House of Commons Hansard Debates for 28 Jun 1990

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Dr. John Cunningham (Copeland) : I concur with the conclusion of the Committee, based on the evidence presented to it, but the conclusion could be read in an entirely different way--one which suggests that throughout the Community there is no effective scrutiny of this legislation in any member state.

Sir Geoffrey Howe : It can be read to support the proposition with which I started : that there is growing interest throughout the Community in the establishment of more effective scrutiny of this kind. The House has what is widely regarded by other Parliaments as an exemplary system, but I do not think that we should regard our system with such complacency--hence this debate and this report. Mr. Ron Leighton (Newham, North-East) rose --

Sir Geoffrey Howe : If the hon. Gentleman will forgive me, I should like to make a little headway.

Finally, the report notes :

"We have been struck by the unanimity of the evidence submitted to us about the continuing need for a body to perform the sifting functions of the Scrutiny Committee."

So, again, on behalf of the Government, and the whole House, I gladly record our view that the Scrutiny Committee, under the chairmanship of the hon. Member for Newham, South (Mr. Spearing), performs that essential task thoroughly, effectively and conscientiously.

The Government therefore welcome the fact that the report of the Procedure Committee seeks to build on and improve the existing system, rather than trying to start again from scratch. We are also grateful to the Scrutiny Committee for its special report, published only yesterday, and we will look carefully at the points that it makes when formulating our final proposals.

Mr. Leighton : Is it not true that we can scrutinise until we are blue in the face, but the point is that power is being taken away from this Parliament?

Sir Geoffrey Howe : To the extent that the treaty makes provisions for decisions to be taken by majority votes--as I have already said--we cannot ensure that our will will prevail. That has been the position from the moment we acceded to the European Community's treaty in the first place.

Mr. D. N. Campbell-Savours (Workington) : It was confirmed by referendum.

Sir Geoffrey Howe : It was confirmed by referendum and modestly extended in the subsequent provisions of the Single European Act. That is the point that I have already made. Scrutiny is important to ensure that British Ministers who attend the Councils go there armed as effectively as possible with the views of the House to see whether they can get those views to prevail.

Mr. Leighton : Does the right hon. and learned Gentleman recall that, in that referendum, the Government of the day issued a manifesto which said that no important decision would be taken without the agreement of a British Minister, answerable to the House of Commons?

Sir Geoffrey Howe : I was not a member of the Government of the day because it was a Labour Government. The position is as I have described it.

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Majority voting was provided for from the outset in some 40 articles of the treaty of Rome and in about a dozen more articles under the Single European Act.

As hon. Members will know, the Select Committee rejected the idea of a single Select or Grand Committee for Community matters, and proposed instead the creation of a new system of European Standing Committees--as we think they might be called--with specific subject areas. It recommended closer informal contacts between Members of Parliament and MEPs. It suggested that the Scrutiny Committee's remit, as well as the range of documents available to it, should be widened. It wanted more forward- looking general debate before European Councils, but it shared the near- universal recognition by those who gave evidence to the Committee that the late night, one-and-a-half hour debates on the Floor of the House on EC documents have become progressively less useful for their declared purpose, and progressively more inconvenient for the House.

Mr. Teddy Taylor (Southend, East) : I intervene in this encouraging and optimistic speech because there are hundreds of ladies outside asking if there is anything that we can do to prevent the Common Market from removing the restrictions on the export of live horses and ponies to the continent. As I have advised them--rightly or wrongly--that there is nothing that I or any other hon. Member can do about that, can the Secretary of State say whether the new arrangements will make any difference? It is important that people who take the trouble to come to the House of Commons to complain about something be given some idea about whether we have such power now--I understand that we do not--or will have under the new arrangements.

Sir Geoffrey Howe : Nothing that we are debating today will alter the provisions of the treaty and associated provisions on that issue. I am not in a position to offer precise advice about the exact state of national or Community law on it. I suspect that the outcome may depend, in some respects, on how far we are able to persuade our Community partners to accept a general framework of law that would meet the objectives that my hon. Friend has in mind. To that extent, this debate is relevant, because if the improved procedures that we are discussing enable my hon. Friend-- with even more assiduity than usual--to arm Ministers from this country with stronger arguments, the debate will have been of advantage. I cannot answer about the precise provisions of Community law on that topic without notice.

