§ 13. Mr. Charles KennedyTo ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs if he will make a statement on progress towards further subsidiarity since the coming into force of the Maastricht treaty.
§ Mr. HurdThe Commission presented its subsidiarity report to the European Council on 10 December. We believe that it is a good start to a continuing process. The report calls for the repeal or simplification of some 25 per cent. of EC legislation. It covers 16 of the 24 items on the list that the French and British Governments submitted. Those include revision of the bathing and drinking water directives, the acquired rights directive, and the liability of service suppliers. One further item from the list has already been amended on those grounds, and the Commission is 1067 pursuing two others. All legislative proposals put forward by the Commission must now be tested against the requirements of subsidiarity.
§ Mr. Charles KennedyI thank the Foreign Secretary for that informative reply. Will he take the opportunity to confirm, as he has confirmed before, that the best guarantee of effective subsidiarity is probably federalism, as understood elsewhere in the Community, although the same definition is not understood in sections of this country? Will the right hon. Gentleman therefore continue vigorously to apply subsidiarity within the nations and regions of the United Kingdom, and confirm that the Conservative Members of the European Parliament have subscribed to a federal future, through their affiliation to the European People's party?
§ Mr. HurdI advise the hon. Gentleman not to start dabbling in the different meanings of federalism. He will find himself in deeper water than he supposes, as his leader did in Brussels last week. The arrangements within the United Kingdom, as within any other member state, are a matter for the individual state. That was made clear in the Birmingham declaration last year.
§ Mr. Anthony CoombsDoes my right hon. Friend agree that the repeal or reform of 17 European measures at the Council last week is the first vindication of the Government's stance on subsidiarity during the Maastricht debate? Does he also agree that, provided that the common agricultural policy is adequately reformed, we can foresee a significant decrease in the competences of the European Community and the Commission, to the benefit of every country in Europe?
§ Mr. HurdMy hon. Friend is right. I did not entirely blame the more sceptical of my right hon. and hon. Friends who, when subsidiarity was first discussed in the House, dismissed it as a mere phrase, but we are now turning it into a reality. This is the beginning of a process that will be extremely important. We said that it would be important, and we are making it important.
§ Ms QuinIf the Government succeed in abandoning the bathing and drinking water directives, will the Foreign Secretary tell us what will happen to the green dowry of £1 billion that was given to water companies during privatisation specifically to bring our water up to EC quality standards? Does the Foreign Secretary appreciate that the British public will not forgive a Government who put party dogma before water safety?
§ Mr. HurdThe hon. Lady and the Labour party miss the point. The purification and cleansing of this country's water are matters on which she and her colleagues can reasonably press my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for the Environment; that is fine. We do not think that the Commission in Brussels should lay down detailed regulations on such matters—regulations, which are, incidentally, out of date. What is new is that the Commission agrees with that point of view.