The House of Commons debated, yesterday, the Commission Work Programme 2013. During the debate Bill Cash made the following speech and interventions.
The Minister for Europe (Mr David Lidington): I beg to move,
That this House takes note of European Union Document No. 15691/12 and Addendum, a Commission Communication on the Commission Work Programme 2013, and welcomes the Work Programme as a useful summary that enables the Government and Parliament to plan their engagement.
I welcome the fact that the European Scrutiny Committee has referred this subject for debate. Today’s debate on the 2013 work programme of the European Commission provides us with a timely opportunity for both Government and Parliament to look ahead and plan our consideration of forthcoming European Union business.
As is always the case, the work programme sets out the European Commission’s priorities, in this instance for 2013 and early 2014; and it may be the last substantial work programme under the current Commission, whose term ends in October 2014. The substance of the Commission’s plans is contained in the annex, which previews 58 initiatives, making it shorter than previous work programmes. However, we know that the list of initiatives is unlikely to be exhaustive; previous experience suggests that reactive work will arise. As the House is aware, various European measures from previous Commission work programmes are already in the system, and work on those will be ongoing over the next 12 months or so.
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Mr William Cash (Stone) (Con): My right hon. Friend, in line with many other members of our party, is deeply committed to the idea of free trade, but given that the European Union has exclusive competence in relation to trade, and with the qualified majority vote and with our having only 8% now, and only 12% even when the Lisbon treaty proposals are introduced in a few months, how will we be able to exercise the degree of influence that he claims, and how will we maintain bilateral trading relations, which will be the answer to all these problems?
Mr Lidington: I have more confidence than does my hon. Friend in our ability to form alliances with other countries to achieve the objectives that he and I share. Our right hon. Friend the Prime Minister has already discussed at length with Chancellor Merkel their shared objective of an ambitious free trade agreement between the European Union and the United States. The leaders of our country and of Germany recognise that the prize at stake is not only the phasing out of tariff barriers but the elimination of non-tariff barriers, thereby establishing, in effect, global regulatory standards agreed on a Euro-Atlantic basis, which would have to become the model for the rest of the world and which other parts of the world would find it difficult to challenge.
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Mr Cash: My right hon. Friend will know that the European Scrutiny Committee is currently holding an inquiry into European Scrutiny Committee matters. Does he accept that timing is very important? What my right hon. Friend the Member for Berwick-upon-Tweed (Sir Alan Beith) has just said is, of course, extremely welcome, but does the Minister not accept that unless the Government are prepared to release the information they have early enough, it could turn out to be far less valuable? Therefore, could not the Government ensure that we all get the information as early as they do?
Mr Lidington: I am always willing to explore how the Government can help to make information available to Parliament, particularly its Committees, in a way that enables a better informed debate and allows Parliament an input at the earliest stage in proceedings. As my hon. Friend will be the first to understand, there is always a balance to be struck between our wish on the one hand to do that and our concern on the other hand not to divulge ahead of negotiations all the details of our negotiating position, including on those areas that are the highest priority objectives and those on which we might be prepared to make concessions. However, I am always happy to look at concrete ideas for improving how we do business.
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Ms Gisela Stuart: The Minister says that there will be an exemption unless proved otherwise. What is the mechanism whereby we keep track and action is reported back to us, because we hear this year after year but nothing happens?
Mr Lidington: The hon. Lady makes a perfectly fair comment. That is why at European Council after European Council my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister keeps coming back to the charge and saying, “We all agreed as Heads of State and Government two or three months ago that the Commission should come forward with a set of proposals on smarter regulation; now we want to see what it has actually been doing in the meantime.” One of the key objectives of the Prime Minister and of my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Business, Innovation and Skills is to ensure that we do not simply relax having achieved a paragraph in the conclusions of a European Council that commits everybody to a measure of deregulation but follow it through so that in all our conversations with the Commission, in our work with MEPs, and in the work that we do bilaterally with other member states we try to co-ordinate a more growth-friendly approach across the European Union. These high-level declarations need to be nailed down in terms of concrete action, and the Commission should be expected to report back. We are making progress on that. I am the first to say that there is still a great deal more to do, and we will encourage the Commission to consider further and more ambitious measures.
