House of Commons Hansard Debates for 18 Dec 1991

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Mr. Garel-Jones : I am happy to answer my right hon. Friend now. The position is clear. No decision by qualified majority voting can be taken, or no subject can be brought up for qualified majority voting, unless that is agreed by unanimity. I think that that is clear.

Mr. Tebbit : I am not at all sure that that is what the section says. Even allowing for the excruciating English, it seems to me to be an undertaking on the part of Her Majesty's Government that, where a decision might arise by a qualified majority, Her Majesty's Government will use every endeavour not to torpedo it by insisting on making it a question of unanimity. That is what it seems to me to mean.

I do not have the advice of the Law Officers, but presumably the Government do, so perhaps I could be as helpful as I can to my right hon. Friends and suggest that they may come back later tonight with a very clear explanation of what that clause means. I hope that they will be able to clear it with our partners in the meantime, because it sounds very much to me as though it was in operation yesterday, when my right hon. Friend left the shores of Britain totally opposed to the recognition of Croatia and Serbia and came back totally convinced that they should be recognised. Whether that decision on recognition is right or good is not the point that I argue. It seems that, within a comparatively short trip, a substantial change in the Government's position was achieved.

Mr. Garel-Jones : Perhaps I could help my right hon. Friend a little further. A decision to recognise Croatia has already been taken by both the United Kingdom and other members of the Community. It was the timing of recognition that was under discussion yesterday. [Interruption.] I am sure that my right hon. Friend wishes to hear my reply, even if Opposition Members do not. It was agreed yesterday that if, in the opinion of the arbitration committee under Lord Carrington, certain conditions had been met, recognition would take place. If those conditions are not met, Her Majesty's Government, and, indeed, their partners in the Community, will be free to take their own decision.

Mr. Tebbit : I am happy to have my hon. Friend's explanation, because I am sure that it comes as a great illumination not only to me but to the assembled corps of press and television journalists and everyone else who has been writing about the matter.

Mr. William Cash (Stafford) : And Chancellor Kohl.

Mr. Tebbit : And, indeed, Chancellor Kohl, as my hon. Friend says. Clearly, we had all got the wrong end of the stick. But I am glad that we have all been disillusioned and told that we had it completely wrong, and that the Government had a covert, unknown policy which they were too shy to explain to the world at large.

Mr. Gerald Kaufman (Manchester, Gorton) : Will the right hon. Gentleman give way?

Mr. Tebbit : I am always eager to accept a little help from the right hon. Gentleman.

Mr. Kaufman : I am afraid I am not able to provide any help to the right hon. Gentleman. I fear that I must disillusion him. What the Minister of State has just told

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him was not what the Foreign Secretary told the House at Question Time today. The Foreign Secretary gave an entirely different set of criteria for the possible recognition of the Yugoslav republics by the United Kingdom.

Mr. Tebbit : I am not sure whether that was helpful or not. It seemed to me to show that many of us were confused about the policy of Her Majesty's Government.

I notice that the treaty also requires that the presidency will represent the union--this new creation--in matters which come within common foreign and security policy. It will

"be responsible for the implementation of common measures ; in that capacity it shall in principle express the position of the Union in international organisations and international conferences". Exactly what does that mean? Is the United Nations Security Council an international organisation or conference? If the union has a common policy on matters which are to be discussed within the Security Council, will it be represented by the presidency? Will the United Kingdom be represented by the presidency? As my right hon. Friend knows, there are two nations within the union which hold a veto in the Security Council.

I understand that the matters which I raise are difficult, but it should not be necessary for my hon. Friend the Minister to look too far into the documents to say whether the policy that appears to be set out here--that the presidency shall represent the union for matters which come within common foreign and security policy--will make any difference to the way in which Britain is represented in the United Nations.

Mr. Garel-Jones : I am happy to set my right hon. Friend's mind at rest. The position of the United Kingdom and the Republic of France as members of the Security Council is specifically safeguarded in the treaty.

Mr. Tebbit : I am grateful to hear that. But what about other aspects of the United Nations? In which intergovernmental conferences and organisations will we be represented by the presidency? It is a pretty unclear piece of work. Or, indeed, it was pretty clear until my hon. Friend the Minister began to explain it.

