EU Citizenship

The Committee consisted of the following Members:

Chair: Mr Jim Hood 

† Bryant, Chris (Rhondda) (Lab) 

† Fabricant, Michael (Lord Commissioner of Her Majesty's Treasury)  

† Graham, Richard (Gloucester) (Con) 

† Green, Damian (Minister for Immigration)  

† Hendrick, Mark (Preston) (Lab/Co-op) 

† Hopkins, Kelvin (Luton North) (Lab) 

† Horwood, Martin (Cheltenham) (LD) 

† Lidington, Mr David (Minister for Europe)  

Paisley, Ian (North Antrim) (DUP) 

† Rees-Mogg, Jacob (North East Somerset) (Con) 

† Reynolds, Emma (Wolverhampton North East) (Lab) 

† Roy, Mr Frank (Motherwell and Wishaw) (Lab) 

† Stewart, Rory (Penrith and The Border) (Con) 

Alison Groves, Committee Clerk

† attended the Committee

The following also attended, pursuant to Standing Order No. 119(6):

Rutley, David (Macclesfield) (Con) 

European Committee B 

Monday 5 March 2012  

[Mr Jim Hood in the Chair] 

EU Citizenship 

4.30 pm 

The Chair:  Does a member of the European Scrutiny Committee wish to make a statement? 

Kelvin Hopkins (Luton North) (Lab):  It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Hood. You were Chair of the European Scrutiny Committee for many years, so I am sure you will be interested in the debate. 

It might be helpful for the Committee if I take a few minutes to explain the background to the documents and why the European Scrutiny Committee recommended them for debate. All the documents deal with different aspects of EU citizenship. The concept of EU citizenship was introduced by the Maastricht treaty in 1993. All nationals of EU member states are also citizens of the European Union. The EU treaties give EU citizens a specific set of EU citizenship rights, which supplement the rights and duties each EU citizen has or owes by virtue of his or her nationality. The next paragraph, Mr Hood, contains lengthy quotes from Mr Barroso. I emphasise they are not my words, but his. 

The President of the European Commission, Mr Barroso, published a set of political guidelines at the beginning of his second term of office in September 2009 that emphasised the need to revitalise 

“the link between the peoples of Europe and the EU (to) make it both more legitimate and more effective”. 

He said that would mean 

“empowering citizens to be involved in decisions affecting their lives” 

and 

“that the rights of European citizens must have real effect: citizens…should not find that they still face obstacles when they move across borders within the EU…They should be able to make use of their rights as EU citizens in the same way as they use their rights as national citizens.” 

Because one of the fundamental rights associated with EU citizenship is the right to move freely within the EU, any obstacle to free movement, provided it falls within an area where the EU has competence to act, is a potential justification for EU action. In document A—the EU Citizenship report 2010—the Commission identifies 25 obstacles, which, it says, EU citizens commonly encounter when living, working or studying in another member state, buying or inheriting property, voting, or just shopping online. In many cases, the Commission says it is sufficient simply to raise citizens’ awareness of the rights they already enjoy and to be more vigilant in ensuring that those rights can be enforced. 

However, the Commission also contemplates further EU legislative measures, notably in civil and criminal law and consumer rights. For example, it says that EU laws are needed to ensure that suspects or defendants in criminal proceedings have access to a lawyer, or to improve the protection of victims of crime. It also says that EU laws are needed to facilitate the free circulation of civil status documents, such as birth certificates. 

The subject is dealt with in much greater detail in document D—a Commission green paper—which seeks to cut the cost and bureaucracy involved when EU citizens who move to another member state are required to authenticate various types of public documents issued for official purposes in their member state of origin. It also contains some potentially far-reaching ideas for ensuring that a legal situation affecting civil status in one member state—for example, the parentage of a child as recorded on a birth certificate, a divorce, a civil partnership agreement, or a sex change—would also be recognised in other member states. 

The Commission says that 

“it should be possible to guarantee the continuity and permanence of a civil status situation to all European citizens exercising their right of free movement”. 

In theory, perhaps, but in practice member states’ laws on matters such as divorce, adoption, civil partnerships and other matters affecting civil status vary considerably, as do social attitudes. 

Document B concerns another aspect of EU citizenship rights. It looks at turnout and participation in the 2009 European Parliament elections and says that many EU citizens who move to another member state choose not to vote there or continue to vote in their member state of origin. Few have chosen to exercise their right to stand as a candidate for election to the European Parliament in their member state of residence. The Commission highlights practical obstacles in some member states that make it difficult for citizens who are not nationals to join or found political parties. It also suggests ways to make it easier for EU citizens who have moved to another member state to vote or stand as a candidate. For example, the Commission says that out-of-country voting facilities could be introduced to enable expatriate voters to vote for a party list in their member state of origin, and suggests that removing the requirement for candidates to make a financial deposit might encourage more EU citizens or smaller parties to stand. 

The European Scrutiny Committee thought that the documents merited debate for two reasons. First, they provide a broad overview of the rights associated with EU citizenship. Secondly, they illustrate how those rights cut across a large number of policy areas and potentially have significant implications for domestic UK policies and laws. The Committee agreed with the view expressed by the Minister for Europe in his explanatory memorandum that the actions proposed by the Commission, especially in its 2010 EU citizenship report, but also in the green paper

“touch on important matters of public interest” 

and was happy to take up this invitation to recommend a debate. Perhaps— 

The Chair:  Order. Your five minutes are up. I understand that we have two Ministers who are sharing the 10 minutes maximum. 

4.35 pm 

The Minister for Europe (Mr David Lidington):  First, may I welcome the debate under your chairmanship, Mr Hood? You have long experience of European matters and scrutiny issues. My hon. Friend the Minister for Immigration is present to cover in particular the

Commission’s green paper on the free movement of public documents and a recognition of the effects of civil status documents. 

The Citizenship report covers no fewer than 25 action points which address a range of measures to tackle perceived obstacles to citizenship rights. These are the responsibility of a very large number of Departments and I will ensure that I put into the Library a list of those 25 action points indicating which Department has the lead responsibility for each. 

I should also like to express apologies to the Committee that such a long time has passed since these documents were referred for debate, but for the reasons to which I have just alluded, it has proved difficult to establish which part of Government is best equipped to address the very broad reach of this report. The Foreign and Commonwealth Office has responsibility for one of these points—consular affairs—and I am sure that the respective Departments will be the best source of information on the details of individual policies as those are taken forward by the Commission and the other institutions. 

It may be helpful to outline the treaty’s provisions on citizenship upon which the report’s suggestions are premised. Article 20 of the treaty on the functioning of the European Union states that citizenship of the European Union is additional to and does not replace national citizenship. That is a crucial point. I hope it goes some way to allay concerns that European citizenship is an attempt to supplant national citizenship. There are certain core rights associated with EU citizenship, including the right to move and reside freely within the European Union; the right to participate in municipal and European elections; the right to seek consular assistance outside the EU from the authorities of other EU states on the same terms as those state’s nationals if one’s own state does not have a diplomatic presence; and the right to petition the European Parliament and to approach the European ombudsman. 

The broad scope of the citizenship report may give rise to some confusion about whether altogether new rights are being proposed. This is not the case. The Government believe that the report has three principal objectives: to enforce existing rights; to eliminate unnecessary complications that impede the enjoyment of these rights, and raising public awareness. Although the report has been published under the banner of “Citizenship”, many of the action points in the list of 25 are about the effective functioning of the single market, and the Government’s commitment to the single market has always been clear. 

As the Scrutiny Committee rightly pointed out in its report, many of these action points are not new initiatives; rather, the report is an attempt to pull together several policy areas in what the Commission describes as a horizontal approach to the concept of European citizenship. I remind the Committee that the Government have committed not to transfer any further power or competence from the United Kingdom to the European Union during this Parliament. We believe that the most effective way forward is to address each action point individually to ensure that any proposals are proportionate, effective and offer value for money. That means that the Scrutiny Committee will be able to examine each concrete proposal on its own merits. 

I should also like to mention briefly the report on the 2009 elections to the European Parliament. The Government agree that participation in European parliamentary elections is important and we note with interest the proposals from the European Commission and the European Parliament on this front. However, clearly, as the Scrutiny Committee notes, these proposals would have significant implications for UK electoral law. If the proposals were implemented, they would need to be carefully considered, and we would want to ensure that any changes respect member states’ different electoral traditions and practices.

I am grateful for the opportunity to debate the reports. The Government have a robust view of European citizenship and will be vigorous in ensuring that the competences of member states are respected. We believe that any future measures must be necessary, proportionate, achieve their objectives and represent good value for money. 

4.40 pm 

The Minister for Immigration (Damian Green):  Thank you, Mr Hood, for this opportunity to be the back end of the pantomime horse. 

