European Union (Croatian Accession and Irish Protocol) Bill

John Bercow Excerpts

Tuesday 27th November 2012 Commons Chamber

[Mr Nuttall]

I beg to move amendment 4, page 4, line 15, leave out subsection (2) and insert—

‘(2) This Act comes into force in accordance with the following provisions—

(a) Section 1 comes into force on the day after the following conditions are fulfilled—

(i) in each House of Parliament a Minister of the Crown moves a motion that the House approves the coming into force of section 1, and

(ii) each House agrees to the motion without amendment,

(b) the other provisions of this Act come into force on the day on which this Act is passed.’.

[The Temporary Chair (Mr David Crausby)]

With this it will be convenient to discuss the Question that clause 6 stand part of the Bill.

[Mr Nuttall]

This will be the last amendment to be discussed in Committee. It would enable the House to revisit the question of whether Croatia was ready to join the EU before this Bill ratifying the accession treaty came into effect. The Minister made it clear on Second Reading that the accession process that Croatia had followed had involved more rigorous demands than those placed on Romania or Bulgaria, or any of the earlier accession states. However, I think it is accepted on all sides that, unless things have changed dramatically since the Second Reading debate, Croatia has not yet fulfilled all that is expected of it. Much progress has clearly been made, and that is to be welcomed, but more undoubtedly remains to be done.

The European Commission is continuing its monitoring process, and the Minister mentioned that a further report was expected next spring. He provided the more accurate date of next March for its delivery, and we expect it to be the final report. On Croatia’s progress in dealing with domestic war crimes, the Minister said on Second Reading that the Government’s assessment was “almost complete”, but that more work was still required. The amendment would allow the House the opportunity to assess whether Croatia had made further progress and whether the process had been completed.

On the Croatian civil justice system, the Minister said on Second Reading that despite a significant number of additional judges being appointed to focus on the backlog of outstanding civil cases, the number of such cases had increased. About 844,000 new cases had been brought before the civil courts during the first half of 2012, and only 836,00 cases had been resolved during that period. In fact, not only was the backlog not being reduced, it was getting worse.