European Union (Amendment) Bill

I am coming to the hon. Gentleman—he does not need to anticipate me. The Minister blew the Government's case, and it is too late for him to take back his words. I now turn to the hon. Member for Wolverhampton, South-West (Rob Marris). Does he want to intervene first, or will he hear what I have to say? Perhaps he will let me make some progress and refer to his comments, and then he can intervene. Can we clear up the point about numbering, because there was confusion about which bits of text we were using? I understand that we have the treaty of Lisbon, which is numbered, and the consolidated text, which has been provided by The Stationery Office and, obviously, is also numbered. Also available in the Vote Office is the European Union publications office's version of the consolidated treaties. The page numbering is slightly different in the EU publications office's version and the TSO version, which was why there was confusion between my hon. Friend the Member for Wellingborough (Mr. Bone) and the hon. Member for Wolverhampton, South-West about which page we were on. We have two consolidated versions, but the document from the EU publications office predates the other. I can say to the Minister that yet again, we and the EU are not on entirely the same page—[Interruption.] I am trying to clear up the situation, because several hon. Members were confused by the difference in the numbering. Let me turn directly to the point made by the hon. Member for Wolverhampton, South-West when he quoted from article 21 in the consolidated text. I shall quote the paragraph to which he referred:"““The Union shall ensure consistency between the different areas of its external action and between these and its other policies. The Council and the Commission, assisted by the High Representative of the Union for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy, shall ensure that consistency and shall cooperate to that effect.””" He said that the key word was ““ensure””, but I would argue that the key word is ““shall””, because it implies an element of compulsion and is used three times in the paragraph. In a sense, he picked the wrong paragraph to support his argument. I hope that he appreciates the fact that I bothered to read in detail the passage that he put before the Committee.