House of Commons Hansard Debates for 22 Feb 1990

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some way going back on our traditional support for the principle of unification. I hope that that notion has now been dispelled to the comfort of us all.

Sir Russell Johnston (Inverness, Nairn and Lochaber) : The Foreign Secretary has referred to the possible effects of the DDR on the EC. He will be aware that he was reported in the press a couple of weeks ago as saying that the DDR must wait in the queue behind Austria and Turkey. Surely that was not a realistic thing to say.

Mr. Hurd : I was talking then about the suggestion made by President Delors that an independent GDR might apply for membership of the Community. I agree that his statement and my comments upon it have been overtaken by events.

When I visited Washington on 29 January, I stressed to the President and to the Secretary of State that a framework was needed, but we did not discuss in detail what form it should take. By the time I went to Ottawa at the beginning of last week, our thoughts had become more precise. My right hon. Friend the Prime Minister and I were clear that, at Ottawa, I should press as hard as possible for a meeting or meetings of the six--the four former occupying powers and the two Germanies. Other external aspects need to be discussed in the EC, in NATO and with Poland, but a six-power meeting seemed to be the first step.

When I got to Ottawa, I found that I was knocking on an open door, because the minds of our allies had moved precisely in the same direction ; only the Soviet Union was reticent but, in Ottawa, that reticence was overcome within 24 hours. We believe that a forum of the six offers some obvious advantages. It brings together those most immediately concerned, the two Germanies and the four countries that have a unique standing in terms of legal rights and responsibilities in Germany.

Mr. Cyril D. Townsend (Bexleyheath) : My right hon. Friend has touched on the status of Berlin and many people would be interested to know exactly what is British Government thinking on it ; after all, we have a garrison there. Is that likely to be reduced in the near future? How does my right hon. Friend see things developing in that regard?

Mr. Hurd : It might save time if I made some progress, but I shall give way later to those who may be dissatisfied by the inadequacy of my remarks.

We have therefore achieved our aim--a channel that can guide the discussion in the future. We welcome that achievement and plenty of hard work lies ahead. We are now optimistic, however, that German unification can be achieved in a manner that fits a pattern of European stability and security acceptable to all. I cannot help adding that now that that framework is beginning to take shape, everyone is saying how important it is.

Everyone is happy to climb aboard now, but an analysis of the importance of discussing the external aspects of German unity was regarded as unrealistic foot-dragging when the Prime Minister and I spoke about that a few weeks ago. Such analyses were two a penny around the table at Dublin on Tuesday. I want to express my appreciation of the way in which the German Minister of Foreign Affairs, Mr. Genscher, has stressed throughout, in private and in public, the importance of consultation and the particular role of the four powers.

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Mr. Denis Healey (Leeds, East) : The right hon. Gentleman has just mentioned the contribution of Mr. Genscher. He will recall that Mr. Genscher told the press at the Dublin meeting that he regarded the Helsinki organisation, the Conference on Security and Co-operation in Europe, as the most important framework for dealing with those problems. He signed the declaration by the Community Foreign Ministers that said the CSCE was a fundamental element. The right hon. Gentleman did not mention the Helsinki arrangements. Why not?

Mr. Hurd : I have been speaking for about eight minutes and I have a particularly exhaustive account of the CSCE process, which I shall give in about 10 minutes. Once again, I learn the lesson that I should make some progress.

It is not just on procedure that we have begun to make progress ; there is a coming together of ideas on substance as well. There is the concept of a united Germany in NATO. I am sure that the right hon. Member for Leeds, East (Mr. Healey) would agree that that is important to the West. It is also important for the security of Europe as a whole, as a number of east European countries now, for the first time, recognise. A neutral Germany, outside existing security arrangements in Europe, would weaken stability, and we believe that the Federal Government was right to reject that option. American and other foreign troops and their nuclear weapons will need to remain in Germany in significant numbers as a stabilising element in European security. There is a growing consensus on that point. We need to take account of Soviet concern, and that means finding special arrangements for the territory of what is now the GDR, including, perhaps, the continued presence of Soviet troops for a transitional period. It is too soon to be precise about details and I do not think it sensible for the Government to try to be precise about them. The principles, however, are becoming clear. I believe that the Soviet Union will come to accept that its own interest in stability will be served by having Germany as a member of the defensive western Alliance, but with the special arrangements I have mentioned, especially as arms control reduces the level of forces on both sides in Europe.

