Examination of Witnesses (Questions 20
- 33)
THURSDAY 22 NOVEMBER 2007
Mr Graham Avery
Q20 Lord Hannay of Chiswick:
I think we have touched on some of these questions already, which
is how the High Representative is going to work together with
members of the Commission with very well structured and based
responsibilities. The most obvious, of course, being trade policy,
but there is development co-operation and there are the enlargement
negotiations. Is the role of the High Representative going to
be just a token? Will the Commissioners responsible for trade
policy, development and enlargement really sub-ordinate themselves
to an overall strategic view of the High Representative or will
things just go on much as before? It is not going to be straightforward.
As you said yourself, the question of a man's or woman's time,
the multiplicity of things he or she has to do, but it is also
the fact that, for instance, on trade policy, the Commission's
role running the European Union's trade policy is now 50 years
old. Successive Commissioners for trade policy have not reacted
in a kindly way to being told by the Commissioner responsible
for external relations, whatever it is, that he should go lightly
on country X or Y because we have good relations with them or
what have you. There will have to be some fairly major cultural
changes if this is to be an effective system, will there not?
Mr Avery: If I may go off the record for a moment.
(There followed a short discussion off the record) In the interim
report in 2005, to which I have drawn your attention, it was stated
that most Member States think trade should be without the remit
of the European External Action Service. Nevertheless, the Vice-President
would have some supervisory control of what is going on, if only
because you cannot separate trade policy from foreign policy.
In terms of operational activity, I think trade would be an exception,
just as it is in the case of many Member States. Let us look at
the other fields. You are quite right to say the force of inertia
is considerable, and in the case of the existing members of the
Commission there will be reluctance to be involved in this new
structure. All I can tell you is if I was a member of the Commission,
which is not very probable, I would want to go into this structure
and play an active role in it. Let us take enlargement. You cannot
possibly handle relations with the Western Balkans, including
places like Kosovo, and you cannot handle relations with Turkey,
unless you are fully plugged into the CFSP dimension. For me,
the logic of having a joined-up approach must mean that the important
parts of policy preparation and policy execution in the Commission
should be covered by it. One of the problems, which we both mentioned,
is the need for deputies. Although the Treaty makes no provision
for it, it seems to me that the High Representative/Vice-President
will need deputies, he will need people to represent him, if only
because there are meetings all over the place, all over the world,
which he cannot go to. Therefore, from my point of view, on a
case by case basis it would be rational to use, as senior political
representatives or deputies of this new figure, either the Special
Representatives if they exist or some of the Commissioners according
to the topic.
Q21 Chairman:
If I could stretch that in one particular area, Justice and Home
Affairs has increasingly got external dimensions, how do you see
that coming into the new arrangements? It will obviously now all
be in the First Pillar, but how will this relate to the role of
the High Representative and the External Action Service?
Mr Avery: You are quite right to mention these
areas of policy which, strictly speaking, are not external but
have very important external spillovers. I think I mentioned some
others which are very active, like energy policy—you cannot
deal with Russia without handling energy policy—environment,
and so on. I have already said that I think the Commission should
co-ordinate itself better for external affairs in general. It
should also co-ordinate better the linkage between the internal
policies and the external policies. It does not do that well enough
and that is going to be a big challenge for this personality,
but it can be overcome. It requires a certain effort of structuring
within the Commission and it requires good relations between the
Vice-President and, let us say, the Commissioner for Justice and
Home Affairs or Energy. Plainly, it will not be the role of this
new Vice-President to replace Frattini or his successor. He will
have a role, but there will also be a co-ordination task and that
co-ordination task can only be done by the new External Action
Service. That is one reason why it has to be adequately equipped
and adequately placed.
Q22 Lord Truscott:
Looking at EU representation in international organisations, how
do you think the EU will be represented in international organisations
in the future under the Treaty provisions and also how that will
impact on representation in the OSC and whether it might also
have implications in terms of the UN Security Council?
Mr Avery: I am not much of an expert on this.
There is something in the new Treaty which says that if he is
called upon to do so, the High Representative could speak at the
United Nations, but only if he is called upon to do so and according
to a mandate which he is given. Another dimension to this Treaty
is that he gives legal personality to the European Union, which
I suppose means the European Union as such could become a member
of other international organisations. At the moment it is a member
of a number of international organisations, the World Trade Organisation,
the FAO and so on, but the simple answer is I do not know exactly
what the future holds on that.