Mr. Campbell-Savours : Perhaps I can help the Leader of the House. The hon. Member for Southend, East (Mr. Taylor) could suggest to his constituents that, if the European Parliament were given a greater legislative role, they might be able to lobby it more effectively, and see their lobbying translated into action. It is the actions of hon. Members such as the hon. Gentleman that have prevented that change, which many of my hon. Friends have wanted.

Mr. Teddy Taylor rose--

Sir Geoffrey Howe : I am afraid that I cannot give way to answer further questions from my hon. Friend. I remind him that I am not speaking as the Secretary of State--still

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less as the Foreign Secretary or the Solicitor-General. I am merely the Leader of the House and there is a limit to my imputed knowledge in respect of these matters. There is even a limit to my omniscience as deputy Prime Minister.

That insight about the importance and effectiveness of the late-night debates will form the central basis of the Government's response. In offering our response, however, we did not wish to pre-empt the views of the House. That is why we have not yet moved to make any detailed amendments to the Standing Orders. We shall certainly consider all the points that may be raised in this debate before putting our detailed proposals before the House later this Session, with the aim of operating any new arrangements from the start of next Session.

I am pleased to say that the Government are willing to accept the great majority of recommendations in the Procedure Committee report. The main change, which I have already mentioned, would be the establishment of a series of new European Standing Committees, each of them specialising in particular subjects. Unlike the ad hoc Standing Committees on EC documents, which are selected afresh for each debate, the new Committees would have members appointed for a Session, so that they could build up expertise in particular subjects. We have also accepted that the new Committees should have powers to question Ministers for up to an hour about the relevant EC proposals before debating the documents.

The Procedure Committee report recommended the establishment of five such Committees, but, as the report acknowledges, there is a limit to the number of hon. Members who could be expected to make such a commitment. So, for strictly practical and not for philosophical reasons, we propose to start by setting up three Committees and to review the matter at the end of the first Session. Given the uncertainty involved in any new system, I hope that that approach will commend itself to the House.

Mr. Bowen Wells (Hertford and Stortford) : Is my right hon. and learned Friend suggesting--it is not clear to me from the report--that the Committees will enjoy the same continuity that Select Committees enjoy and will be established for a Parliament?

Sir Geoffrey Howe : As I explained, the present intention is to establish them for one Session. That is in contrast to the existing Standing Committees on EC documents, which are established on a one-off, ad hoc basis. It has not yet been concluded whether Members will be reappointed and I look forward to hearing the views of the House on such matters during the debate.

Like the Procedure Committee, we felt that a single Standing Committee or a Grand Committee would be unable to handle the number and variety of debates --about 50 per Session--that are recommended by the Scrutiny Committee.

Mr. Campbell-Savours : May I comment on that in the presence of the Chairman of the Procedure Committee? We spent a lot of time on the matter and I had strong views in favour of a European Grand Committee. It was argued that we would not get the necessary membership. But could not we have had a Committee with a fixed quorum, an established membership and, in addition, a rotating membership? Such a Committee could have become a forum for debate on European matters where hon.

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Members could come and go and debate these matters. I think that such a Committee would always have been manned.

The problem with the recommendation is that we may have a lot of trouble in attracting hon. Members who want to question Ministers, as the Leader of the House suggested, and to fulfil the responsibilities that we recommend in our report.

Sir Geoffrey Howe : I am trying to give way as often as I sensibly can, but I would rather not give way to hon. Members who have already fought these battles in the Select Committee. It is important that I should try and conclude my speech, and, although I respect the wisdom of the hon. Member for Workington (Mr. Campbell-Savours), I hope that he will forgive me if I move on.

It is important to stress that, under our proposals, any hon. Member would be free to attend the Committees' debates if they wished. To encourage that, I am considering another recommendation on the best way of drawing attention to the Committees' forthcoming debates in my weekly business statement.

The establishment of the new Committees is central to the new system. We foresee a number of benefits. First, the new system will allow most debates to take place at a civilised hour and reduce the number of late-night, sparsely attended EC debates, which are all too frequent at present.