The second important consideration is the eastern border of a united Germany. No one with any sense of history can be surprised by the Polish emphasis on this subject, which was stressed to us by Prime Minister Mazowiecki last week. The German Government have made it clear that the substance of their position is not in doubt. I have heard Mr. Genscher say several times that a united Germany will comprise the territory of the Federal Republic, the GDR and Berlin--not more, not less. Nevertheless we believe that there should be a formal and binding agreement to settle this matter once and for all. A treaty is the obvious solution and Poland, of course, will need to be closely involved in the discussion.

In answer to the hon. Member for Inverness, Nairn and Lochaber (Sir R. Johnston), we need to consider seriously within the Community the implications of an enlarged Germany. The economy of the GDR is clearly ill suited to Community life. It is massively state-aided, it offends every EC environmental directive and its industrial and manufacturing standards are, to put it mildly, not those of the single market. The Germans will therefore need derogation from Community law, and we shall all need some transitional arrangements. That is why the Irish Government, as the President of the Commission, have

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proposed a special Community summit to discuss this, after proper preparation, towards the end of April. We welcome that initiative. The European Commission agreed in Dublin, at my suggestion, that detailed work should begin now in preparation for that meeting.

Mr. Robert N. Wareing (Liverpool, West Derby) : In relation to the Oder-Neisse line, I agree with the right hon. Gentleman about the need for Germany to seek unity, and I am in favour of that. But a possible future powder keg might be the lot of the German minority living in the territory, in Silesia and around Stettin, to the east of the Oder-Neisse line.

Does the right hon. Gentleman agree that the sooner Poland is drawn into the European Community the better, because that would ensure that the human rights of the ethnic minorities in Poland--and perhaps in Czechoslovakia, too--could be maintained, remembering that that was a source of some problems in the days before 1939?

Mr. Hurd : Indeed it was. The Helsinki Final Act covers human rights and the question of borders, so it is important as a safeguard for both parts of the problem.

Fourthly, there is the question of Berlin. The western allies have defended freedom in their sectors of Berlin during the long period when the city and Germany itself was divided. Now that the Berlin wall is coming down and unification is in prospect, we do not want needlessly to perpetuate the occupation regime. It has served a particular and worthwhile purpose during a particular period in Berlin's history.

The allies will consult the Russians about the future status of the city, and the two Germanys should be asssociated with the rather more formal process of four-power consultation.

I am particularly anxious that, in all these matters, we should work closely with the French. We have long had a virtual identity of interest in many of these matters. I hope that we can work for a virtual identity of view.

Mr. Tony Marlow (Northampton, North) : My right hon. Friend has spoken of the economic background of East Germany. We are well aware of the massive wealth of West Germany. Obviously, East Germany will be put back on its feet. May we have an assurance that there is sufficient money in West Germany to put the east European economy back on its feet and that the British taxpayer will not be required, through European funding, to put into effect a greater Germany, which will then have the economic effect of putting some of our own companies and people out of business?

Mr. Hurd : My hon. Friend will have seen and read how the German Government, industry and the Bundesbank are already engaged preparing a massive infusion of help into the GDR. The question of the access of the eastern part of a united Germany to Community funds--how exactly that would work out, transition arrangements for goods and, as I mentioned, derogations to the law--is all detailed work which is just beginning in the Commission in Brussels and which will come to a head at the European Council at the end of April. It is a big series of dossiers, as they say in Brussels, and it is too soon to be clear what the outcome will be.

