European Union (Approvals) Bill

Debate between John Redwood and Michael Connarty

Monday 11th February 2013 Commons Chamber

[Michael Connarty]

No, I do not want to continue with the Council of Europe. I have spoken at length in the House in debates on the functions of the Parliamentary Assembly, which I think is an excellent organisation that brings people back to why we come to Parliament. It is about the application of human rights. We often get tied up in playing our parties off against each other, but if we look through the lens of human rights we can very quickly see where the breaches are. There were huge outcries under the previous Government when we were locking up people for long periods without trial, which I objected to. Many of these things come back to the fundamentals.

The EU is adding its weight. It has more power than the Council of Europe to deliver judgments and make those judgments stick, because penalties apply to things that the EU gets involved in. If we decided to break away from a European directive, we could, as a country, be fined. When, for example, Bulgaria refused to come up to scratch with its legal system, it had all its EU finances frozen until it brought itself up to a standard that was acceptable.

The EU might attract many criticisms, and at times I find it greatly irritating, but I am pleased that it is adding its weight to the need to look at things on a human rights basis and to report on that. That is what the proposal is about.

[Mr Redwood]

Does the hon. Gentleman not accept, in retrospect, that when so many powers were given away by the House under the Labour Government, it would have been much better if they had asked the British people’s permission? The British people feel cheated now.

Europe

Debate between John Redwood and Michael Connarty

Wednesday 30th January 2013 Commons Chamber

[Mr Redwood]

No. That is a trivial point compared with the issues that I am raising, and it is entirely wrong, because there are many countries outside the EU that attract as much as or more inward investment than we do. I want, as does the hon. Gentleman, to keep those jobs, and we will continue to attract and support that inward investment as long as we have a satisfactory enterprise economy here and a decent market. We have a very large market of our own. That is why those investments come here.

The hon. Gentleman needs to look around and see how many powers have been taken away. We can no longer have an agricultural policy of any kind unless it is the approved one from Brussels. Our fishing grounds are completely controlled and regulated from Brussels. Our energy policy is greatly circumscribed by a large amount of European legislation, regulation and price control, and many more decisions coming along on climate change and energy, which means that it is very difficult to have an enterprise-oriented energy policy in this country.

We find that we do not control our own borders. We have no say over who comes here from the continent of Europe, and they have come in very large numbers in recent years. Many of them are welcome, but a sovereign country has the right to decide who comes and on what terms. We were always assured by Governments that we kept control of our welfare policy—that that was a matter for domestic consideration. We now find that the EU presumes to instruct us to whom we give benefits and what benefits we give them.

[Michael Connarty]

This is a grand opportunity to ask the right hon. Gentleman, as I asked the hon. Member for Stone (Mr Cash), to outline what position he would take and on what issues he would vote to leave the EU—on a matter of emotion, or can he give me some specific issues that he says should persuade his party and his Government to vote no when it comes to a referendum?

[Mr Redwood]

I wish to help restore democracy in our islands and to do that we need to regain the veto. We should not have sacrificed 100 vetoes at Nice, Amsterdam and Lisbon. This Parliament needs to be able to decide whether a new law goes forward or not; otherwise we will find that in ever more areas—I am just beginning to illustrate some of them—we are a fax or an e-mail democracy. We receive the e-mails or the faxes from Brussels and this Parliament has to put through the measure, whether we like it or not. That creates a tension within our democracy. Successive Governments bring measures to this House and recommend them to this House. They are very fundamental measures, but they often sneak them through this House, or sneak them through upstairs, because they fear they are unpalatable to us. However, they know that there is nothing that the House of Commons can do once the agreement has been made in Brussels—and very often it is made without the wholehearted consent of the British Minister. In the case of this Government, it may often be made against the wishes of the British Minister, but this House is still expected to put through these measures come what may.

That is why we need a Government who resolutely negotiate a new relationship for us with our partners in Europe. Of course, I give no ground to anybody in wanting to maximise jobs and investment in this country, and my recommendations would increase that rather than reduce them, as we find with non-EU members already. However, I also wish to see the Prime Minister’s great speech used as a platform for setting out how we recreate a democracy and secure the right in this House to say no to European laws if we do not like them. We have waited a long time for a Prime Minister who would say honestly that this country does not share the aim of the treaties and of many of the member states of the European Union because we do not wish ever-closer union.

I have heard very few Labour Members say that they want ever-closer union, because they know that that means political, monetary, fiscal, economic and every kind of union known; it means the creation of a united states of Europe. Those who wish to join that, I wish well, but it was never Britain’s view that we wanted to be part of a united states of Europe. The British people, if asked, would say no to that idea. It is up to us now, at this late hour, to say that too many powers have gone and that they need to be returned if we are to restore this once-great Chamber to what it once was.

