HC Deb 15 November 1977 vol 939 cc280-2
Ql. Mr. Marten

asked the Prime Minister when he next expects to meet the German Chancellor.

The Prime Minister (Mr. James Callaghan)

I expect to meet Chancellor Schmidt at the next European Council in Brussels on 5th and 6th December.

Mr. Marten

I applaud some of the Prime Minister's remarks at the Lord Mayor's Banquet last night, and also some of the remarks that he made to the General Secretary of the Labour Party in his letter on the European Community, but will he, when he meets the Chancellor of Germany, stress that we shall not accept fedralism in this country, that we shall retain control over our parliamentary and governmental system here, and that we shall control our legislation here? Does he agree that it is only right and fair, before the enlargement of the Community, that we should make this absolutely clear to our partners and to new members who may be joining the Community?

The Prime Minister

With respect, I do not think that it is necessary to make it clearer than I have done. Indeed, I came in for quite a bit of criticism last time from what I would call professional Europeans—although not from the Heads of Government—about those remarks. I am pretty confident that the views I expressed are widely shared by the Heads of a number of other Governments.

Mr. Greville Janner

Will my right hon. Friend take the first opportunity to express to the German Chancellor the revulsion felt in this country at the proposed visit this week of three former senior SS officers—one of whom was in Hitler's bodyguard—to launch a book designed to whitewash this organisation? As the SS was concerned not only with the killing of British prisoners but with the setting up and operation of Hitler's extermination camps, does he not consider that such a visit would be an extreme provocation to hundreds of thousands of people in this country, and that it ought to be banned?

Mr. Faulds

Like the visit of Mr. Begin.

The Prime Minister

I think that all of this goes to show that we must be very careful about the company we keep on all occasions. As regards the supplementary question of my hon. and learned Friend, the record of that German division is well known and excoriated, but what happens if these gentlemen offer themselves at the port of entry will, of course, be a matter for the immigration authorities.