Ms. Clare Short (Birmingham, Ladywood) : Will the right hon. Gentleman give way?

Mr. Tebbit : No.

While I realise that my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister feels that he has hedged around the bridgeheads established by the Community and the union with good defensive positions, all experience within the Community suggests that it will expand from any bridgehead which it has been given.

Mr. Favell : Will my right hon. Friend give way?

Mr. Tebbit : No, if my hon. Friend will excuse me.

As my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister has suggested, it would not be honourable for Britain to sign up to those aims and objectives without sincerely intending to implement them.

So now there are many other European dimensions. The treaty refers to a European dimension in education and says :

"The Community shall implement a vocational training policy."

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Then, under a protocol on economic and social cohesion, all 12 nations have agreed that a cohesion fund will be set up which will support

"member states with a per capita GNP of less than 90 per cent. of Community average".

It sounds as if there will be many beneficiaries of the fund, but not too many payers-in.

I am glad to hear the words of my old friend Otto Lambsdorff in Germany. He questions how long people in Germany will be willing to bear the excessive costs of supporting poorer areas. I do not share the optimism of the Leader of the Opposition that all the money required could come out of the funding of the common agricultural policy. That could happen only over the dead bodies of the French, the Italians, the Bavarians, the Irish, and one or two others who would constitute something like a blocking majority.

The treaty commits us to further policies. No one could object to being committed to ensuring prudent and rational utilisation of natural resources. Presumably it is within that envelope that the Environment Commissioner will campaign for the much-talked-about tax on hydrocarbons, while his friend the Energy Commissioner proposes to subsidise coal mining. Those two policies seem slightly incompatible, but I understand the needs of social cohesion between the German miners and the Federal Government, which coughs up an illegal subsidy of £14 billion a year to its coal- mining industry.

The treaty also contains a definition of subsidiarity. Oh, subsidiarity is a marvellous thing. Presumably it is under the doctrine of subsidiarity that we are not to fix our own speed limits for lorries and motor coaches on our roads. They will be fixed "at the appropriate level". The appropriate level will presumably be the union, the federal or the Brussels level. How on earth can that happen under the new definition of subsidiarity? It seems to me that subsidiarity means whatever I say it should mean.

We also find in the treaty a new commitment that

"the Community shall contribute to the establishment and development of trans-European networks in the areas of transport, telecommunications and energy infrastructures"

The Council may, by qualified majority, establish guidelines "covering the objectives, priorities and broad lines of measures envisaged in the sphere of trans-European networks".

I ask myself whether every right hon. and hon. Member in the House knows in this context what a trans-European network is. I would love to go round the House asking hon. Members whether they have checked the definition and whether they are happy that the guidelines should be binding on us and should be reached by qualified majority voting. In order to encourage hon. Members to peruse the treaty with great care, I shall let them all go and read the relevant section--indeed, find it themselves--to discover what a trans-national network is. Lastly, I turn to monetary union. As I have said before, it is possible to argue that a single currency either would be of economic benefit to the Community or would not. I happen to take the second view, and to believe that, until convergence--not the measurements for the economists but real convergence, in terms of living standards and gross domestic product--is achieved, a single currency would be a disaster. It would lock into everlasting poverty in the Community those who are already in poverty. It would require the movement of massive sources of funds and of millions of people. They would both bring about

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the resentments which are already fuelling the march of the Nazis and neo-Nazis in Germany, the National Front in France, the Lombardy Front, the Vlaams Blok and others. Those forces will be unleashed and will destroy the European Community, which has achieved so much good for Europe in the past 40 years.

Madam Deputy Speaker (Miss Betty Boothroyd) : The Standing Order must now be applied and speeches must last no longer than 10 minutes.

7.10 pm

Mr. Robert Sheldon (Ashton-under-Lyne) : The right hon. Member for Chingford (Mr. Tebbit) mentioned the role of the central bank, which is what I wish to talk about most. My right hon. Friend the Leader of the Opposition was right to try to circumscribe the work that it would do. The proposed central bank needs to be dealt with in that way.