Q23 Chairman:
One of the things which might concern us is there are some circumstances
where at the moment the country which holds the rotating Presidency
of the Union does speak for the Union in bodies of which it is
not a member and would that continue or would it not?
Mr Avery: I am sorry, I cannot give you a categorical
answer. Generally, it seems to me, for what concerns foreign affairs,
this would be taken over by the new High Representative.
Q24 Chairman:
But possibly in some of the international bodies which are not
directly foreign affairs, for instance? Let us say that if the
EU was not a member of the Food and Agricultural Organisation,
given that it would be the rotating Presidency which would be
presiding over the Council which deals with agricultural matters,
then it might be appropriate for its representative in the FAO
to represent the European Union as well as represent itself during
the period of its rotating Presidency. I just give this as a "for
instance".
Mr Avery: In those cases where the Community
has competence, the representation is made by the Commission at
the present time and that will continue to be the case. It is
a case by case question on which I do not have a universal answer.
Q25 Lord Hamilton of Epsom:
Going back to what you said about the Constitution suggesting
there should be a foreign minister, and you said you thought that
was a bad idea because it smacked of a European super state, we
have seen under successive treaties that have come, we now have
a single currency, we have quite a bit of jurisprudence which
comes from the European Court of Justice, we have got a lot of
talk about a European army and we now see European foreign affairs
being brought together in a greater way, the only thing we have
not got at the moment is a common language, but that all sort
of smacks of a super state to me. What is the end goal of the
European project? Is it not to be a super state?
Mr Avery: Some people say we have got a common
language and it is English.
Q26 Lord Hamilton of Epsom:
Exactly, I could have mentioned that, but I did not want to!
Mr Avery: That is not met with great acclaim
by other language speakers! The question you asked was what is
the end goal of the European Union?
Q27 Lord Hamilton of Epsom:
Yes, we have been advancing.
Mr Avery: To that, the answer is we do not know.
It is an ongoing process which has been going on for more than
50 years and it has achieved quite a lot but, frankly, it does
not help very much to make speculations about what is the ultimate
objective. Let us do what is useful for the European Union to
do, now and today. This Treaty helps the European Union to do
something more useful in foreign affairs. By the way, all public
opinion polls suggest that despite the existence of euro-scepticism
in a number of Member States, including ours, in general people
are in favour of the European governments and the European nations
doing things more effectively together in foreign affairs. This
Treaty does not change the way in which Member States conduct
their national foreign policy, defend their national interests
and conduct their national diplomatic services. If it was not
sufficient for the legal text of the Treaty to imply that, there
are declarations which make it clear. There is absolutely no question
that neither this Treaty nor the preceding one replace British
foreign policy with something else, and Britain will continue
to have an independent foreign policy. On the other hand, how
many areas of foreign policy are there in the world where Britain
can achieve much by acting alone? For me, the opportunity of the
European construction is for the British, if they take the chance,
to ensure that Europe functions in a way which effectively pursues
British interests. This is something which traditionally the French
were supposed to have understood: they ensured that the objectives
of many areas of European common policy corresponded largely to
French objectives. For me, given the British tradition of diplomacy,
its highly effective diplomatic service, of which there are some
ex-members around this table, I think that is a challenge to which
the British should respond in a positive way.
Q28 Lord Hamilton of Epsom:
To answer your question, an area where there is very distinctive
British policy is vis-á-vis the Atlantic Alliance and the
relationship with the United States where we have a much closer
relationship than either France or Germany or, indeed, any other
member of the European Union. If we were bound-in tightly, and
I do not envisage that as being inconceivable, we would not be
able to take decisions to ally ourselves with the United States
if our EU partners did not go along with it.
Mr Avery: If I may say so, I do not think this
Treaty has any bearing on that.
Q29 Lord Hamilton of Epsom:
This is the problem, is it not?
Mr Avery: I understand what you are saying.
Q30 Lord Hamilton of Epsom:
It is the grandmother's footsteps all the time?