I am responsible for civil registration in England and Wales, and I responded to the EU green paper on the Government’s behalf. As the Committee may know, civil registration is a devolved matter to the Administrations in Scotland and Northern Ireland, and my written response to the green paper was collated in consultation with those jurisdictions. 

The green paper focuses heavily on reducing bureaucracy for citizens and the associated benefits. We support those outcomes, but the green paper makes little reference to identity and fraud prevention issues and does not consider the potential capacity, cost and legislative implications of introducing change in the suggested areas. We need further analysis of the issues to confirm the need for change and provide evidence on the benefits of any proposed change. Greater clarity is also required on the breadth of documents that fall within the description of civil status records. 

We are keen to support activities that promote freedom of travel and provide individual citizens with access to relevant services. Such access, however, has to be secure and achieve the right balance between public protection and the rights of the citizen. In the absence of further analysis, the Government consider that the issues raised should be addressed through sharing best practice, providing information to citizens, closer co-operation between member states and the introduction of standard forms, where applicable, for specific civil registration events. Further detail is required on the proposals and there needs to be more detailed consideration of spreading good practice and adopting more efficient ways of working. 

The Chair:  We have until 5.30 for questions to the Ministers. I remind Members that questions should be brief. It is open to Members, subject to my discretion, to ask related supplementary questions. 

Emma Reynolds (Wolverhampton North East) (Lab):  It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Hood. I welcome this opportunity to discuss the various European Union documents on citizenship, even if, as they date from 2010, some seem a little old. 

We welcome the objective of bringing down barriers in the single market and the digital economy, which were also mentioned at last week’s European Council summit. One of the many reasons why consumers are put off purchasing goods online is that they do not have the confidence that, if something goes wrong, their problems will be addressed. The Government have stated that they will develop policy in advance of the Commission’s legislative measures on alternative dispute resolution. Will the Minister clarify what policy is being developed? 

Page 16 of the EU Citizenship report, which dates from 2010, refers to a scenario in which a Greek citizen moves to Germany and complains about the length of time required to determine which country should grant child benefits. Will the Minister tell us whether the Government will feed in the common-sense solution that child benefit should be paid by the country in which the children reside and that there should be a qualifying period for such payments? I am not being party political, because that is something with which we struggled in government. People rightly think it unfair that a migrant who comes to one country may send child benefit back to their country of origin if the child resides there. Are the Government taking this opportunity, while those issues are being discussed, to consider that anomaly? Do they think a solution might be forthcoming? 

The Chair:  Although those questions were certainly in order, they were not as brief as I expected. I am sure that questions will get briefer as the sitting proceeds. 

Mr Lidington:  I will address those questions in sequence. 

The Commission published a legislative package on alternative dispute resolution last November. That is currently being scrutinised by the European Scrutiny Committee, which has asked for further information from officials and Ministers at the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills, and I do not want to pre-empt the evidence that they may give. The Government have concerns, however, that the Commission’s current proposals are unlikely to deliver the benefits claimed, because there are no measures to ensure the greater use of the alternative dispute resolution. We are also concerned at the wide scope of the ADR proposals. We will be arguing that it should be restricted to disputes between consumers and business that relate to online cross-border transactions. That is where we consider the greatest potential benefit to consumers to be.

The hon. Lady tempts me on the question of eligibility for child benefit and other social security benefits, but I will simply say that my right hon. Friend the Member for Epsom and Ewell (Chris Grayling), as the Minister with direct responsibility for this policy area, is currently extremely active in engaging with the Commission and with his counterparts in other member states. There is an acceptance by the Governments of many member states that the relationship between the freedom to travel in order to work, which we all support, and the question of eligibility for benefits needs to be resolved in a way that does not lead to a perverse incentive for what amounts to welfare tourism. 

Jacob Rees-Mogg (North East Somerset) (Con):  It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Hood. 

I direct my first question to my right hon. Friend the Minister for Europe. On page 13 of the documentation, it states: 

“As the Court of Justice of the European Union has stated on several occasions, EU citizenship is destined to be the fundamental status of Member States’ nationals”. 

I assume, from what my right hon. Friend said in his opening remarks, that Her Majesty’s Government is opposed to that and will ensure that being a subject of Her Majesty is the primary status of people residing in the United Kingdom. 

Mr Lidington:  It is important that we look at the ECJ’s view in context. In the cases that the Court was considering, the phrase about the fundamental status of EU citizenship was defined as meaning that 

“those who find themselves in the same situation to enjoy within the scope of the Treaty”— 

that is the key phrase— 

“the same treatment in law irrespective of their nationality.” 

The scope of the treaty is of critical importance, because the treaty states that citizenship of the European Union is additional to and does not replace national citizenship. I can assure my hon. Friend that the Government will be extremely vigilant and watch out for any instance of the institutions, whether the Court or the Commission, seeking to push the boundaries of EU citizenship beyond what we believe the treaty currently covers. We will do everything we can to resist such attempts. 

Jacob Rees-Mogg:  My concern is that the Court ruled that people are entitled to reside in another member state purely as citizens of the European Union. It seems to me that someone cannot be a citizen of the European Union without being a citizen of a member state. The Court is therefore trying to create rights for people within the European Union irrespective of their citizenship of a member state. That is an attack on us as British subjects. 

Mr Lidington:  I am willing to take some legal advice on that point and write to my hon. Friend with more detail, but I will say now that the phrase in the treaties to which I referred earlier, about EU citizenship being additional to national citizenship, indicates that EU citizenship is dependent on the individual first having citizenship of one of the member states. I hope that that reassures my hon. Friend. 

Kelvin Hopkins:  I have a couple of questions arising from the last paragraph of the statement, which I do not have time to read out, so I hope that is acceptable. Given that the documents were recommended for debate at the beginning of last year, will the Minister explain why it has taken more than a year to arrange this debate and provide an update on developments? 

Mr Lidington:  As I mentioned briefly in my opening remarks, a large number of Departments cover the 25 different initiatives mentioned in the Commission’s report, and when the report came out, it was not immediately apparent which Department had parentage of any of those. That has now been clearly established,

and I will place a list of those Departments in the Library so that further inquiries can be directed at the right quarter. 

Kelvin Hopkins:  In effect, the Minister has answered my second question, but I shall put it on record if I may. Will he assure us that systems have been introduced across Government to ensure that cross-cutting policy documents such as these, which concern different aspects of EU citizenship, can be handled expeditiously, so that similar delays in arranging a debate do not occur again? 

Mr Lidington:  The hon. Gentleman makes a reasonable point, with his customary courtesy. What happened in this case was far from ideal. I would not want to see that replicated in future and will do my best to ensure that it is not. Sometimes, however, when we receive a document from the Commission, it is not immediately apparent which Department or combination of Departments will have the lead role in relation to it. One sometimes has to look behind generally phrased language to work that out. Needless to say, the responsibility of individual commissions and directorates-general does not mirror exactly the allocation of responsibilities among Departments in this country. 

Kelvin Hopkins:  We are all too familiar with the difficulties of understanding precisely what the Commission’s language means. The Minister has, effectively, already implied this, but in those cases where the UK opt-in applies, the Committee is particularly interested to hear whether the UK has chosen to opt in or is likely to do so in future. 

Mr Lidington:  I will defer to my hon. Friend the Minister for Immigration in matters of Home Office responsibility, but I can comment on two cases. In terms of action point 4, which concerns minimum European standards for the 

“protection of persons suspected and accused in criminal proceedings”, 

the Government decided not to opt in at the start of the negotiations on the directive, which was about access to a lawyer in criminal proceedings and the right to communicate on arrest. It was a more narrowly defined area of activity than that which could have been covered by the green paper’s broad heading. We agreed that such a directive a good idea in principle and that it might benefit UK nationals who became subject to the criminal justice system in other member states. However, a number of the provisions in the Commission’s proposal went beyond the requirements in the European convention on human rights. We judged that those provisions would have had an adverse impact on our ability to investigate and prosecute offences effectively and fairly. We are trying to work with our partners to see whether the final version of that directive could be negotiated into a form where we felt able to opt in. We will, of course, consult Parliament about any hypothetical future decision to opt into the final text. 

The Ministry of Justice has the lead again on action point 5, which provides for the Commission to 

“improve the protection of victims of crime”. 

In May 2011, the Commission published the proposed directive on establishing minimum standards on the rights, support and protection of victims of crime to replace an earlier framework decision dating from 2001.

The Government decided to opt into that directive. A general approach was agreed at the Justice and Home Affairs Council on 14 December 2011. Both Scrutiny Committees agreed with the Government’s decision to opt in, and the House of Commons debated the proposal on the Floor of the House on a take-note motion during 2011. The directive is currently under consideration by the European Parliament. 