One tradition is common to all parties of the left and centre--there has always been a deep suspicion of banks and bankers. That suspicion has not extended merely to the socialist parties, but also to the Democratic party in America, the centre parties in Europe and social democrats elsewhere, who have all regarded the power of such banks with awe and apprehension-- the literature is abundant and the cartoons remain for ever in our minds.

The reason for that is the power of banks and bankers. If they have not been regulated, they have always been able to close companies, to withdraw support from Governments and to dominate economies. Additionally, they naturally want a high exchange rate, which provides strength for their international operations, and high interest rates to add to their profitability, which is not always in the best interests of the country concerned. That is why the nationalisation of the Bank of England received such wide support in 1945. Even Tories voted for it.

Those people who call for independence must ask themselves why the measure to nationalise the Bank of England gained such acceptance. Those who look to the Bundesbank as a model for Britain and the Community must ask themselves how it makes its decisions. Is it always unanimous? If it makes decisions in that way, we must ask what they are. What level of inflation does it want to achieve? Is it 3 per cent., 2 per cent., 1 per cent. or zero? Do the members of the Bundesbank always come to the same conclusion, and who decides? Such matters are largely political and at a time of crisis they become even more political.

Why has the Bundesbank been so successful? We must question whether it has been all that successful. The Bundesbank did not create the German economic miracle--it was made by companies such as Volkswagen, Bayer-Hoechst and Siemens. They owe little to the Bundesbank, but it owes everything to the success of Germany industry. Out of the devastation, the expertise and skills of the work force remained. Whatever is destroyed can be recreated and improved if the people remain. Our own greatest wasted assets are the liabilities and skills in the hands and minds of our people. Germany exploited them and we did not. That also happened in Japan. The economic miracle was not a miracle of brilliant minds within the Government or the central bank--it came from manufacturing industry. So when we consider

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such matters--creating research teams and design offices--we must remember that it was German industry rather than the bank which produced the miracle.

People who call for an independent central bank and for a Eurobank must look to a future in which it might have to deal not merely with a recession like the one that we have just experienced, but with slump and depression. We must not assume that we have finally eliminated all those problems which occurred so often in previous decades and centuries. It is easy to abandon Government intervention at a time of prosperity, but we must take into account the less happy situations which have been experienced in every century and which we may have to deal with again. At such times, Government intervention is required. Measures taken in the 1930s, such as Franklin Roosevelt's new deal, which was hated by bankers, could come into their own. There could be a time when Governments have to take charge of economies for the sake of their citizens, whom only they can represent.

I used to hold the opinion that an international depression was not possible because Governments would overcome their differences when faced with such a catastrophe. I cannot be sure that they would do that and with a Eurobank I shall be even less sure.

What do we mean when we talk about control of the central bank? The controllers would be a body of 12 Finance Ministers seeking to control the immense financial power of the Eurobank, faced with all the difficulties of language and communication. The power of the bank would rival that of national Governments. That is the monster that we could be creating.

If all Governments, or even only the major Governments, were agreed and exercised their powers it might just work, but there could be differences of view. In a crisis, one or more of the major countries might find the situation acceptable. If there were such a division of view--one would need to be a great optimist to rule that out--those who pressed for inaction would be most likely to win. Without a decisive political viewpoint, the bankers' view would almost certainly prevail.

It is hard to overemphasise the power of the head of the Eurobank. The day- to-day decision making provides enormous power, which to a large extent would have to be conceded. At a time of crisis, faced with a part-time group of Finance Ministers, invariably holding different viewpoints and anxious to return to their own countries, the head of the Eurobank would be almost unchallengeable. The right hon. Member for Chingford mentioned the problems of convergence and there are also problems of regional development. Those will always be difficult to reconcile with problems of growth. As the right hon. Gentleman said, convergence is what it is all about and there are few pointers as to how it will be achieved. However, all of that is subordinate to the haste with which these monumental changes are being rushed forward. The Community seems to be intent on preparing a blueprint which we are called upon to accept. There seems little place for organic growth, for co-operation leading to trust, for greater confidence leading to changes in the light of experience rather than as a result of a brainstorm. The Community should be trying to restore that process. There are enthusiasts who want to change the entire working of the Community, in contrast with the clearly nonsensical common agricultural policy, which is

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removed from any sensible reform. What a statement of priorities : if we cannot change the CAP, let us concentrate instead on a constitutional revolution.