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The second important outcome of the Ottawa meeting was the agreement to hold a CSCE summit later this year, at which-- this is important--an agreement on conventional force reductions in Europe would be signed and which would establish a framework for future European co-operation.

The background is known to the House. For years, our negotiators struggled to secure, in the Helsinki process, a common standard of human rights. It was a long-drawn-out business under several Governments, painstaking and painful. The Governments of Eastern Europe were in the end brought to sign up to a set of standards by which their own people could apply a test, and we have all been able to make good use of that Final Act.

People such as President Havel and Doina Cornea would have been lost to view--they might have disappeared for ever--if we had not had a standard that could be waved on their behalf, a mechanism by which we and others could keep pressing for their freedom and rights. All that effort has been proved worth while. It has been vindicated. The new Governments of eastern Europe, many of whose individual members benefited personally from that process, want to build on it for the future. We agree and believe that the process can now play a greater role than ever before in strengthening peace and stability in Europe. It has the right membership and the right broad agenda.

We need to make human rights, democracy and the rule of law as secure and as permanent as we can throughout Europe, and to achieve that we need an underlying framework of stability to support and nourish the wider growth of human rights, democracy and the rule of law, because all history shows that the survival of those things is fragile and sometimes at risk. The CSCE process is there to hand. We believe that it should be adapted and strengthened for that purpose. I see the CSCE rather like a motorway which at present carries a good deal of the traffic of East-West relations, but that traffic has been moving uncertainly in the past. The political work of the CSCE will become more important in future. If this motorway for carrying the traffic of East-West relations is to fulfil its potential and carry the additional traffic, we must widen it. We must increase the number of lanes and find other ways of keeping the traffic flowing. So we shall look for practical new elements with which we can strengthen the CSCE's contribution to European security.

Mr. Tim Rathbone (Lewes) : Does my right hon. Friend agree that the existing instrument of the Council of Europe has a useful part to play in the road-building programme that he has outlined?

Mr. Hurd : The Council of Europe provides, particularly in the European convention on human rights, a mechanism--a rather more formal standard--which will be important as the east European countries develop. That is why they are showing such interest in the Council of Europe, and I welcome the fact that our representatives there have supported them in their efforts to become more closely associated with the work of the council.

Returning to the subject of the CSCE, last year, we and the United States launched a proposal in this context of

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free elections and made another about respect for the rule of law. In Ottawa, I advanced another British proposal which, so as not to bore the House, I simply mention.

The cold war had many undesirable effects, but one which was perhaps neutral was to freeze many of the old nationalist emotions and tensions which for centuries were flashpoints in Europe. Now that the cold war is melting and the ice is thawing, there is a risk--we can see it in every newspaper--particularly in central and eastern Europe, that national reawakening will be accompanied by some of the uglier effects of nationalism as the old rivalries reassert themselves.

In the West, we have made a reasonable job of overcoming such rivalries in freedom, but Communism--the enforced and artificial uniformity of Communism --denied that chance to our eastern neighbours. The CSCE could provide a means of resolving disputes between its members to defuse tension and avert the threat of conflict, alongside, of course, the established machinery of the United Nations. The process should not get bogged down in machinery. It would perhaps be reasonably easy to get agreement on a piece of conciliation machinery and then find that most countries spend their time finding excuses for not using it. We need to encourage the countries of Europe to talk and think collectively and more often about some of these issues--such as minority rights and the protection of minorities--which may be at the heart of existing or future disputes between and within countries.

The third important agreement to come out of the two and a half days in Ottawa was perhaps in some ways the most surprising. It was the agreement reached between the United States and the Soviet Union on the reduction of their stationed forces within Europe. Alongside that was a consensus between the alliances that the negotiations going on in Vienna should press ahead as quickly as possible so that we can reach an agreement this year.

We shall work hard to achieve that outcome. Problems remain. We have not solved the problem of aircraft or the problem, which always dogs the negotiations, of effective verification, but I came away from Ottawa with the feeling that the political will was there to achieve that result.

