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Mr. Robert G. Hughes: Will the hon Gentleman give way?
Mr. Cook: I will give way to the hon. Gentleman and then I must move towards my close.
Mr. Hughes: The hon. Gentleman has talked about qualified majority voting and about the social chapter. Will he confirm that under QMV it is absolutely impossible to pick and choose what will be put into practice and what will not?
Mr. Cook: If the hon. Gentleman looks at what has been said in the reflection group, to which the Minister of State, Foreign and Commonwealth Office, the hon. Member for Boothferry (Mr. Davis) has signed up, he will see that it rejects the idea of an o la carte Europe. Not only that, many of his other hon. Friends have previously rejected it. The words "pick and choose" were derided in a book six years ago by a very distinguished member of the Government who is now the Deputy Prime Minister and First Secretary of State. He made it plain then that we could not have a pick-and-choose Europe. The reason why it is impossible for the Government to find allies when faced with
something that they do not want is precisely because the rest of Europe knows that the Government's approach is on a purely pick-and-choose basis.
Several hon. Members rose--
Mr. Cook:
I shall not give way as I must proceed. I want to ensure that I cover the remarks of the hon. Member for South Derbyshire (Mrs. Currie) before I conclude.
The other point that the Secretary of State is fond of making is that we can proceed by a trade arrangement with other countries that will provide us with an alternative to Europe. Indeed, the right hon. and learned Gentleman is fond of parading a commitment to the transatlantic free trade area. [Hon. Members:"Hear, hear."] The hon. Members who have just shouted and the Secretary of State know perfectly well that the route to a transatlantic free trade area lies through Brussels. We may well have a special understanding with America, but it does not want Britain to have less influence in Europe. The United States wants a Britain that is part of Europe and can provide a role in Europe.
On last week's "On the Record" a spokesman from the state department said:
There was a time when Ministers would not have waited for that message to be made by the Opposition, but would have been prepared to tell that truth to their Back Benchers. It is a curious feature of Ministers that they have the courage to be isolated in Brussels, but that courage appears to evaporate between Calais and Dover and they show no such boldness in talking about the reality of Britain's need for allies when they confront their Back Benchers. They are prepared to isolate Britain in Europe, but not prepared to isolate themselves in the Conservative party.
Mr. Michael Colvin (Romsey and Waterside):
Will the hon. Gentleman give way?
Those Ministers know that the process of isolation on which they have embarked does not match up to the need for co-operation in the modern world. They know that the majority of British exports go to the continent. The Confederation of British Industry has recorded by a majority of three out of five in its recent survey that the recent statements by the Government have been unhelpful in promoting business interests in Europe, our majority market.
Those Ministers know that we cannot protect our environment by concentrating only on national measures: they know that we have to work in co-operation with our partners in Europe. They also know that the most positive development in international politics, both inside and outside Europe, has been the growth in democracy and, with it, the parallel demand for proper human rights. But, at that very moment, voices from the Conservative Back
Benches suggest that Britain should withdraw from the European Court of Human Rights although Britain helped to create it. In Britain, some quarters of the Tory party no longer want to live by the standards of that court.
Mr. Butterfill:
I am sure that the hon. Gentleman is aware that the European Court of Human Rights is not an institution of the European Community, but the function of a separate treaty which, to our eternal regret, a Labour Government sponsored.
Mr. Cook:
Absolutely. My case--I am not sure whether the hon. Gentleman entirely apprehended it--is that we support the European Court of Human Rights. Conservative spokesmen are arguing the case for decoupling from it.
It has not always been so--there was a time when current senior members of the Government would have argued with Conservative Back Benchers who argue for isolation. I do not know where the Deputy Prime Minister is today, but I know that we never hear those views argued from the Dispatch Box, nor did we hear them from the Foreign Secretary today. If we hear them at all, it is occasionally from voices such as the hon. Member for South Derbyshire and other Tory Back Benchers who know that it is foolish to boast that we must be successful if we are isolated.
Those Conservative Members know that we cannot make a success of our membership of the European Union if we constantly talk as though we wanted it to be a failure. They know that if we have pride and a sense of national identity we need not express it in hostility to the ambitions of other countries and contempt for their politicians--[Hon. Members: "Soundbite politics."] With the greatest respect, I think that I have been speaking for longer than a soundbite. Those Conservative Members know that the Euro-sceptics in the Tory party are the tail wagging the dog. They know that they are a minority, even in a Tory party which itself has only a bare majority in Parliament.
There is a majority in the House for constructive engagement in Europe. There will be no vote tonight-- there has been no vote on most nights this week and there will be no vote on most nights next week, as the Government trickle out the most threadbare programme that I have seen in any parliamentary Session in my 22 years in the House. But we shall not complete the year of the intergovernmental conference without a vote on Europe.
Sir Edward Heath (Old Bexley and Sidcup):
I am grateful for the opportunity to make a brief speech in this debate.
I ask my right hon. and learned Friend the Foreign Secretary and, through him, the Prime Minister in no circumstances to make a statement on the position of the British Government before the conference next summer. I have had many experiences of international negotiations and five years of negotiating in Europe. It is impossible for any Prime Minister or leader to lay down beforehand what he must get from negotiation.
In this Parliament, we have long had a tradition, which has been broken occasionally in recent years, that the Prime Minister and the Government decide what they are going to negotiate and what will or will not be acceptable. Having made their judgment and negotiated, they come back to both Houses for their approval. If we do not approve, that is the end of the Government.
I beg the Foreign Secretary and the Prime Minister not to make statements at any time before the negotiations, however much they are provoked, about their intentions.
Mr. Cash:
Will my right hon. Friend give way?
Sir Edward Heath:
No, I must be brief.
The House and the present members of the European Union know that the first six members had an enormous advantage because, in each country, every political party supported membership. As the number of members increased--it is now 15--in all countries except one, Britain, all parties supported membership. One country that wanted to join was Norway, but it did not have three-party support for membership. It held a referendum, and the Government who had negotiated lost.
I believe that our position can be consolidated for the first time--if we go the right way about it. All three major parties will be agreed about our membership of the European Union. That is essential, because Britain has no future outside the European Union. The statement of an American spokesman just quoted by the hon. Member for Livingston (Mr. Cook) shows that very clearly, and those of us who have had discussions with the leaders of the other members of the Union, and with Americans, know it vividly. Before that statement, President Clinton had announced that he was not interested in a transatlantic free trade area.
I must tell my right hon. and learned Friend the Foreign Secretary, whom I greatly admire, that I wish he had not started his first speech as Foreign Secretary by asking for a transatlantic free trade area. The first reason is that the Americans are not interested--they have enough to do to sort out the North American Free Trade Area, especially with Mexico's problems. Secondly, the Americans do not want a transatlantic free trade area, and Europe knows that they do not. Thirdly, from our point of view, his speech made Europe think immediately that we are again trying to ride two horses--that we are not really wholehearted about Europe and that we want to be able to play both sides of the Atlantic together. That is damaging to us.
"We would regret a lessening of Britain's power in Europe. Our own dealings with Britain would be less relevant, less vital if Britain's own role was diminished."
Our relationship with the United States and any of the other great powers outside Europe will be determined by how influential we are inside Europe. It is not a formula for success with the rest of the world to be as rude as possible to our immediate neighbours.
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