Commission Work Programme 2014

Debate between William Cash and Brian Binley

Wednesday 22nd January 2014 Commons Chamber

[Mr Brian Binley (Northampton South) (Con)]

It is important that the House considers the European Commission’s work programme, as we have done before.

The Greek presidency has the potential to make a major difference to the EU at this critical time, and we should have every hope that it will attempt to make those changes, bearing in mind the recent history of the Greek Government. Greece is arguably one of the greatest victims of the bungled “integration at any price” agenda of those behind the European project and should be well placed to showcase the dangers of recent approaches. This was an opportunity for European integration to change course, but the message from the programme of the Greek presidency is that that process of political integration and state building continues apace regardless. This document and agenda do little to address the very real concerns of ordinary voters across the EU and convey that detached superiority of a complacent unaccountable elite. At a time when Europe teeters on the brink, this work programme presents an agenda for ever-more integration, justified in language that would cause even the most cynical to take note.

We are promised that the Greek presidency will

“reverse the current trend of youth unemployment”

as part of the effort on economic growth and job creation, but it seems that the main output is to

“enhance the implementation of the Compact for Growth and Jobs”,

whose relevance is worthy, to say the least, of deep scrutiny. If we want to reverse the trend of youth unemployment as well as put right many of the wider ailments of the European economy, we need to revisit the entire economic model on which the European project is based. Instead of a burdensome, overbearing single market driven by a social model that is neither desirable nor affordable, we need a much lighter, more flexible and trade-focused agenda for wealth creation and prosperity.

That is not, however, the priority of the Commission. Instead, we are promised a further push on the integration of the EU and the eurozone. The work programme undertakes to push hard on banking union, and promises to

“create a well coordinated Economic and Monetary Union with a view to ending the instability and uncertainty observed in particular in the ‘periphery’.”

Are they talking about the fastest-growing economy in the world when they talk about the periphery? One wonders whether that is how they see Britain.

Perhaps of the greatest concern is that we are promised

“a particular focus on the social dimension”

of European monetary union,

“which, for the first time, will be integrated into the European Semester cycle”.

[Mr Cash]

My hon. Friend refers to banking union. For the last two and a half days, I have attended a conference in Brussels, in which it was explicitly said, over and over again, that it was crucial to get the banking union proposals through. They pleaded with national Governments to get those proposals through before the European elections, because they fear that if they do not get them through before then, they will never get them through.

[Mr Binley]

My hon. Friend is, of course, right. We know that banking union was proposed as a last-ditch effort to give some confidence to the market, but I doubt whether these are the key economic promises for businesses across the EU—that is the truth of the matter. They are a long way from where voters would like the political emphasis to be placed—especially, if I may say so, in this country.

It is difficult to reconcile these priorities with the economic realities, particularly within the eurozone. As we emerge tentatively from recession, alongside the United States, the eurozone continues to face a crisis of existential proportions. The promising picture in Ireland and Spain, as well as improved confidence, is more than offset by the risk of a widespread deflationary spiral and the worrying travails of the French economy, which, being socialist-driven, frightens most of the people in most of the countries across Europe.

European Union (Referendum) Bill

Debate between William Cash and Brian Binley

Friday 5th July 2013 Commons Chamber

[Mr Cash]

I totally agree. My hon. Friend and I, with other Members, have debated this in complete unity, for the same reason: freedom is about freedom of choice. In parliamentary and constitutional terms, freedom of choice depends upon freedom of choice at the ballot box and in the marketplace. If we get the first, the political choice, wrong, as has been going on with this European Government, we will end up with austerity, small and medium-sized businesses not being able to work properly, and massive unemployment among young people, which I know Opposition Members are worried about, as are we on the Government Benches.

When 65% of the young people in several countries in Europe—Spain, Greece and so on—are unemployed, that is unacceptable and it is a direct result of the way in which the European Union has been centralised. Opposition Members have been saying recently, “We do not like the centralisation”—people who are completely in favour of the European Union, until they suddenly realise that the centralisation is creating austerity, unemployment and misery for those young people. It is unacceptable.

[Mr Binley]

Does my hon. Friend agree that those who perpetuate the myth of the single market, arguing that the UK will lose 3 million jobs if we come out, fail to take account of the fact that there is a £70 billion surplus, and no business in Europe will cease to trade with this country whether we are in the single market or not?

[Mr Cash]

Furthermore, with respect to our trade deficit, as I have said on a number of occasions, in 2012, according to the Office for National Statistics, we had a trade deficit of £70 billion with the other 27 member states. To give the point some substance, Germany, on the other hand—no wonder there are two Europes, which are increasingly becoming German-oriented—had a trade surplus with the other 27 member states in 2011 that has now gone up to £72 billion.

It is not really a European Union any more. It is so heavily dominated, wilfully or otherwise, by the circumstances that have created that imbalance, and that of course has its effect on the qualified majority voting. That is why we have to have a referendum, and we need to have it sooner rather than later, because the fundamental renegotiation itself is dependent on the fact that the circumstances have already arisen, and as I said just now, not necessarily with a new treaty.