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6.54 pm
Mr. Jimmy Hood (Clydesdale): As Chairman of the Select Committee on European Legislation, I welcome this debate. Although there has not been much mention of our report so far, I am sure that the Minister would like to say a few things when he replies to the debate.
In my brief contribution I hope to be as pragmatic as usual. I am tempted to deal with some of the issues that have been raised in earlier contributions, but I feel that it would be more helpful if I confine my remarks strictly to the report. That may provide more emphasis for the issues that we have addressed during our inquiries.
I want to thank my Committee and its staff for the work that they have put into preparing the report. My Committee has 16 members--nine Government members and seven Opposition members. There is a wide range of views, from that of the Euro-sceptics to that of the Euro-fanatics and the Euro-agnostics--of course I am referring only to Government members when I say that. In spite of that wide range of views, there has been tremendous co-operation during our work and during preparation for the publication of our findings, and I should like to record my appreciation for the excellent work carried out by my colleagues.
It is important that we recognise the tremendous work of our staff, including the clerks, advisers, and the secretariat. It is not usual to name individuals, but I want to mention my senior clerk, Robert Rogers, whose expertise in European legislation has no equal. Our findings owe a great deal to his valuable contribution. I record my appreciation for the work carried out by Robert.
The debate comes at an opportune time and I hope that it will help to meet the great need to involve more parliamentarians in the scrutiny process and/or educate right hon. and hon. Members on how best they can contribute to and involve themselves in that process.
Democracy and transparency will be the two key themes of the 1996 IGC. How do we make the European Union more responsive to its citizens and how do we make it more understandable and accessible? The Select Committee's report, which is before the House today, shows just how bad things are. Part IV reveals a litany of failure. For example, it shows how European legislation appears to be made in a private club and how the Council is prepared to discuss laws on the basis of an unofficial text, which would be unthinkable in our national Parliaments. It shows how translation and transmission delays often mean that proposals arrive in national Parliaments after laws have been approved. It shows how, time and again, the Commission fails to meet deadlines for the production of proposals and how proper discussion in member states is prevented. It shows how important matters appear on the agenda of the Council of Ministers at the last moment. It shows how documents travel not by e-mail but by snail mail, because there is no proper electronic transfer system that links the European institutions and all the national Governments and Parliaments. On a day when a probe from the earth has reached Jupiter, surely that is not too much to ask.
What about the jargon and the Euro-speak? I think of them as the dry rot of the European Union, because they can ruin any idea, no matter how good, and any proposal, no matter how sound. As we say in our report:
Our report is uncompromising on all those issues because we do not believe that there is room for compromise where the interests of the people of this country are so fundamentally affected. I am delighted to say that our views have been widely endorsed. We sent our report to every Parliament, to every European Affairs Committee and to every Foreign Minister in the Union. Last month, at a meeting of all the European Affairs Committees in Madrid, there was widespread support for both our criticisms and our proposals.
I want to pick up on a key recommendation. We see national Parliaments as a focus for democratic legitimacy in the Union. Without their full involvement and consultation, the Union would lose its way. We suggest that there should be a minimum period of four weeks between any proposal with legislative implications arriving in every national Parliament--in the correct language and in an official text--and that proposal being considered by the Council. Let us try to bring some sanity and order to the way that Europe does its business.
It may surprise the Minister, but I want to compliment the Government. The Minister took our four-week proposal to the reflections group; he argued for it and the group endorsed it. It is clear from my conversations with Carlos Westendorp, the able chairman of the group, and from the group's final report, that the importance of orderly decision making, proper information and the role of national Parliaments are well understood by the group. I hope that they will also be well understood by the IGC.
The Minister may think that Christmas has come three weeks early, but I want to say two other nice things about the Government. First, I thank them for arranging this
debate today. It will not, of course, clear the five documents that we have recommended for debate, because this is only an Adjournment debate. However, there will be a further debate in European Standing Committee B after Christmas. That will also be a good opportunity to consider the outcome of the Madrid European Council.
Secondly, I thank the Minister for the Government's constructive reply to our report. It shows a real appreciation of the problems and, I hope, a real willingness to tackle them. The Government have asked for further views from my Committee on a number of aspects and we hope to respond soon.
However, I must sound a warning. The problems are not to be solved by rhetoric. When the Maastricht treaty was being negotiated, somebody must have said--it was probably in the middle of the night--"Hang on a minute, what about national Parliaments? Will not they feel left out?" So the national Governments stuck on to the Maastricht treaty a declaration on the role of national Parliaments. It sounds wonderful. It states:
In fact, as our report shows, that turned out to be a sham. The declaration is routinely ignored by the very Governments who agreed it so solemnly. High-flown commitments, intentions and undertakings will no longer do. Better ways of doing business must be legally enforceable and must give national Parliaments their full and proper role.
I hope that the House will forgive me if I end with a short advertisement for the Committee that I have the honour to chair. Some hon. Members are critical of our European scrutiny system, although I suspect that most of them do not read the reports that they criticise. I am not sure that many of them attend the Standing Committees; certainly, not many of them have attended tonight's debate.
The House of Commons Select Committee on European Legislation examines well over 1,000 documents a year. It assesses their legal and political importance, their financial implications, their likely effects on British interests, how well they are drafted, whether they are consistent with other Union policies, and so on. We are in constant dialogue with Government Departments to get the information that we need and we try to ensure that the Departments observe their obligations to this House. We co-operate closely with our sister Committee in the other place. We produce a report virtually every week that the House sits and we report substantively on more than 400 documents each year. Those reports are key sources of information for both hon. Members and their constituents. I hope that that will be the case with our IGC report and its extensive glossary.
We recommend 70 or 80 documents for debate every year, but it often appears that the excellent system of European Standing Committees, in which Ministers can be questioned for an hour on their policy on a particular European proposal and then have that policy debated, is greatly underused. Some hon. Members might not realise that any hon. Member can attend and speak in any European Standing Committee. We often say that our parliamentary opportunities are limited, but I have just referred to one that is definitely underused.
My Committee is continuing with the next stage of our work that relates to the IGC. We will be looking at the effectiveness of the European scrutiny system in the House and determining what improvements can be made. I hope that hon. Members on both sides of the House will feel free to tell us their ideas.
"If the Union is to move closer to the citizen, then it must speak in a language that the citizen recognises as his or her own."
"The Governments of the Member States will ensure that National Parliaments receive Commission proposals for legislation in good time for information or possible examination."
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