As many hon. Members have said, we need to look beyond the Vienna negotiations to the future needs of European security. Future arms control measures will be part of that, as will the political aspects of security, which I have already mentioned. In Ottawa, I suggested that we should set this work in hand, and we shall follow up the proposals in NATO and the CSCE.

Mr. Heffer : I agree that we cannot settle matters in Europe overnight, and it will take some time. However, in future, could not we introduce the concept of a wide neutral zone in Europe that is non-nuclear, with both American and Russian troops withdrawn? It is an old concept that was suggested many years ago by Mr. Gaitskell and others in the Labour party. As we think to the future, is not this the way that we should go?

Mr. Hurd : That is a concept of which we shall certainly hear more, but I do not think that it makes best use of our opportunities. The separation of conventional and nuclear, which lies at the heart of the hon. Gentleman's suggestion, is a bit old hat. I would rather do what we have suggested, which is not try to copy exactly the CFE 1 talks on conventional forces in Europe, but to look at what the

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needs of European security will be in 1991- 92 and begin to work out what further arms-control collective negotiations are needed to meet those needs.

All those developments raise the question of the future of our own Atlantic Alliance. We need not be dominated by thoughts of symmetry and what is happening in the Warsaw pact. The implications for the pact of democracy among its members will certainly be profound. It will either be transformed or fade away. But that is for its members to decide. They will decide, and are deciding now, what its future should be.

NATO will change, too. It will be affected by the changes in eastern Europe and will need to adapt. However, it is different ; it has proper foundations in the consent of Governments and peoples. Therefore, whatever happens to the Warsaw pact, NATO will endure. We need to distinguish as rigorously as we can between those attributes of NATO that will remain important in future and other aspects that should change in response to events. Our security needs will change, but the need for security will not.

Among the permanent characteristics I would list--some hon. Members will have different lists--NATO's present membership, the presence of significant stationed forces, including those of the United States, Canada and Britain, on the continent, a sensible mix of nuclear and conventional forces and an integrated command structure. Those essentials taken together would mean that we would continue to have a strong European defence. For us they include, among other things, the retention of the independent nuclear deterrent.

As for change, the Alliance will become more deeply involved in the management of change in Europe, in the dialogue with the East, in arms control and its verification, in consultation about security problems outside--as well as inside--Europe and in developing the new ideas that I mentioned for the 1990s, such as minimum deterrence. An Alliance that can change with the times still has a lot of offer for the security of its members. It offers a sure link between Europe and north America. I hope that we can have a consensus in the House about the importance of that. It offers a sound framework for co-operation in defence and arms control and the cheapest insurance policy against the uncertainties and possible turbulance of the 1990s.

The long-term security and stability of Europe can best be maintained if what is happening now--the democratic renewal in the Soviet Union and eastern Europe--remains on track. There may well be reverses and upheavals, but I do not think that they are likely to bring back the cold war. However, they could send tremors of danger through the whole of our continent.

Mr. Hugh Dykes (Harrow, East) : Does my right hon. Friend agree that, in that context and in the context of the peace treaty governing the reunification of Germany, there is an attractive logic in considering eventually a formal agreement between NATO and the Warsaw pact, within the umbrella of other international agreements?

Mr. Hurd : That is one possibility, but it assumes the survival of the Warsaw pact. We should not argue that we need the Warsaw pact--that is a matter for its members. If they decide to keep it, my hon. Friend's suggestion will fall to be considered, but we should not say, "We need the Warsaw pact."

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I am nearing the end of my speech, because I know that many right hon. and hon. Members wish to speak. I was talking about the process of democratic renewal in eastern Europe. We must provide what practical support we can for that. Hon. Members will be familiar with much of the detail, which was covered during the debate in December. My right hon. Friend the Minister of State with particular responsibility for these matters may have something to say about this.