Greater confidence in the workings of the Community is required. Before giving it greater powers and losing some of our own, we should examine how the existing arrangements are being administered. That is where I feel that changes need to be made.

Let us look at the report of the Court of Auditors and the strictures that it makes. The reports which illustrate implementation of Community policies are also important. The Public Accounts Committee report on external trade measures for agricultural produce states that West Germany had 583 irregularities, the United Kingdom had 130 and Greece had two. In another report Britain had 11, Germany had 28 and Italy had none. Those figures do not stretch one's credulity because they are obvious nonsense. The auditors' report needs teeth to bring about changes. Countries which tend to abide by the laws must not be disadvantaged by those who have a more relaxed or even a corrupt approach to Community regulations. If we are to grow together, we must have a minimum of trust in the administrative competence and will of member Governments.

I look forward to a number of actions which need to be taken. First, the Community's published accounts and financial and performance information need to be presented in a clear form. Many people who are best fitted to query financial matters cannot be expected to undertake an investigation to discover where the money went. The figures must be properly set out in the way that the National Audit Office has done so successfully.

Secondly, there must be more effective ways to hold the Commission to account for its expenditure. Personal accountability is important. In Britain we have that. We have accounting officers who carry the responsibility. If one wants a job for the European Parliament, let us forget some of the nonsensical views which have been put forward and let the extra powers be used to investigate areas of expenditure which are clearly fraudulent. There are already some links between the National Audit Office and the Commission and I hope that these will be extended.

What saddens me most is that the problems that I have outlined should have been appreciated by many other countries in the Community. They include the difficulties of convergence, the power of the Eurobank and the difficulties in getting control over such a body. The question before the Community is whether it has the ability and the political will to bring about the essential changes in a moving and not invariably crisis-free world.

I want a solution. I voted for entry against a three-line Whip, and I would do it again. I do not want to be locked out, but the main debate should be about the way the Community meets the basic needs of its members, providing wider opportunities and improving prosperity, establishing greater trust between countries, encouraging compatibility while respecting distinctiveness. That is what should concern us most. We should turn our attention in that direction. Mr. Delors has been too clever by half. It is time for the realists to take control.

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7.21 pm

Sir Peter Tapsell (East Lindsey) : When the then Conservative Prime Minister returned from the Congress of Berlin with the plaudits of the world ringing in his ears, after helpful interventions by the German Chancellor Bismarck, he arrived by train at Victoria station. He was met by the diplomatic correspondent of The Times, who asked, "Lord Beaconsfield, how does it feel to hear the cheers of the world ringing in your ears ?" Dizzy, after a pause, replied, "The whole world ? There is no one left." What it is generally thought that he meant was that his mother, his wife and his sister were all by then dead, but it was also a reflection of a great statesman aware of the highly ephemeral nature of human achievement.

Our present Prime Minister has come back from another conference, again with the plaudits of the world, and certainly those of almost the whole of the Conservative party, ringing in his ears. I join in these cheers. He, together with his team--the Foreign Secretary, the Chancellor of the Exchequer and the Minister of State, Foreign and Commonwealth Office--did a brilliant negotiating job. In a difficult situation, they brought back a result that was much better than the one that I expected and feared. However, I do not share, and have never shared, the enthusiasm of those who wish to rush forward into a federal Europe.

In the 32 years that I have been a Member of Parliament, I have always voted the pro-European ticket. I voted in favour of the original application to join the Common Market in 1961 by the then Harold Macmillan, which started our negotiations for entry. I have continued to vote the pro- European ticket at every point. The nature of the case that we have to put to our constituents has altered a great deal during my time in the House. I voted against the referendum proposal because I am against referendums in principle, but when the referendum was held in 1975, I campaigned actively in favour of Europe, making 35 speeches. In every one of those speeches, I gave the people whom I was addressing, including those in my constituency in Lincolnshire, a categorical assurance that Britain could never be forced to do anything of vital national importance to which it had not consented. I said that we would always have the right to veto anything against our fundamental national security and social desires. I meant that at the time, as did all my colleagues who campaigned along similar lines in the run up to the referendum, from the leader of my party downwards.

