EU Enlargement

HC Deb 10 July 2001 vol 371 cc646-8

3. Mr. Mike Hall (Weaver Vale)

When he expects EU enlargement negotiations to be completed. [1540]

The Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs (Mr. Jack Straw)

The Gothenburg European Council agreed last month that we should make it possible to complete the negotiations by the end of 2002 for candidates that are ready. The objective is that those candidate countries should then participate in the European parliamentary elections of 2004, as members.

Mr. Hall

I congratulate my right hon. Friend on his appointment, and wish him well in his challenging job.

I welcome the news that enlargement of the European Union can commence in 2002. I should like the Czech Republic to be one of the first members in that tranche. What steps will the British Government take, however, if the euro continues to be weak, to ensure that our economy does not suffer as a result of enlargement?

Mr. Straw

I thank my hon. Friend for his kind remarks. He may like to know that the Czech Republic has closed 20 of the chapters for accession, and is among the first five or six countries in terms of its advance towards satisfactory accession. As for his second question, about the euro, he will know that just 11 countries are currently in it. Whether the accession countries come in will depend on whether they meet the criteria for the euro, and whether they decide to join. The assumption behind the question does not, therefore, arise for the moment.

Mr. John Redwood (Wokingham)

I too congratulate the Foreign Secretary on his promotion.

It is clear that the Irish people have voted no, so the treaty of Nice cannot be ratified. Does the Foreign Secretary not agree that it is a most important democratic principle that if a people are consulted in a referendum and vote no, "no" means no? Or does he belong to the new wonky school of democracy according to which, if the people give the wrong answer, they must be polled as many times as the Conservative party in the election of its leader, in the hope that they will change their minds?

Mr. Straw

I made it perfectly clear during last week's debate on the European Communities (Amendment) Bill that the Irish people's decision in the referendum meant what it said—that they had rejected membership of the Nice treaty. [HON. MEMBERS: "Ah!"] I cannot remember whether the right hon. Gentleman was in the Government at the time, as he was in and out so often; but in 1992, when he may have been—[Interruption.] We have now ascertained that the right hon. Gentleman was a member of the last Administration. In 1992 they decided, in the light of the Danish refusal to vote yes on Maastricht, to follow a similar procedure to that agreed by the 15 members of the General Affairs Council.

Mr. Francis Maude (Horsham)

We delayed the Bill.

Mr. Straw

It is not about delaying the Bill; it is about the principle of the thing.

At the General Affairs Council in mid-June, we agreed that we would stick to the text of the Nice treaty, while providing Ireland—if we could—with some accommodation in respect of its worries. [Interruption.] That was exactly the approach of the last Administration, and it is the approach that we have agreed to adopt. It remains to be seen whether in due course there is a further referendum for the Irish people, and whether they agree to the Nice treaty. If they do not, the treaty will not go ahead.

David Cairns (Greenock and Inverclyde)

Has my right hon. Friend received any representations from business leaders on enlargement of the European Union? When I met business leaders in my constituency over the weekend, they were very keen that we move towards the speediest possible enlargement of the European Union. They recognise that access to new markets is good for jobs in my constituency and good for jobs in Britain.

Mr. Straw

We have had a great many representations on enlargement from business leaders in the United Kingdom. Almost without exception, they support enlargement because of the benefits that it would bring to British jobs and to British business.

Mrs. Cheryl Gillan (Chesham and Amersham)

May I welcome the right hon. Gentleman to his post? This month, in the Nice treaty debate, the hon. Member for Milton Keynes, South-West (Dr. Starkey) berated my right hon. Friend the Member for Horsham (Mr. Maude) for not reading the Foreign Affairs Committee report, saying that had he done so, he would know that six of the applicant countries had closed the chapter on agriculture."—[Official Report, 4 July 2001; Vol. 371, c. 282.] Will the Foreign Secretary confirm that the hon. Lady was completely wrong about the contents of her own report, and that, as the report states, even after all these years none of the candidates for enlargement has yet resolved the thorniest issues: freedom of movement&agriculture, competition policy, transport policy, taxation, environment and budget"? Given the Foreign Secretary's very words today that the Nice treaty might riot go ahead, rather than that enlargement will forge ahead, is not the cruel reality that EU enlargement is turning out to be a promise that ranks with the other great deceptions such as "the cheque is in the post" and "I will love you in the morning"?

Mr. Straw

I am grateful to the hon. Lady for her generous congratulations on my assumption of this post. I did not hear all of her last point—I heard only bits of it, about loving in the morning—so I shall let it pass. As for her point about whether chapters are open or closed, as I understand it my hon. Friend the Member for Milton Keynes, South-West corrected herself. The truth is that none of the applicant countries has closed the chapter on agriculture. The hon. Lady is wrong, however, because a number of countries including Cyprus, Hungary, Poland, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania and Slovakia have closed chapters on the free movement of goods, services and persons.

Mr. Derek Foster (Bishop Auckland)

May I welcome my right hon. Friend—a Euro-realist, like the Chancellor and me—to his new post? Does he recognise that there is huge enthusiasm among Labour Members for the completion of enlargement, as it will underpin emerging democracies in eastern Europe and force a very substantial renegotiation of the common agricultural policy? However, does he also agree that enlargement will make it all the more important that we approach the euro with caution, and will he ensure that at least the European Central Bank becomes far more transparent and that it begins to take employment and output into consideration in pursuing its inflation targets?

Mr. Straw

I thank my right hon. Friend for his kind remarks. We believe that enlargement is very much in the interests of the United Kingdom, the applicant countries and the stability of the peace and security of Europe. I greatly regret the fact that the hon. Member for Chesham and Amersham (Mrs. Gillan) seemed to welcome the fact that there have been some temporary difficulties in the pathway to enlargement, as there always will be. The extraordinary achievement of the EU in the past 20 years is the way in which it has enlarged but still brought benefits to the people of Europe. We believe that that will be the case with the enlargement countries.

It will also come as no great surprise to my right hon. Friend that I fully support the position on the euro set out by my right hon. Friend the Chancellor of the Exchequer in his excellent speech at the Mansion House a few weeks ago.