European Union Bill

Debate between James Clappison and Baroness Stuart of Edgbaston

Tuesday 8th March 2011 Commons Chamber

[Mr Clappison]

I am grateful to my hon. Friend, because he has done the House a service. It was entirely due to him that the contents of the Van Rompuy report, as they affected this country, which they clearly did, were revealed to this House. We look forward to having a fuller debate on those in due course. We want a fuller debate on many other issues, but when a treaty change comes before this House and is the subject of a statement under clause 5 we need to have all the information. We need to have everything out in the open so that we can have a full and well-informed debate.

[Ms Gisela Stuart (Birmingham, Edgbaston) (Lab)]

By way of explanation, Mr Speaker, I think I have fallen victim to my usual habit of reading newspapers from back to front. I apologise for not having been here at the start of the debate, and I thank the hon. Member for Hertsmere (Mr Clappison) for introducing the new clause.

I need to explain the antecedents of the thinking behind the new clause. When I was a Minister I attended meetings of the Council of Ministers, and I knew that it was perfectly impossible for any national Parliament to find out even whether their Minister was there to vote, let alone whether they had made any particular representations. I am sure that I am not the only Minister—people on both sides of the House must have done this—who performed the most amazing U-turns on policy when doing a Council of Ministers stint. I am talking about little notes along the lines of, “The United Kingdom no longer supports amendment 58”—and that was all that was ever said about the matter. There is nothing wrong with that; we do that in politics. But in this House, if the Government perform a U-turn, someone at some stage has to stand at that Dispatch Box and say, “We’ve changed our minds.” They have to give reasons for doing so, and on occasions those are perfectly acceptable. This is the one thing that is completely missing in our dealings with the European Union.

Post-Lisbon, we have made some advances in the information provided for the European Parliament. Although I welcome those provisions, I would challenge even hon. Members to close their eyes and tell me, hand on heart, that they can name all the MEPs who represent their region. I bet that they could not do that; I could not name them all myself. [Interruption.] My right hon. Friend the Member for Rotherham (Mr MacShane) says that he does not even know all the MPs for Birmingham. Fortunately, I could tell him all their names, even in alphabetical order.

European Union Bill

Debate between James Clappison and Baroness Stuart of Edgbaston

Wednesday 26th January 2011 Commons Chamber

[Mr Clappison]

We come to a new subject area, that of freedom, security and justice, which used to be known as the judicial and home affairs pillar of the EU. As the clause stands, it would require parliamentary approval for a UK decision to opt in to certain provisions in the area of freedom, security and justice. At the moment, as I am sure the Committee knows, the UK enjoys an opt-out in that area. Were a decision to be taken to opt in to one of the matters specified in clause 9, parliamentary approval would therefore be needed.

Three such matters are specified in clause 9(2). Generally, they seem to cover further developments in the field that are not specifically set out in the freedom, security and justice chapter, which is chapter 5 of the treaty of Lisbon. I should say that that is a lengthy chapter containing many matters. I think I can see the Government’s thinking, which is to cover further developments in European law and new ideas in the field of family law, criminal procedure and serious crime. I agree with that thinking, as far as it goes, because it means that opt-ins on those matters will require parliamentary approval.

It should be said straight away that that is an improvement on the current situation, in which there is no requirement for approval of any of the important matters specified in the clause. There will therefore be additional protection, if one wants to look at it that way, and there will certainly be an additional role for the House, which will be required to give its approval before the UK can opt in.

My amendment 14 would take matters further in a logical way, by making any chapter 5 opt-in subject to the same parliamentary approval that is required for the three matters specified in the Bill.

[Ms Gisela Stuart]

Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

[Mr Clappison]

I certainly give way to the hon. Lady, who I know has an interest in these matters.

[Ms Stuart]

I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for giving way and for tabling the amendment. Does he share my sadness that since May 2010, the Government have opted in to eight such provisions, including on such matters as the European investigation order, a new IT agency and a new crime and immigration database that will cost €113 million to set up, without the House having had any say in the decision?

[Mr Clappison]

The hon. Lady has updated my information, which goes only as far as 30 November, by which point there had been six opt-ins. There have therefore been another two since, and they are coming along all the time. We heard evidence in the European Scrutiny Committee that 30 or 40 such opt-ins were due to take place. The EU has an ambitious programme in that regard—that is not an expression of opinion; it has admitted it. I shall deal with that later.

The hon. Lady is absolutely right that some of the opt-ins are on important points, and I shall come to one or two of them that I experienced under the previous procedure. I should like to ask the Minister how many of the provisions that we have opted in to since the present Government came to power would have been covered by the procedures in clause 9. I fully accept that those procedures are an improvement on the current situation, but I should like to know how well they cover the ground.

