European Union (Amendment) Bill

To mirror the Minister, I am equally delighted to propose that clause 4 should be deleted from the Bill. This clause 4 allows the increases in power given to the European Parliament that result from the treaty of Lisbon to be approved for the purposes of section 12 of the European Parliamentary Elections Act 2002. Section 12 of that Act specifically states:"““No treaty which provides for any increase in the powers of the European Parliament is to be ratified by the United Kingdom unless it has been approved by an Act of Parliament.””" Before deciding whether to approve those clauses that increase the power of the European Parliament and in the seven minutes that I now have left, I want first to set out very briefly what powers the treaty gives to the European Parliament and, secondly, to make at least a few remarks on the Parliament itself and whether any improvement should be made to its functioning before it is granted these additional powers. It makes sense that, before increasing the powers of an institution, its ability to use those new powers should be analysed. What new powers will the European Parliament gain? Under the treaty, the power of the European Parliament will be increased by a move to co-decision with the Council in up to 40 new areas, including such controversial things as financial regulation, the laws on police co-operation, Eurojust’s structure and operation, laws that relate to the implementation of the common agricultural policy and laws on the mutual recognition of criminal judgments, to name but a few. As the Committee will know, co-decision, which is sometimes known as the article 251 procedure, is a method of decision making between the European Council and Parliament that requires those two institutions to agree. If I had more time, I would develop that further, but suffice it to say that the Lisbon treaty represents a major transfer of power by extending co-decision in the direction of the European Parliament.