Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Lord Clarke of Nottingham and Lord Cameron of Chipping Norton

Wednesday 17th December 2014 Commons Chamber

[The Prime Minister]

The levy control framework has been fixed, and it sets the overall amount of investment that can go into renewable energy schemes, many of which are providing jobs for constituencies up and down the country—often particularly those on the east coast of our country, not least in Hull, where an enormous amount of investment is going in. I welcome that investment, and I am not sure what the hon. Gentleman’s view is.

[Mr Kenneth Clarke (Rushcliffe) (Con)]

Will the Prime Minister confirm that if he and the Chancellor deliver their plans for the economy, they will take public spending back to the level that was being delivered by a former Labour Chancellor, but only because he was bound by an election pledge to stick to my economic plan, which he therefore inherited from a Conservative Government?

[The Prime Minister]

My right hon. and learned Friend gives us a very important historical perspective. It comes back to the point that the Opposition now seem to be basing their entire economic policy on some throwaway remark on the BBC at about 10 past 6 on a Monday morning. The truth is, what is envisaged is getting public spending back to the level where it was in 2002, when the Leader of the Opposition was sitting in the Treasury. I am afraid that his whole idea, like all his economic policies, has collapsed within five minutes.

G20

Debate between Lord Clarke of Nottingham and Lord Cameron of Chipping Norton

Monday 17th November 2014 Commons Chamber

[The Prime Minister]

I do not even know where to start with the hon. Gentleman. When he started his question I thought perhaps he had forgotten that the communists were not running Russia any more. I know he used to back them in those days, but I thought he would have moved on a bit since then.

[Mr Kenneth Clarke (Rushcliffe) (Con)]

Does my right hon. Friend agree that, when one looks for concrete practical steps that might be taken to achieve the wholly desirable goal of increased growth in the global economy, a very great deal depends on the successful achievement of a comprehensive trade deal between the European Union and the United States? As this is one of the few areas on which the Republicans in the United States agree with the Obama Administration, did he press other European leaders to go for rapid progress on agreement at this stage in the short window of opportunity between the mid-term elections being over and the next presidential campaign beginning?

European Council

Debate between Lord Clarke of Nottingham and Lord Cameron of Chipping Norton

Monday 27th October 2014 Commons Chamber

[The Prime Minister]

I would say to the right hon. Gentleman, for whom I have a huge amount of respect, that, to be fair to the Secretary of State for Defence, he corrected himself this morning, and I think he was absolutely right. It is right for politicians to raise concerns about immigration, but we should always choose our language carefully. He said this morning that he wished he had chosen his language in a different way, and I agree with that.

[Mr Kenneth Clarke (Rushcliffe) (Con)]

May I sympathise with the Prime Minister on being taken by surprise on a subject that everybody in the Foreign Office and the Treasury must have known was coming along for the past five months, because British officials carried out the huge revision of the British GNP? I congratulate him on now choosing the sensible points, which are how to challenge the methodology and get the size of this reviewed, and how to get rid of the nonsense that it is all to be paid in a lump sum in a fortnight. Many other countries will join him in trying to sort that out.

Did the Prime Minister raise the European arrest warrant and the 34 other desirable directives which, I trust, we are going to opt into? Does he agree with my right hon. Friend the Home Secretary that these opt-ins are absolutely essential for the sake of our policing and criminal justice system if we are to make sure that it is up to dealing with international crime?

[The Prime Minister]

Let me say to my right hon. and learned Friend that of course these changes happen every year—they are expected every year and discussed every year—but what has never happened before is a change on this scale, and no one was expecting that. As for the opt-out or opt-in on justice and human rights, it is very important to recognise that we have already achieved the biggest transfer of power from Brussels back to Britain by opting out of 100 different pieces of legislation. We now need to make sure that we keep our country safe.

Ukraine (Flight MH17) and Gaza

Debate between Lord Clarke of Nottingham and Lord Cameron of Chipping Norton

Monday 21st July 2014 Commons Chamber

[The Prime Minister]

As a friend of Israel—the right hon. Gentleman said that he is one too—I think we should always speak the truth, and I always have done with Israel, for instance in the case of illegal settlements. But I think another element of the truth is that if Hamas stopped the rocket attacks on Israel, the Israeli operation in Gaza would end and there would be a ceasefire. The point that the Israeli Prime Minister makes, which I think is a legitimate one, is that there have been a number of occasions when he has unilaterally declared or agreed to a ceasefire, but Hamas will not follow suit. I absolutely agree that we need to speak the truth, but the truth must start with an end to these attacks.

[Mr Kenneth Clarke (Rushcliffe) (Con)]

Does the Prime Minister agree that within the next few days negotiations should be concluded between the member states of the European Union on a proper sharing of the economic burden that will fall on our own economies from economic sanctions? Does he also agree that if this outrageous behaviour is not met with truly effective sanctions, the west faces very grave problems in the next few years from Russian behaviour across the rest of central and eastern Europe, including the Balkan states and the Baltic states inside the Union itself?

[The Prime Minister]

My right hon. and learned Friend makes two extremely good points. First, we have to make sure that when tier 3 sanctions come—and they should come—they cover areas such as financial services, defence and energy. That will affect different countries in different ways, but we need to ensure that we are all effectively sharing in the burden. Britain has been clear that we are willing to do that. The second point he makes is that those who argue that the effect of sanctions will be to damage our own economies are missing the bigger point, which is that our economic future is bound up with our economic security. We will lose that diplomatic and economic security if we do not confront the fact that one country in Europe is now being destabilised by Russia, and if we let this happen, others will follow.