Secondly, it will offer hon. Members, including those who are not members of the Committees, the opportunity to play a more effective role by allowing them to question Ministers and thus to assess and influence Government policy more fully.

We are still considering the breakdown among the three Committees--of the matters to be considered--and in particular whether the division should be on a subject or on a departmental basis. We should welcome the views of the House on that. Clearly, however, it will be desirable that the number of debates is split as evenly as possible between the Committees, although allowances must be made for variations in the subjects on which proposals are emerging from Brussels. That matter, too, would be subject to review at the end of the Session.

There is one point on which we have gone beyond what the Procedure Committee recommended and on which I know the Scrutiny Committee takes a different view from the Government. It relates to the system of referring documents to the Committees. We believe that the new arrangements will allow more effective scrutiny in Committee and to allow them to prove their effectiveness we wish to work on the presumption that the majority of debates will in future be taken in Committee instead of on the Floor of the House as at present. To that end, we propose to change the balance of the present referral system so that all documents will automatically stand referred to a Committee unless, after discussion through the usual channels, a motion is tabled to hold the debate on the Floor of the House. I expect that to change the proportion so that about two thirds of the debates will take place in Committee rather than on the Floor of the House as they are at present. It will be open to the Scrutiny Committee to recommend that a particular document should be debated on the Floor of the House if it regards that as especially important, and the Government would naturally take that into account.

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Mr. Nigel Spearing (Newham, South) : It might be better to clear this matter up now rather than later. The difference between the Scrutiny Committee's views and those of the Leader of the House is rather less than he supposes. I think that, for the reasons that he explained, it is likely that the majority of referrals from the Scrutiny Committee will be to the new Standing Committees, and the presumption ought to be that they should be so referred. The difference between us has to do with whether the judgment should ultimately lie with the House, or with the Government, in consultation. For all sorts of reasons, the House would prefer that the judgment should remain with it, although, in all honesty, I think that if that happened, we should still achieve the result that the right hon. and learned Gentleman seeks.

Sir Geoffrey Howe : I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for that compact and courteous intervention. I have studied the report that the Scrutiny Committee produced yesterday on this very topic. What emerges from the analysis in that report is that our proposals go with the grain of actuality, which is another way of saying that the outcome may be much the same. It is our judgment that it is best to tilt the balance of decision making in that way, and that is perhaps an understandable difference of judgment between us. No doubt views will be expressed on the matter during the debate.

The Government's response also confirms our continued intention to try to bring proposals before the Scrutiny Committee rapidly and to arrange prompt debates when that Committee so recommends. We have, in general, steadily improved our record in that respect. On occasion, there may be a balance to be struck, as the report notes : a debate too early in the life of a proposal increases the risk that it may be approved in a substantially different form. Even so, we expect that a presumption in favour of early debates will make it increasingly rare for proposals to come to a Council for adoption before the House has had a chance to debate them. Because of that, the Government have not accepted the suggestion that Ministers might make oral statements before a Council as a substitute for a debate.

The Procedure Committee report also advocated that improved opportunities should be provided for hon. Members to debate general developments in the EC--as opposed to specific legislative proposals before the Council of Ministers. The Government welcome that. The most recent six-monthly debate was already more forward-looking and took place before the Dublin summit. In future, such debates might be renamed simply "European Community debates" and would give the House an opportunity to express its views on issues that are expected to be considered at European Council meetings.

On a more technical point, we have accepted the recommendation for a modest extension in the terms of reference of the Scrutiny Committee. That will regularise the Committee's position by giving it a more formal mandate to carry out inquiries which the Government felt that it was already able to conduct. The hon. Member for Newham, South has been suggesting such a change for a number of years and, as suggested in yesterday's special report from his Committee, we shall be discussing with him the precise wording.

The Government response recognises the benefits to be gained by building up informal links between this Parliament and Members of the European Parliament. We

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fully support initiatives such as the conference of scrutiny committee chairmen from the 12 member states--with European Parliament representation--held in Cork last month and the proposed parliamentary "assizes" at which both European Parliament and national Parliament representatives would be present, which is to be held in Italy later in the year to discuss preparations for the intergovernmental conference.