Mr Avery: I am sorry, I have been asked to give
evidence about this Treaty. When you say that Britain has a closer
relationship than France or Germany, that may be true or it may
be true of the recent past, but we have seen considerable changes
of attitude in France and maybe in Germany. These things are not
set in stone. National interests react to changes in the world,
they react to events and experience, and I would repeat that for
me in many areas of world affairs it is plain that the United
Kingdom can best obtain its objectives by working with its European
partners, by persuading its European partners that the best course
of action is precisely the one which corresponds with British
national interests. In that context, I think the construction
of a more unified, a more joined-up system of decision-making
in Brussels, is an opportunity rather than a hindrance to the
pursuance of an effective British foreign policy within the European
framework. If you talk to the Americans, they would certainly
tell you that they want to see the European Union to be more effective
in foreign policy. Naturally they want it to be effective in doing
things together with the Americans, but the Americans would far
rather in almost all circumstances co-operate with a united Europe
than singly with its Member States in disorder.
Q31 Lord Hannay of Chiswick:
In any case, there is surely rather an important distinction between
the single market and the single currency and a Common Foreign
and Security Policy. It is not purely semantic, it is real. Nobody
is talking about a single foreign policy for the 27 Member States
covering all aspects of their external policy, which is what you
mean when you say a single market or a single currency. A common
foreign policy surely covers the bits of foreign policy that together
the 27 decide they will work on in common. It is really quite
an important distinction I would have thought, would you not?
Mr Avery: Let us take an example, let us take
Russia. It is perfectly clear that all Member States, the biggest
and the smallest, have bilateral relations with Russia on all
sorts of problems. When Russians are assassinated in London, that
is nothing to do with the European Union. There is a long tradition
of bilateral contacts, but there are many other things where we
are much stronger if we engage with Russia on a multilateral Europe-wide
basis. The Russians, what do they want? They want markets, they
want access, they want membership of the World Trade Organisation
and those are things where acting through and with Europe can
help us to inflect Russia more effectively than we can possibly
hope to do on our own.
Q32 Lord Hamilton of Epsom:
You said that you do not know where the European project is leading
to, but I think the founders of the EEC, Monnet and Schuman, had
a very clear idea of where it was leading to. They wanted to stop
war between the French and Germans and so therefore they would
have liked to turn everybody into Europeans. I think they would
have been quite clear they did want a super state, would they
not?
Mr Avery: No, Schuman said very categorically
that states exist, they will continue to exist, and any idea that
the European construction replaces them is a fiction. I do not
think any respectable founding father expressed the idea of super-state.
Many people have said, and I would say myself, that the European
Union is on the way to being a super-power—not in military
and nuclear terms, but in economic and political terms—it
is on the way to being a super-power, but it is not organised
as a state, and is not going to replace states. For me, it is
an instrument, an architecture, which allows the states to do
better than they can do on their own.
Q33 Chairman:
Can I pick up something which Lord Hannay said a moment ago. I
find, in fact it was a mistake in Maastricht to use the term "Common
Foreign and Security Policy", because for me I thought of
the Common Commercial Policy which is a replacement policy, whereas
the Common Foreign and Security Policy is an addition, it is a
way of providing some value-added to the policies of the individual
Member States. I do think there is a problem with the phrase "common"
because of other links which common has to replacement policy
for those. We have not got the right word, but it is too late.
That is a battle which should have been fought at an earlier stage,
purely linguistically and not substantially. I heard somebody
the other day characterise the foreign and security dimensions
of the Reform Treaty as being probably the coal of the Treaty,
probably the most important bits of changes which existed in the
Treaty. How would you rank the importance of the things which
are being done over foreign and security policy, of which we have
been discussing this afternoon, in terms of the totality of change
which the Treaty, if it is ratified, will bring?
Mr Avery: I would not like to engage in ranking
but, nevertheless, for me as an ex-practitioner, it is clear that
these changes in what I call the architecture for foreign policy,
are the most immediate and, dare I say, most urgent practical,
pragmatic steps forward. We have wasted a lot of time with the
debacle over the Constitutional Treaty, we have been messing about
for about seven years. Out there in the world the Russians, the
Chinese, they do not wait for us to get our act together, so I
think it is a practical step forward and we should do it as soon
as we can.
Chairman: Mr Avery, thank you very much
indeed for coming and speaking to us this afternoon. Thank you
again for getting us copies of the EPC Working Paper, which seems
to have had a strong team of people preparing it. We will look
forward to reading it and your other contributions. The Committee
will be taking more evidence on this subject, but we are very
grateful that at the beginning of our inquiry you have been able
to give us such useful answers to questions this afternoon. Thank
you very much indeed.
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