Mr Cash: I suggest that the Minister uses the word “ambitious” because annexe 2 of the programme refers to “simplification” and “administration burden reduction initiatives”. There are three of those, two of which are legislative and one non-legislative. If one turns to the rest of the work programme and goes through the entire list, one finds that 48 of the 58 are new legislation. I am afraid to have to say to my right hon. Friend that ambition is one thing and vanity is another.
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Mr William Cash (Stone) (Con): Thank you very much, Mr Speaker, and a happy new year.
I can be brief, for the simple reason that we have before us a list of initiatives, and although there may be fewer than 129, there are still 58, while the number of proposals to reduce regulation of a legislative nature amount to no more than two. The second thing to say is that the Commission work programme is crucial, in that it gives us the route map for where the European Commission is going.
The European Union is dysfunctional: it is not working as it was claimed it would work. Indeed, as I pointed out, referring to the White Paper that the European Commission produced in 1985, here we are, 20 years on from 1992 and nearly 30 years on from 1986, with a provision that simply does not match up to either the aspirations or the promises made. If the single market had worked as I hoped it would when I voted for it in 1986, we would perhaps be better placed than we are now. Unfortunately, it simply has not worked in that way.
The suggestion is that the strategic focus of the work programme is to
“Help business thrive and become more competitive in the global market, by reducing the costs of EU law,” but I am afraid that is simply not substantiated by the facts. Furthermore, there is also a proposal—the Government welcome all of them—to
“Prioritise action to boost growth through improving the single market in services and digital, and ambitious free trade agreements.”
It gives me great pleasure to recall that it was Monsieur Jacques Delors, no less, who only last week proposed in Handelsblatt that it was about time that the United Kingdom got its act together and decided what it was going to do. I hope the Prime Minister will do that when he makes his much anticipated big speech on Europe, by following Monsieur Delors’ advice and going for either the equivalent of an enhanced economic area or alternatively—as he himself put it in stark terms—a free trade area between the United Kingdom and the European Union.
I say that because we have another provision:
“Help develop the single market in financial services, as the basis for a strong and sustainable financial sector.”
Say that to the marines: ask the City of London whether it believes that is the direction in which things are going. The House should look at the problems of qualified majority voting. Despite the attempts to change the voting arrangements, the problems remain. The manner in which jurisdiction over the City’s regulatory system was transferred to Europe by the previous Government—endorsed and acquiesced in by those in the present Government—has been a catastrophe and will remain so.
The document also mentions—the Government welcome this, too—measures to
“Support an environment that encourages innovation, including helping drive the transition to a green economy.”
There are many aspects of the green economy that may or may not turn out to be sustainable, but I shall mention just one, in deference to my hon. Friends the Members for Daventry (Chris Heaton-Harris) and for South Northamptonshire (Andrea Leadsom). [ Interruption. ] Whichever constituency she represents, I know she does a great job for it. The question of wind farms is part and parcel of this, and they are growing exponentially.
The Government also applaud the work programme for helping member states
“to work together more effectively to strengthen the external border and protect citizens from terrorism and serious or organised border crime.”
Again, these are important aspirations; the question is whether that is actually happening. Indeed, I would say the same about increasing
“the EU’s influence on external policy issues”.
Over and over again, we get the aspirations and we are given the promises, but the question asked repeatedly in this dysfunctional European Union is: where is it going and to what extent is it delivering the kind of things that the people in this country vote for in general elections? They put their votes into the ballot box, then find that things are implemented through the Commission’s work programme, which goes to the Council of Ministers, and in almost every area, and driven by qualified majority vote or consensus, we end up with legislation that was not sought, called for, or promised in manifestos in our general elections.