Mr. George Robertson (Hamilton) : I simply seek information from the Leader of the House about the idea of assizes, which has been put forward by the European Parliament. Can the right hon. and learned Gentleman tell the House more about that proposal? When is it likely to be held, will there be a delegation to it from this Parliament, and how will it be chosen?

Sir Geoffrey Howe : I thought for a moment that I was going to be cross-examined about the linguistic background to the use of the word "assizes" in this context. As a former member of the Wales and Chester circuit, I have a clear understanding of what the assize commission is like. I doubt whether this assize will be anything like that. It is an interesting example of a possible mistranslation of the word "assize", which means something quite different from what we used to know at the Lampeter assizes.

This gathering is likely to take place in October, during the Italian presidency--which is the next one. My right hon. Friend the Foreign Secretary has already commended it in concept to the House, in the debate the other day. On that basis, we hope that representatives from this Parliament will be present. I cannot yet give the House any more information, save to say that both he and I have given a favourable response to it, so one hopes that there will be a reasonably favourable outcome.

Various channels are already in operation between Members of Parliament and Members of the European Parliament. Many of those are on a party basis for contact and for the exchange of views between hon. Members and Members of the European Parliament. The European Democratic group now meets regularly in the Palace of Westminster. It meets proudly, progressively and effectively here. I hope that such contacts can be cultivated and that more contacts and channels can be opened.

I know that the recommendation in the report on telephone and postal charges for communications with Community institutions will be especially valued by hon. Members, and the Services Committee has commissioned further work on both. I hope to make further progress on all of this in the not-too -distant future. We are also looking at the question of wider access for Members of the European Parliament to the House facilities in other respects.

The principles on which the Government have based their response to the report are first, that Britain wants to maximise its influence in the Community, secondly, that the House wants to play a constructive part in influencing the content of Community legislation and thirdly, that Westminster and the European Parliament can, each in its own distinctive ways, significantly increase the democratic accountability of both the Council and the Commission.

Against that background, the Government hope and believe that this response will help to bring our scrutiny

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procedures up to date and will allow the House to play a proper role in the consideration of Community legislation. For these to work effectively requires a positive commitment by the Government--which I give--and a commitment by the House. On that basis, our combined input can be substantial, and I commend these documents for consideration by the House.

6.2 pm

Dr. John Cunningham (Copeland) : It is good that this debate is taking place on a motion for the Adjournment of the House, because that provides an opportunity for all of us to reflect on the documents before us : the report of the Select Committee on Procedure of November 1989, the Government response of May of this year, and, last but not least, the report by the Select Committee on European Legislation which was published yesterday. I welcome the opportunity spelt out in the speech of the Leader of the House for us to give our observations and comments, and for the Government to take them away and to consider them before any definitive proposals are brought to the House for a decision.

There is general agreement about the need for improved procedures for scrutiny of European business and legislation. That must be so, not only in the present circumstances but because of the increasing momentum of change in Europe, the completion of the single market in 1992 and the developing debate on economic and monetary union. The debate on the social charter is of particular importance to Labour Members and I deplore the Prime Minister's description of it as "piffling little powers". There are many important issues embodied in the social charter and we want to see an informed debate about them. When we also consider the possible enlargement of the Community and the dramatic changes in eastern Europe, we can only conclude that all this vital--and often exciting--train of events will demand and deserve more time for debate and consideration in the House of Commons. Today, we have had the latest example of the need to have more effective and more wide-ranging financial scrutiny and control of our own Government in respect of their dealings involving the European Community. I wish to put on record the fact that no Labour Member decried or denounced the achievements of Rover under the ownership of British Aerospace. That was not the issue. The issue was a deception of Parliament and the European Community by the then Secretary of State for Trade and Industry, the predecessor of the present holder of that high and important office.

The Leader of the House made the point that our existing procedures for scrutiny have barely changed since they were introduced in 1973. I agree that we should see the Strasbourg Parliament and this House as complementary--as working in co-operation on these important issues of policy and these important developments--and not as being in conflict. There is ample opportunity for both Parliaments to improve the scrutiny and control of legislation.