A different situation has now arisen, and we must apply our minds to it. I shall confine my remarks entirely to the single currency, which is what I know most about anyway from my commercial experience, but also because it is by far the most important aspect of the matters under discussion. There are two aspects to the single currency--accountability and practicality. One of the things that astonish me about the parliamentary Labour party is that it hardly seems to worry about accountability. It is surely the case that if we have a single currency for the whole of Europe and a single central bank, we in the House of Commons will lose control over many of the key matters that so much affect our national life.

The Labour party is making a great and understandable fuss about mortgages, but mortgages, as we all know, are intimately linked to the current rate of interest. Once

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there is a single currency and a single central bank, the rate of interest will not be decided by the Chancellor of the Exchequer and the Governor of the Bank of England.

Mr. Budgen : It is not now.

Sir Peter Tapsell : I will not go into the issue of the exchange rate mechanism, because I was not in favour of joining it in the first place. The United States is also in a serious recession, but has interest rates of 4.5 per cent. compared to ours of 10.5 per cent. Were we not members of the exchange rate mechanism, I have no doubt that our interest rates and therefore our mortgage rates would be lower. However, I do not want to get drawn into that wider argument, although it underlines the point that I am making. Just this first step--joining the ERM--has limited our economic room for manoeuvre and the further steps towards monetary union that are suggested will take it away altogether.

The question is whether we are prepared to give up what the House has existed for 800 years to defend and for which our predecessors have fought- -control of the economy and the distribution of money, and the control of taxation which stems from that. That will disappear if we become members of a single European currency. It is extraordinary that the parliamentary Labour party, which has always been critical of the European concept, has gone overboard on this. As far as one can understand from the speech of the Leader of the Opposition earlier today, he would sign, straight away, now, a commitment to join the single European currency in 1997, irrespective of the economic situation of this country, of Europe or of the world at that time. As Labour Governments have never been able to foresee what was going to happen to the economy even six weeks ahead, I do not know how the Labour party can be so confident about the situation in six years' time.

The second aspect is practicality. I rather agree with the fear expressed by my right hon. Friend the Member for Chingford (Mr. Tebbit), that unless there is an extraordinary economic and social convergence and a convergence of standards of living throughout Europe--by then it may stretch not just from the Atlantic to the Urals but from the Baltic to the Black sea--there will be tremendous unemployment and discontent in foreign regions.

I know that part of the scheme is an immense transfer of wealth from the richer to the poorer countries, but we all know from our constituency experience that even such a modest scheme as the rate support grant, which was introduced by Winston Churchill in the 1920s to help the poorer parts of England by transferring to them rate income from the richer areas, caused tremendous difficulties. In my constituency, throughout my time in the House, I have always heard complaints in the shire counties that people have to pay more in rates to support the industrial poor of the north. Already, criticism is building up in Germany of this concept that huge sums of German taxpayers' money will be transferred elsewhere. The burden that the five new la"nder impose on west Germany is only a first example of the burden that will fall on the German taxpayer in order to fulfil those obligations. I am doubtful whether they will long be prepared to meet them.

We should recognise that the French have been able to stay inside the exchange rate mechanism only by devaluing

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their currency seven times. When the French have a single currency and cannot devalue, what will they do? We all know what they will do. I know because I have a French wife--they will go out into the streets and fight. Let us not put Britain and modern Europe into a position where the fate of our continent will be determined, as has been the case so often in the past, by the hurling of paving stones around the Champs Elysees.

7.31 pm

Mr. Tony Banks (Newham, North-West) : It was rather wretched of the hon. Member for East Lindsey (Sir P. Tapsell) to criticise my right hon. Friend the Leader of the Opposition, who today gave a bravura performance. It contrasted with the Prime Minister's downbeat effort. Quite frankly, he gave us a vision of the future, and it yawns. It is obvious that he now realises that the deal that he brought back from Maastricht will not stick either in the country or with Conservative Members.