Mark Hendrick (Preston) (Lab/Co-op): The hon. Gentleman criticises the Commission for trying to do something about cross-border crime. He was against the introduction of the European arrest warrant, but it is working well and providing tangible results. Why is he critical of it?
Mr Cash: For the simple reason that we would have achieved the same results had we put in place our own operation through our own legislative system. Furthermore, there are many examples of the European arrest warrant being used to convict innocent people in absentia, including someone in Staffordshire who was recently convicted of a murder that they could not have committed because they were serving in a restaurant in Leek at the time. There might be some advantages to aspects of the co-operative arrangements, of which I am in favour, but that does not mean that the panoply of powers associated with the European arrest warrant is justified.
The Government have expressed reservations about certain proposals, but the key question is: what are they actually able to do about this? We can express reservations and argue against the proposals, but the qualified majority voting system operates in such a way as to prevent us from exercising our much-vaunted influence. I have to say to the Minister and the Government—and through them, I hope, to the Prime Minister in relation to the speech that he is about to make—that if that influence cannot be effective, it is worthless.
I have considered the evidence that has accumulated over the past 40 years since we came into the European Union. I wished you a happy new year earlier, Mr Speaker, but we must also remember that it is the 40th anniversary of our accession to the European Union, through the European Communities Act 1972. This is a time for serious reflection. It is a time not only for mere reform but for a fundamental change in the relationship. There is a disconnect between the legislation that is going through the House, in relation to the implementation of sections 2 and 3 of the Act, and what is being offered to the British people in manifestos.
Mike Gapes (Ilford South) (Lab/Co-op): The hon. Gentleman talks about a new relationship and mentions a free trade arrangement. Does he accept that, if the United Kingdom were to leave the European Union and simply have a free trade relationship with what would be the remaining 27 states after Croatia had joined, we would be in a similar position to Norway, in that we would have integration without representation? We would have to pay in and comply with the EU rules without having any say on how they were being formulated.
Mr Cash: I have great respect for the hon. Gentleman, who has been vociferous on European matters for a long time, albeit on the other side of the agenda from me. He might be interested to know that the Norwegians are now getting restless and using their arrangements within the European economic area to challenge directives. I heard only a few hours ago that that was happening.
Mike Gapes: That is just one instance.
Mr Cash: Yes, but that one instance demonstrates a principle. For 15 years, I have been advocating that we use the “notwithstanding” formula, and when my party was in opposition, we agreed that we would do so. If we were to use it just once now we are in government, it would send out an appropriate signal. Unfortunately, however, that is not happening. We hear about aspirations and reservations, and that it would be a good idea to change the relationship and to repatriate powers, but I have very little confidence that we will achieve anything when it comes down to it. Even more dangerous is the raising of expectations only to have them dashed by reality.
As Churchill said, offering something to the British people but not fulfilling that promise is the best way to ensure that they will no longer trust us.
There are many aspects to this work programme—including a proposal for a European public prosecutor’s office, which I was glad to hear the Minister say we will not accept—but I shall not go into other matters this afternoon because they are so numerous and because others wish to speak.
Let me simply make the point that we are now at a threshold and that there is no turning back. Messrs Barroso and van Rompuy, unelected as they are, have thrown down the gauntlet to the British people. They have said, “We are going to have a federal system,” yet it is unthinkable that this country would get involved in federal arrangements, be they in the eurozone or indeed in the European Union as a whole. We must have a clear strategy; we must have a fundamental change in our relationship. What goes with that has to be a return to the British people of the right to determine the legislation that they voted for in general elections. That is the principle on which this House was founded, and that is the principle on which we have to stand.
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One and a half hours having elapsed since the commencement of proceedings on the motion, the Deputy Speaker put the Question (Standing Order No. 16(1)).
Question agreed to.
Resolved,
That this House takes note of European Union Document No. 15691/12 and Addendum, a Commission Communication on the Commission Work Programme 2013, and welcomes the Work Programme as a useful summary that enables the Government and Parliament to plan their engagement.