Martin Horwood (Cheltenham) (LD):  It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Hood. I have four questions. First, do the Ministers agree with me that it was rather tactless of the Commission to entitle the documents “European Citizenship”, given that they do not fundamentally change or develop the European citizenship concept, which, as has been pointed out, is defined in treaty? This is actually more about European citizens’ rights and, as the Minister for Europe said, reducing burdens and obstacles to the exercise of rights and of the single market. 

Secondly, and more substantially, the documents contain recommendations about the movement towards telemedicine and the sharing of medical data, which has been a rather contentious issue in this country, with the development of NHS databases becoming something of a political football. However, the sharing of at least a minimal level of basic medical information between different health systems is potentially incredibly important, and, if technical language is used, it actually helps to overcome some of the language barriers, which can, in certain circumstances, pose a real risk for Britons seeking medical treatment abroad. I want to hear the Minister’s views on the inter-operability of medical data and to support moves in that direction, especially given, as the report points out, the general move towards telemedicine in various member states. 

Thirdly, I want to raise the issue of civil status documents. When it comes to property rights and, if things go badly, access to children and so on, it is important that European citizens know which laws apply to which kinds of civil status in different jurisdictions. Ironing out and trying to rationalise differences is actually a good thing that might protect people’s rights and prevent costly litigation and disputes. The Government’s response to that seems a little cool, and I want an explanation from the Ministers as to why that might be. 

My final point is on the strange area of promoting European citizenship, which seems to be a good idea in one sense in terms of the promotion of people’s awareness of their rights, but then we have proposals such as the European Year of Citizens and what looks like a PR budget for promoting European citizenship. Do the Ministers agree that the ways in which European citizenship will develop will actually be determined by their coverage in national media? Encouraging coverage of European decision making and European Parliament debates at a national level, rather than misguided and probably slightly wasteful EU-level PR initiatives, will lead to that transformation in awareness. 

The Chair:  Again, the questions were in order, but too long. 

Mr Lidington:  I will answer some of my hon. Friend’s questions as best I can, and my hon. Friend the Minister for Immigration will deal with the questions on civil status and the European Year of Citizens. 

Was the Commission tactless? What is undoubtedly the case is that if one looks at the list of 25 action points, one will find several that are much more about single market matters than citizenship. Cross-border health care, protection for consumers buying package travel, common rights for passengers, increasing consumer confidence in tourism products, and the code of EU online rights all seem to be single market measures. The Commission’s paper argues that its points on the registration of cars, too, are driven—no pun intended—by a wish to complete the single market. 

On telehealth, we are working actively with the EU to promote cross-border health care and to provide online access to information about health care. The work going on in the EU is in line with our domestic priorities to develop this area of health information, and how that would be applied in terms of our national policy will be set out later this year by the Department of Health in a health care information strategy for England. As with any EU initiative, we would want to ensure not only value for money, but also that there is a proper impact assessment and that the targets, in terms of both time and content, are deliverable. We do not want to sign up to some great plan that proves to be a fiasco because nobody can make it work in practice. Work is already being done on a voluntary e-health network connecting member state health authorities, and on a member state-led project on e-health governance to make stronger links between online health information and wider health policy. A lot is going on already at the European level that complements what we are doing nationally, which will give genuine benefit to British people. 

On media and PR, all such things have to be judged on the basis of whether they are genuinely worth while and whether they provide value for money at a time when the EU ought to be reducing and limiting its budget, not looking for extra things on which to spend the money of taxpayers throughout Europe whose national Governments are having to cut back severely. The British Government believe strongly that the media should be free, and not financed by or run on behalf of Governments or supranational Government institutions. 

Damian Green:  I believe a couple of those questions were for me. My hon. Friend the Member for Cheltenham asked why the Government were cool towards the idea of civil status documents; he could see the convenience for citizens. The overall answer is that the idea has a faint air of a solution looking for a problem. The green paper does not offer any indication of the scale of the problems encountered by citizens who have to register some kind of civil event, or prove that something has happened, in another country. We would be interested to see the evidence behind the scale of the problem before making changes that might be far-reaching for a number of countries, because member states have different legal systems and different systems of civil registration. Automatic recognition of the effect of civil status records, for example, which seems on the surface to be a fairly simple idea, would require significant changes to the laws of different member states and convergences in many aspects of legislation related to each civil status event. That would be particularly significant in respect

of civil marriage, adoption or gender recognition. A lot more detailed work would be required before the British Government would want to sign up to such a proposition, although, as my hon. Friend said, it seems attractive in general terms. 

My hon. Friend the Member for Cheltenham mentioned the European Year of Citizens, and overall we welcome the proposal. Raising awareness of citizens’ rights is clearly a good thing, but it is always important to put those rights in context and to balance them against the associated responsibilities and conditions. We have made it clear that the scope of the proposal should be limited to the initiatives that the Commission puts forward, and that member states should be able to decide their own level of involvement in the year, respecting their national judgments, processes and requirements. 

Chris Bryant (Rhondda) (Lab):  I, too, am delighted to be serving under your chairmanship, Mr Hood. May I just push back on the Minister’s argument about why it has taken us so long to get the documents we are debating? I was reading them the other day, and they went so far back in time that I thought I was going to find something from me in the bundle. The documents certainly go back to 28 September 2010, and half of them are ludicrously out of date now. May I suggest that the Foreign Office always seizes hold of such matters—the other Departments are lazy; the Foreign Office does things better than anybody else—and deals with them properly? I dare the Minister to disagree with me. 

Mr Lidington:  I will gladly pocket the compliment to my officials, but even if a document is produced that is broad in scope, the individual legislative initiatives that flow from it will be the responsibility of Ministers in the relevant Whitehall Departments with the lead role in that area of policy. It is important that those Departments are properly engaged. 

Chris Bryant:  There are great things about the Foreign Office, but when Ministers start sounding like Foreign Office officials, that is when it is going badly wrong. That is when one knows that nothing is going to get sorted and nothing is going to get better. 

I will now ask a completely different question. The Minister for Immigration suggested that there were not many problems, but one problem is the recognition of civil partnerships across Europe. Different countries have different sets of rules. That is fully understandable; I do not want to force any country to do anything it does not want to. However, where countries have parallel legislation, it would be good for that to be recognised. Up until recently, if people formed a pacte civil de solidarité in France, they would have to divorce in order to get remarried in the UK in a civil partnership. How is the Minister getting on with ensuring that that little piece of legislation, which I think everybody thus far agrees with, is achieving recognition across the whole of the EU? 

Damian Green:  The hon. Gentleman makes a reasonable point. That is why we say there is a way forward, particularly in the short term, because we are at a very early stage. He complains about delay but he knows the

proposals themselves are a very green green paper. There is clearly some way to go before anything practical happens. The practical issues put forward, such as the one he raises, are best addressed by sharing best practice, provision of information, closer co-operation between member states and, if necessary, the introduction of standard forms for specific civil registration events. That will be a quicker way to get practical solutions to individual problems than wrapping them all up together and attempting to find a big bang solution, which will inevitably be much more difficult to achieve. 

Chris Bryant:  Unfortunately, that would all be fine and well if the Government had done a single thing since the general election to try to reconcile the situation regarding civil partnerships with other European countries with similar legislation. They have done absolutely nothing. My suggestion might be quicker. 

Let me ask him about something different. He will know there are a million British people living in Spain. The majority have bought homes there and many have had real difficulties with the registration of their homes, and have ended up losing all their finances and had their homes pulled down by local authorities because they had not got planning permission. Those people surely would prefer to see more of a standardised system across the EU, so that they know when they buy a house—the single most expensive thing they will probably buy—that they are on a secure footing. 

Damian Green:  They may wish to see a standardised system if it actually enforced property rights effectively. If, as the hon. Gentleman postulates, there are other European member states that do not operate property laws properly, a common system that adopted a worse one than the British one would make things worse for British citizens. 

Chris Bryant:  That is absolutely true. The Minister is quite right, but would it not make more sense for him to argue assertively, now that he has Conservative colleagues in Spain, to ensure that British people do not lose their homes because of ludicrous, frankly, Spanish practices in Spain in relation to housing? For that matter, would it not make more sense for British people who go to live in Spain, France and other countries in the EU, who often think they are going to have free health service provision for the rest of their lives but do not end up getting that, to have a clearer understanding of their citizenship rights when they go abroad? 

Mr Lidington:  We have lost no time in registering directly with Spanish Ministers as well as with their officials in the new Spanish Government the importance of the property issue to us as a Government. I raised it in my visit to Madrid a few weeks ago and it has been raised with Spanish visitors here. The hon. Gentleman will know, probably better than anyone on the Committee, that this is a subject that occupies the time and attention of our staff in Spanish posts to a great extent. 

We are not talking just about housing rights. In the case of some Spanish local authorities we are talking particularly about planning decisions as well. To say that we should move to a common European system, not only for property rights but for planning, would be

a very big step. We would want to look carefully at the detail of anything proposed before we automatically decided that that would make things better for British citizens. 

