national interest. They are the same right hon. and hon. Members that he tried to get on board when he ran for his party’s leadership. He beseeched them to “stop banging on about Europe”, but they did not obey.
I am not sure what was on the menu at Chequers, but the Prime Minister should be in no doubt that his guests have an insatiable appetite. After starters of prosciutto and cured meats, they will still want steak tartare for their main course. The Prime Minister has only earned himself a gap between the entrée and the plat principal.
The Prime Minister’s actions last week were apparently taken in the face of some unidentified threat to one part of our economy, but the real objective was to toss some extra red meat to the anti-Europeans, whose appetites have now been whetted but not sated. Had the Prime Minister spent as much time and energy speaking to our European partners in the run-up to the summit as he spent pandering to his anti-European Back Benchers, we might be in a different place now—and it would be in the national interest for us to be in a different place. However, we have a Prime Minister who puts his party’s interest before the national interest, and as a result we have a bad deal for British jobs, businesses and banks. Our country needs and deserves better leadership.
Emma Reynolds
Will the hon. Gentleman confirm that the decision-making procedure for any financial transaction tax is subject to unanimity, not to qualified majority voting, and that no attempt at all was made to impose such a tax on us at last Thursday’s summit?
Dr McCrea
The hon. Lady has come to the Dispatch Box today, but has not yet told us what the official Opposition would have done had they been in government, so it is rich of her to ask questions of other Members about the issue.
What has happened is that Europe has been taught a salutary lesson, which it will not forget. Perhaps it will be one of the last lessons that Mr Sarkozy will face on the international stage; the presidential elections are coming and one never knows the results of those. Since the Prime Minister’s justifiable action in Brussels, many commentators have tried to suggest that he has lost credibility on the European stage. What kind of influence could our Prime Minister have had if he had failed to honour his pledge to act in the best interests of the British people? It is clear that Mr Cameron has the support of a vast number of people throughout the United Kingdom on this issue, and we want and encourage him to continue to stand firm.
I suggest that if some Liberal Democrats feel that this does not have the support of the community, they can test it in two ways. First, they could have a referendum; certainly, it would be interesting for them to support that idea, as they wanted a referendum recently on something that was also a side, rather than an important, issue. Secondly, they could allow the electorate to decide. If they thought that Mr Cameron did not have the backing of the people, they could allow an election to take place and let the electorate make their decision based on that situation.
It is absolutely disgraceful that the leader of the Liberal Democrats stayed away from the House but was happy enough to go to bed in his constituency when the Prime Minister was standing up for the interests of the United Kingdom. He was happy to agree with a certain standard, but whenever the chips were down he claimed that Mr Cameron was yielding to his Back Benchers. I suggest that the change came over Mr Clegg because he was yielding to the shouts from his own Back Benchers. We do not need Mr Flip-Flop on this issue. We need a definite stand for the interests of the United Kingdom, and I am delighted that our Prime Minister took that stand in Europe.
Emma Reynolds
Nothing was agreed on Thursday that led to a signing of a treaty change. We would have to see what was in the treaty change to decide whether we would sign up to it.
Sammy Wilson
This is the problem—if that is the case, why would those in the Labour party not support a deal? Why will they not say that they would also have vetoed a deal? If they would not have vetoed it, they are saying that they would support something that they believe is bad for jobs. That is the logic of their position.
The other argument is that the Prime Minister has taken this action because he is afraid of his Back Benchers. If anyone is afraid of his Back Benchers, it is the leader of the Liberal party. On Friday, he was saying that he agreed the terms, the tactics and the approach. By Sunday he had changed his mind. What changed his mind? I suspect that his Back Benchers changed his mind. It is a bit rich to say that the Prime Minister is in hock to his Back Benchers. Equally, I suspect that the Labour party has taken the attitude it has adopted because it is afraid of the public. It knows that the vast majority of the public—57%—support what the Prime Minister has done. I would rather have a Prime Minister who is cognisant of the British people’s views and then responds to those views. For that reason, we commend him in our motion.
I am sure that we will have plenty of opportunities to disagree with the Government, and times when we criticise the Prime Minister. This is not the end of the matter. The Prime Minister will have to show again the backbone that he showed last Friday, and we will look for him to do it.
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs (Mr Henry Bellingham)
I congratulate our friends in the Democratic Unionist party on securing this debate on the Prime Minister’s decision last Friday to protect the national interest. They are true allies in these challenging times. I pay tribute to the right hon. Member for Belfast North (Mr Dodds) and the hon. Member for East Antrim (Sammy Wilson) for their speeches.
As the Prime Minister explained to the House yesterday, we went to the European Council in good faith, seeking to reach an agreement acceptable to all 27 members of the European Union. In doing so, we were clear on the need to have the necessary safeguards in place to protect our national interests on the single market as a whole and on financial services. We did not seek special treatment or carve-out for the UK, but safeguards that would ensure a level playing field. As my right hon. Friend the Minister for Europe said, those safeguards were modest, reasonable and highly relevant. As he also pointed out, it was a question of protecting not just the City of London, but financial services across the whole of Europe. As it was not possible to reach agreement on satisfactory safeguards, we were not able to agree to a treaty at 27. That was clearly the responsible course for us to take in order to protect the United Kingdom’s national interest.
The hon. Member for Wolverhampton North East (Emma Reynolds) asked whether the Government had been properly prepared, and concluded that they had been ill prepared. She said that we had asked for too much, too late. Where has the hon. Lady been for the last month? The Prime Minister and the Deputy Prime Minister talked to most leaders and visited key capitals during that period. The Prime Minister saw Chancellor Merkel three weeks before the Council, and met President Sarkozy a week before it. The Prime Minister was clear about the position on safeguards, and made it crystal clear that the safeguards he wanted were moderate and reasonable. As was pointed out by my hon. Friends the Members for Folkestone and Hythe (Damian Collins) and for Stroud (Neil Carmichael), the position was well understood.