This Parliament wrestled power from over-mighty monarchs. This Parliament took on those who wished to dominate the continent of Europe and rejected the imperial ambitions of first Spain, then France, and then Germany. Because of the work of our predecessors in the House of Commons, we as a nation said to Europe: “We want a Europe of the free. We want a Europe of independent nations. We want a Europe where people’s sense of local belonging is respected. We are against a tyranny. We are against an over-mighty Europe. We do not believe that Europe can be governed as a whole.”

How proud that vision was, and how right it is that our Prime Minister has reminded us of the foundations of our beliefs: no to ever-closer union, yes to more democracy; no to restrictions and too much centralised government from Brussels, yes to greater freedom to breathe and to decide and to choose among all the smaller countries of western Europe. I suspect that many countries out there and many politicians in them respect that vision and are rather impressed by its boldness. We should all join together now in rallying the peoples of Europe to say yes to friendship, yes to trade, yes to co-operation, but no to centralisation and no to authoritarian interference.

Finance Bill

Debate between John Redwood and Michael Connarty

Tuesday 28th June 2011 Commons Chamber

[Mr Redwood]

No, I was just wondering whether my hon. Friends had that in mind, knowing how much they treasure the coalition with the Liberal Democrats, and knowing that such bold statements were made in the Orange Book by no less than a former Chief Secretary to the Treasury, who presumably knew the price of everything and the value of some things, and who would want to ensure value for money.

I hope that my hon. Friends on the Front Bench consider the wider issue that was rightly raised by my hon. Friend the Member for Mole Valley. How do we get extra resources and money spent on health in a friendly and sensible way, on top of the very great and important NHS, which my hon. Friends the Members for Mole Valley, for Christchurch and for North East Hertfordshire rightly back? If not by their route, what route? May we please have some numbers? The proposal could be a good-value buy, but that depends very much on how much cost would be taken out of the NHS.

[Michael Connarty (Linlithgow and East Falkirk) (Lab)]

I have one or two things to say about this debate, and I was stirred into standing up by the previous speech, because either woolly-headed logic was being used by the right hon. Member for Wokingham (Mr Redwood), or he was making a deliberate statement to try to cover—

--- Later in debate ---

[Michael Connarty]

You know, Mr Deputy Speaker, there is amazing technology in this place. Members can sit in their offices and, if they wish, not watch the tennis but follow the debate in detail, and come down to the Chamber when they think it might be useful to add something. I recommend it to Members: turn off the tennis, turn on the Chamber.

The point I was making is that the logic used by the right hon. Member for Wokingham was possibly deliberately to convince the public that the proposal is an effort to add extra resources to the health services by encouraging people to put money into private health insurance. The logic, of course, is that such private health insurance is available to some people when they are in employment, but is denied them when they retire. If that is the kind of employer that people have, it is a shame that they are deluded into thinking that insurance is a substitute for taxation-based health services.

The right hon. Gentleman stated that resources are not finite, and that somehow this money would bring new resources rushing into the health service. Everyone who has studied the health service over the time I have been in elected politics, which is since 1977, knows what happens. The consultant and the surgeon choose whether to work in the private sector or in the public sector. Sometimes they choose to work in a mixture of those. I commend those who decide to work entirely in the public sector, because they give the best value to our constituents, as my right hon. Friend the Member for Holborn and St Pancras (Frank Dobson) said when, in an intervention, he cited the number of operations for cataracts.

However, the reality is that only a limited number of people get to the top of the elitist profession that is the medical profession, particularly to consultant level, because we do not train enough people to do the work that is required in the health service.

[Mr Redwood]

Does the hon. Gentleman not understand that in countries that have a bigger private sector on top of a large public sector, there are more doctors and nurses in relation to the population, because there is more money?

[Michael Connarty]

The right hon. Gentleman leads me to my next point. He recommended that we look at the EU system. I am glad that in reply to an intervention from one of my hon. Friends he said that he objects to the idea of a comprehensive, insurance-based health service in this country. I, too, have looked at that on the continent and in EU countries, and I have seen that it does not work.

In fact, other EU countries do have a larger number of doctors—there are more doctors per head of population in most of them than in this country—but that is because of the elitist structure of the medical profession in this country. That structure keeps the numbers down and pays huge bonuses to people once they get to the higher gradings. Many of those people are the very same ones who moonlight in the private sector for additional personal financial gain.