As the hon. Lady said, some of the opt-ins have been significant. I wish to mention two in particular—they were debated a little yesterday, so I will not take the Committee over the same ground. They are the European investigation order, which received practically no scrutiny in the House and on which we had no opportunity for a vote, and the draft directive on the right to information, which was also very important. We had a little more scrutiny of it, but no real opportunity for a vote unless one was prepared to trigger a deferred Division.

Under successive Governments, the UK has been very careful and vigilant about permitting the EU to deal with the so-called area of freedom, security and justice, which is dealt with in clause 9. That goes back to pre-Maastricht days, when such matters were dealt with on the basis first of informal co-operation, and then of slightly more formal co-operation, between Home Affairs Ministers. They were not dealt with as part of the treaties or Community institutions—Home Affairs Ministers simply met to co-operate as such.

The Maastricht treaty put that on a more formal basis with what was described as the justice and home affairs pillar, which was the third pillar of the treaty. The first pillar was the old matters within the treaty—the single market, fisheries and agricultural policy, and all the rest of it—and the second was common foreign security policy.

One or two hon. Members who are in the Chamber now were in the House at the time of that treaty, and there was much debate on the justice and home affairs pillar. We were assured—I remember being given a solemn assurance by an authoritative figure in the Government of the time—that the treaty settled the problem as far as justice and home affairs were concerned, that we need not worry about home affairs coming within the purview of the Community method and Community institutions, and that they were being kept separate. The same applied to the common foreign security policy. The implication was that the pillars in the treaty would stand for ever, and that they were all the protection and assurance we needed. I am reluctant to say this but I have heard similar claims in respect of many other so-called safeguards since then, including in the course of this debate.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Clappison]

My constituency does not have a fishing port, but my understanding is that there are no demonstrations in favour of the CFP in fishing ports.

[Ms Gisela Stuart]

I confirm that people in Edgbaston also do not talk much about fishing policy.

The reason why the hon. Gentleman’s amendment is so important is that it goes to the heart of the contradiction. We are told that the EU is a political construct in which the Union has only those powers that member states have decided to give it, but when we raise questions we are told that there are safeguards, which actually shows that that is not quite how it works. Proportionality and subsidiarity have not worked—only the opt-out contains the powers, and that is why it is so important.

[Mr Clappison]

That is why the opt-out is so very important, and that point brings me to the subject of this amendment.

European Union Bill

Debate between James Clappison and Baroness Stuart of Edgbaston

Monday 24th January 2011 Commons Chamber

[Ms Stuart]

There are plenty of inherent inconsistencies both in the original Bill and in the amendments. I was involved in the tabling of amendment 11, which makes it clear that if there is any doubt, it should be resolved by this House.

As a final observation, in our Parliament, the Executive always has a permanent majority. We can rely on the strength of this House only if there are sufficient Back-Bench Members who defy their Front-Bench Members. I see the Conservative Benches full of Members, so let me point out frankly that tonight provides them with a chance to show whether they have the guts and the courage of their convictions. They said all sorts of things in the process of their election and now they have an opportunity to defy their Front-Bench team, support an amendment tabled by a majority of Members of their own side and restore faith to this place.

[Mr Clappison]

What a great pleasure it is to follow the hon. Member for Birmingham, Edgbaston (Ms Stuart). As to the generality of her comments, I found nothing in what she expressed to the Committee to contradict my experience over five years of the European Scrutiny Committee. I intend to be as brief as possible, because I know that other Members wish to speak and that important amendments on other issues are due for debate later. I am sure that my hon. Friends share my wish to debate those important issues, particularly accession.

Let me say a few words in support of amendment 11, on which I shall seek a separate vote and hope I am lucky enough to achieve it. By way of introduction I should say that, in seeking to establish that a referendum is required before certain steps are taken, the Bill is a great improvement on the existing position. The Bill is also a significant improvement in requiring other steps, such as an Act of Parliament or a vote of this House where a referendum is not required.

I am genuinely concerned, however, that there remain some very significant gaps in the scheme of the Bill, and I believe that it is at this point in our detailed scrutiny that we should try to fill those gaps. It will be very disillusioning for all those whom we have promised and have led to expect that there will be a referendum on great transfers of power or great decisions in the European Union if that referendum does not take place. We want to do all that we can to avoid that sense of disillusionment. It is against that background that I seek to deal with the problem of the significance condition, to which hon. Members have referred.

Simply, amendment 11 would give Parliament a vote on whether certain transfers of power to the European Union are significant enough to warrant a referendum. As the Bill stands, the decision on whether matters are significant enough is in the hands of the Minister alone, subject to a challenge in the courts. Parliament does not get a say, however, at least on the question of whether there should be referendum.