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Mr. Bercow: Does the hon. Gentleman believe that the parental leave directive will increase employment in Britain?
Mr. Rammell: In the longer run, it may well have an impact in attracting people back into the workplace, but I do not want to polarise the arguments artificially, as the hon. Gentleman is attempting to do. The parental leave directive, giving three months' unpaid leave, which the vast majority of people will not take up, because they will not want to forgo a quarter of a year's salary, is completely marginal in relation to the number of people who are taken on or made redundant in a workplace. That argument is fatuous.
The key issue of the social chapter was fundamentally and conclusively resolved in the general election. In any general election campaign and in any manifestos issued by political parties, there is a series of issues on which people vote; but some issues have added saliency, and people understand the clear division on them between the political parties. The social chapter was one such issue.
That was certainly my experience on the doorstep: people understood that the Conservative party had negotiated the opt-out and was there to protect it, and that if Labour was elected we would sign up to the social chapter. People voted overwhelmingly, in historic proportions, for that proposition. We should remember that in this debate.
Sometimes on the doorstep one comes across hostility to Europe and the European Union, but in seven years' campaigning I have yet to come across one person in my constituency who has said that he or she would not vote Labour because we wanted to sign up to the social chapter. The prominence that Conservative Members give to that issue is way beyond its recognition and understanding among the general public.
The issue is about bringing the country into the 20th century and taking it through to the 21st. People want minimum standards of fairness; they understand the need for flexibility, but they want the other side of the coin as well. If we can achieve minimum standards of fairness in employment through Europe, that is what people want us to do. That is why they want us to sign up to the social chapter.
Mr. Swayne:
I ask the hon. Member for Harlow (Mr. Rammell) to read the Official Report of yesterday's sitting; there he will read of the seriousness of his accusation, made in the Committee's first sitting, with respect to xenophobic rhetoric. I would not want to repeat that now.
Instead, I want to draw the Committee's attention to new clause 27. In many respects, it concerns one of the less controversial aspects of the treaty as a whole. Notwithstanding the fact that Conservative Members are wholly opposed to the social chapter and its implications, we accept that the British people were warned and, as the hon. Member for Harlow pointed out, gave the Government a mandate. New clause
27 recognises that. It would put into effect a means of monitoring the activity of the legislation and would enable us to pass resolutions on it.
When I went to Germany the summer before last, I arrived just after the Prime Minister--then the Leader of the Opposition--had addressed the German equivalent of the Confederation of British Industry. He was well received, but had he stayed to listen to the debate that followed his address, he would have been somewhat embarrassed, because business man after business man got up and asked for the same Thatcherite reforms for Germany that we had experienced in our labour markets in Britain: reforms which the right hon. Gentleman had voted against at every opportunity.
Mr. David Davis:
My hon. Friend is being too kind. The current Prime Minister was sitting in the front row when the head of the German CBI said that Britain, after 15 years of Tory reforms, was the best equipped country in Europe to face global competition.
Mr. Swayne:
I thank my right hon. Friend for that intervention. Our delegation had gone to Germany precisely to discuss with German business organisations and individual business men how they might achieve the same reduction in social legislation and social costs as we had. At every meeting, I asked the Germans how much they believed that their problems arose from their own internal legislation, and how much from the social chapter. We know the answer, because we know that at the time the social chapter consisted of only two elements; but they were completely unaware of, and had given no thought to, that question.
New clause 27 will prevent such an occurrence in this country. It is right and proper that businesses and the House should know the source from which such legislation arises, because the Government with their majority can implement whatever social protection they choose.
Many Labour Members have implied that we Conservatives are against social protection. It is not a question of being for or against social protection: the treaty that the Government have signed effectively raises the possibility of our having to implement social protection legislation of which we disapprove, and which we fear may generate unemployment.
The Government made their intention clear from the outset, and trailed their objective well in advance. In so doing, they failed to exact any price whatever for their concession. As a result, the concession has been pocketed and more has been and will be demanded by their partners. That was an act of unilateral disarmament which will cost this country dear.
Mr. Coaker:
It is interesting to be able to participate in the debate and comment on the amendments. In all the meetings of European Committees, in European Standing Committee B, and in this Committee, we start from the premise that we have one group, the Conservative party, that is by and large Euro-sceptical, and another, the Labour party, that is not Euro-fanatical but is determined to work within the European context to try to improve matters. It is important to set out that philosophical divide, because the arguments on both sides should be seen in that context.
There is a continual re-run of arguments that are almost about whether we should be in Europe in the first place and whether we should participate in anything European. The amendments are not constructive amendments, designed to improve Britain's position: they are wrecking amendments. They arise from a desire that Britain should take no part in the drive to improve European standards.
Why should our people be denied the minimum standards that are being given to other workers throughout Europe, and the employment and social policies that promote jobs and fairness in a European context? We all want a voice at the table, not isolationism. Without flexibility in the labour market throughout Europe, there is bound to be increased unemployment.
Why do Conservative Members appear to want to deny our work force the protection and rights at work, and the proper health and safety regulations, that are common to the rest of Europe? To try to achieve all those aims for our own workers and our own country would not be to abrogate our sovereignty to the rest of Europe; it would be a way of trying to assert our sovereignty.
Mr. Crispin Blunt (Reigate):
The hon. Gentleman should bear in mind the fact that we operate in a world market, not only a European market. If we give authority to Europe to decide those matters for us, we limit our ability to make decisions in our own interest so that we can trade in the world in the best possible way. We are a global trading nation, and global free trade should be our final objective, not tying ourselves into Europe. The danger is that we will tie ourselves into a fortress Europe. That is where the social and employment chapters are leading us.
Mr. Coaker:
I appreciate the hon. Gentleman's argument, but, as has been said, the Government recognise that we operate within a global economy. If we are part of a strong Europe we will achieve more than we would if we opted to be little Englanders, working within the confines of our nation state. As part of a European block and co-operating with one another, we will achieve more than by opting for the individualistic, narrow, nationalist road which the hon. Gentleman would prefer us to follow.
Mr. Robathan:
When the hon. Gentleman talks about what we can achieve, does he believe that we will gain the same employment prospects as those on continental Europe? After all, they are not very good. I was in the House when we debated the Maastricht treaty and I saw the same starry-eyed optimism among Members then, but I must say that most of them are now rather disillusioned.
Mr. Coaker:
I cannot speak for those individuals, but I am certainly not disillusioned or a starry-eyed optimist. I am a realist and, in my view, the employment prospects of our people and those across Europe will be better served by co-operating at a Europewide level rather than by taking a narrow nationalist view.
8 pm
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