I stress the key role in the process of the European Community. The Community's response to events in the East has been fast and effective. The Commision, at the request of the United States and others, co-ordinates the work of the wider group of 24 western countries. We, the Twelve, are sending aid of many kinds. We have launched the idea of a European development bank, whose emphasis on helping the private sector owes much to our urging.

We are acting to develop trade and co-operation agreements with the eastern countries and, as a British initiative before Christmas, we looked for closer forms of co-operation between the Community and those countries in the longer term. We want to enable those emerging democracies to develop their economies and align themselves more closely with the Community as reform proceeds.

I hope that the process will eventually lead to full membership of the Community. That is for the future, and a matter for those countries, as well as the Community.

Mr. Michael Jopling (Westmorland and Lonsdale) rose

Mr. Hurd : I shall give way, for perhaps the last time.

Mr. Jopling : Does my right hon. Friend agree that one other step that it is essential to take now in our relations with the emerging countries of eastern Europe in order to assist them, is to try to dissuade them from building up economic, military or political boundaries between themselves? That could only give rise to the nationalistic tendencies about which he spoke earlier.

Mr. Hurd : I entirely agree. I was encouraged by the talks that I had for the first time with individual eastern Foreign Ministers in Canada. They were well aware of the danger there. Democracies heed public opinion. They are all engaged in election campaigns in one way and another. My right hon. Friend's point is sound, and it is in the minds of those in the eastern European countries.

I hope that the process of gradually creating and enriching association agreements between the countries of eastern Europe and the Community will eventually lead to full membership. That will be a matter for them, as well as the Community. The Community already provides a stable political, economic and legal framework for European development. Their relationship with the Community will enable those countries to cope better with the conomic and political travail through which they will pass during the next few years. It will be hard for almost all of them. We have provided bilateral help. That well-targeted help is well documented and I shall not list it today. It is increasing all the time and is increasingly effective.

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I wish to make a new announcement today. We want to look, on an all-party basis, at what help Britain might give to political parties in eastern Europe and elsewhere. We shall shortly be in touch with others in the House to see whether we can reach some understanding about the way in which we, as a country, could do that.

Mr. A. E. P. Duffy (Sheffield, Attercliffe) rose--

Mr. Hurd : I shall give way for the last time.

Mr. Duffy : I thought that the House would want to know that some right hon. and hon. Members, notably the right hon. Member for Westmorland and Lonsdale (Mr. Jopling), have already taken on such a task on behalf of NATO parliamentarians, in consultation with Mr. Primakov, chairman of the supreme Soviet, as long ago as last June. I am glad to say that that intention is prospering and on-going. I was glad to hear what the Foreign Secretary said, and perhaps we can come together on this.

Mr. Hurd : I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for bringing me up to date on that. We shall ensure that, as far as possible, these efforts are brought together.

Hon. Members will agree that we must encourage those countries in every way possible in the amazing task that they have set themselves. In their societies they are transforming the nature of the relationship between the state and the individual. That sounds easy as a general statement, but it is extraordinarily difficult in practice day by day.

I have touched on the three main efforts in which the British Government are engaged--the move towards German unification and our interests in the external aspects of that, the development of the European security framework and support for reform in eastern Europe. All those tasks stem from events of which the House was glad--the breaking down of walls and the freeing of peoples.

Lech Walesa told me when he was here before Christmas that he and his fellow amateurs, as he put it, had done their bit by proving to us professionals that the impossible was possible. He added--this was the thrust of it--that the rest was up to the professionals. We professionals-- parliamentarians and diplomats, business men and bankers, journalists and broadcasters--must show the skill and imagination to follow up in a worthy way the work of, for example, the shipyard workers in Gdansk, the crowds in Wenceslaus square, and those who, through the years, defied the Berlin wall.

5.10 pm

Mr. George Robertson (Hamilton) : I welcome the Foreign Secretary back to this country after his unsuccessful visit to Dublin for the Council of Ministers meeting where he found himself, yet again, out-voted, out- argued and out on a limb.

