Treaty of Lisbon (No. 4)

Of course competition is a means rather than an end, but the French President is seeking ends that are based in economic nationalism. Most of us feel that that is extremely unhelpful in the context of the economic union. The Secretary of State spoke about the fundamentals of the single market, and he was right to begin by emphasising that the single market is the bedrock on which the EU is built. It is the EU's greatest success, and it underpins the rise in living standards that we all enjoy. The common market, followed by the single market, has attracted and sustained the membership of countries from southern and eastern Europe, permanently liberating the first group from fascism and the second from communism. Those are major achievements, and we should underline the major contribution that the single European market makes to the UK economy. We often take it for granted, but roughly 63 or 65 per cent. of British visible exports now go to the EU, compared with 43 or 45 per cent. in the mid-1970s. The EU market represents some 40 per cent. of total world trade, so it is an enormous entity into which we are fully integrated. Britain has benefited disproportionately from the very large amount of inward investment in the single market that has taken advantage of its unified characteristics. Those are major benefits, but I often meet people who would be described as Eurosceptics—I am talking about people old enough to have been able to make their choice in a referendum—and they say, ““We voted to join the common market, not for silly political things like square tomatoes, straight bananas and abolishing double-decker buses.”” From the outset, we must acknowledge that the establishment of the common market and the single market had very far-reaching implications for how we do things. They include many of the things that people often do not like but which are the flip-side of the benefits. Let us remind ourselves of how the EU is structured. The simplest base is the free-trade area. Superimposed on that is a customs union, and on that a common market that involves freedom of movement of people and capital. That freedom of movement explains why so many foreigners have come here—more than 600,000 from eastern Europe alone. However, we should also recall that 750,000 Brits have gone to the south of Spain and 300,000 to France. No doubt they are regarded in much the same way as we regard the eastern Europeans—