| Previous Section | Back to Table of Contents | Lords Hansard Home Page |
Baroness Symons of Vernham Dean: I meant that the Minister for Europe was not forcing himself on schools. The point that I made was not that the noble Lord was not forcing himself on schools—I do not know whether the noble Lord, Lord Stoddart, has attempted to force himself on schools or not. My point was that my right honourable friend does not force himself on schools; he goes at people's invitation. I am sure that invitations will be forthcoming where that is appropriate.
I remind the noble Lord, Lord Howell, who asked us to consider the importance of having treaties that are more easily understood, that one of the issues that I hope we shall debate in the run-up to the IGC in 2004 is the simplification of treaties,
- Xwith a view to making them clearer and better understood without changing their meaning".
It is the view of Her Majesty's Government that the noble Lord, Lord Phillips, has underestimated the cost of his amendment. We believe that the cost would be in the region of #5 million—which I had understood to be the noble Lord's original calculation; perhaps that was not so. No one grudges that amount of expenditure. But if we are to spend #5 million, we should like to do so in a way that would be focused on
really provoking an argument in the way that I believe the noble Lord genuinely wishes to see and in the way that Her Majesty's Government genuinely wish to see. We do not think that the traditional method of the leaflet through the door will really provoke what the noble Lord believes is the case. Therefore, we ask the Committee to reject the amendment.
Lord Norton of Louth: Before the Minister sits down, I am sure that she would not have referred to the website without having the figures. Can she tell us how many hits the website has had, and from how many users?
Baroness Symons of Vernham Dean: Foolishly, I do not have the figures. I shall endeavour to obtain them and let Members of the Committee know as soon as I can.
Lord Phillips of Sudbury: Perhaps I can help the Minister. When she wrote to me, she said that the website receives 10,000 hits a month. At that reckoning, it would take 27 years for half the population to make a hit on the aforesaid website.
I must be honest and say that I am disappointed with the Minister's response. Indeed, I wonder whether she was latching on to the purport of my attempt to justify the amendment; namely, to make the point that it is the bottom two-thirds of the population of this country who are out in the cold as regards Europe. They are citizens like the top third, like the brightest and the best. They have as much right to understand what is going on in their name as do those of us in this Chamber.
Although the Minister said that my view was the traditional one, she did not respond to my point that no single attempt has been made by any government since 1975 to communicate information to the public of this country by any means of a mass nature. That is to say, no leaflet, no brochure, no tabloid has been put through the doors of the people of this country over that long period.
When I referred to Xtraditional", I did not mean in terms of modern means of communication. My reference was to the fact that the same old dialogue was going on between government and the elite, and between the students, the cognoscenti. Trying to pretend that a few visits by the industrious Mr Hain to a handful of schools remotely comes near to what I am talking about in the amendment makes me deeply disappointed. It is a particular disappointment because democracy should be a bottom-up process, not a top-down one. Europe has become a top-down project. Unless we change that radically and do so soon, all of us who harbour hopes for Europe's future will be disappointed.
At this time of night I do not propose to divide the Committee, although I may wish to come back to the subject on Report. I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
Lord Norton of Louth moved Amendment No. 42B:
- After Clause 3, insert the following new clause—
The noble Lord said: The subject of the European Charter of Fundamental Rights was covered in an amendment moved by my noble friend Lord Howell of Guildford last week. On that occasion I put two questions to the Minister about the status of the charter. I later intervened during her response to put a question about her comments on the debate on the future of Europe.
In her response to my noble friend's amendment, the Minister made no attempt to answer the two questions that I had put in the discussion on the amendment. She also failed to answer points that I made in my intervention, instead repeating a point that had already been made, and refused to give way when I sought to pursue it.
The Minister's actions as well as her response to my noble friend suggest some reluctance by the Government to address directly important questions about the European Charter of Fundamental Rights. The charter is referred to in Declaration 23 on the future of the Union. It is one of four topics to be considered, inter alia, as part of the debate about the future of Europe, leading up to the Intergovernmental Conference in 2004.
I shall begin with a general point that I put to the Minister in my intervention last week and then move on to specific points. The Government wish the debate on the future of Europe to be precisely that: a look at where the Union is going. The Foreign Secretary made that clear on the Second Reading of the Bill in the other place. He said:
For those who want the debate to focus on those fundamental questions, Declaration 23 is a disappointment. It lists topics that are essentially disparate and discrete. If we debate each of those topics, particularly if we debate them as discrete items, we shall miss the wider picture and I fear that the IGC in 2004 may prove to be a lost opportunity. As the noble Lord, Lord Dahrendorf, whom I am delighted to see in his place, said on Second Reading:
On the specific points in support of the new clause, the charter is one of the four subjects adumbrated in the declaration. Why is it there? Why is the status of the charter deemed so important that it is one of only four subjects to be explicitly identified in the declaration? The Government have said since the charter was drawn up that they are clear about its
Why is there a need to debate the status of the charter if the Government are clear as to that status? The noble Baroness made it clear last week that there can be no change in the status of the charter unless all member states agree. If the Government believe that it should remain a political declaration and have the power to prevent it from being anything else, why are we having this debate?
Given that the Government have agreed that the charter should be such a prominent part of the debate on the future of Europe, the presumption must be that they are prepared to contemplate departing from their present position. In that case, we need to hear more from the Government.