Jacob Rees-Mogg:  I direct this question to my hon. Friend the Minister for Immigration. On the European Court of Justice ruling on the naturalisation of people who live in the United Kingdom for a certain length of time, and the statement on page 63 of the document that people have the right to acquire the nationality of any member state if they have lived there for five years, does the Minister feel this would affect our own immigration policy in any way? Might it make it more difficult to get proper control of our immigration laws, and are there loopholes because of the case law developments in the European Union based on the citizenship heading? 

Mr Lidington:  I will take further advice on that. It is a Cabinet Office responsibility in so far as we are talking about electoral rights here. We have yet to see any evidence of legal initiatives that would put at risk our definitions of British citizenship. The cases that have aroused controversy here have been those from the European Court of Justice, or initiatives by the Commission that have dealt with social security benefit, rather than entitlement to citizenship in a member state. 

Jacob Rees-Mogg:  I am looking at page 56 of the documentation, on case law development, where it states: 

“Member states must, when exercising their powers in the sphere of nationality, have due regard to European Union law”. 

It goes on to discuss when naturalisations may be withdrawn from people who are nationals of other member states, and the proportionality of that. Also, the chart on page 63 states: 

“A citizen of the European Union has the right to acquire the nationality of any member state in which he has lived for at least 5 years.” 

That is under 

“awareness of rights that a citizen of the EU has”. 

I am very surprised to discover that British citizenship has become a right that may be acquired by foreign nationals under foreign law. 

Damian Green:  I am grateful to my hon. Friend for the question. This is a subsisting arrangement, not a change being proposed. He will be aware that in general terms we have proposed changes that tighten up the route to settlement. In answer to his original question about whether I see this as a loophole in our immigration controls, the short answer is no. That is not least because, although it confers rights on people eventually to settle in this country, it does not give them any rights to come here that they do not already have as citizens of other European member states. 

Chris Bryant:  Does the Minister think that British people living in Spain, France, Greece or wherever, who no longer have the right to vote in British general elections because they left so many years ago, should have the right to vote in general elections in those countries? 

Mr Lidington:  We are very willing to look at proposals for changes in European legislation that would make it easier for people to vote. I concede the point that the hon. Gentleman makes. It would seem wrong if someone of whatever nationality in the EU were debarred from voting anywhere in the European Union; but again, we would want to look carefully at exactly what was proposed in concrete terms. There is nothing yet on the table. So far as the UK is concerned, we would have to look, for example, at what our own law provides for in terms of expatriate voting rights. One of the Commission’s implicit messages in this document is that any sort of time limit imposed on the right of expatriates to vote in their country of origin should be challenged. That, potentially, would raise a big question. There are arguments in favour of it, but there are also contrary arguments which have been debated in the House on many different occasions. 

Chris Bryant:  I am not sure that it has been debated on all that many occasions in the House. What about British ex-pats living in Spain, for instance, who after so many years are no longer allowed to vote in the United Kingdom? Presumably, the Minister now thinks either that we should allow them to continue voting here for ever and a day, despite the fact that they do not pay taxes and are not part of the political system in this country, or that they should be able to vote there as British citizens living in Spain. I hope that he will not be too “Foreign Office” and want to sit on both sides of the fence—or both sides of the Channel. Which way does he think we should go? 

Mr Lidington:  The hon. Gentleman came very near to saying that anyone who does not pay taxes should be disfranchised, and I hope that he does not propose to apply that to British citizens resident in this country. In action point 18 in the document, the Commission asks 

“Member States to ensure that voting rights of EU citizens in their Member State of residence are fully enforced, that EU citizens can be members of or found political parties in the Member State of residence and that Member States duly inform EU citizens of their electoral rights”. 

That has not yet been turned into any legislative initiative. We would want to examine any proposal that is brought forward to judge whether it is in the interests of British citizens. I find it difficult to discuss electoral law further. 

Mr Frank Roy (Motherwell and Wishaw) (Lab):  Does the Minister think that it is right for EU nationals to be given a vote in the referendum to determine whether Scotland separates from the rest of the United Kingdom? 

Mr Lidington:  That is a question I am very happy to refer to my hon. Friends in the appropriate Departments. 

Chris Bryant:  The Minister has missed my point. I do not want to disfranchise anyone; I want to enfranchise more people. It is difficult to find anyone who does not pay any kind of tax in the place where they live, because they end up paying VAT and all sorts of other taxes. I want to know the Government’s view. I assume that they will not just be passive and wait for the Commission to come along with a set of ideas—for example, to enforce voting rights on all EU citizens living in the UK, even though they do not become British citizens. What is the Minister’s view? 

Mr Lidington:  I have just set out my view. Nothing from the Commission is yet on the table, so I see no need to go into further detail. I am sure that the hon. Gentleman’s points will be closely attended to by my hon. Friend responsible for electoral law. 

Emma Reynolds:  On the point about expatriates losing their right to vote—at present, they do so after having lived abroad for 15 years—the Government submission states that they are currently considering the position of overseas voters. Do they therefore intend to change that rule? 

Mr Lidington:  The Government’s view is set out in the document: the matter is being considered. The hon. Lady will know that the previous Labour Government decided to restrict the franchise for UK citizens overseas by reducing the maximum period allowed from 20 years to 15 years. The Government are looking at the current law, and we will make our views clear to Parliament once we have reached a considered view. 

Chris Bryant:  One group of people who might be covered by such rights are those who live in British overseas territories. The French guarantee rights to those living in French overseas territories and, for that matter, to French people who live in the UK. [ Interruption. ] Whether such a territory is in the EU or not is irrelevant, so I suggest that the Minister for Europe not listen to the Minister for Immigration. What plans should the Government have to ensure that those people have an opportunity to vote? 

Mr Lidington:  I hesitate to come back too harshly on the hon. Gentleman. I realise that it is nearly two years since he left the Foreign Office and that his knowledge may be slightly rusty, but whether or not a territory is part of the EU makes a difference, because the treaties require that anyone who lives in any part of the EU is entitled to vote in European parliamentary or municipal elections. The French overseas territories are treated as departments of France, and they are fully part of the European Union. As far as the British overseas territories are concerned, Gibraltar is for most purposes—not for all—within the European Union, and the residents of Gibraltar are entitled to vote in European parliamentary elections. 

The Chair:  If no more Members wish to ask questions, we will proceed to a debate on the motion. 

Motion made, and Question proposed ,  

That the Committee takes note of European Union Documents No. 15936/10, No. 16219/10 and No. 16392/10 relating to the EU Citizenship Reports 2010, and European Union Document No. 18122/10 relating to the Commission Green Paper on less bureaucracy for citizens: promoting free movement of public documents and recognition of effects of civil status records; and supports the Government's view that European citizenship should be understood as defined in the Treaties, which make clear that citizenship of the EU is additional to and does not replace national citizenship; recognises that the Government is approaching each measure individually to ensure it is proportionate, effective and offers value for money; and further notes that the Government is supportive of the objectives of the Green Paper but does not consider that the Paper is able to provide evidence of the need for change in some areas, and that much can be achieved through the sharing of best practice and closer co-operation between Member States.—(Mr Lidington.)  

5.21 pm 

Emma Reynolds:  I will make some brief comments and focus primarily on the European Parliament. Several of the documents set out details of the turnout in European Parliament elections and they consider how there may be an increase in turnout in future European Parliament elections. In the Opposition’s view, the European Parliament is an important institution because it is the only directly elected institution of the European Union and the only major EU institution whose business mostly takes place in public, unlike the Council and the European Commission. It is important and central to the notion of European citizenship. 

However, turnout in European Parliament elections is disappointing. One reason why that might be so in the UK is that we have been required to have a system of proportional representation at a regional level, which, especially in England, is quite alien to many voters who have never experienced an electoral system other than first past the post. 

Kelvin Hopkins:  I agree with my hon. Friend about PR and first past the post. It was in fact the previous Labour Government who introduced PR. 

Chris Bryant:  But they signed up. 

The Chair:  Order. 

Kelvin Hopkins:  Well, I opposed it. I have raised this issue in the Commons and I have asked Ministers in the present Government whether we should consider re-introducing first past the post. 

Emma Reynolds:  I was not a Member of Parliament when the Plant commission considered a European Commission recommendation stating that our system was not proportional enough. I certainly remember, before 1999, when the European Parliament used to elect MEPs in our country on the basis of larger Westminster constituencies. In a perfect world, I, like my hon. Friend the Member for Luton North, would prefer to go back to that system. However, there is a treaty obligation that our system be more proportional than a first-past-the-post system, so we have to deal with what we have now. 