There are in this important issue some matters of considerable importance, and our relationship with the United States, as the Foreign Secretary has rightly said, is of crucial importance. Therefore, why was it falsely said in Dublin that there was American support for the Prime Minister's policy on sanctions for South Africa? Was it President Bush's repudiation yesterday of that claim which makes the Government too scared to tell the House, other than through a written answer, that they will now lift the investment sanction pressure on South Africa?

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Mr. Hurd : The hon. Gentleman is a day out of date. He had better find out what has been said today in Washington about that.

Mr. Robertson : The House will be delighted to know. The House would have been delighted to know yesterday what was being said. This morning's Financial Times says :

"In Washington, a senior administration official stressed that the White House did not endorse Britain's intention to lift the voluntary ban on investment in South Africa".

Mr. John Maples (Lewisham, West) : On a point of order, Mr. Deputy Speaker. Many of us came here today under the happy impression that we were to talk about foreign affairs subjects other than South Africa. Is the hon. Member for Hamilton (Mr. Robertson) in order?

Mr. Deputy Speaker (Sir Paul Dean) : This is an Adjournment debate and the hon. Member for Hamilton (Mr. Robertson) is still on his preamble.

Mr. Robertson : I well understand the embarrassment of Conservative Members when they discover that relations with one of our closest allies are in such a state of disrepair.

Mr. Patrick Cormack (Staffordshire, South) : Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

Mr. Robertson : No, I will not give way. I am well aware of the time constraint on all of us.

We unreservedly welcome the debate. At this time, when history is being made every day, it is right that the House should have time to look at the momentous events going on around us--events which will yet determine the kind of world that we shall inhabit for generations to come. After all, we know that Britain will be intimately affected by events on the other side of the continent and well beyond that as well.

The Foreign Secretary forcefully made the point that we are at a veritable hinge of history and the people of Britain have a right to expect that their politicians will try to achieve a consensus on what is happening and on what role Britain should play.

Remarkably, the Foreign Secretary said that we should think collectively in Europe. That is a remarkable claim, but one to which we would subscribe. In most countries, in the East and in the West, an attempt is being made in the dramatically improved climate of relations to achieve a community view of what the future holds. These times involve the collapse of the cold war and with it the collapse of the Warsaw pact as a military alliance in anything other than name. That has created unprecedented opportunities for the new and less risky European security order. There are also the grave and perhaps crippling crises within the Soviet Union--in the economy, in the ruling Communist party and in the republics that seem set to secede from the union.

There is no doubt that, as Mr. Gorbachev was the trigger for the remarkable process that we are enjoying, his personal and policy survival is of considerable consequence to us all.

There has been the economic collapse of the former Communist satellite states in eastern Europe, where four decades of sterile, incompetent, corrupt bureaucracy have left rising expectations which, if denied, may spark instability or worse. Then there is the question of the new unification of the two German states, a question which seems to mesmerise the world and one on which the Foreign Secretary rightly concentrated.

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That is a more than full agenda, and for any Government with vision or any sense of destiny, the need for national consensus on the future would be self-evident. A consensus at home and the building of future influence abroad should be our collective priority. But if, as is the bitter reality, we have no consensus, but instead conflict at home and isolation abroad, it is solely the result of that unique egocentric short-sightedness that our Prime Minister has made her own special hallmark. We were out-voted and marginalised again this week in the EC over sanctions, just as we were on the social charter and on monetary union in December, and it looks as though we shall be in conflict again over the role of the new European bank for development and reconstruction, perversely, at exactly the same time that the Government have the brass neck to claim that that bank should be placed in Britain.

Mr. Cormack : Will the hon. Gentleman remember that we would not be in this position today had it not been for the foresight, vision and co- operation of Ernest Bevin and Winston Churchill in days when the Labour Government were doing things of which the Conservative party thoroughly disapproved on the domestic front, but it realised that there were greater things to come together on? Would it not be a good thing if the hon. Gentleman emulated the example of that great Labour statesman now?

