EU: Prime Minister’s Speech

Lord Howell of Guildford Excerpts

Thursday 31st January 2013 Lords Chamber

[Lord Howell of Guildford]

My Lords, those, both here and overseas, who think that the Prime Minister’s speech was all about getting some exclusive deal for the United Kingdom from the rest of the European Union are starting from entirely the wrong point. The first line of the Prime Minister’s speech was that this speech was,

“about the future of Europe”.

What he is concerned about, and what we should in all parties and sections be concerned about, is giving new direction to a European Union which is today lost in the thickets of the debate about the eurozone—which will continue for a long time, it has not been cured—overcentralisation and general unpopularity. That creates uncertainty which will continue and must be addressed.

To give new direction to that unsatisfactory situation throughout Europe, we need two things. We need colossal intellectual effort, similar to, or perhaps even greater than, that which went into the original Monnetiste ideas in the post-war situation; and we need new friends and allies all around Europe to mobilise the new thinking.

I believe that the friends are there. I think that the European budget experience last autumn showed that many people are determined to have a new approach in Europe. They are to be found in almost every quarter, not just in the smaller ex-satellite countries of eastern and central Europe but in France, Germany, Italy and other great countries.

On the intellectual side, huge new effort will be required. If I may say so, it must be more than diplomatic effort. I very much admire the team inside the Foreign and Commonwealth Office—indeed, some of them are my good friends—but the task now is one for which we will have to draw on the best brains in business, engineering, science, management and, I would hope, all the political parties to bring new direction to the eurozone and new relationships of its members to the central institutions. The task is to show how a modernised European Union can work and how treaties can be amended to allow that. The challenge now is to draw up the architecture for a more flexible, dynamic, democratic European Union which connects to the people. It is a challenge to which all those who are concerned about our position in Europe and the stability of Europe should now turn their efforts.