I urge the Minister to consider ways in which we could make the system more easily understood, especially, as I have said, to English voters who do not experience other electoral systems. I have knocked on many doors ahead of elections. When we do so ahead of a European election, people often ask who their MEP is, and we have to explain that they have various MEPs—something that is not intuitive. Will the Minister consider, for example, including at the next European parliamentary elections information on the polling card about how the system differs from the one people are used to? 

I am a pragmatic pro-European who has spent several years living in another member state, as well as knocking on doors in Wolverhampton. The idea proposed in one of the papers of having MEPs who serve the whole of the European Union as a way of bringing the EU closer to EU citizens is absurd and would do the opposite. As a pragmatic pro-European, I think that some of the ideas generated in Brussels need to be reality-checked. 

I was disappointed to read that in some member states, European citizens going to work somewhere else do not have the right to become members of existing parties or to set up parties. The Labour party is open to European citizens from other member states, and I hope that other parties in the UK offer the same opportunity. I want to see that opportunity extended if our citizens decide to go and live in other member states. 

5.25 pm 

Jacob Rees-Mogg:  The problem with this whole debate is that it shows the ambition of the European Union to create a superstate. It is about creating a citizenship that makes a person a citizen of a nation that is Europe. No other international organisation has the audacity to say that we are citizens. NATO, for instance, does not say that we are citizens of NATO. Even the United Nations does not say that we are citizens of the United Nations. 

The ambition is set out in this documentation. I referred in questions to the ECJ’s view that citizenship is destined to be the fundamental status of member state nationals. We know that that Court is a political court that is always looking to extend the boundaries of the competences of the European Union and to erode those of member states, and it believes in this concept of citizenship. It also believes that the Members of the European Parliament are the representatives of the Union citizens. It is now in the law of the European Union that they are not simply representatives of the people of the states brought together in the Community. That slight change in the form of words is actually very important. 

In my view, the reason why we send MEPs off to Europe is to represent the United Kingdom’s interests in a European Parliament—it is really a European Assembly, rather than being a proper Parliament, but that is beside the point. They are not representatives of us as European citizens, who are going there as a representative might in the United States to Congress. It is a subtle shift in the wording to make us believe that we are part of a single state. That is set out increasingly clearly in the documentation. 

As we notice, it is the “Commission’s political objective” that 

“EU citizenship progresses to become a tangible reality” 

in our daily lives. I do not know, much though I am a monarchist and this is a jubilee year, that being a subject of Her Majesty is a tangible reality in my daily life, other than occasionally hearing the national anthem on Radio 4, looking at the head of our sovereign on coins and thinking that a monarchical system is a great thing to have. It is not the tangible reality that the brainwashers of the European Union wish to make for us. 

I want to consider the areas that the European Union is trying to involve itself in, because through citizenship, it has found a route into areas that are simply not within the competence of the European Union. If we look at the list of 25 items that it wishes to push ahead with, we see at number (6) car registration. That is very sensible, isn’t it? We all want to register our cars easily. We send the information off to Swansea or wherever—I have no idea what the equivalent in France may be—to make it simple, if we go abroad, to re-register our cars.

However, the document goes on to say—this is where the European Union is doing its classic stuff—that the Commission 

“will also take action in cases where the tax treatment of cars is discriminatory”. 

We leap from the issue of cars—something mild and relatively unimportant; we can all agree with that—to taxation, which is a jealously guarded, veto-protected right of member states. We can look at the other parts of it. I am particularly concerned—we are getting this with a number of opt-ins— 

Emma Reynolds:  Far be it from me to defend things that the European Commission does, but I think that in this case, the European Commission is simply trying to ensure that people avoid having to pay tax twice. Surely, from the hon. Gentleman’s political standpoint, he would be sympathetic to that. 

Jacob Rees-Mogg:  I am in favour of low taxation generally, but I am in favour of taxation being set by this Government, by this nation, for the British people, not being set at European Union level, and I am not entirely sure that this is about double taxation. I think it is about regulating the taxation of transport and trying to involve the European Commission in that. 

If the hon. Lady is not willing to agree with me on tax, let us look at what is happening with the opt-ins, under justice and home affairs. We see a push in civil and criminal law that is all about harmonisation, minimum standards and equal recognition; and it works in the reverse of the way I put it. We recognise the laws of other countries and say that they can be applied with an arrest warrant and so on, but then the argument follows that the standards are not high enough—that a Bulgarian legal system, judgment or arrest warrant is not good enough in a UK context. We must therefore have the same standards, and of course those standards must be set— 

Mark Hendrick (Preston) (Lab/Co-op):  Minimum standards. 

Jacob Rees-Mogg:  Minimum standards must be set at European level. The hon. Gentleman makes an extremely helpful intervention from a sedentary position. We soon find that minimums become maximums, as has happened with the issue of bank capital. Once the European Union gets a matter under its regulatory belt, it is there for all time. 

Emma Reynolds:  The hon. Gentleman’s Government are worried that the Commission will not let them impose capital adequacy standards that are stricter than those of the European Union. I find his comments confusing. 

Jacob Rees-Mogg:  The hon. Lady is absolutely spot on. She has understood me perfectly. The European Union sets a minimum and then it says, “Well, actually that’s a maximum, too. We’re setting the rules now. We’ve got this right to set a minimum and, no, you can’t add to that. That is now the standard and the level at

which it must be done.” What is being done in the banking area is quite wrong and unhelpful for the United Kingdom. It is, again, a power grab by the European Union. 

Earlier during questions, we discussed nationality and how the European Court of Justice is extending its reach into what type of person may be naturalised. That may not be particularly important because European Union peoples have the right to reside here anyway. However, what about people they marry who come from third countries, and what about the children of those people they marry who come from third countries? Will we be obliged to give them nationality under a push by the European Court of Justice? 

It is worth pointing out that, on page 20, the documentation states that the European Union is proposing to facilitate access to cross-border health care. What exactly is cross-border health care? Does it mean that if someone breaks their leg in one place, they will have it put in a splint in another? What is the nature of what the Commission is doing? Is it in fact trying to extend health care, which is obviously a national responsibility, into a responsibility of the European Union? That is the whole case I am making. It is really about trying to create a single superstate and call us “citizens”. 

I am glad to say that the “citizens”, such as they are, have a very robust view of this. They do not really love being citizens. I am very pleased by the chart on page 42, which shows the raspberry being blown by the European Union’s electorate to the Munchkin Parliament. In 1979, turnout was near enough 62%. It has fallen every time since, to 43% in 2009. The European Union is, of course, very worried about that. It shows that we do not love being citizens of Europe because we have it imposed upon us. The political engagement of the peoples of the member states of the European Union is decreasing because they do not wish to be ruled by this top-heavy bureaucracy. 

That is the point on which I want to conclude. I reject fundamentally being a citizen of a state called Europe. I thank God I am a subject of Her Majesty. No Act of Parliament has a right to make me a citizen of any other state or owe loyalty or fealty to any other nation. I can no more be made Chinese than I can be made subject to the European Union. It is offensive to a free-born Englishman to be put in that position, and I imagine that that is true of free-born Englishwomen, Scots men and women, Welsh men and women and Northern Irish men and women. It is an improper intrusion and infringement of our liberties. It is a state in embryo that is trying to put duties on us that will follow from the rights that are in this document, and it should be rejected and opposed. We should live as we were born: as subjects of Her Majesty. 

5.33 pm 

Kelvin Hopkins:  Setting aside some of the phrases and where there are clearly differences of philosophy, I entirely support the thrust of the speech made by the hon. Member for North East Somerset. People who are desperate for British citizenship come to my surgery every week. It is a privilege, a right and something we are proud of. It is not something that is administered to people against their will, whether they like it or not. We have had European citizenship administered to us; we have not asked for it. If I had the choice, I would opt

out of European citizenship and just be a British citizen, but I do not have that right. I entirely agree with the hon. Gentleman. 

There are some interesting polling results on page 31 of the document, which suggest that 68% of the population are not well informed, not informed at all or do not know about their rights as citizens of the European Union. It strikes me as rather dubious that 32% claim they are very well informed or well informed. I suspect that the figures in Britain are rather lower than that. With all polling, the question asked is key. I suspect that, if asked, “Do you know your rights?” many people would say yes, even if they do not, because they do not want to appear foolish or ignorant. Those statistics are pretty negative anyway—70% do not understand their rights and 30% allegedly do—but I suspect the figures are actually rather worse. 

Not so long ago, there was a debate in the Chamber in which I raised the question of free movement. Free movement for European citizens is one thing; free movement for illegal immigrants, those who trade in human beings and criminals trying to cross borders is very different. There has been a slight hint in the past year or so that some countries are thinking about imposing internal borders rather than a common external border. 