Mr. William Cash (Stafford) : I have been looking at the wonderful document, "Looking into the Future", produced by the Labour party as a run- up to the next general election. The Labour party has a great deal to say there about the European Community. Can the hon. Gentleman give us some idea how this so-called

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"complementary relationship" would function if the Labour party agreed to allow the Community institutions to acquire a higher function--in relation, for example, to a central bank--than Conservative Members would be prepared to allow? Can he comment on the way in which that scrutiny would operate?

Dr. Cunningham : That intervention has nothing to do with the debate. As the hon. Gentleman has not even got the title of the document right, I do not have much confidence in his analysis of the contents. [ Hon. Members :-- "What are they?"] I am quite happy to depart into a debate about the Labour party policy and the document "Looking to the Future." That is not one of the documents on the Table of the House for discussion today, but if the Leader of the House will provide time, we may be able to come to that matter. I recognise the importance of the work of the Procedure Committee in preparing its recommendations to the House under the chairmanship of the hon. Member for Honiton (Sir P. Emery) and improvements in procedures are always welcome to me personally. I take no pleasure--this week is a perfect example--in sitting here until the early hours of the morning scrutinising legislation, whether it be United Kingdom legislation or legislation from the European Community. It is an unsatisfactory way for any Parliament to operate, and anything which improves that is, in principle, welcome to me and, I believe, to most Opposition Members.

I also applaud the work of the Select Committee on European Legislation under the chairmanship of my hon. Friend the Member for Newham, South (Mr. Spearing), who is indefatigable in devoting himself to his responsibilities in these matters. He is always skilful and certainly always tireless in his pursuit of the issues, and we are grateful to him and to his Committee for the publication of their report yesterday in time for discussion today.

Sir Russell Johnston (Inverness, Nairn and Lochaber) : Does the hon. Gentleman agree that keeping the House up for an hour voting last night was a waste of time and simply used up hon. Members' energy? That was in the power of the Labour Chief Whip.

Dr. Cunningham : In the midst of controversial legislation, the House often has many Divisions. I cannot say that I enjoy it, but it is often important for political parties to put on record their views of particular issues--and the hon. Gentleman's party is no exception. As there is such a wide gulf between the Labour party and the Government on issues involving the national health service, in the judgment of my hon. Friend the Member for Livingston (Mr. Cook) it was important for us to record our position in the Division Lobby last night. Like the hon. Member for Inverness, Nairn and Lochaber (Sir R. Johnston), I cannot say that I enjoyed it, but sometimes it is important to put matters on record.

Despite all the hours that many hon. Members spend in this place and all the work that we put in, the House of Commons is a relatively weak and deficient legislature--in many respects, not just in its scrutiny of European legislation. In the past decade, the momentum of legislative change has increased dramatically. From a Government who came to office professing less government, we have had more government and more legislation than ever before. Yet our democratic processes

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and political and constitutional arrangements have apparently been beyond question, protected on some mythical high ground as a tidal wave of change washes over everything and everyone else. I welcome debates of this kind, because at least we are talking about the need for a strengthened, modernised and better informed House of Commons, which can begin to redress the imbalance between a centralising executive Government and the House which has the duty to examine, question and hold them to account.

As I have said, we have just witnessed an example of that imbalance in the totally inadequate statement and responses from the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry on the Government's deception with regard to the sell- off of Rover to British Aerospace. That was ironic when just last month, following the European Community summit meeting, the Prime Minister said that she would do her best to see that as much information as possible comes before the House. Her message certainly did not get through to her Trade and Industry Secretary--or perhaps it did and, characteristically, he simply dismissed it. Accountability in decision-taking at whatever level is a basic requirement of democracy. If the European Community is to be more effective, it must develop an improved system for making decisions. Over the years, the Community has gained powers from this and other national Parliaments. That process has not been accompanied by greater accountability and scrutiny. Where decisions are rightly made at the European level, the decision makers must be accountable. We believe that the European Parliament should also be given the powers that it needs to complement and not replace national parliaments. The scrutiny of European Community legislation is an important aspect of our work and it will continue to grow in importance. At present, the House deals with European business in what is universally regarded as an inadequate fashion. As the volume and importance of decision-making in Europe has increased, we in the House have failed to keep pace with developments.

