Letter to The Rt Hon Lord Roper, Chairman
of the Select Committee on the European Union, House of Lords,
from Mr David Lidington MP, Minister for Europe, Foreign and Commonwealth
Office
Thank you for your positive and proactive engagement
in our recent meetings on how inter-parliamentary oversight of
the EU Common Security and Defence Policy (CSDP) should be structured
once the Western European Union Assembly is wound up.
I welcome your draft constitution and judge it provides
a good basis for parliamentary discussion. In particular, I support
your proposals that the new structure should add value to national
scrutiny systems and that costs are borne by the "troika"
parliaments. I also welcome that third states, such as EU candidate
countries, will have a standing invitation. Given their important
and valuable role in CSDP and the key partnership between the
EU and NATO on security matters, I strongly believe that other
countries—notably Norway—but also other non-EU European
NATO members should be invited as a matter of course.
The date for closing the WEU Assembly, 30 June 2011,
is fast approaching. I believe we share concerns that the European
Parliament's influence may increase if there are no arrangements
for inter-parliamentary debate in place by then. I therefore urge
that the necessary arrangements between EU national parliaments
and the European Parliament to decide on the new body be taken
forward as a matter of some urgency, especially considering the
potential difficulty in reaching an agreed arrangement at 27 plus
the European Parliament. Understanding that it is for parliaments
to drive this process, I am happy to consider ways I could expedite
this process.
I am copying this letter to William Cash MP (Chair
of the House of Commons European Scrutiny Committee), the Foreign
Affairs Committee, the Defence Committee, Robert Walter MP, Alistair
Doherty (Clerk to the Commons Committee), Les Saunders (Cabinet
Office), Sarah Winter (Departmental Scrutiny Co-ordinator), Richard
Everingham and David Beeney (Select Committee Liaison Officers).
29 November 2010
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