In fact, internal borders have become a reality in some cases. France did not have an effective border with Italy because people were coming from north Africa. France did not want to accept those people, so they had to stop in Italy. Greece is in desperate straits in any case, but thousands of people have got into Greece through its porous border with Turkey and are now destitute and being kept alive by charitable donations in a country on its knees. Those people cannot move out of Greece because the internal border has effectively been closed. 

Let us not pretend that we have free movement. We ought to re-establish internal borders whereby, with a European or national passport, one would be free to go between one country and another, but with restrictions on those who are not here legally and foreign criminals. Free movement will become a bigger issue as time goes on. 

On electoral systems, I agree with my hon. Friend the Member for Wolverhampton North East on the disadvantages of proportional representation, which has led to even less interest in European Parliament elections in Britain. People do not have an MEP for their area who they can relate to, go to see and be represented by. We have a list of distant Members of the European Parliament. The eastern region is not even a meaningful region—Rickmansworth and King’s Lynn are not really in the same region—in the sense that Catalonia is a genuine and meaningful region. 

We ought seriously to seek an opt-out from PR so that we may go back to first past the post. If that means seeking release from a certain part of a treaty, so be it. PR was introduced with enthusiasm by Tony Blair, and a reason for doing so was very obvious: to scoop out all the Eurosceptics and people of the left in Labour’s European parliamentary party. The first thing to happen afterwards was the imposition of a strict selection system in our party so that only those who passed the Tony Blair test got back into the European Parliament. That is what actually happened, and many people who had

served Britain, our party and working people well were cast aside because they did not fit what our leadership wanted at that time. 

I want all MEPs to represent single-Member seats and to be selected by their local parties and approved nationally so that people may genuinely choose an individual human being to represent them and speak with their voice, not with the voice of the leaderships that choose lists. I will continue to press that case, although I do not expect early success. I have lodged the idea with the Minister for Europe, and I hope that he may be convinced in time and that he will convince his own party that it ought to take the matter seriously. I may have a slightly harder job with my own party, but I will keep trying because I think it is right to do so. 

The European Union, against the wishes of the citizens of many countries, not just Britain, is cynically moving towards a superstate. The Eurobarometer of enthusiasm for the European Union sinks as the years go by. Indeed, anybody who suggested that we join the euro now would be laughed out of court in Britain. It will not happen, not only because we as politicians think that it is nonsense, but because the people would never wear it. The sooner we get back to a more sensible European Union—an association of independent democratic states co-operating for mutual benefit, not a superstate imposing laws against our will—the better. 

With those few words—you would expect me to say nothing less than I have, Mr Hood—I will conclude, but I hope that some of what I have said will register with the Minister. 

5.40 pm 

Martin Horwood:  We have now got to some of the fundamental issues in this debate. It is always a pleasure to follow the hon. Member for North East Somerset, whose rhetoric I often admire, although I have to disagree with a lot of the content on this occasion. His love of patriotic rhetoric and his legitimate scepticism sometimes veers into something approaching paranoia and seeing European monsters under the bed at every stage. On occasion, there is an almost wilful misunderstanding of what is actually being proposed. We are not being brainwashed into citizenship of a European superstate at all. There is nothing in these proposals, as far as I can see, that fundamentally changes the relationship between British citizenship and European citizenship or the relationship between Britain and the European Union. 

We are citizens of things at many levels. I am a proud citizen of Cheltenham. Indeed, I am a proud citizen of Leckhampton parish, if we want to take it down to that level. I am a proud citizen of Gloucestershire. I am a proud citizen of the United Kingdom, and of England, and of the European Union, and, indeed, of the United Nations. The hon. Gentleman said that the UN has never used the word citizen, but it frequently uses the word. Last October, Ban Ki-moon alerted the entire world to the birth of the world’s seven billionth citizen. The concept of citizenship is fluid and general and recognises that we live in many jurisdictions at different levels. We are citizens in various different ways and the documents in front of us reflect that. 

If the hon. Gentleman was right in identifying that the documents seek to make the European level fundamental in some way and have precedence over

levels of citizenship, I would agree with him, but the Minister was right in rebutting that and explaining that the documents discuss that fundamental nature of citizenship only in the context of the European treaties and the European Court, which is right. 

Emma Reynolds:  Does the hon. Gentleman agree that it is unthinkable that either the European Commission or the French or German Governments would want to construct a European health care system? That is a fanciful idea, which surprised me. 

Martin Horwood:  Yes. The hon. Lady has identified an accurate piece of wilful misunderstanding. 

Jacob Rees-Mogg:  I am sorry that on this occasion I cannot give an extra minute, which is how it works in the Chamber. If the European Union has no interest in health care, why does it put it in its documents? 

Martin Horwood:  Because it is interested in the health of European citizens, particularly for those who may find themselves in areas of medical and linguistic expertise that are not those of the ill citizen. If a British citizen is being cared for abroad, it is in their interest for doctors in that country to have access to common medical data on an agreed basis, which informs the local doctor of their basic medical history, without having to understand English. 

Kelvin Hopkins:  Will the hon. Gentleman give way? 

Martin Horwood:  At the risk of prolonging this even further, yes. 

Kelvin Hopkins:  We have long had bilateral arrangements on health, where we take a form and we can have our health needs dealt with abroad, provided that we have the right documentation. That was not administered by the European Union initially; it has been in operation for decades. 

Martin Horwood:  Actually, it is already in operation at European level. I have a European health card, and I advise the hon. Gentleman to get one if he travels to the rest of the European Union. 

The idea that this can be done bilaterally is defeated by simple mathematics. For 27 or 28 member states all to have bilateral systems with each other is fantastically inefficient and leads to an exponentially rising number of different bilateral arrangements. That is fantastically wasteful. The simple, obvious route is to try to agree a common system.

On voting rights, there is also quite a long tradition of citizens of European countries voting in British elections and of British citizens standing in other European countries. David Steel stood in a proportional representation election in Tuscany many years ago, before the common electoral system was introduced—to make a point rather than seek representation—and was eventually entitled to take his seat, although he declined at the time. For a long time, Irish and Commonwealth citizens have been

entitled to vote in elections in this country. The time has come to take a much more relaxed, pragmatic view of the voting rights of European citizens in different European countries. 

On the overall thrust of the documents, it seems quite right to try to lift many of the burdens and complications for European citizens in, for example, access to justice and support for victims of crime. It is perfectly sensible and intelligent to discuss the common understanding of the significance of civil status or birth certificates, access to consular assistance—importantly—and even the much-maligned common understanding of registration systems for cars. The devil may be in the detail. It is right for Ministers to take a reasonably cautious approach to the detail and not absolutely commit to support one approach until we have seen the detail, but the broad thrust must surely be good for European citizens. 

Finally, on awareness, it is interesting that the hon. Member for Wolverhampton North East took a rather bizarre pop at proportional representation during our discussion. I remember being part of a large single-Member European constituency called The Cotswolds, where, frankly, a sheep with a blue rosette would have been elected with a majority of 30,000. That disfranchised thousands of Labour, Liberal Democrat and, doubtless, other voters and it was profoundly depressing even to try to participate in that election, and I am sure that that situation, in turn, depressed turnout. I feel much more represented now in a PR constituency. It may be a bizarre one, including Gibraltar, but Sir Graham Watson does a fine job as my Member of the European Parliament. 

Damian Green:  Just on a factual basis, as has already been mentioned, the turnout in European elections has declined consistently since they were first held, meaning that more people turned out under first-past-the-post elections than turn out now under proportional representation. 

Martin Horwood:  Of course, I support a coalition Minister’s judgment on this matter, but he may have drawn the wrong conclusion from the statistics. If turnout has continued to decline following the introduction of PR, presumably the trend is regardless of the electoral system being used, otherwise it would have—[Interruption.] I think the statistics might show that. I suspect that if we had kept on holding elections where vast numbers of people ended up with no representative for whom they had voted, that would have reduced turnout even more. I am sure that that would be so if we went back to such a system. 

What will increase turnout and awareness and understanding of European decision making is better education through our schools and better coverage by our national media of European decision making. It is outrageous that even the BBC, despite its token effort on “Democracy Live”, does not cover European Parliament debates or decision making at all in any meaningful way. Even coverage of the European Council has been pretty poor, although the intense coverage of last December’s summit may have been at least one silver lining in the cloud in Brussels at that time. 

We need less paranoia, less public relations activity by the European Union and more information and clarity. The documents take us in the right direction in

that sense and should enable all European citizens, including British European citizens, to exercise their rights to the full. 

5.49 pm 

Chris Bryant:  I seem to follow the hon. Gentleman—my honourable classmate—rather regularly in debates these days, which is slightly curious. I never thought that would come to pass. 

I have previously referred to the hon. Member for North East Somerset as the Member for the 14th century, but I have got the dates wrong: 1708 is the year in which he would have been happy. We were winning in Europe, we had a Tory, high Anglican Queen on the throne and all was right with the world because we had a Union not just of the Crowns, but of Parliament. 