The new clause is a way of ensuring that we have a clearer statement of the Government's views. The Government have said that they welcome the debate on the future of Europe. A report from the Government on the status of the charter will be an enormous benefit in informing that debate, at least helping us understand why we are having a debate about the status of the charter. If the charter can already influence the courts and the Government wish it to retain the status of a political declaration, what purpose is served by incorporating the charter in the treaty?
Last week I also asked the Minister what was the logic of drawing up a charter and deciding its status after the event. Should that not have been decided before, not after, the charter was drawn up? That point was well recognised by the European Union Committee of your Lordships' House in its report on the charter published in May last year. The report said in paragraph 122:
The position we are in is therefore profoundly unsatisfactory. The new clause will impose a useful discipline on government. It will allow us to move forward with a little greater confidence than is possible at present. Rather than giving the seal of approval to the Nice Treaty and then moving on to the debate on the future of Europe, I think that we should link the
The modest provision of this new clause ensures that we are at least clearer about what is intended as far as the Charter of Fundamental Rights is concerned. I should prefer clarification of far more before we give approval to this Bill. I think that this clause is the minimum that we should demand as we engage in the debate on the future of Europe.
I end with two quick points. First, this is not a novel proposal. There is a precedent for requiring a parliamentary resolution before treaty ratification can proceed. Secondly, it is not a device to delay the Bill. There is no reason why the Government should not move quickly to produce a report. If the Government are clear on the status of the charter, they should not fear this clause; they should welcome it.
Baroness Symons of Vernham Dean: I believe that we debated this question fully on 20th November. Indeed, I can think of few issues where a relatively straightforward matter has been discussed so clearly.
On 20th November, the noble Lord, Lord Norton, put two questions to me. He said:
The noble Lord did get an answer there and then, because I told the Chamber a few minutes later in the same debate (at col. 1118) that,
The noble Lord says that he would like further elucidation, so let me try to help him further. His first question was: if the Government are clear on the status of the charter—and we are, it is a political declaration—why have an IGC to debate it in 2004? The answer is simple. As I said, some member states want to make the charter legally binding. They did not succeed at Nice. Our view, that it should be a political declaration, was the view that prevailed. We are happy to have that discussion, but only on the basis that it does not prejudge the outcome. The mandate we agreed certainly does not prejudge the outcome.
The Nice text stipulates that we will consider only, Xwhether, and if so how, the charter should be integrated into the treaty". Moreover, at Nice we wanted to add our own points to the 2004 agenda on better demarcation of competencies between the EU and its member states, on simplifying the treaties and on the role of national parliaments. We got that into the Nice declaration on the future of Europe, not least because we were prepared in exchange to agree on another discussion of the charter in 2004.
The second question posed by the noble Lord was: why draw up the charter first and decide its status only afterwards? The answer to this is equally simple—because that is what the EU leaders decided upon. They agreed at the Cologne European Council in 1999 to draw up a charter to make fundamental rights more visible to EU citizens. Everyone agreed to that—and why not? There was no consensus, however, on the final status of the charter. It was also agreed at Cologne that, once the text had been drawn up, it should be considered whether, and if so how, the charter should be integrated into the EU treaties. There was no agreement at Nice to do that, so the charter remains a political declaration outside the EU treaties. It remains so, unless and until there is unanimity to integrate it into the EU treaties.
I do hope that the noble Lord can now agree that that is an unambiguous answer to his points. I believe that it was made before, but I hope that that answer has elucidated the position to his satisfaction.
XCHARTER OF FUNDAMENTAL RIGHTS OF THE EUROPEAN UNION
This Act shall not come into force until both Houses of Parliament have agreed a resolution on a report from Her Majesty's Government on the status of the Charter of Fundamental Rights of the European Union."
XWe have to ask what exactly is the European Union for? What precise purpose does it serve?".—[Official Report, Commons, 4/7/01; col. 272.]
XWe may have years of discussion on institutional changes without any sense of where the European Union is supposed to move or what its next major themes in substance will be".—[Official Report, 1/11/01; col. 1592.]
I cannot improve on that.
Xa showcase of existing rights".
The noble Baroness repeated that point last week. She said:
Xit is a political declaration. It cannot take precedence over our law because it is not the law".—[Official Report, 20/11/01; col. 1118.]
She has said again this evening that the courts could take account of it, as they could take account of other things.
XThere is something quite odd in drafting a document before a decision has been taken as to its ultimate status and legal effect. This might well be said to be putting the cart before the horse".
Indeed, as the European Union Committee concluded, it may also be the wrong horse. The view of the committee was that accession by the Union to the ECHR should be on the agenda of the IGC.
9.15 p.m.
XFirst, it is my understanding that the Government themselves are quite clear as to the status of the charter ... If the Government are quite clear on that, why do they believe that an IGC is necessary to discuss that status?
Secondly, could the Minister explain to me the logic of drawing up a charter and deciding its status subsequent to the event?".—[Official Report, 20/11/01; col. 1115.]
Xthe charter is a political declaration. It cannot take precedence over our law because it is not the law. It is not in the present EU treaty. Nor is it referred to in the treaty itself.
One can quote a variety of different sources. Perhaps some people would like the charter made law. I freely concede that the Commission and some member states want to make the charter legally binding and to incorporate it into the treaty, but we have not agreed to do that. Nor can there be any change in the status of the charter unless we and all member states agree, because the treaty requires unanimity.
We have agreed that at the 2004 intergovernmental conference, consideration should be given to whether or not to incorporate the charter in the treaty and, if so, how. That is the mandate agreed by the Cologne European Council ... and we shall stick to it".
Next Section
Back to Table of Contents
Lords Hansard Home Page