Mr Bellingham
I will not, because I must cover as much ground as possible.
The course taken by the Prime Minister allowed eurozone countries and others to proceed with a separate treaty in which they could pool their sovereignty on an intergovernmental basis with the aim of implementing tighter fiscal discipline in the eurozone as part of the process of restoring market confidence. It is right and important for eurozone countries to take the action that they deem necessary to deal with the crisis in the eurozone. We want and need the eurozone to sort out its problems. That is in Britain’s national interest, as it is clear that a crisis in the eurozone is having a negative effect on the UK economy.
European Council
Emma Reynolds Excerpts(12 years, 5 months ago)
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Mr Leigh
To be frank, I do not think that that is a serious point. Everybody knows that the hon. Gentleman is trying to tilt at windmills. Things are getting worse, because the United Kingdom’s level of influence on new financial rules has decreased. Regulation is now geared less towards financial services growth, and more towards curtailing the financial market economy. The perception in many continental capitals—there may be a reason for this—is that the so-called Anglo Saxon light-touch capitalism needs to be reined in. In the past, EU politicians and policy makers generally, but not always, felt constrained from imposing financial regulation on the UK, but that has now ceased to be the case. I agree that United Kingdom regulation has moved from the light-touch concept, but its new focus on regulatory judgment looks set to clash with the prevailing rules-based culture at the EU. In addition, the eurozone crisis is increasingly likely to create exceptional needs and political incentives for the euro countries to act in the interests of their own eurozone of 10.
I believe that all those reasons—the new emphasis on qualified majority voting, our inability to use our veto in this marketplace, and the increasing tendency of the European Union to want to interfere in the financial marketplace—are as big a threat to the main motivator of our economy as anything that we have seen in history. What do we do about it? I think that this is a decisive moment for the Prime Minister. He has to say in the conference that he is not prepared to sign any treaty unless he receives cast-iron guarantees that our financial sector will be set free from interference. If he does not get such cast-iron guarantees, I believe that he must be prepared to veto any treaty. If he is then told that the 10 will go ahead and create their own treaty, he must declare that illegal. Although that may sound like a very dramatic thing to do, I have read in today’s papers that German commentators are already talking about even the threat of our Prime Minister standing up for British national interests as being “obnoxious,” but that is precisely what all European countries do. The first lesson of history, as I have said, is the overwhelming imperative on behalf of successive British Governments over the centuries to protect our commercial interests. The second lesson of history is that all Governments in Europe act in their own financial interest—all are determined by their own history.
We need not say much about recent German history, but we know that there is an imperative throughout German history to extend their marketplaces, particularly into the east in the Balkans. We know that there is an imperative on behalf of French Governments to hug Germany close, so the French President and German Chancellor will be acting entirely in their own national interest, which is what we demand of our Prime Minister.
I hope I will be forgiven for saying this, but we have had enough of spin and of reading about British Prime Ministers who, over the past 20 or 30 years, have said in the days preceding a summit that they will stand up for British national interests and ensure that they are protected, only to come back with a Chamberlain-esque piece of paper, saying, “I have negotiated very hard, got an opt-out from this and that, and succeeded in standing up for British interests,” when such guarantees are not worth the piece of paper they are written on. I suspect that agreements have already been made among the sherpas and the miners, and that our Prime Minister will be offered something, but that will not be enough unless it includes cast-iron guarantees that we can all accept and that protect our vital national interests, particularly those in relation to our financial sector.
Emma Reynolds (Wolverhampton North East) (Lab)
Does the hon. Gentleman agree that it is not in our national interest that the Government are deeply divided on the issue, and that the Prime Minister is therefore weak and isolated in the European Union and less able to negotiate the sorts of things demanded by the hon. Gentleman?
Mr Leigh
What is in our national interest—we see it in this Chamber today—is that patriotic Members of Parliament are prepared to speak up for the vital national interest. By speaking out this afternoon, we are actually supporting the Prime Minister in his negotiating stance, because I believe that we stand for what the British people want.
Andrea Leadsom
I have not seen the poll—I have been looking forward to seeing it—and I am not surprised by what my hon. Friend says. Although, as I have said, the treaties are all about expanding markets, growth and opportunities, some of the unintended consequences of EU policies have been the complete opposite of that, and never more so than in financial services. I think that a deliberate attempt has been made to reduce financial services activity in the eurozone.
Financial services should be the top priority for the Prime Minister. He has been clear about drawing a marker in the sand to the effect that Britain wants a secure legal agreement that, in the event that financial services legislation is against Britain’s best interest, we can prevent it from being imposed on us.
Emma Reynolds
The hon. Lady is making an eloquent speech. Does she support our idea that, to protect financial services and decisions on the internal market, the Prime Minister should call for all non-euro member states—the 10—to be observers at the euro group meetings that will be held so regularly?
Andrea Leadsom
Any attempt that the non-eurozone members make to protect their interests is important, but perhaps an even better way to do it would be to ensure that, if any vote is passed under QMV by the eurozone bloc, there should also be a supporting vote under QMV on the part of the out-group of 10, at a very minimum, to ensure that the in-group could not ride roughshod over the out-group.
Martin Horwood
I congratulate the hon. Gentleman on his qualifications.
Apart from the eurozone, the other key issue that will be discussed at the summit is, of course, the accession of Croatia. We very much look forward to the accession of Croatia, which is a brilliant example of the transformative process of applying for membership of the European Union. Croatia has managed to address so many issues relating to its judiciary, economy and the reform of its political processes. That is an example that should be followed by other candidate countries looking to accede to the Union. It is inspiring to remember that in the area of Europe most recently torn apart by war, those in the Balkans still see European Union membership as something that helps to guarantee future peace. That is one of the founding principles of the European Union and one that we should not lose sight of in the current melee over the eurozone and possible treaty reforms.
