Business of the House (Lisbon Treaty)

It is a pleasure to follow my hon. Friend the Member for Forest of Dean (Mr. Harper), who made a forthright speech. Article 1 of the Lisbon treaty sets three objectives. It states:"““This Treaty marks a new stage in the process of creating an ever closer union among the peoples of Europe, in which decisions are taken as openly as possible and as closely as possible to the citizen.””" I am confident that the treaty will fulfil the first of those objectives—ever closer union—but I am not as confident as I would like to be about the second and third objectives on openness and decision making. We have not got off to a good start in being open and taking decisions as closely to the citizen as possible, not least in this House and in what Ministers have told Members about negotiations and the intergovernmental conference process to date. I was hoping that this motion—this much-trumpeted opportunity to give the issue the promised detailed, line-by-line consideration—would make up for that lack of openness. I appreciate that the Minister who will wind up the debate has styled himself—justifiably, I think—a straight-speaking sort of chap, and I believe that his colleague, the Minister for Europe, is that as well. However, it will take a lot of straight talking to convince me that the Government have been anywhere near open on these proceedings to date. It is important to go back to what took place before the IGC negotiations in June. On 7 June, the then Foreign Secretary, the right hon. Member for Derby, South (Margaret Beckett), gave evidence to the European Scrutiny Committee. She more or less said that that was a waste of time because nothing was taking place. She even denied that there were any negotiations. She said:"““There has been a process whereby Member States were occasionally invited to give some views. There have not been negotiations.””" My hon. Friend the Member for Stone (Mr. Cash) pressed her on that, saying it was astonishing, and she replied:"““I came here because you asked me to come and give evidence. If you had asked me whether there was very much I could tell you, I could have told you no before I came here.””" That was our then Foreign Secretary’s opportunity to tell the House’s Committee scrutinising Europe about what was taking place, and we did not find out very much at all. A fortnight later, as if by magic, a draft IGC mandate appeared and was circulated to Departments. It was circulated for some 48 hours before the then Prime Minister went into negotiations, in which time we are led to believe that all Departments saw the document and gave their comments on it. On 23 June, the negotiations were completed and an IGC mandate came into being. What is more, the very next month the Government produced a document stating,"““The Reform Treaty strengthens the role of national Parliaments in EU decision-making.””" That was hardly borne out by what had taken place hitherto, and the European Scrutiny Committee was well justified in its conclusion, which was a little mild, if anything:"““We were concerned at an early stage that the process which was leading up to the convening of an IGC was proving to be far from transparent.””" That was a masterly piece of understatement by the ESC, although of course it has a majority of members drawn from the Government side of the House. Against that background, it is natural for us to look for an opportunity to compensate for that lack of openness and to have full discussion in this House. However, what this motion offers has come as a disappointment, and it is very much in keeping with the Government’s approach before the IGC negotiations, with a view to closing down discussion. I agree with the learned comments of Opposition Members with far more experience of procedure than me about the severe curtailing of the opportunity to subject this provision to line-by-line consideration. Let me give one example that was mentioned by Labour Members: immigration and asylum policy, which comes under the judicial and home affairs part of the debate. We have been given four and a half hours to debate the entire field of judicial and home affairs. My right hon. Friend the Member for Richmond, Yorks (Mr. Hague) was right to take the House through all the issues covered by that field. The part of the treaty dealing with judicial and home affairs consists of five articles; immigration and asylum is just one. Let us consider what would happen if we devoted a proportionate amount of time to each of those articles. The others are equally important. There are articles on co-operation between police forces, on co-operation in criminal matters, and on co-operation in civil judicial matters. If we gave an equal amount of time to immigration and asylum in the general debates, we would be debating that issue for 54 minutes. That would be 54 minutes to debate articles dealing with the whole range of policy and law on asylum, illegal immigration and co-operation between Governments. In that time, we would also be getting into the subject of legal migration, which the European Union is greatly interested in taking on board as one of its competencies. Moreover, we would have 18 minutes to move amendments on asylum and immigration. The asylum and immigration provisions in this Bill touch on all such matters that regularly come before this House. We spend hours debating asylum and immigration, because these are extremely important and fundamental issues that touch on the liberty of the individual and on control over our borders, yet we are supposed to amend a treaty that deals with those issues within a total of 18 minutes. The same is true of foreign and security policy, the important changes to which my right hon. Friend the Member for Richmond, Yorks took the House through. For example, changes in majority voting arrangements will affect our ability to have an independent foreign policy. There is the highly significant creation of a new diplomatic service for the EU, and the creation of a new Foreign Minister. Apparently, the Government are now saying that all such matters will be decided on after we have debated the issues before us. We should be debating them on the Floor of the House. The most important issues appear to have been compressed with others that, although important in themselves, are little changed by the treaty. Subjects as fundamental as foreign policy, immigration and asylum, and judicial and home affairs—including the very important question of the increased jurisdiction of the European Court of Justice, let alone all the other matters that are dealt with in the treaty—are important, and if we do not have adequate time to debate them on the Floor of the House, frankly, we will be unable to look our constituents in the eye. Yes, a lot of constituents do write to me about Europe. They want to know what is happening there, and they are alarmed by some of the things that are going on; sometimes, they do not fully understand what is taking place. If we cannot look them in the eye and say, ““Yes we debated those issues in the House of Commons as fully as we possibly could. We went through the legislation line by line and it was properly debated””, what sort of opinion will they entertain about this House?