Draft EU Budget 2011

Debate between Lord Dodds of Duncairn and Douglas Carswell

Wednesday 13th October 2010 Commons Chamber

[Mr Carswell]

I am grateful to my hon. Friend, and to the other 32 hon. Members—many of whom are present—who supported the amendment. The £380 million increase comes at a time when there will be costly cuts in my hon. Friend’s constituency and in others—cuts that none of us wants to see—and when it is surely wrong to reduce spending on public services in order to increase the money that we give to EU institutions.

[Mr Dodds]

The hon. Gentleman said that some of the increase would fund the External Action Service. Does he recall that when the service was debated in the House, it was promised that it would be budget-neutral? That was bad enough—there should have been a decrease—but can the hon. Gentleman explain why we are now being asked to finance an increase in its funding?

[Mr Carswell]

I cannot. I wish that I could, and I should have liked to hear an answer from the Minister. I am perplexed and puzzled about why we are now being asked for an additional increase in funding for a measure that we were told was budget-neutral.

The issue before us is indeed one of supply. It is a question of whether we think that our constituents’ money is being well and wisely spent. Do Members believe that, in our current financial circumstances, we should find more resources to pay for, among other things, high commissioners’ entertainment allowances and additional staff for Members of the European Parliament? Is that really the best possible use for this money? Is it better to spend it on that than on the 13,000 nurses whose jobs we might otherwise save, or on 22,000 servicemen? I do not think it necessary to be either Eurosceptic or fiscally conservative to believe that there are better ways to allocate our finite resources. When all the Governments in Europe are cutting their budgets, it cannot be right for the EU bureaucracy to be expanding.

If we do not think that this is the best use we can make of our constituents’ tax contributions, our duty is clear: we should support the amendment and reject the increase. Our predecessors fought a long and bloody civil war to establish that only this House might raise revenue for central Government through taxation. We are the inheritors of a sublime tradition, but also of a heavy duty. It is not for any outside agency, either our own Ministers or overseas Commissioners, to tell us how to dispose of this nation’s resources. We shall make that decision guided by our consciences, and in the interests of those for whom we speak.

I respectfully seek to press the amendment to a vote. Others have signed it, and I hope that they will speak in its support tonight.