The Opposition therefore welcome the debate on specific proposals to improve the procedures with which we scrutinise that business. I should make it clear that in my view, whatever Ministers may say--the Leader of the House seemed somewhat complacent--the way in which the Government have restricted opportunities for hon. Members to question Ministers on European matters over the past decade has not been a good example of how to proceed. Statements on Ministerial Councils have become a rarity, being made only when a Minister wants to publicise a so-called success, usually blocking a progressive move for co-ordinated action on the environment, for example.

Twice-yearly debates on Community developments often occur months after the period reported, but I am pleased to welcome the proposed changes, the suggestion that we should have a European affairs general debate and the proposal that the Leader of the House should announce at business question time each Thursday what European business will be coming before the House.

As a result of the Single European Act, the Council of Ministers can decide on measures to implement the 1992 single market by a qualified majority vote. That may have focused our minds on the fact that our scrutiny of European legislation has become somewhat out of date,

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but it has made the status quo even more unacceptable in the process. We therefore have to move to a new, better and more effective system of dealing with such matters.

The practice of regular ministerial statements after important Council of Ministers meetings has almost disappeared and nothing has been done to fill the gap and to enable Parliament to question Ministers. That remains a major problem. The decisions taken by the Councils are to important for the House not to have adequate opportunities to influence them or to express an opinion on their work. Hon. Members need more information and access to what is happening in the European Community. Given the increasing volume and speed of decision-taking at Council levels, the House needs to be far more alert.

Mr. Hugh Dykes (Harrow, East) : In that connection, do the Opposition support the idea of postage and telephone call facilities? Without any disrespect to the way in which the Services Committee operates, the danger is that the consideration and study of the matter will mean further weeks and months of delay while a relatively simple system is put in place which most other Parliaments have adopted long since as a matter of routine. Will the Opposition undertake to support celerity and haste in this matter?

Dr. Cunningham : The short answer to that is yes, but I will explain in more detail a little later.

I commend to the House the memorandum submitted for consideration by my Friends the Members for Hamilton (Mr. Robertson) and for Carrick, Cumnock and Doon Valley (Mr. Foulkes) to the Procedure Committee. Here lies the major difference between the Government and the Labour party. As I have said, I welcome much of what the Leader of the House has said, but I do not welcome the proposal for three Committees. We adhere to our view that a Grand Committee on European affairs is a far better and more practicable approach. It is a matter not of ideology but of having a practicable system for working in the House.

I have reservations, which are shared by the Whips Office, about the ability permanently to provide sufficient hon. Members to man the Committees in the way envisaged by the Leader of the House. Inevitably, there would be some pretty serious differences of opinion about the distribution of places on those committees between the parties. I do not believe that anything like sufficient consideration has been given to those matters.

I share the concern expressed by my hon. Friend the Member for Newham, South (Mr. Spearing) in an earlier intervention about the Government deciding automatically whether a matter should be discussed in Committee rather than on the Floor of the House. That is a proposal to take power away from the House of Commons and vest it in the Executive. I have considerable hesitation about agreeing to that proposal. There is no record of the House being obstinate or obdurate about these matters, so I ask the Leader of the House to reconsider that proposal.

Mr. Robin Maxwell-Hyslop (Tiverton) : Before the hon. Gentleman leaves that point, would his objection be overcome if the Committee upstairs were accessible to all hon. Members, so that they are not frozen out by it being moved upstairs?

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Mr. Cunningham : That is the proposal, but it does not meet the point that I am making. The whole House should have the opportunity to discuss these matters, and I put that on the record for further consideration. With a little more discussion, we may be able to reach agreement.

I welcome what the Leader of the House said about improving relations between hon. Members and Members of the Strasbourg Parliament. I understand the historic angst about Members being appointed or indirectly elected, but now there are democratically elected Members of the European Parliament representing Britain and we must have sensible working relations with them. The way in which they are treated when they come to this House is appalling. When I visit the European Parliament, I am made welcome as a guest. I have wide-ranging access to its facilities, yet Members of the European Parliament must queue like anyone else to get into this place. They have no access to the Galleries of the Chamber.

