European Union (Amendment) Bill

I seek clarification. I am afraid that I am not up to date with the procedures, but a report on European affairs used to be made to Parliament every six months. It seems to me that that vehicle would incorporate all this. More than most previous ones, this treaty has a very large area of important unclarified material. It is perfectly possible to take the view which has been argued, particularly by the noble Lord who served a very useful purpose as chairman of the foreign policy Select Committee in the House of Commons. However, you cannot narrow these things down; they are matters of practice. This is a view with which I have a good deal of sympathy but, when looking at amendments to this legislation, the real problem, apart from these general well-meaning reports back to Parliament, is how to clarify the actual meaning of these words. This relates to a later amendment that I have tabled. When she replied at Second Reading, the noble Baroness was very clear that there was no problem with the commitment to allow the European Court of Justice to adopt a new role in the European Council. In my view that is quite a big step and we cannot change it. But there is also a commitment in the legislation that the European Court of Justice will not involve itself in foreign affairs. However, the President of the European Council is definitely involved in foreign policy. The noble Baroness has the best of intentions as regards these commitments but I assume she means that, when dealing with foreign affairs, the President of the European Council will not be subject to the European Court of Justice and that will still be an area in which he will effectively be exempt. These wordings are very important. I hope that the Minister will put on record exactly the limitations on the European Court of Justice. In listening to the earlier debate, this is the issue that worries many people; the capacity of the European Court of Justice to expand the role of the European Union powers beyond that which the House of Commons and the House of Lords at various times under different Governments have fought to be the limits. It is therefore really the main focus of parliamentary scrutiny and debate to set limits. I am sure that the honourable gentleman agrees—sorry, I mean the noble Lord; I am used to the other place, and seeing the same face makes it even harder—that it is important if we can to nail down these areas, and I particularly draw attention to the European Court of Justice. I ask the noble Baroness in preparing for these debates if she could be as precise as possible about the Government’s understanding of the role of the European Court of Justice and where it is constrained and where it is not constrained. That would be very helpful.