The hon. Gentleman’s argument was somewhat extravagant and erring. He ended up in a position that is not a fair representation of any pro-European’s argument anywhere. The honest truth is that any idea of trying firmly to create a European citizenship is flawed in its conception. The waves of political movement do not crash on the shores in every country in Europe at the same time. There is no such thing as a European polis.

The hon. Gentleman tried to draw a distinction between a Parliament and an Assembly, and talked about citizens. I merely point out to him that all of those are French words that were given to us. It is perfectly legitimate for the European Parliament to be called a Parliament, since that is where the word came from in the first place. 

Jacob Rees-Mogg:  I agree with a good deal of what the hon. Gentleman has just said, but we should be precise in the language that we use. If the European Union is going to use the term citizen, then we are entitled to take it at face value that it means a citizen in the sense that we are citizens of the United Kingdom, or there are citizens of the United States. If it does not mean citizens, if it means that we just happen, by virtue of our nation’s memberships, to be within this overarching system, it should use a word that describes that. 

Chris Bryant:  The word citizen has all sorts of different interpretations. The hon. Gentleman has a rather high Anglican understanding of—[ Interruption. ] I know he is a Roman Catholic, yes, but high Anglicanism is basically sad that the Churches have split, rather than anything else. To avoid a theological dispute, he has a rather high Anglican understanding of citizenship; the hon. Member for Cheltenham seems to have a very low, happy-clappy understanding of citizenship, if the people of Leckhampton are to be called—I know Leckhampton—the citizens of Leckhampton. 

Rory Stewart (Penrith and The Border) (Con):  Will the hon. Gentleman give way? 

Chris Bryant:  We are now going to have Afghanistan, I think. 

Rory Stewart:  I am very interested in hearing exactly what the hon. Gentleman thinks the idea of European citizenship is supposed to contain. What are the aspirations? He has mocked everybody else’s definition. Why use the word citizen at all? 

Chris Bryant:  The fundamental principle is that we should have a shared market, a common market. To achieve that, everybody has to be able to have the same basic human and economic rights, and enjoy the same rights to travel, move, work and so on. There are moments when a lot of British people—even the most ardently anti-European—who suddenly they find themselves in a country elsewhere in Europe resort to arguing for more rather than less Europe. My experience as Europe Minister for two and a half seconds was that many British people living in Spain, all of whom had moved out of Britain because we had all gone ludicrously pro-European, suddenly found themselves operating under a system where they did not trust the legal situation. They wanted Brussels to tell Spain that their house should not be pulled down. 

To have an effective common market, we end up having to have similar rights for businesses—consumer rights and so on—in the whole of the EU. I say to the hon. Gentleman, the Member for 1708 that one of the problems is that it is very difficult to split off elements of the market from elements of citizenship. For example, we have an electricity system that is different from the system elsewhere in Europe. Plugs are different in the UK from anywhere else in Europe, and that makes it more difficult for British companies to compete across the whole of Europe on electrical goods—a simple fact. One of the big reasons why mobile phones took off so much faster in Europe and ended up dominating the world market, as opposed to the US, is because we enforced standards in Europe, rather than allowing them to be developed by the market in the US. There are areas where I think most British people would hope—[ Interruption. ]  

The Chair:  Order. I am sorry for interrupting the Government Whip’s conversation, but I ask him to allow the hon. Gentleman to be heard by the Committee.

The Lord Commissioner of Her Majesty's Treasury (Michael Fabricant):  I was listening to the hon. Gentleman, but I was just commenting— 

The Chair:  Order. I did not hear you listening. I heard you speaking. 

Chris Bryant:  I am grateful, Mr Hood. However, I have heard the hon. Gentleman thinking from time to time, but not that often. 

I was going to make a point about the national health service. When they go abroad, many British people expect doctors in every other country in Europe to have at least the same level of qualification that they would expect in the United Kingdom, which is why standardisation of qualifications is sometimes a useful facet. 

Jacob Rees-Mogg:  The citizenship document is about the equal recognition of qualifications without the standard having been in place, so if that is the case, it is putting the cart before the horse. 

Chris Bryant:  No, it is important to say that we want to strive for the highest possible standards across the whole European Union and that should always be happening. Similarly, on legal rights, if someone is in

court or is arrested under the European arrest warrant when abroad, most British people would think that they ought to be able to command exactly the same rights and respects that they would enjoy in the United Kingdom. 

When it comes to consular rights, to which the document refers, I have significant hesitations. However, since the earliest treaties, a provision has been in place so that when a citizen of any member state goes outside the EU they should be able to avail themselves of the consular services—if their country has no such provision—of another member state. That is a good development, and it is something that Britain has taken advantage of in many parts of the world. Equally, it would be wrong for the EU to drive towards creating a single consular service for the whole European Union, as has been suggested by some smaller European countries, because the danger is that different countries have completely different sets of expectations and I fear that countries such as the United Kingdom would end up paying for a consular service for Latvia, Estonia and others. I hope that the Ministers would want to oppose that. 

While I am sceptical about some of the concepts of citizenship embraced in the proposals, the extravagance of some of the arguments used against the whole thrust of where Europe is going on individuals’ rights is inappropriate. 

5.57 pm 

Damian Green:  We will reverse the order, so that the debate can end with a crescendo of interest and acclaim from my right hon. Friend the Minister for Europe. 

Chris Bryant:  But not a rallentando. 

Damian Green:  Hopefully not. Although I have been fascinated by the last half-hour’s debate, sadly, I will puncture it by actually speaking about what is in the document before the Committee, forgoing the opportunity to discourse on the difference between the Anglican and Catholic views of citizenship—fascinating though that is. 

I assure the Committee that when proposals finally emerge from the ideas in the consultation document, they will be fully considered by the Government. As I said at the start, as did my right hon. Friend the Minister for Europe, the Government are supportive of the green paper’s objectives, and we are keen to support activities that promote freedom of travel and provide the individual with access to the services to which they are entitled. Secure and trusted documentation is vital to prevent individuals from gaining fraudulent access to rights. However, we need further analysis of such issues to confirm the need for change and the evidence of the benefits of any specific proposed change. We want to balance the rights of the citizen and public protection, but also to consider the benefits against any costs incurred in implementing the changes to computer systems, paper records and related processes as a result of the proposals brought forward by the Commission after the green paper. We will engage with the Commission on this continuing piece of work, but in the absence of any evidence of the need for change in some areas, my view remains that much can be achieved through sharing best practice and closer co-operation between individual member states. 

5.59 pm 

Mr Lidington:  I am grateful to all those who have taken part in the debate. Turning first to the comments made by the hon. Member for Wolverhampton North East, I share her sense of disquiet about the fact that although the European Parliament, especially since the treaty of Lisbon came into force, has enjoyed considerable powers to influence legislation that will govern the lives of citizens of the United Kingdom, people in this country—and, for that matter, people resident in other European Union member states—take little interest in the proceedings of that Parliament. It is fair to say, and she will know from her own previous experience, that that is not true of business. Business, and for that matter single-issue campaign groups such as environmental organisations, are extremely active in engaging with Members of the European Parliament, because they recognise the importance of the role MEPs now have. 

Mark Hendrick:  Declaring an interest as a former MEP, I agree with the Minister. Does this perhaps have more to do with the fact that when people vote, they are not voting for a Government as such, which makes them feel that it is less relevant? Those who do feel it is relevant tend to be large organisations and businesses, as he says. It is about relevance, not the diminution of power of the European Parliament. 

Mr Lidington:  Without wanting to throw stones at the European Parliament, many of whose Members work incredibly hard in their role, I think that the hon. Gentleman is right. Any Member of the House who has knocked on doors during a European parliamentary election campaign will know that people do not follow in detail what the European Parliament does. They are conscious when they come to cast their vote that the government of the UK is not at stake. A similar point could be made, of course, about participation in local government elections here. It is a further illustration of a more general point about democratic accountability within the United Kingdom. 

This is not the place for a lengthy debate about how the problem could be addressed. The hon. Lady made an interesting point about providing information on the cards distributed to voters, and I will draw that to the attention of my hon. Friends responsible for that policy area. I must confess that I am dubious about some of the procedural changes proposed in the Commission document. The suggestion of new rules on attestation would lead to serious practical problems, with the possibility even that somebody’s name could appear on the ballot paper before attestation of his eligibility to stand as a candidate could be obtained from his home member state, and that the ballot papers would be printed only for it to be discovered that the person in question was actually ineligible to stand as a candidate in a European election. There are practical issues. I am deeply sceptical of the idea of an additional transnational list of MEPs who would owe allegiance not only to no defined constituency, but to no region. 