The third, and obviously the most important, issue that the Council has to address is the crisis in the eurozone. Here, I think, we are on common ground in realising that the threat of a disorderly collapse in the eurozone is of enormous importance to this country. If the eurozone goes down, it will do considerable damage to the entire world economy, let alone to the British economy. It should be our No. 1 national priority at the Council to advance the process of securing the future of the eurozone, however it happens to proceed. That the eurozone countries have not yet agreed the treaty process or the rules that ought to surround it is a matter of enormous frustration and anxiety. It reflects badly on the leaders of those countries that they have not yet come to such an agreement.
The second clear national priority has to be to defend Britain’s interests in the process, which is rightly the instinct of the Prime Minister at the Council. To come with a list of unrealistic demands that would hamper and threaten the whole process of resolving the crisis, however, would be spectacularly reckless and playing politics with Britain’s national interest. I apologise to the thinly attended Labour Benches, but I am afraid that as a country we are still deep in the process of cleaning up the mess left to us by the previous Government. Our economy remains in a fragile position, which is possibly more fragile than we had expected at this stage.
Emma Reynolds
When the Labour party left government, the economy was growing. The policies of this Government have choked off the recovery.
Martin Horwood
The economy is still growing, actually, but that is a debate for another day. The voters made up their mind about who was responsible for the economic mess that we found ourselves in.
We are still in a vulnerable position, and all colleagues need to be able to go back to their constituencies, to look pensioners, small business people and others in the face and to say that we are doing everything that we can to speed a resolution of the crisis and that we are not throwing spanners in the works.
Mr Cash
I agree. People were not listening back in the days of Maastricht and they are not listening now. That is the problem. I give special thanks to my hon. Friend the Member for Harwich and North Essex not only for this debate but for the consistency that he has shown since the days of the Maastricht rebellion, which I had the honour to lead all those years ago and of which he was a very important member. He was a new Member of the House and he understood the position immediately, as did my right hon. Friend the Member for Chingford and Woodford Green (Mr Duncan Smith) and a number of others who have remained in the House.
This is not only an historic question but a national question. The now absent hon. Member for Luton North (Kelvin Hopkins) mentioned Peter Shore and Bryan Gould. When I set up the Maastricht referendum campaign, it was hon. Members on the other side of the House, such as Peter Shore and Bryan Gould, who joined me in that campaign. We presented a petition, which many people may recall, of well over 500,000 signatures; in fact, we reckon that we got 700,000 signatures all told. The petition was deposited, calling for a referendum on the Maastricht treaty. I was delighted that my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister said only a couple of weeks ago that there should have been a referendum on that treaty. As one who was very deeply engaged in the whole of that process, from beginning to end—much to the dismay of those who have now, in my opinion, lost the argument—I believe that the necessity of knowing the views of the British people remains implicitly entrenched in the arrangements that are now coming forward and that therefore a referendum is essential.
I should now like to move on to the present time. I want to address the question facing us today in terms of the broad landscape. I wrote a pamphlet that was published in effect in this very room when we had a conference between the leading Eurosceptics and the leading Europhiles. It involved Charles Grant of the Centre for European Reform, Roland Rudd of Business for New Europe and a galaxy of others. Both sides regarded it as essential that we should get together and properly debate the questions on both sides of the argument with many of the best people from the two sides of the debate. In that pamphlet, I set out details that I will not go into today, but I say to those who are interested and who read the transcript of these proceedings that it is available. Indeed, the Prime Minister has written to me, saying that it is a substantial document and effectively, therefore, it has to be answered. He has said as much to me, and it does have to be answered. I assume that my right hon. Friend the Minister for Europe will do so in due course.
This is an historic turning point for both the country and the Conservative party. The dream of ever-closer union and, indeed, political and economic union has failed, and the root of that trouble is the fantasy world, which has persisted for so many decades, of trying to create economic and political union among so many diverse countries with diverse cultures, diverse economies and diverse democratic traditions.
Only today I witnessed Mr Barroso on the television screens berating everyone in the most dictatorial language. He was saying that everyone had to come together for the sake of saving this project. They themselves are responsible for having created it and they are now attempting to save it, despite the fact that the causes of the present discontent come from the creation of this project in the first place by the very people who are now berating everyone else.
I will go further and refer to two documents that I have just obtained. One is dated 6 December. It is Mr Van Rompuy’s document, entitled “Towards a stronger economic Union”. There is not one word about democracy anywhere in that document—the word “democracy” does not appear. Similarly, in the letter written to the President of the European Council—Mr Van Rompuy, no less—by Mr Sarkozy and Angela Merkel, there is not a single reference to the democratic question. There is not one iota, not one jot of a reference to democracy in either of those documents, yet they are demanding that this failed project be continued with greater—deeper—integration. All the mistakes that have been made in the past are being reinforced in the new arrangement, which clearly will not work. It did not work before and it will not work now. It is a tragedy— I say that—that we are in the current position. I trust that the Prime Minister will address that during the next 48 hours.
This is not some theoretical experiment. It is about the daily lives of the British people and about our democratic traditions and economic performance. The idea that a fiscal union of 17 would be stable is simply and emphatically wrong. It will concentrate and increase the dangers of centralisation and will be fundamentally unstable. Germany will not be able to bail out the other countries, and it is a complete strategic failure for people, including the coalition Government, to think that it can.
Germany of course wants to preserve the euro, because it is doing so well out of it. One has only to consider the foreign direct investment by the Germans in other countries, the extent to which those countries are in effect economic satellites of Germany and the fact that the structural funds—I have the figures from the Library—are so incredibly important in generating investment backed by German contracts in those other countries, from which they then repatriate the profits. This is actually a German economic hegemony. Equally, I do not think that the Germans are inherently hostile about this. I say what I say without any hostile spirit, but I do say that we have to be realistic. We are desperately at risk. The British nation is in peril under these arrangements.
