European Union (Amendment) Bill

No, I will not. I have taken on board Mr. Deputy Speaker's caution about other people wanting to speak. I may have more to say than he is pleased with. Due to the fact that I have been chairing European Scrutiny Committee sittings, I have often had only four or five minutes to speak at the end of a debate in which I would like to have participated more. I have a number of things to say. The point is that some people did want a constitution. If they had got away with it, there would have been one treaty, a president of Europe and a Foreign Secretary of Europe, but all those things have been taken out of the treaty. The right hon. Member for Richmond, Yorks referred to a turf war because of the president of the Council, to whom people still refer as the ““president of the EU””. If there was going to be a turf war, it would be between the president of the Council—a Council, not Commission, member—and the president of the Commission. That is what happens at the moment. The Council goes into discussions about something that the Commission proposes, and there is a turf war. The great thing is that someone will be representing and carrying on the work of the Council in two-and-a-half-year terms, with a Council secretariat. Hopefully, that person will apply more leverage back against the Commission so that the Commission does not have things all its own way, which happens at the moment. The shadow Foreign Secretary also asked why there was not primary legislation in respect of common foreign security policy and defence. That suggestion was also put forward by the Foreign Affairs Committee. All we have on the record is the Prime Minister's declaration that any time we move from having a veto to qualified majority voting—using the passerelles, as they are called—that will be decided on the Floor of the House. Why should there not be primary legislation? Given my analysis of the treaty and all the logic that applies to my, and many people's, concern about the sovereignty of the House, why should there not be primary legislation for such far-reaching decisions? That is something for the Government to think about; they have not yet answered our questions about the process that involves this Parliament in the moves that we make in respect of the opt-outs and protocols. I was impressed by the many contributions of the right hon. and learned Member for Kensington and Chelsea (Sir Malcolm Rifkind), who unfortunately is no longer in his place. It is amazing that a man of his stature—I knew him when he was a junior Minister in the Scottish Office when I was a council leader fighting against the Thatcher proposals for local government—whose logic, honesty and integrity I have always respected should be sidelined not because of age or lack of talent, but simply because the Eurosceptics have what they tell me is a blocking minority on the Conservative party in opposition. If that is the case, it is a very sad day for the Conservative party and for the people in Britain that it claims to represent—the businesses, the civil society and the constituents whose interests and concerns are helped along by Europe as much as by anything else we can do in this House. I wonder why the right hon. and learned Gentleman has been sidelined. In respect of Schengen, the right hon. and learned Gentleman referred to an ““à la carte”” menu for justice and home affairs. That is one way of looking at it, but not how the UK's approach is regarded by everyone else I meet—in the Conference of Community and European Affairs Committees and in European Parliaments, for example. They respect us, but, in terms of the EU arrangements, they view us as the most detached member. We have no euro and we have no Schengen borders. Contrary to the mythology we heard earlier about Schengen borders, we do not have the same border controls. We made a virtue—I believe it was the wrong thing to do—in our proposals for the 2001 election of our intention not to sign Schengen and not to come within the Schengen borders, but to have our own immigration system. I think that that weakened the Schengen system, just as our non-participation in the euro weakened the euro system. That decision bounced back on us and we became a target for illegal immigration. After all, if someone gets into a Schengen country, they will want out of it because they have been given a transit visa, so where do those immigrants head? They go to the nearest non-Schengen country, which is the UK. That is what has happened. We took a terrible decision and if we ever get the necessary opt-ins, it will take us a long time to get the Schengen arrangements working properly.