Mr. Robertson : The hon. Gentleman should listen not only to Opposition Members but to many of his colleagues. Of course we want a consensus. We should like to return to the vision of Ernest Bevin, when the creation of NATO and a unified Europe stood at a more difficult time than today. If anybody is guilty of breaking such consensus, shattering it before it could even be contemplated, it is the lady in No. 10 Downing street today.

We are divided even from the Americans on South Africa. As I said, as we gallop alone to relieve the pressures that have brought reform in that country. We are shunned in the Commonwealth and out on a limb on nuclear modernisation in NATO. As the world moves into a new era, the Government's stewardship of foreign policy has brought us to a new low in international influence. Never was that more glaringly on display than in the handling of the German issue.

For more than 40 years, we in Britain have stood by the objective of uniting the two artificially divided German states. Therefore, we should now rejoice that the brave people of East Germany have liberated and democratised their oppressed land, and that the German people can now choose to live together in peace and freedom. But at a time when delicacy was required, the Prime Minister offered only meddling obstruction. At a time when vision was required, the Prime Minister offered only a crude rehash of the past. At a time when generosity and imagination were required, the Prime Minister offered only bleak prejudice.

Mr. Heffer : Is my hon. Friend aware that at least some Opposition Members were not keen about the language that the Prime Minister used about German unification, but some of us who had a certain experience at one time of our lives as young fellows, have never quite forgotten that experience, and we have a worry about this matter? That is why the Labour party split after the war on the

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question of German rearmament. Some of us feel very strongly about that matter, although in principle, we are in favour of German reunification.

If my hon. Friend reads Le Monde, he will know that the French are very concerned--all the French. My hon. Friend must not imagine that he speaks for the whole of the Labour party, as I saw him claim to do on television the other day. We want unification, but we want to be certain that there are safeguards, so that we never again see the situation that arose before.

Mr. Robertson : I always listen with great care and attention to those of my elders who have wider and longer experience than myself. My hon. Friend the Member for Liverpool, Walton (Mr. Heffer) speaks with great passion, as do other of my right hon. and hon. Friends. However, I have read carefully the words of President Mitterrand, whose experience is as long and distinguished as that of my hon. Friend the Member for Walton. As my hon. Friend listens to the rest of my speech, he will come to realise that the distinction I draw is one of the tone and the repercussions of that tone, rather than of any under-estimation of the concerns that he and many others in Europe genuinely feel.

It is an act of diplomatic vandalism for the Prime Minister to campaign with the insensitivity that she has, and thereby alienate and irritate our closest European ally and our most important European trading partner. Last week, I was told by German members of the European Parliament in Strasbourg that our Prime Minister stimulates and encourages the very forces of Right- wing German nationalism that she warns about by insisting--in her own special, grudging, carping tone--that, of all the Europeans, only the Germans are to be denied self-determination.

We must ask ourselves why the Prime Minister seems immune to criticism from the continent and even from this House. Why is it necessary for Mr. Ingham and Mr. Powell to cut her newspapers so forensically that she can ignore the criticism that is coming? Last weekend, The Sunday Times, which is not known for its loyal support of the Labour party, commented :

"Britain's future role in the world is more uncertain than at any time since the end of the second world war No wonder Britain is set to play only a marginal role in the reshaping of Europe, an increasingly irrelevant voice that nobody bothers to listen to. That is certainly isolation, but there is nothing splendid about it." An editorial in The Economist , which is usually well to the right of the politics of Ronald Reagan, stated :

"There is fog in the Channel, and once more the continent is cut off. This time, however, the fog is being generated in Downing Street and threatens to cut off not just Britain's partners in the European Community but the new governments of Eastern Europe, all of black Africa and even America. In short, Britain is in danger of becoming an irrelevance on the world stage, largely because its foreign policy emanates from the gut of its prime minister, Mrs. Thatcher." As my hon. Friend the Member for Walton said, there are concerns inherent in the unification of the two Germanies, and they are shared by many cleverer minds than that of the Prime Minister. Poland's western frontier is of vital significance and it must be guaranteed absolutely. I agree entirely with the Foreign Secretary's view that there should be a treaty in that respect. The prospective neighbours of a united Germany are

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apprehensive and nervous about the perhaps natural introversion of their large next-door neighbour. Instability in central and eastern Europe poses dangers to us all.