We have a Gallery for distinguished strangers, a Gallery for Peers, and other designated Galleries. I cannot for the life of me understand why we cannot have a row in the Gallery designated for Members of the European Parliament. That would be a simple way of showing the determination of the House to seek better relations with our colleagues. There are other ways in which we should enable elected Members of the Strasbourg Parliament to have access to other facilities in the House, but I shall not go into detail now. I turn to the point made by the hon. Member for Harrow, East (Mr. Dykes). It is a matter of astonishment to everyone, particularly business people, when I explain that if my Euro-Member of Parliament writes to me, he does so in effect at the taxpayer's expense, but if I reply to him I do so at my own expense. If he telephones me--he is a Conservative Member, but never mind--from Strasbourg or Brussels, the call is paid by the European Parliament from public funds. If I telephone him in Brussels or Strasbourg, I receive a bill. That is surely nonsense, and I hope that the procedures can be accelerated so that we can resolve it soon.

As the Leader of the House knows, European Members of Parliament can travel anywhere in Europe on legitimate parliamentary business. I see no reason why hon. Members should not be able to make a limited number of visits to Strasbourg or Brussels, at public expense, in pursuit of legitimate business on behalf of their constituents. Until we involve ourselves in what is happening in Europe and other member states, we shall always be seen as reluctant, or we shall lose out because we are not using the institutions of the European Community half so effectively as the national Parliaments of other member states.

I hope that my response to the introduction to the debate by the Leader of the House, much of which I agreed with, has been helpful and constructive. I further hope that, when we finally decide how the procedures should be changed, there will be much agreement across the Floor on the changes that should be implemented.

6.23 pm

Sir Peter Emery (Honiton) : The debate is on two considerable matters of importance, and one follows from the other. First, we must make people understand, whether Members of Parliament like it or not, that major parts of British sovereignty and the direct control of part of the

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British law have passed from the British Parliament to the European Economic Community. That is a fair but bland statement to make, but one that frequently is not clearly understood. Therefore, it is of greater importance than in the past, when British Ministers could veto EC directives and regulations, that the House should be able to examine carefully and, where necessary, debate the new laws passed by Brussels.

However, it must be understood that changes in procedure, which we are debating today, will do nothing to lessen our treaty obligations or the overall effect of the Single European Act. The fact that the Council of Ministers determines more and more issues under the majority voting procedure does not, nor should it, lessen the importance of the House maintaining proper scrutiny of the action of British Ministers. The expansion of majority voting may mean that there is a need to examine, and perhaps develop, new channels of influence. Therefore, two of the recommendations in the report deal with links with the European Parliament. None of that lessens the essential requirement for Ministers to be answerable to, and examined by, the House for their action on European matters.

I am grateful to my right hon. and learned Friend the Leader of the House and the hon. Member for Copeland (Dr. Cunningham) for the kind remarks that they have made about me and the Select Committee on Procedure. The Committee does the work ; I am only its instrument. I thank my right hon. and learned Friend for agreeing with my request that the Government's response to our report on the scrutiny of European legislation should be in the form of a White Paper rather than a letter to the Committee. That has allowed hon. Members to enter the debate fully informed of the Government's views and able to react to the report rather than having to listen to the speech and make judgments on a prima facie basis. Without wishing to sound pompous, I congratulate my right hon. and learned Friend on providing a response to every one of the 28 recommendations and not side-stepping any of them.

I need not repeat that the report is the first in-depth report providing detailed consideration of how the House deals with and scrutinises European legislation since the Procedure Committee report in 1978. We attempted to do a thorough job so that perhaps it will not be necessary to carry out a further investigation for another 10 years.

