The Prime Minister made a statement, yesterday, at the House of Commons, on the recent European Council. Bill Cash made the following intervention:
The Prime Minister (Mr David Cameron): With permission, Mr Speaker, I would like to make a statement on the recent European Council, and update the House on the dreadful events in Woolwich.
The European Council was called specifically to discuss energy policy and tax evasion. We also discussed the situation in Syria, prior to the lifting of the arms embargo that was agreed at the Foreign Affairs Council last week. On energy policy, we agreed to continue our efforts to complete the single market in energy, so that we drive competition between suppliers and force prices down. We also put down a marker to get rid of unnecessary regulation in making the most of indigenous resources such as shale gas. Europe has three quarters as much shale as the United States, yet while the Americans are drilling 10,000 wells a year, we in Europe are drilling fewer than 100. We must extract shale in a safe and sustainable manner, but we have to do more to ensure that old rules designed for different technologies do not hold us back today.
On tax, to crack down on tax evasion we need proper exchange of tax information, which in Europe has been stalled for decades because of the selfish actions of a minority of countries. I made tackling tax evasion a headline priority for our chairmanship of the G8, and that has enabled us to ramp up pressure and make real progress. At the European Council we agreed there should be a new international standard of automatic information exchange between tax authorities, and proper information on who really owns and controls each and every company.
In Syria, the situation continues to deteriorate. There is a humanitarian crisis, so Britain is leading the way with humanitarian support. We need diplomatic pressure to force all sides to come to the table, and in recent weeks I have held talks with Presidents Putin and Obama to try and help bring that about. We must be clear: unless we do more to support the official Opposition, the humanitarian crisis will continue, the political transition that we want to see will not happen, and the extremists will continue to flourish. That is why I believe it is right to lift the EU arms embargo on the Syrian Opposition. There must be a clear sense that Assad cannot fight his way to victory or use the talks to buy more time to slaughter Syrians in their own homes and on their streets.
I regret to say that the EU arms embargo served the extremists on both sides. It did not stop Assad massacring his people, it did not stop the Russians sending him arms, and it did not stop Islamist extremists getting their hands on weapons either. It just sent a signal that for all its words, the EU had no real ability to support the reasonable opposition that could be the basis of an inclusive transition. That is why the Foreign Secretary and the French Foreign Minister secured agreement to lift the arms embargo in Brussels last week.
I believe we should also be clear about the Syrian National Coalition. It has declared its support for democracy, human rights, and an inclusive future for all minorities, and we—not just in Britain but across the EU—have recognised it as a legitimate representative of the Syrian people. The EU has agreed a common framework for those who, in the future, may decide to supply it with military equipment, and there are clear safeguards to ensure that any such equipment would be supplied only for the protection of civilians, and in accordance with international law. That does not mean that we in the UK have made any decision to send arms, but we now have the flexibility to respond if the situation continues to deteriorate. With 80,000 killed, 5 million fled from their homes, rising extremism and major regional instability, those who argue for inaction must realise that it has its consequences too. (…)
Mr William Cash (Stone) (Con): On the question of the EU and tax, will my right hon. Friend give the House an assurance that the proposals in the conclusions are not the thin edge of the wedge towards a Europe-wide tax regime and that in respect of UK taxation regarding multinationals, the City of London and others, the ambit of taxation will remain firmly within this national Parliament?
The Prime Minister: My hon. Friend is absolutely right to have raised this issue, because often people have said that the reason we cannot get proper information sharing and tax sharing between European Governments is that it is subject to a national veto, and we demonstrated at that Council that that is not the case. So there is no change to unanimity—this absolutely should be an area of national decision making—but what we do want in Europe is countries to come together to share that tax information, so that we can make sure that companies are properly paying their taxes.