Furthermore, the impact of this economic conglomeration in the hands of one country in particular has led not only, in effect, to the dismissal of two Prime Ministers, whatever their merits or demerits, but to the voting arrangements, which follow from the qualified majority voting system. I am talking about the number of votes that are available to Germany when it wants to pursue a policy, because of its influence and, in effect, its control over the countries in question, which are dependent on it. That is the case not only in the eurozone of 17, but in so many of the other countries, including— I say this without any disrespect for them, because I love these countries—Poland and Denmark. Then of course there are Bulgaria, Romania, the Baltic states, Hungary and so on. The truth is that that is inherently in German national interests. Indeed, we have to look only at what Chancellor Kohl had to say in the 1990s, which I have included in a pamphlet that I wrote, called “It’s the EU, stupid”, to see the political determination behind Germany’s desire to ensure that the euro survives. Angela Merkel is now using that very language in the same context.
I do not blame the Germans. I have said in this Chamber that I recognise the fact that to a great extent they have shown their commercial nous—they have taken advantage of the system to ensure that they get the best out of it. The organisation is not a European union, but effectively a greater Germany.
We, above all other countries in Europe, ought to recognise that we should defend our own interests—not, as I said, in a hostile manner, but in a realistic and down-to-earth manner. We ought to get across the message that there should be, inherent in the proposed arrangements, a fundamental change in our relationship with the European Union. We and, if I may say so, the Prime Minister, have an absolute duty to protect the national interest that he says he wants to protect; to ensure that there is fundamental reform in the European Union, which he called for at the Mansion house the other day, to generate the growth that we need, with our 40% of trade with the Union and to guarantee that we are not drawn into an arrangement by which, through a majority block vote, we are consistently outvoted and become completely and utterly controlled by the system. It just does not make sense, and I believe that the system will not work.
It needs to be pointed out that not only is voting power naturally going to Germany, with its economic investments—it is doing extremely well out of the system—but Germany believes that it can require countries to obey rules. That is a much deeper question, a matter of attitude. We cannot require countries to obey rules just because we prescribe them. That is where I think the whole philosophy and the attitudes in the Eurocracy and in Germany go wrong. As we have heard, the Germans themselves have not obeyed the rules on the stability and growth pact when it suited them not to. An inherent dishonesty lies at the heart of the arrangements: someone disobeys the rules when it suits them, but insists that the rules be obeyed when they can benefit out of those rules. That cannot be right.
Countries are made up of individuals and individual companies, which have their own ideas as to how they should be democratically governed. Those ideas do not by any means fit within the rules prescribed from above or the conditions that are imposed. The Eurocrats, Germany and those who go with it on the matter simply do not understand that the lack of democracy is a fundamental flaw in the entire European project.
Emma Reynolds
Is the hon. Gentleman not a little unfair in singling out Germany? Germany is obviously the largest country to have done quite well out of the euro, but other eurozone countries in the group of healthy economies are doing pretty well economically. It is slightly unfair of him to single out Germany.
Mr Cash
I do not think it is. If the hon. Lady investigates, as I have, German FDI into the other countries, and then looks at the countries that are growing, she will see that there is a correlation with the amount of money that the Germans have provided. I give them credit for doing so on good investment projects, but some of them have been bad, as in Greece. The growth in some of the countries is buttressed and underpinned by German investment. That is the problem.
Emma Reynolds (Wolverhampton North East) (Lab)
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mrs Main, and I congratulate the hon. Member for Harwich and North Essex (Mr Jenkin). We might not agree on all the detail in relation to this debate, but I agree with him that the seriousness of the situation calls for time in this Chamber to discuss the European summit. The pre-summit dinner is only a couple of hours away, but it would also have been useful if the Prime Minister had been invited to last night’s dinner organised by the centre-right European People’s party, at which Chancellor Merkel, President Sarkozy, President Barroso and many other centre-right leaders—unfortunately, most European Union countries have centre-right Governments—were present. Unlike his centre-right equivalents, however, the Prime Minister was not invited, which is a shame.
Emma Reynolds
The hon. Gentleman makes a valid point. When we were in government in 1999, 11 out of 15 Governments were on the centre-left and we attended such meetings, which proved very useful indeed.
I respectfully beg to differ with those hon. Members who have said that the Prime Minister has a strong hand in the negotiations. Last Friday, the Prime Minister was relegated to a quick sandwich lunch with President Sarkozy in Paris, without the inclusion of even a press conference in the programme. The French press hardly noticed that he was there. Given that we are one of the largest economies in the European Union and used to be at the heart of its decision-making, it is incredible just how isolated this Government have made the UK. Today’s New York Times leads with an article that says that the UK is merely a “bystander” at this European Union summit. That is not in the national interest.
The past few days have served to remind us how the Conservative party likes to debate the European Union and of—perhaps this is a point of nostalgia for some—the long, tortuous and, in some cases, destructive history of the division in the Conservative party on the EU. It is worth remembering the context of the Prime Minister’s current position and the labyrinthine trajectory he took to get there. In his bid to secure his party’s leadership while in opposition, he promised to withdraw his MEPs from the centre-right European People’s party, but they still sit in the European Parliament with the same group, which the Deputy Prime Minister has called
“nutters, anti-Semites, people who deny climate change exists and homophobes”.
After becoming the then leader of the Opposition, the Prime Minister told his party to stop “banging on about Europe”, because he hoped that the issue could be put to one side and ignored. How wrong he was.
I say to this Government that, for a year, they ignored the impending crisis in the eurozone. It was only recently that they stopped being asleep at the wheel and woke up to the seriousness of the situation. Six weeks ago, we saw the unedifying spectacle of nearly half of Conservative Back Benchers defying the Prime Minister’s three-line Whip and voting for a referendum on our membership of the European Union. During that same debate six weeks ago, the Prime Minister said that he wanted to repatriate powers from the European Union. He reiterated that demand last month at the lord mayor’s banquet and declared himself a sceptic who wanted a European Union that was a network, not a bloc, while in the same breath extolling the benefits of our membership and demanding a say at the top table.
