European Council

Shailesh Vara Excerpts

Monday 26th June 2017 Commons Chamber

[The Prime Minister]

I welcome the hon. Gentleman to his place in the Chamber. I did indeed have a bilateral discussion with the President of Cyprus about those talks, and about our hope and expectation because they have come so far. I think that both President Anastasiades and Mr Akinci have taken the discussions to a point that is far closer to a resolution than we have ever seen before, and I hope that we shall be able to take it over the line in the talks that will start in Geneva later this month. The UK, as a co-guarantor, stands ready to play its part in that.

[Mr Shailesh Vara (North West Cambridgeshire) (Con)]

When EU leaders say that they want EU laws to prevail over their citizens in the UK, what they are effectively saying is that they do not trust our judicial system. When the Prime Minister next meets her EU counterparts, may I suggest that she gently reminds them that many of the companies in their own countries—the companies that drive their economies—actually use English and Welsh contract law, which is enforced in our courts by our judges, and the reason why they use English and Welsh law is that, globally, our judicial system commands greater respect than the judicial systems of Germany, France, Italy and so on?

[The Prime Minister]

My hon. Friend makes an extremely good point, and the nub of it is that our courts are respected around the world. As he says, people choose to use our law because they respect our courts, and they also respect the validity of our law. It is important that citizens in the UK are under the jurisdiction of our courts.