UK-EU Renegotiation

Hywel Williams Excerpts

Wednesday 3rd February 2016 Commons Chamber

[The Prime Minister]

Let me deal first with the harmonised directives. We now have this test for subsidiarity—we had only fine words in previous treaties because there was never a mechanism to go with them—so the European Council and the European Commission are going to have to look at all these competences and return to member states those that are no longer necessary. That seems to represent important progress in the area my hon. Friend mentions. On migration, the European Commission has said that Britain qualifies now. Where my hon. Friend is right is that although we know that what is proposed is the ability to stop someone getting full access to benefits for four years, we need to fill in the detail on how long such a mechanism will last and how many times it can be renewed.

[Hywel Williams (Arfon) (PC)]

In the Welsh general election, how will the Prime Minister’s Conservative colleagues argue for the economic stability that Wales so sorely needs when it might be overthrown by his referendum just six weeks later?

[The Prime Minister]

British people, including people in Wales, voted for a Government who would deliver economic stability while putting this great question about Britain’s future in front of the British people. As I have said before, public opinion in Wales, England, Scotland and Northern Ireland is all, to a greater or lesser extent, in favour of holding a referendum. I think this is the right policy for the whole of the United Kingdom.