May I therefore divide my analysis of our report's recommendations into four different sections. First, I refer the House to paragraph 43 of our report :

"In the evidence submitted to us there was general agreement that the way in which the House currently debates European legislation is profoundly unsatisfactory. Particular criticism focused on the amount of time spent by the House after Ten o'clock on European business, notably in the form of debates subject to a 1 hour limit under Standing Order No. 14. These were variously described as cursory' and not very well attended'. In addition, the then Leader of the House referred to the tendency of such debates to attract Members more interested in rekindling the embers of the argument over the principle of membership of the Community than in examining the detailed merits of a particular proposal Stress was also laid during questioning on the great unpopularity of these late night occasions, particularly amongst backbench Members whipped for divisions which seldom materialise."

We were impressed by the strength of feeling about debates on Europe being set for a late hour and the sterility of major debates, which are taken twice a year in prime

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time and were, until today, set only to consider matters in retrospect. Equally, we realised that to make demands on prime time for all the matters that the Scrutiny Committee considered and recommended for debate by hon. Members could not be practical. We therefore recommended that the two major debates should be organised in the two weeks prior to the twice-yearly summit meeting, that the debate should be on a substantive motion and that the Government should be responsible for providing the House, prior to the debate, with a list of the matters likely to be on the summit agenda. Obviously it would be helpful if we could have the exact summit agenda, but I am informed that that is frequently not available until a few days before the summit meeting. However, the Foreign Office must know approximately what is likely to be debated at the summit meetings and it is obviously right and proper that the House should know about that before our debates take place.

Mr. Maxwell-Hyslop : Is not the description that my hon. Friend has just given of late night attendances equally true of attendances at 6.30 pm? That strengthens our point about having such debates upstairs in Committee rather than in an almost empty House.

Sir Peter Emery : My hon. Friend may well be right. I was hoping that the two debates every six months on European matters would attract a greater number of hon. Members interested in them if hon. Members were to be debating matters for the future rather than referring to things that had happened weeks or months previously and upon which the views of the House could have no effect.

The second major alteration to procedure is our recommendation that the new special European Standing Committees should be established, with the same membership, for a year instead of for the duration of a Parliament. We thought that it would be too much to ask someone to commit himself to such a Committee for the length of a Parliament. We thought that it was reasonable for someone to commit himself for a year to consider upstairs the bulk of the matters which the Scrutiny Committee recommended should be considered by the House.

Those special European Standing Committees should have power to hear statements from Ministers and to cross-exaine them on the relevant documents before the Committee before proceeding to the normal consideration by way of a debate on the documents. We considered whether those Committees should be given powers to call for papers and persons, but we thought that that would duplicate the work of the departmental Select Committees. We thought that it was necessary to have details about the documents before the Committee and that that could best be achieved by cross-examining the Minister responsible.

Mr. David Winnick (Walsall, North) : Does the hon. Gentleman agree that one of our important recommendations in the report was that there should, as far as possible, be a link between the new Committees--the Government have accepted at least three of those--and the departmental Select Committees which cover the same subjects? Would it not be unfortunate if, for example, the Select Committee on Agriculture did not know what the special scrutiny Committee on Agriculture was doing? There should be a link, and that is why we suggested that at least two members of a departmental Select Committee should be members of the special Standing Committees

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that we are recommending. That linkage is important because, if it does not exist, the two Committees will not know what is going on.

Sir Peter Emery : The hon. Gentleman has kindly dealt with a whole paragraph of my speech, to which I now need not refer.

We saw the importance of the hon. Gentleman's point. My only criticism of having three special Committees instead of five is that it will be difficult to ensure a link with two Committees, perhaps between finance and trade and industry, which would involve four members of the Select Committee, so that only six other members would be left on that Select Committee. There are difficulties, but I agree that there must be seen to be a link between the departmental Select Committees and the work of the specialist European Standing Committees.

To encourage greater interest in European regulations, we believe that matters on the same subject being considered by those with a particular interest and whom we hoped would want to serve on those Special European Committees would provide better and more expert consideration, especially as service over the year built up and the committee members understood the problems that they had to consider. There must be no misunderstanding about the fact that all hon. Members can attend and speak at the special European Committees. We want to encourage all hon. Members interested in particular subjects to do that. The only limitation is that they will have to catch the Chairman's eye and they would not be able to vote on the motion before the Committee because that would be the responsibility of the members appointed to the Committee. Hon. Members would have full powers to attend the Committee and to question the Minister so long as the Chair recognised them.

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