Mr Baron
It is rich for the hon. Lady to criticise the Prime Minister, because when her party was in government, it not only sacrificed the rebate that had been negotiated, but oversaw the transfer of swathes of power to Brussels. The list of measures that she is highlighting runs very shallow with those who remember when her party was in government.
Emma Reynolds
I say to the hon. Gentleman that, when my party was in government, we were not isolated in the European Union. The previous two Prime Ministers had a good relationship with both the French President and the German Chancellor, and such a relationship is very important to our national interest.
Martin Horwood
Will the hon. Lady therefore congratulate the Under-Secretary of State for Business, Innovation and Skills, my hon. Friend the Member for Kingston and Surbiton (Mr Davey) on his co-operative approach to lifting onerous accounting rules for the smallest businesses? Her Government did not manage to achieve that co-operative approach.
Emma Reynolds
I agree that a co-operative approach is needed and that we need to constructively engage with our European partners. When you go to a European summit, you get what you want not by banging on the table, but by the power of your ideas and the strength of your alliances. [Interruption.] Government Members may laugh, but my right hon. Friends the Members for Kirkcaldy and Cowdenbeath (Mr Brown) and for Edinburgh South West (Mr Darling) showed at the London G20 summit in 2009 just what you can achieve by the power of your ideas and the strength of your alliances.
Mr Jenkin
I remind the hon. Lady that, after the collapse of the European constitution, Tony Blair went to the European Parliament and said that the trumpets were outside the walls of Jericho and asked whether anybody was listening. Nobody was listening and we got the Lisbon treaty instead. There is no evidence that any Labour Prime Minister had any influence over the general direction of the European Union any more than we do now.
Emma Reynolds
I disagree entirely. When our party was in government, we were at the centre of European decision-making, and the truth is that we are not any more.
Six weeks ago the Prime Minister demanded repatriation of powers, yet yesterday, in a 1,000-word article in The Times, in which he set out his position for the European summit, he did not mention repatriation once. We agree that the priority should be given to providing a lasting solution to the eurozone crisis, because we think it is in the national interest, but we also say that Britain should have a strong voice in these negotiations. Unfortunately, because the Prime Minister has tried to face two ways on the issue—on the one hand placating his Eurosceptic Back Benchers and some members of his Cabinet, and, on the other, trying to have a realistic negotiating position with our European partners—the risk is that he will not deliver on either of those objectives. Whereas many Conservative Back Benchers demand repatriation, a split has emerged, not only in the coalition, but in the Conservative party, over the past few days.
Emma Reynolds
I will not, because I do not have much time. The Deputy Prime Minister has said that attempting repatriation would be economic suicide, and the Mayor of London and two Cabinet members—the Secretaries of State for Work and Pensions and for Northern Ireland—say that the treaty change would inevitably lead to a referendum, whereas the rest of the Government seem to be saying something quite different.
The fact that the Prime Minister is leading a divided party while negotiating on Europe is very much weakening his hand. By facing two ways, the Prime Minister’s position and the negotiating position of our Government are both confused and confusing. It is no wonder that our European partners are not entirely sure where the Prime Minister stands. It is clearly not in our national interest to have that weak voice and to stand on the sidelines. Splendid isolation is really not that splendid. The fact that we are in the slow lane of a two-speed Europe might chime well to the Eurosceptic ear, but, essentially, it could mean that other member states will take decisions that affect us without our being at the table.
I say to the hon. Member for Bury North (Mr Nuttall) that it is wrong to assume that eurozone members all agree on which direction they want to take regarding better economic co-ordination, because the French Gaullois tradition is an intergovernmental one that is very hostile and suspicious of supranational institutions. There are disagreements within the eurozone countries. We should not just assume that France and Germany agree on these issues.
If the eurozone crisis continues to deepen, it will have serious implications for jobs, businesses and banks in the UK. Our economy is closely entwined with the other 26 members of the European Union, and more than half our trade goes to those countries. Our banks are also extensively linked and exposed to eurozone banks, so it is clearly in the national interest for a solution to be found at the summit. Labour Members want the Government to push for a greater and more decisive role for the European Central Bank and a credible crisis fund with, of course, built-in conditionality. The so-called six-pack package goes a long way to creating credible rules and procedures to enforce those rules, but it is clear that a solution must also be found to tackle the balance of payments and trade imbalances, which several hon. Members have mentioned, between the different eurozone member states. It is also very important to enhance the competitiveness of the weaker economies.
In winding up, I would like quickly to ask the Minister a couple of questions. Why did the Prime Minister promise repatriation of powers six weeks ago and then suddenly drop those demands yesterday? What resources in the Foreign and Commonwealth Office were given to working through options on repatriation, or was that always a matter of rhetoric rather than something really considered in the corridors of King Charles street? Why have the Government been so complacent about the emergence of a two-speed or multi-speed Europe, and what specific reassurances are the Government asking for with regard to the City and the single market? Are the Government seeking, for example, an emergency brake to be extended to the area of financial services? Finally, are the Government hopeful of a fairly rapid treaty change, and what are the risks to the UK and the rest of the EU of a prolonged process of treaty change and ratification?
In conclusion, we want to see the eurozone succeed, because it is clearly in the national interest that a solution is reached. It is not in the national interest to engage in “I told you so” arguments or schadenfreude, nor is it in the national interest for the governing party and the coalition to be so divided on this issue. Our European partners are left scratching their heads about what the Government’s position really is. The Prime Minister should never have promised repatriation of powers, if it was never his intention to deliver on that promise. His promise has entrenched and deepened divisions in his party, as we saw today and yesterday at Prime Minister’s questions.