On the hon. Lady’s point about membership of political parties, as far as I know, all the parties represented in the House of Commons allow people who are nationals of other EU member states to become members. My experience is that every British political party is usually desperate for new members, from wherever they can

obtain them. That is not a problem as far as we are concerned. It is to be welcomed that that principle should be established throughout the EU as well. I cannot see any legitimate reason for denying somebody from another member state the right to belong to a political party in the state where he or she happens to be living. 

My hon. Friend the Member for North East Somerset treated us, as always, to an eloquent description of his fears about ambitions to create a European superstate. I will not denigrate in the least his argument, because it is demonstrable that there are people in European institutions and in some member states’ Governments and Parliaments who openly espouse the idea of much greater European political and economic integration. In fact, one of the differences between the politics of the UK and the politics in a number of continental European countries is that in many of those countries, for understandable historical reasons, the cause of European political integration is seen as an honourable thing that should be championed and championed openly; whereas it is quite difficult to find people in the UK who openly say that that is the direction in which they wish to go. 

However, I repeat to my hon. Friend now what I said in my opening remarks: that the institutions of the EU have to observe the limits placed on their actions by the European treaties. Article 20 of the treaty on the functioning of the EU defines what EU citizenship involves. Paragraph 1 states: 

“Citizenship of the Union shall be additional to and not replace national citizenship.” 

Paragraph 2 states: 

“Citizens of the Union shall enjoy the rights and be subject to the duties provided for in the Treaties.” 

The article ends by stating: 

“These rights shall be exercised in accordance with the conditions and limits defined by the Treaties and by the measures adopted thereunder.” 

Articles 21 to 25 of the section of the treaty that deals with EU citizenship define in a little more detail the citizenship rights to which I referred earlier: the right of free movement and residence; the right to vote and stand as a candidate in municipal and European elections; the right for consular representation where someone’s home state is not represented; and the right to petition and to apply to the EU ombudsman. 

Jacob Rees-Mogg:  I am very sympathetic to what my right hon. Friend the Minister is saying on this point. My concern is that the treaties state specifically in another context that the institutions of the EU may not be used without the consent of all member states, but the fiscal compact is doing something different. My concern is that there is a general thrust behind citizenship for a superstate and that the observance of the spirit of the treaties is relatively limited. 

Mr Lidington:  I understand that point, not least because I had the pleasure of spending two hours giving evidence to the European Scrutiny Committee on this subject a fortnight ago, and of spending three hours in a debate on the Floor of the House on the subject last week. My hon. Friend will be very familiar with the Government’s arguments on this point. What this boils down to is a debate about the correct interpretation of article 273 of the treaty on the functioning of the EU. 

In addition, I say to my hon. Friend that the Government are vigilant and will continue to be vigilant against any attempt by legislation or other means to advance the remit of EU citizenship further than we believe is justified by the treaties. However, what also needs to be acknowledged is that there are huge numbers of our fellow citizens—our fellow subjects of Her Majesty the Queen—who enjoy their freedom to travel and to reside in other parts of the EU, and to take up employment there on the same basis as citizens of those particular countries. There are something like nearly 2 million British citizens living elsewhere in the EU. 

Mark Hendrick:  That we know about. 

Mr Lidington:  As the hon. Member for Preston has just interjected from a sedentary position, that is the number that we know about. There may be more. These freedoms cut both ways. 

Let me illustrate the points about vigilance and opportunity by discussing two specific issues to which my hon. Friend the Member for North East Somerset referred in his speech. He spoke about vehicle registration taxes, but the UK does not operate such a tax. The Commission has said that it wants to prevent drivers from being required to pay a car registration tax in one member state and then, when they move to a different member state, being required to pay what amounts to another one under that state’s laws. 

We have a vehicle excise duty, which is not a registration tax but an annual tax on vehicle circulation. The Treasury has taken great care to ensure that UK vehicle excise duty rules do not hinder cross-border movement. Contrary to what it suggested in its green paper, the Commission did not propose a legislative instrument in 2011; it has published a communication on car taxation, which reveals that it is considering three options: doing nothing; adopting a voluntary approach to prevent double taxation; or adopting a legislative approach to double taxation that would take the form of a mandatory refund mechanism. Even that third option is less ambitious than Europeanising vehicle taxation in toto. I give the undertaking to my hon. Friend that my colleagues in the Department for Transport and the Treasury will be closely considering the detail of any Commission proposal in the next 12 months, or in years to come, to ensure that the importance of sovereign control over taxation is properly defended. 

On the health and the e-health programme, I say to my hon. Friend that health policy remains in the competence of member states. The treaties do not give European institutions power to come in and simply propose new arrangements or policy for health provision in this country or in any other EU member state. However, there is a genuine challenge in ensuring that we provide the best possible health care standards to the growing number of people from the UK and elsewhere in Europe who travel across European national frontiers to work, to go on holiday or to retire. It is sensible to consider how we could collaborate between different European countries to make the service provided to ordinary families as good as it can be. 

Chris Bryant:  I absolutely agree, but there are complexities, which is why the issue of citizenship is important. Many British people who go to live in Spain simply do not know what they are entitled to. They presume

that when they go there, they will be able to use their E111 card for the rest of their time in the country. They cannot; the card is valid for a limited period, during which time, in effect, Britain pays Spain for it. After that period, if people have not accumulated work benefits in Spain and are not yet retired, they will be high and dry when it comes to health provision. Clarifying such matters is of enormous benefit to British citizens. 

Mr Lidington:  I do not disagree with the hon. Gentleman’s analysis, but the answer is not necessarily to push for obligatory European legislative in health care. He is right that it is important to do as much as we can to ensure that people are well informed about their health and social care rights and responsibilities. Some of the items in the green paper that we are debating deal with proposals such as that for a better EU online portal, to try to provide a means by which people anywhere in the EU can access quickly and in their own language information about what they are entitled to, or about where they need to be alert and make their own provision. 

On health, if I were travelling in Europe, I would want to feel that details held by my doctor about my prescriptions or medical notes could be shared elsewhere, and that systems were in place to make that possible. Given the differences in the ways that health systems in different countries are organised—let alone the differences between IT systems—the situation is not straightforward, and it is usually sensible to try first to tackle such issues through non-legislative co-operative measures, rather than through legislation. That is why we need to move forward on the basis of hard-headed pragmatism, working out how we can defend the independent sovereignty of the United Kingdom, while also seeking forms of partnership with other EU member states that will provide a better deal for our citizens. 

Mark Hendrick:  Will the Minister give way? 

Mr Lidington:  I will give way once more, and then I want to push on. 

Mark Hendrick:  Briefly, I have had experience of living and working in Germany as an electronics engineer. When I went to see a doctor, I was told that the insurance policy that I held with the company I was working for did not apply—I was sent everywhere. I should not have had to come back to Britain to receive treatment; I should have been able to receive it in Germany under a regime agreed between members

of the European Union. There is nothing wrong with that; it helps everybody, whichever country they come from. 

Mr Lidington:  The hon. Gentleman makes a reasonable point. 

I have covered to a considerable extent some of the more general points made by my hon. Friend the Member for Cheltenham and the hon. Member for Rhondda. I have been advised by my hon. Friend the Member for Lichfield, who is an expert on matters electronic, that there is no standard continental European plug but, to give one example, a different standard for French and German electrical plugs. I think, however, that I will leave it to the hon. Member for Rhondda and my hon. Friend the Member for Lichfield to debate the detail of European policy on electrical appliances. 

In conclusion, my hon. Friend the Member for Cheltenham raised good and serious points about the advantages that could pertain to British people if the concept of European citizenship were developed in a way that works to the advantage of ordinary families. I agree with him about that, but such advantages must at all times be balanced against the points raised by my hon. Friend the Member for North East Somerset about defending the integrity of our system of parliamentary sovereignty, and only agreeing to powers being exercised by European Union institutions that are provided for within the treaties governing the European Union. That is the basis on which the Government intend to act. We will display hard-headed pragmatism that defends our national interests while always striving to advance the opportunities that are available to the citizens of this country. 

Question put and agreed to.  

Resolved,  

That the Committee takes note of European Union Documents No. 15936/10, No. 16219/10 and No. 16392/10 relating to the EU Citizenship Reports 2010, and European Union Document No. 18122/10 relating to the Commission Green Paper on less bureaucracy for citizens: promoting free movement of public documents and recognition of effects of civil status records; and supports the Government's view that European citizenship should be understood as defined in the Treaties, which make clear that citizenship of the EU is additional to and does not replace national citizenship; recognises that the Government is approaching each measure individually to ensure it is proportionate, effective and offers value for money; and further notes that the Government is supportive of the objectives of the Green Paper but does not consider that the Paper is able to provide evidence of the need for change in some areas, and that much can be achieved through the sharing of best practice and closer co-operation between Member States. 

6.19 pm 

Committee rose.