Nevertheless, it is a counter-productive insult to continue to rattle old skeletons in the face of two Germanies, as the Prime Minister has repeatedly done over the past few weeks. To invite any comparisons between Hitler's third reich and the threat it posed to Poland and to other neighbouring countries with the Federal Republic of Germany--a nation with strongly rooted, robust and developed democratic institutions, many of them created by this country after the war, and which has no conceivable territorial ambitions--displays a perverse lack of tact, or just an absence of reality. A newly united Germany will pose a challenge to the rest of Europe, but it will be economic, not military. As I said in December's debate, perhaps we should beware of the second Japan, not the fourth reich. When the costly and painful unification is complete--perhaps five years is a generous estimate of the time that that will take to accomplish--and despite the formidable problems of unifying currencies, harmonising benefits and pensions, and tackling appalling pollution problems, we will have in our midst in Europe an economic super-power that could easily distort the balance between the Community's member states. The Prime Minister would serve this nation better by facing up to that challenge instead of abrasively campaigning to lose our friends and allies.

The framework to develop relations with Europe will be found within the European Community--with nation states both inside and outside its present membership. It will be within the Community that economic and political balance can be ensured and strengthened. It is the Community which will be able to tackle the huge aid project for recovering the crucial stability of newly democratised countries. Only the Community can provide the institutions that can bind together diverse states and provide the pooling of sovereignty that alone will guarantee that no nation or economic force becomes disproportionately powerful.

Given Britain's isolation among our Community partners, what hope is there that we will be on the inside track of the new Europe? As a party politician, I suppose that I should rejoice in the incompetence of the present Government, the divisions among Ministers and Conservative Back Benchers, and the yawning chasm between Downing street and the Foreign Office. But I do not. I care enough about my country and the future of my children and their generation to feel only despair at the way that Britain is avoidably losing out. In security, amazing opportunities are opening before us. The agreements reached in Ottawa that the Foreign Secretary outlined show what is possible when political will is there. But the disintegration of the Warsaw pact demands a reassessment of NATO's role and its current military strategy. It is interesting that the doctrine of flexible response was not among the components listed by the Foreign Secretary as the most valuable to be retained within NATO. Obsessional debates about neutralism are becoming meaningless, given that the bulk of Soviet troops will be leaving eastern Europe and that only one alliance is left facing a radically weakened, if still well-armed, Soviet Union.

The 35-nation CSCE group meeting to which the Foreign Secretary referred offers a real chance to bridge

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the now almost irrelevant divide in Europe. We must grasp that chance. I stand full square with the Foreign Secretary on that. The group must not degenerate into a talking shop but should set about creating institutions that will provide a new security framework for our continent.

I listened sympathetically to the Foreign Secretary's suggestion that the potential border problems, ethnic grudges and nationalisms that have been unleashed by the new process might be considered by the group. In the new security and political atmosphere that now exists, we must seek to avoid crude triumphalism and vain, unconvincing attempts to grab credit for what has happened. That would be not only wholly inappropriate as the euphoria dies away and the problems pile up, but deeply patronising.

The people of Poland, many of whom I met when I visited that country three weeks ago, displayed an astonishing sophistication last year in achieving what they wanted from their elections, despite the complex problems and obstacles put in their way under the system offered. I welcome the Foreign Secretary's initiative in bringing together the political parties of this country, to see whether we can give financial aid to political parties abroad. There is no doubt that the German system of foundations allied to political parties has played a major role in boosting German influence abroad and helping developing countries.

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