That is no way to negotiate with our European partners. Our country demands and deserves better leadership, and only then will the Government be in a position to effectively pursue the national interest and start being part of the solution rather than part of the problem. Division, isolation and weakness are, in fact, a betrayal of the national interest. My concern is that the Prime Minister will not be able to deliver on even the modest demands that he has set out because of his isolation.
Oral Answers to Questions
Emma Reynolds Excerpts(12 years, 5 months ago)
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Mr Hague
There is no doubt that Iran has been involved in trying to prop up the Syrian regime. Iran is a country that has supported popular revolution in other parts of the middle east but then has been happy to collude in trying to repress such revolution in Syria—its ally. It has helped with technical equipment, expertise and advice on how to help the regime to deal with the situation, and it shows a hypocritical approach to events in the middle east.
Emma Reynolds (Wolverhampton North East) (Lab)
Turkey is a vital ally of the United Kingdom and, indeed, the European Union. What discussions did the Prime Minister have with the Turkish President last week on what further specific measures Turkey can take to exert additional pressure on the Syrian Government?
Mr Hague
We discussed this at some length—the Prime Minister with the President—and I discussed it with the Turkish Foreign Minister in the margins of the state visit. We are all working closely—Turkey and the European Union nations—with the Arab League. Turkey is considering a range of measures that it could take on Syria, but, as the hon. Lady knows, the Arab League has led the way at the moment in announcing sanctions. I would not be surprised if further measures now follow from Turkey, on the basis of the discussions that we had last week.
Judiciary and Fundamental Rights
Emma Reynolds Excerpts(12 years, 5 months ago)
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Emma Reynolds (Wolverhampton North East) (Lab)
I welcome the opportunity to debate Croatia’s accession to the European Union and, in particular, its progress under chapter 23 on judicial and fundamental rights.
As the Minister has underlined, there is in the House a broad, cross-party consensus on enlargement. When our party was in government, we supported the path of accession for the western Balkans, and we are pleased that significant progress continues to be made. In effect, the progress is remarkable, given that it is only 16 years since the signing of the Dayton accords, which put an end to the worst outbreak of violence seen in Europe since 1945.
In the early 1990s, Yugoslav republics collapsed into war, with friends and neighbours pitted against each other in the name of ethnic and religious nationalism. One of the principal objectives and greatest achievements of the European Union has been to put an end to the wars that wrought so much damage on Europe in the first half of the 20th century. It is therefore right that the EU should support the membership aspirations of the western Balkans, and we are proud of the fact that under the previous, Labour Government, Slovenia joined the European Union and the negotiations that Croatia began made significant headway.
With European Union membership comes responsibility for reform, however, and it is right that any discussion of accession involves detailed and complex benchmarks, so it is testament to the dedication and intellectual rigour of the European Scrutiny Committee that it has concentrated on chapter 23, a highly important area where progress is vital.
The Committee is right to stress, and the Minister also underlined, that lessons must be learned from the accession of Romania and Bulgaria. That experience led directly to the introduction of the new chapter, which covers a range of areas, including the appointment and independence of judges and prosecutors, tackling corruption, the protection of fundamental rights and, importantly, Croatia’s co-operation with the International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia. Each area is crucial to an effective, modern and democratic state that protects its citizens from discrimination and roots out corruption.
While we were in government, we paid particular attention to progress in that area. We also led the way in putting pressure on the western Balkans to co-operate fully with the International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia. At that time, we were concerned about the Croatian Government’s level of co-operation with the ICTY, and we exerted pressure on them to find and release key military documents from the period in question.
In April, former military commanders, Ante Gotovina and Mladen Markac, were sentenced by the court for their role in the war. Their convictions are important not only because justice has been done, but because it sends a powerful signal to military commanders everywhere that the international community can and will pursue the perpetrators of war crimes.
We welcome the recent report of chief prosecutor Brammertz, which states that the Croatian Government are providing “timely and adequate” responses to requests for witnesses and evidence, while expressing disappointment at the “limited progress” in locating the military documents relating to Operation Storm. The Opposition place a high value on Croatia’s continued co-operation with the ICTY. Engaging constructively with the court is a test of Croatia’s willingness to draw a line under its past and to look forwards to a brighter future within the EU.
We welcome the Croatian Government’s strategy, adopted in February, for addressing impunity. In particular, we welcome the improvements in witness support and the new legislation for four specialised war crime chambers. Although Croatia has clearly made some progress in investigating and prosecuting domestic war crime cases, considerable progress still needs to be made.
Given that the strategy still needs to be systematically implemented, will the Minister tell the House in his winding-up speech whether he is satisfied that priority is being given to the most serious war crimes cases? Are cases in which the alleged perpetrators were members of the Croatian security forces being investigated and pursued? Are the Government assisting the Croatian Government in that important area?
We welcome the active role that Croatia is playing in regional co-operation. It is vital that Croatia maintains good relations with its neighbours, and in particular we welcome its support for the membership aspirations of other western Balkan countries. The visit of the Croatian President to Serbia and the Serbian President to Croatia marks an important step in the improvement of relations between the two countries.
It is vital that Croatia’s significant reforms on the independence, accountability and professionalism of the judiciary are carried through. We welcome the new state school for judicial officials, which will recruit and train judges and prosecutors. That is essential to ensuring that candidates are selected on the basis of merit not patronage. However, the new state school will not produce graduates until 2013. Has the Minister discussed that issue with his Croatian counterpart and is he satisfied that, prior to accession, Croatia will be able to push forward in that area?
In its most recent report on enlargement, the European Commission states that there has been “substantial progress” on anti-corruption measures. It is, indeed, encouraging that a raft of measures have been implemented as part of the Croatian Government’s anti-corruption action plan, including the introduction of a new police Act to make the police more professional and, crucially, to depoliticise the force. A requirement for Government officials to register their assets has also been introduced. As the Minister said, it is promising that high-level corruption cases are being investigated, including the case against the former Prime Minister, and that the accounts of the party of the current Prime Minister are also being looked into.