Eurozone Financial Assistance

Debate between John Redwood and Michael Connarty

Tuesday 24th May 2011 Commons Chamber

[Michael Connarty (Linlithgow and East Falkirk) (Lab)]

I am pleased to follow the hon. Member for Clacton (Mr Carswell), because he talked about something that should be discussed more in this place: the plight of the people who are suffering problems because of their own Government’s mismanagement. My Eurosceptic colleagues on the Labour Benches are still against the common market—they are not really against the European Union as such—whereas the Eurosceptics on the Government Benches are, honourably, against the EU as a project. As they know, the problem I have with this whole debate is that all these manifestations have nothing to do with our being in the eurozone; they are to do with the failure of Governments to use the money that they had available, their own economic powers and the money made available to them by the EU in their period of transition into the EU to do the right things and invest correctly in the skills of their people and in the supply side of their economy, rather than spending the money on large economic projects.

For example, when we go on a cheap holiday to Portugal we can drive on excellent motorways directly from the airport to the place where we will lie in the sun, and the hotels and large boulevards will have been paid for by EU money. However, the young people of that country fail to get a decent education, proper skills and university places. The reality of these countries is that they have under-invested in their own people. That criticism cannot be levelled at the UK.

The eurozone offers these countries a way out of their dilemma that, as a socialist, I do not particularly find attractive; they will be asked to cut further their budgets, which should be invested in their social infrastructure and the supply side of their economy. That will cause them great harm, but that offer will be made to them by the International Monetary Fund, the World Bank and so on because it is the capitalist model. That model says, “When you are in trouble, slash your budgets in the public sector.” Now, where have I heard that before? I have heard it from those on the Government Front Bench and from every Government Back Bencher. They have been told that every time they get up they should use the mantra about how they have to slash and burn the economy of this country—thus denying the young people of this country the chance to look for a better future—because of the problem of debt.

That situation will be the consequence for Greece, Portugal and Ireland. It is what is happening in Ireland, and the young people in Spain are worried that it will happen to them. That country is a good example of a place where major infrastructure projects have been financed by the EU and the supply side of the economy has been run down. I have met many young people in Spain who say, “It was easy to leave school at 16 and get a job building houses, but nobody can afford to buy them now. It was good money, the sun was shining and everything was going to be fine.” Suddenly, these people find that they have no skills, no jobs and no future.

[Mr Redwood]

rose—

[Michael Connarty]

I will give way in a moment.

Everything I am discussing is the consequence of the things that the Governments of these countries did; this was not about the EU being in existence and not about their being members of the eurozone. These things were done by those Governments. The offer is that the IMF, the World Bank and the eurozone countries, mainly, will bail out those countries.

--- Later in debate ---

[Michael Connarty]

I am about to give way to the right hon. Member for Wokingham (Mr Redwood). A small part of the bail-out will be a fund, to which we have signed up, that will give a loan to those countries to help them to get over this unattractive prospect of having to face down their own people and cut their own services because of the lack of good Government management, so that they can be bailed out.

[Mr Redwood]

Does the hon. Gentleman not see that these countries are locked into a currency at a rate that makes them completely uncompetitive, which is why they have mass unemployment and why lending them money does not get them out of the mess?

[Michael Connarty]

I do not see that. What the right hon. Gentleman says may be a good indicator of where this debate is coming from. This is not about the European mechanism; this is about wanting to destroy the euro, to see it bust and to see it fail. If that is what it is about, people should stand up and say so; they should not lie to the people of the UK or mislead them by saying that it is about something else. People should be told the truth. I know that some Labour Members would certainly like to see the European monetary project and the euro completely collapse. If that is the agenda of Members on the Government Benches, they should say so.

The prospect I was describing is not one that I find attractive. In the modern world economy we clearly need to have a large trade bloc, probably united in some way around a monetary discipline, that faces down the problems coming from the United States of America, which is in the most unbelievable debt to the rest of the world. That country is run on the basis of its economy always being indebted to other countries. What will come from China and from Africa? That is part of this whole issue, and I hope that one day we will have the courage to move into that area, but what we are talking about is a very small loan of £4 billion, which will come back to the people of this country eventually when these countries are resettled in a new economic environment.

We hear hon. Members go on and on as if they are doing something wonderful in defending the UK, but they are not. We are talking about “beggar your neighbour” politics here and I am not prepared to vote for that. I applaud the Government for being honest and sincere about the fact that this European project either collapses or it is supported by all of us in different ways. I believe that the interest of the people of the UK lies in maintaining the eurozone and the euro, and helping countries when they fall into indebtedness. I hope that the Government will persuade hon. Members to reject the proposals before them.