I accept that the Prime Minister enjoyed some success at Maastricht, but it was a party political success. It was not a national success ; it was not a success for Britain. As is usually the case, the interests of the Tory party were put before the interests of the country. The Prime Minister set out to get the best deal that he could for the Tory party, not for Britain. He failed to get a deal for Britain that is worth the paper on which it is written. Initially--and this is interesting--the right hon. Gentleman threw dust in the eyes of his party's right wing, especially the right hon. Member for Finchley (Mrs. Thatcher). As we have heard, she was thrilled by the outcome at Maastricht. The right hon. Member for Chingford (Mr. Tebbit) gave an excellent party-pooper speech : he was more appalled than thrilled by the outcome. I know that one should not repeat private conversations, but when he was on his way to the Library, I heard him say, "I am just off to read the small print in the treaty." He obviously went to the Library and read the small print to good effect because he has revealed matters to Conservative Members that I do not think they previously knew. Certainly, the right hon. Member for Finchley did not know. She knows as little about the consequences and implications of the Maastricht treaty as she knew about the likely consequences of the Single European Act. She has revealed her ignorance on two separate occasions.

Mr. Tebbit : In fairness to my right hon. Friend the Member for Finchley (Mrs. Thatcher), when she made that remark she was referring to the Prime Minister's performance in the House of Commons earlier that day-- and it was an excellent performance.

Mr. Banks : I accept what the right hon. Gentleman says. I think that, perhaps, there is a little clever rewriting of history. When the right hon. Lady said that she was thrilled by Maastricht, I thought that her social life must be very down at the moment if she could be thrilled by that.

The double opt-out of the single currency and the social chapter represents a sticking plaster that the Prime Minister has tried to put over Tory party divisions. It will not hold--it is already breaking up. I have time for the Prime Minister ; I like him as an individual. However, he gave a terrible performance today. I think that it was

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because he realises that he has brought back a bum deal that will not stick in the country or in the Conservative party.

The opt-out of the single currency is politically and economically unrealistic. The right hon. Member for Chingford revealed that. Either there will not be sufficient convergence and the single currency will be delayed by the other countries, or there will be sufficient convergence and it would be economic suicide for Britain to try to opt out of the agreement to move towards a single currency.

I thought it degrading that this country alone should not sign the social chapter. After 12 years of Thatcherism, British workers will be denied the rights of workers in Spain, Greece and Portugal. The Prime Minister said that the social chapter would destroy our competitive advantage. Does he really mean that we need a low-wage, long-hours, short-holidays, sweated- labour economy in order to be competitive in Europe and the world? If so, what an indictment that is of 12 years of Thatcherism.

Does anyone really believe that the Germans, the French, the Dutch, the Italians, and all the others really want to destroy their competitiveness? I cannot understand it. That is a simple question and I am a simple fellow. How can 11 countries sign, and one country not? That is all I want to know. I cannot believe that there is a collective death wish among the 11 countries that are our partners in Europe. Those countries contain some of the most successful economies in the world. It was ideology and party political considerations that motivated the Prime Minister's attitude towards the social chapter--it certainly was not economic factors. He revealed himself as a Thatcherite with a grin.

Despite the fact of the double opt-out--and again I agree with the right hon. Member for Chingford--we are still inexorably and irresistibly moving towards ever closer union in Europe--or ecu, to use the right term. Chingford has spotted it, and I welcome it very much. Although the word "federal" was omitted from the final treaty, what is in a word? We are still moving towards a federal Europe. This is an issue on which I disagree violently with my hon. Friend the Member for Newham, South (Mr. Spearing)-- as violently as one could disagree with him. I hope that that happens and, indeed, that we go a great deal further. I want a United States of Europe, with our own independent foreign and defence policies. Of course, it must be a democratic federal Europe, and the enormous democratic deficit must be filled. It does not mean that we will be overruled by faceless bureaucrats in Brussels. We have to make sure that the Commissioners are accountable to an enlarged and empowered European Parliament. With all the democratic traditions of this country, have we no confidence that we can make a federal Europe as democratic as what we have achieved in this country? What is so wonderful about the nation state? Its days are numbered. It has been an interesting contrast to watch western Europe moving closer together while eastern Europe breaks up. The difference is that in eastern Europe an empire is being broken--an empire based on force and coercion. The west has mature democracies, and they are coming together voluntarily because, through their collective strength, they can achieve a great deal both individually and collectively.

