EU: UK Membership

My Lords, as this is a European Union debate, I declare that I spent a part of my career in United Kingdom public service dealing with the European Union and another part of it in the European Commission. If that is a declaration of interest, I still have it and I make that declaration now. I congratulate the noble Lord, Lord McNally, on initiating this debate and especially on drawing it so widely, with particular reference to the contribution that the Union can make to the pursuit of United Kingdom national interests. I want to draw attention to one or two specific points under that heading, as well as dealing with some of the constitutional and related issues which are already being discussed and are imminent. The European Community, now the European Union, has been at the centre of European political and economic life for many years. It is 50 years since the Treaty of Rome, and we have been part of it for almost half a lifetime. Over this very long period, I have been struck by the frequency with which not only debate but also public perception of our role within the Union has been dominated by reaction—often knee-jerk—to developments or proposals which are often minor and which may be—or, more likely, are alleged to be—against our interests. Of course, if there are proposals or developments which are indeed against our national interest, we should strongly resist them, demolish them or adapt them to our advantage. But often here in Britain the noise drowns out the reality. That is a sad part of our history and we should do our best to change it. In addition, having served as both a United Kingdom and a European Commission official, and having attended literally hundreds of meetings of the member states in the Council and hundreds of meetings of the European Commission itself, I am surprised by how often people in Britain believe that major European Union law is always made by bureaucrats when, in fact, it is made for the greater part by the Ministers of the member states in the Council in consultation with—or, more recently, in co-decision with—the representatives of the people in the European Parliament. I think that that misunderstanding influences public perception of some of the decisions that are taken. It would be difficult to make a speech today without making some reference to the imminent European summit meeting and to the memorial service now being held for the constitutional treaty. But mymain theme today is to stress that sharing, as we do, and potentially benefiting from a Union of almost500 million people, with many common interests and ambitions, a generally high level of economic prosperity and a great range of talents in business, the arts and sciences, the right course for Britain is to give our attention in particular to identifying those areas of activity, those potential proposals and those areas of co-operation that will give us—the British—the greatest benefit. That is where our priorities should lie. I am sure that the Minister will say that the Government are doing this, whether in the Lisbon agenda or elsewhere. Well done on that, but my theme is that the identification and achievement of benefits for Britain and generally, in consequence, for the EU as a whole, should be the dominant theme of our approach, not just for government but for trade and many other organisations. How can we make best use of the huge strength and diversity of the Union? That is far more important than the occasional political disagreement. Let us hear in which areas we believe the best potential lies. That should be the European agenda. By agenda, I do not mean that we should be looking necessarily for formal proposals for legislation—probably not, as legislation is slow and very often unnecessary—but at other forms of co-operation with European partners at the national, local or other levels. I want to take one specific example in saying a word about research and development. So often we hear about other great political issues that are important—I accept that—but we do not hear quite so much about what happens at a lower level, which perhaps in terms of the long-term prosperity of the country may be very important. The research and development programme of the European Union is very large. The seventh framework programme for 2007-13 has a budget of €53 billion, which is a 63 per cent increase over the programme that preceded it. The United Kingdom has favoured this, and over the years we have benefited clearly from the EU programmes. When I was in Brussels I was always very much impressed by the seriousness with which the construction of the programmes was discussed and examined—in particular, the balance between basic research and development work being closer to the manufacture and marketing of products. I think that the approach is very good. It is an example of a benefit that we achieve now and from which we could probably achieve more, as the approach is similar in many ways to our British approach elsewhere. The programmes are bottom-up; they are based on a wide process of consultation; they are subject to open competition with peer review and decisions on the programmes; and the cost is shared—perhaps we might think a bit more of doing the same thing in the common agricultural policy. The cost is shared with equivalent sums from industry or government, so that the total investment in research and development is much bigger than the basic EU programme. This is an example of the considerable flexibility that we in the EU have shown over the years.We started with programmes that were more aptperhaps in the 1980s; for example, on advanced telecommunications, basic research in industrial technology and biotechnology. Gradually over time, we have moved into other areas, such as the life sciences and the environment, while the latest programme has a substantial effort on health and transport as well as environment. The programme is flexible and can give real benefits. I wanted to cite it today because I so often read in the newspapers about the things that are apparently going wrong; I seldom read about the things that are apparently going right. I take the opportunity of being on my feet to draw attention to this one. In simple budget terms, which is not the most important point about a research and develop programme, the UK received more funds under the fifth programme than it paid in. That was also true of the sixth programme in relation to manufacturing. We are in fact benefiting pretty well. We must give great attention to the budget. I always accept that, and always look at the latest figures. From the ones I have seen, we are unfortunately the fifth largest net contributor per capita, an important way of looking at the contribution; I wish we were lower. I will say a word on what we are going to do in the immediate future at the European summit meeting. Views on the proposed constitutional treaty are very strong, but this does and should not inhibit us from now taking an objective look at matters which might improve the working of the Union while protecting our national interests. The constitutional treaty has unfortunately shared the fate of John Cleese’s Norwegian Blue parrot, but any new proposals should not hark back to it but be looked at on their merits; that is where we should be now. There is still room for some better ways in which the Union could be governed; for example, the extent to which national Parliaments should be able to sound a warning when subsidiarity is not being respected: the famous ““yellow card””. That would be a good thing to bring in, among others Some elements of the operation of the common foreign and security policy could be improved, for example, by removing the six-monthly rotating presidency and having one of longer duration, as well as having the high representative acting as chair of the CFSP council and as vice-president of the Commission—although not, of course, with the title ““Foreign Minister””. I agree with the noble and learned Lord, Lord Howe; it belonged to him at one time, and should not be used by anybody else in the European Union. We should retain for the Charter of Fundamental Rights the position negotiated at Nice, that it should not be a formal part of the treaty. The more tricky questions—for example, on voting weights—could be looked at again. There is at least a good chance that that would be more favourable to us than what we have at the moment. Of course, Parliament would have to agree any consequential amendments of the treaties or they would not come into effect. Like others, I sincerely hope that any suggestion that these sorts of changes deserve a referendum will be put aside.