However, corruption is one of the areas of most serious concern in this chapter. The Commission states that more needs to be done to establish a track record in the effective handling of organised crime and corruption and local and high-level corruption cases, including cases related to public procurement and the judiciary. Although it is clear that the Croatian Government are seized of the importance of that issue, will the Minister reassure the House that he is confident that those measures will be effectively implemented prior to accession?
We welcome the recent comprehensive study and subsequent action plan on the representation of national minorities in the public sector in Croatia. However, as the European Scrutiny Committee and the hon. Member for Kettering (Mr Hollobone) have highlighted, there remains a substantial backlog of housing appeals from those refugees wishing to return and fewer than half the available housing units have been handed over to successful applicants. More progress on that issue is needed to provide assurances that the Croatian Government are committed to honouring their pledges to refugees seeking to return.
On another issue, a recent gay rights parade in Split was attacked and the police failed to protect those on the march. In winding up, will the Minister say whether he has discussed that incident with the Croatian Government, whether he is satisfied that freedom of speech and expression can be secured, and whether discrimination on the grounds of sexual orientation is being tackled by the Croatian Government?
After the experience of the accession of Romania and Bulgaria, we welcome the introduction of this new chapter, as well as the introduction of a new monitoring mechanism. It is clear that once countries become EU members, it is very difficult to apply pressure for improvement and change, so the pre-accession period is incredibly important. Is the Minister satisfied that his Government, and more widely the EU, has sufficient leverage in the period between the signing of the accession treaty in December and accession itself in July 2013? What more can the Government do to help Croatia deliver those changes?
In conclusion, Croatia’s preparation for accession has been rigorous to date. Both the nature and number of reforms introduced in a short period have been impressive. However, in terms of chapter 23, it is evident that Croatia still needs to demonstrate a track record on implementation and enforcement. We will continue to scrutinise the work of the Government and the European Union in its monitoring of progress during the pre-accession period. It is particularly important to monitor reforms with regard to the recruitment and independence of the judiciary and the measures introduced to tackle corruption.
Following Slovenia’s accession and given the war that blighted the western Balkans in the 1990s, Croatia joining the EU will be an historic moment. Providing the reforms in this area are carried out and successfully implemented, and providing that the House ratifies the accession treaty of Croatia, we look forward to welcoming Croatia into the European Union.
Council of Europe (UK Chairmanship)
Emma Reynolds Excerpts(12 years, 6 months ago)
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Emma Reynolds (Wolverhampton North East) (Lab)
This is an important and timely debate, and it is absolutely right that we have an opportunity to discuss in the House the UK’s forthcoming chairmanship of the Council of Europe. However, it is a shame that the most pro-European member of the Cabinet is not here to open the debate as was planned until late this morning.
There are now 47 members of the Council, and the period of chairmanship is six months, so this opportunity does not come around often. According to my rudimentary mathematics, the next time the UK will be in the chair will around 2035. The last time the UK was in the chair was in the early 1990s when the Conservative party was falling out about another European institution—the European Union. I sense a bit of déjà vu, and I trust that this afternoon’s debate will be less heated and divided than the debate earlier this week.
Our membership of the Council of Europe has been supported by successive Governments of different political colours and persuasions for the last six decades. It is worth reflecting on the history of the institution, which was shaped by the aftermath of the second world war and the defeat of fascism, and later by the collapse of communism. When Winston Churchill made his speech at the 1949 gathering in Strasbourg, he talked of an
“ancient city still scarred by the wounds of war”.
The horror of that global conflict, and the destruction and loss of life throughout Europe, led to the growing realisation that avoiding future wars had to be a priority.
That realisation brought together some of the leading statesmen of post-war Europe, with much of the earliest thinking coming from Winston Churchill. Other Conservative politicians played a role, particularly former Home Secretary David Maxwell Fyfe, who was instrumental in drawing up the European convention on human rights, which Clement Attlee’s Labour Government ratified in 1950. A cross-party consensus held then and over the following decades, and I hope that it will do so today.
Mr Leigh
We all accept that, but the fact is that the process has gone way beyond what was envisaged by people such as Winston Churchill.
The hon. Lady presumably wants to protect vulnerable women. Going back again to the diaries of theformer immigration Minister, he wrote that his proposal to increase the marriage age from 18 to 21 for a family visa would be overturned by judicial review because of the judges constantly referring to the convention on human rights. It is anti-human rights now, and we must reform it fundamentally.
Emma Reynolds
I agree that the Court needs to be reformed, and I will come to that, but I do not agree with everything that the hon. Gentleman said. Like the Minister for Europe, I have not had a chance to read my former colleague’s memoirs.
The Council today is very different from when it was first established, and Europe has changed beyond recognition. The rush of countries to join the Council of Europe in the years following the fall of communism extended its membership and reach significantly. Today, the Council of Europe has 47 member countries, covering 800 million people, and a vast land mass stretching from Reykjavik to Vladivostok—that is a tongue twister. It has led the way in protecting and promoting the rule of law, human rights and democracy in Europe. Many hon. Members, past and present, have taken part in the Council of Europe’s election monitoring to ensure that democracy is upheld in every member state, and I commend them for that. I want to join the Europe Minister in commending the work of the UK delegation to the Council of Europe.
Oliver Heald (North East Hertfordshire) (Con)
The hon. Lady mentioned some distinguished contributions to the Council of Europe by Conservatives in past years. Does she agree that the leader of our delegation, my hon. Friend the Member for North Dorset (Mr Walter), has played a very distinguished part in the current process to change the rules of the Parliamentary Assembly to make the way in which it operates more streamlined and effective?
Emma Reynolds
I join the hon. Gentleman in that view. I recognise that Members across this House have played very important roles in the Council of Europe at different times.