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I like what is happening and I want the process to continue. It is true that I now have a different attitude--I have managed to do a 180 deg. turn, something that the right hon. Member for Chingford said that he could not do. I have done it because circumstances have changed dramatically in eastern Europe-- [Laughter.] Hon. Members may laugh, but politicians should be able to explain why they have changed their views. It is a foolish politician who pretends that he was right then, is right now, and allows no change. "I have never changed my mind," some politicians say, "I never apologise, never explain." That is the death knell of politics. We must always explain and, if necessary, apologise. Of course, I am not apologising--I am saying that my position has changed because of the momentous events in eastern Europe.

The opportunity being presented to our generation of politicians is one of involvement in the peaceful redrawing of the map of Europe, for the first time ever. There is the possibility of a Europe that stretches from the Atlantic to the Urals. There could be a new federal structure that would take on board not just the EFTA countries--that would be easy--but the emerging democracies of eastern Europe. That is the future for this country, that is the future for Europe, and I welcome it. The right hon. Member for Chingford deplores much of what happened at Maastricht ; I welcome it. However, I believe that the Prime Minister tried to do a deal for his party, not for his country.

7.39 pm

Mr. Jonathan Aitken (Thanet, South) : There is a great debate to be held on the Maastricht summit, although not the debate launched by the leader of the Labour party and his associates this afternoon. The hon. Member for Newham, North-West (Mr. Banks), with an uncharacteristic touch of sycophancy, referred to the speech by the Leader of the Opposition as a bravura performance. I must say that it was the best speech that the Leader of the Opposition has made this year, but to those of us who have had to listen to all the others in the past 12 months that is hardly the ultimate accolade.

What staggers me about the Leader of the Opposition is that when he chooses his weapons for a great debate he manages to pick boomerangs, and I am sure that his speech today will boomerang against him and his party. The cheers that he received from his Back Benchers this afternoon will end, I predict, in the jeers of the electorate because, by his ardent advocacy of the social chapter, he is going to lose the votes of 5.5 million part-time workers whose jobs will be threatened when they have to pay national insurance and whose employers will have to pay them full-time rates, as the social chapter demands. He will also lose the votes of 2.5 million overtime workers, many of whom would be denied the right to earn their overtime by the restrictions of the social chapter.

Above all, it is extraordinary that the whole Labour party suddenly wants to embrace the social chapter and leave social affairs to Europe--one thinks of all that guff about the Health and Safety Executive. Surely, if there is one thing that this House can do well--and should, under the principle of subsidiarity--it is to devise health and safety legislation here. When we last debated the issue on 27 October 1989, when there were only four Labour Members present, they all agreed that health and safety

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legislation in this country was superior to that proposed by Europe. I am amazed, therefore, that Opposition Members have led us off on this wild goose chase--turning the social chapter into the great issue on which they will fight the Prime Minister's stewardship at Maastricht.

No ; the debate that we ought to have is the one opened up by my right hon. Friend the Member for Chingford (Mr. Tebbit). Do these treaties as they have been negotiated set us ever more inexorably down the road to a European federal super-state, or do they offer Britain and other member states the chance to build the Europe of the future with greater flexibility, more emphasis on co-operation outside the treaty of Rome and the retention of adequate powers for national Parliaments and Governments? That is really the crucial question, and I should like to try to answer it from the viewpoint of a longstanding Euro-sceptic--one who, like my right hon. Friend the Member for Chingford, is not usually in the business of doing 180 deg. turns.

