G8 and NATO Summits

Lord Barnett Excerpts

Wednesday 23rd May 2012 Lords Chamber

[Lord Strathclyde]

My Lords, my noble friend, with all his knowledge and experience in these matters, has taken the opportunity to share his views with your Lordships’ House. That is immensely useful as part of the process of discussion. On Afghanistan, I do not think that where my noble friend stands and where my right honourable friend the Prime Minister stands are all that different. With him, we agree that the initial objective in Afghanistan has been reached and that the most important objective, which is that it should no longer become a home for terrorism, has been largely achieved. But my noble friend is right, and we entirely agree with him, that there are other countries, most notably Pakistan, with which the United Kingdom has very close links, where there are still major issues to resolve. That is not just in Pakistan; it is also in other countries.

[Lord Barnett]

The noble Lord spoke briefly in the Statement about the eurozone problems and Greece in particular. He said that that was a matter for the Greek people, but is it not the case that the Greek people—according to opinion polls, anyway—seem inclined to stay in the eurozone while not wanting the austerity programme? Can the noble Lord tell us what the situation would be then?

[Lord Strathclyde]

My Lords, the noble Lord is asking me to look into a crystal ball to give us the results of the Greek elections and to try to guess what I think is almost unguessable at the moment as to the likely reaction of the markets of the rest of the eurozone countries and the impact not just within the EU but on the rest of the world and particularly the United Kingdom. The Prime Minister has laid out—and I suspect that the noble Lord, beneath his occasional expostulations, agrees with this—that it is in Britain’s best interests for the eurozone to sort out its problems. The eurozone is at a crossroads. It either has to make up or it is looking at a potential break-up. Europe should have a committed, stable and successful eurozone with an effective firewall; it should be well capitalised with well regulated banks and there should be a system of fiscal burden sharing and supportive monetary policy across the eurozone. If we do not get that, we are in uncharted territory. I will not be the first Minister from the Dispatch Box to advise either the Greeks or the eurozone what they should do next.