Despite the fact that a Conservative Government were the driving force behind the European convention on human rights, a Labour Government put those rights into UK law in 1999, and we are proud of that. The Human Rights Act 1998 gives British citizens the right to bring cases before British courts rather than having to petition European judges directly. Although we remain committed to the European convention and the European Court, we also recognise that the Court needs reform. The Government have said today that its reform should be a priority for our forthcoming chairmanship, and I support that.
As has been mentioned, the Government set up an independent commission that has presented interim recommendations concerning that reform. The commission highlighted three areas that need to be addressed: the need substantially to reduce the number of cases brought before the Court; the need to consider the remedies that the Court may grant; and the need to improve the process of selecting high-quality judges.
Sir Alan Meale
At the moment, the judges are elected in the Assembly by all Members of the Assembly, but the Interlaken process proposes to diminish that democratic selection mechanism. The current process involves not just the election of the judges but the interviewing of the candidates, in which two criteria must be fulfilled: first, they have to be fully qualified to stand for election; and secondly, there must be at least one woman among the three candidates. I hope that my hon. Friend is not suggesting that we should move away from those principles.
Emma Reynolds
I am a great supporter of gender equality, but the selection process needs to be improved.
Mr Mike Hancock
For those of us who have had the privilege of being in the Council of Europe for any length of time, it is clear that it is not the process of selection by the Council of Europe that affects the calibre of judges but the pathetic selection process that goes on in member states after people have put their names forward. On most occasions, that leaves the Council of Europe having to pick the least worst of a bad bunch.
Emma Reynolds
I am sure that the Europe Minister has noted the hon. Gentleman’s concerns.
Any reform of the Court must begin by addressing the crippling backlog of cases before it; I understand that there are 150,000 cases and that number is increasing at a rate of 20,000 a year. I hope that at the end of the six months in which our Government have the chairmanship, the Opposition will be in a position to give them credit for pushing forward with these reforms. Indeed, the test of success for the Government is not only what they do in the six months when they are in charge, but whether they are able to inspire successive chairmanships of the Court and the Council to take on and continue their reforms.
Until now, I have been fairly consensual, but I am about to embark on a section of my speech that is perhaps not so consensual.
Emma Reynolds
I wrote it, thank you very much. That is very patronising of the hon. Gentleman. I might be a young blonde woman, but I am able to write my own speeches.
There is another area where the Government need to take action. It is incumbent on this Government to tackle the misconceptions about the European convention on human rights. I am sure that the Minister is only too aware of how some members of his own Government have peddled myths about human rights legislation to further certain political arguments, and of how there is a confusion—sometimes, it seems, a conflation—of the rulings and activities of the European Court of Human Rights, the Council of Europe, the European Union and the European Court of Justice. In some cases, there seems to be a deliberate lumping together of any institution with the word “Europe” in its title, with the assumption that Europe has a malign influence on this country.
Will the Minister reassure us that the Government will take a lead on challenging such misconceptions, not only in his party but in the country, and champion the positive role that our membership of the Council of Europe has played in furthering human rights and democracy in the UK and in other countries across the continent? After all, taking on the mantle of chairmanship brings with it certain responsibilities, one of which, surely, is demonstrating accuracy in debates on human rights. Let us hope to hear no more misleading myths about cats or other bogus stories.
Labour Members remain firmly committed to the Council of Europe and the European convention on human rights, but we recognise that this does not necessarily mean sticking to the status quo, and reforming the Court. We want the Government to use their six-month chairmanship to push forward with reforms to ensure that the Council continues to meet the aims and objectives in a way that is beneficial for all member countries, including the UK. Upholding a universal notion of human rights is a sign of a civilised nation and something that we should be proud of, not something that should be rubbished, heckled or blamed at every opportunity.
As I underlined in my introduction, successive Governments of different political persuasions have supported our membership of the Council of Europe and obligations that come with it. There is a long history and tradition in our country of which we should be proud.
Mr Raab
I agree that we should not automatically, in a knee-jerk way, blame Strasbourg for everything. However, has the hon. Lady seen the comments by the Lord Chief Justice, which read:
“I would like to say that maybe Strasbourg shouldn’t win and doesn’t need to win”?
Does she accept, as the Lord Chief Justice does, that there is a legitimate debate about the expansion of human rights through judicial legislation?
Emma Reynolds
I do accept that, and I think it is a debate that we will have today.
Although modernisation and reform of the Council of Europe are needed, the values that underpinned its formation and membership are just as valid today as they were in 1950, and we should all be proud of those values.
Oral Answers to Questions
Emma Reynolds Excerpts(12 years, 6 months ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
Mr Lidington
I am glad that my hon. Friend has raised that matter. I took note of the points that he and others raised in the debate yesterday evening, and I have looked at the latest figures. I am glad to be able to tell him that the trade deficit has narrowed since the figures that he and others cited yesterday were produced. The way to get the trade deficit down is, in part, through Government Ministers making every effort through commercial diplomacy to help our businesses to sell British goods and services in Europe and the wider world.
Emma Reynolds (Wolverhampton North East) (Lab)
Now that the Prime Minister has managed to secure a seat at tomorrow’s summit in Brussels, what specific proposals will he put on the table, and which alliances will he build, or rebuild, to ensure that the eurozone 17 do not start to take decisions about the single market without us?
Mr Lidington
I am sorry that the hon. Lady, whom I welcome to her new responsibilities, overlooked the commitments already made on Sunday by all 27 Heads of Government to ensuring that the integrity of the single market is protected and that the rights of the Community at 27 are safeguarded. My right hon. Friend will be seeking both political and legal or administrative ways to ensure that the position of the Euro-outs is protected. He will find allies—my own experience in the General Affairs Council on Saturday certainly showed this—not only among other countries outside the eurozone, but among a number of eurozone member states that do not wish either the UK or other Euro-outs to be excluded from discussion.