Those of us who have followed the European debate for the past 10 or 15 years know that the European Community, despite British protests, has been moving steadily in a federal direction. Those who drafted the Maastricht treaty were quite right to include that phrase in the preamble, or chapeau. It was a pleasant surprise that it was taken out as a result of British pressure. From 1972 to 1986 we moved in this federal direction with, in the Fabian phrase, the inevitability of gradualness ; but from 1986 onwards, hastened on by the Single European Act, passed through this House under a guillotine, we stopped travelling with the inevitability of gradualness and started to travel down the federal road with the inevitability and rapidity of a train grande vitesse, with Mr. Delors as the engine driver. One of the most significant results of Maastricht may be that the runaway Delors train, destination United States of Europe on a one-track line, may have been slowed down. But we have certainly been offered some alternative routes and destinations. These alternative routes and destinations may become much more attractive to the other passengers in Europe as time goes by.

Here I want to pick up a point made in the serious part of his entertaining speech by the right hon. Member for Leeds, East (Mr. Healey). He highlighted the fact that ours is the only national legislature so far to have debated this issue seriously. As other national legislators in member states start to debate the Maastricht treaty there are already signs that opinion may be shifting. I do not say that closer union will not take place, but it will happen differently as a result of the German Parliament waking up to what is occurring. Other national Parliaments will also become aware of it and French political pressures may come into play--all leading to changes.

For the first time there is a chance that these changes may turn out to be different from the original blueprint. The treaty of Rome augmented by the Single European Act was a conveyor belt to federalism. Unanimity was its watchword, the European Court was its watchdog and the Commission its driving force. But the treaties of Maastricht have allowed some different thinking to emerge. There are pillars of co-operation outside the treaty now. Subsidiarity has been defined, although somewhat imperfectly. The jurisdiction of the European Court is now severely limited and opt-outs and opt-ins have, if not been blessed, at least been introduced and allowed.

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My right hon. Friend the Member for Chingford asks the vital question : is this structure watertight? I do not know the answer, although I do not believe that it is as waterlogged as he seems to think it is. There is at least some basis for saying that new structures have become possible. If these pillars of co-operation work well there will be some stirrings towards a different sort of Europe, a Europe which would not follow these blueprints which have caused us such anguish in the past few years.

Will this system work? What has been negotiated? Will the Western European Union start to be a significant force? Will law and order co-operation under the pillar outside the treaty of Rome start to function? Let us not forget the importance of the European-Atlantic alliance. The special relationship between Britain and the United States has been the cornerstone of our democratic values and suddenly to start, as the federalists want, to throw that out of the window is quite wrong. I am glad that that was stopped--at least I hope it was--by the continual references in the treaty to NATO and the Atlantic alliance.

Unlike my right hon. Friend the Member for Chingford, I shall go through the lobbies in support of the Government, for the following reasons. The first is common ground between us--the Prime Minister and his colleagues delivered a negotiating triumph, in the sense that they brought back more than they promised--

Mr. Tebbit : Less than was threatened.

Mr. Aitken : Indeed. It was a tactical success and a considerable achievement. Certain qualities of steel were required beside mere negotiating skills. Like Horatius, the Prime Minister held the bridge.

Was Maastricht a strategic success as well? On that, the jury is still out ; time alone will tell. What is certain is that the federalists will fight back, having suffered a reverse, not a defeat. The next phase of the battle in Europe as we approach the future of the common agricultural policy and of the budget will be between centralising federalists and flexible co- operators. At the moment, the flexible co-operating party is led by a party of one : Britain. It should not worry us that Britain stands alone ; we have a long and proud history of standing alone in Europe and of being proved right afterwards. There are signs, picked up by the right hon. Member for Leeds, East, that sentiment in Europe is changing. I can see a Europe with more co-operation between member states, less domination by the Commission, more a la carte dishes and more flexibility. None of these things seemed possible under the treaty of Rome and the Single European Act.

I am waiting for events to unfold, but if Europe goes the way that I have described this evening, as I think it may because of enlargement, and because of outside events such as Soviet developments, history will be grateful to the Horatius who held the bridge for long enough so that alternative plans and schemes could evolve. The ranks of Tuscany will cheer him then. This Euro-sceptic has enough faith in him to cheer him and to vote for him tonight. 7.49 pm

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