HC Deb 21 October 1991 vol 196 c347W
Mr. Dykes

To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs if he will make a statement on progress in the negotiations on European political and economic and monetary union leading up to the Maastricht European Council on 8 December; and what is his policy on the relative priority of Community deepening measures and widening the Community as new member states seek accession.

Mr. Garel-Jones

I refer my hon. Friend to the written answers my right hon. Friends the Chancellor of the Exchequer and Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs gave on 14 October, column15, and 16 October, column 156, respectively, reporting the 7 October meeting of ECOFIN, and the political union intergovernmental conference ministerial meetings of 29 July and 30 September.

We support both the deepening and widening of the Community. We are working for the completion of the single market by the end of 1992 and a good outcome at the intergovernmental conferences with which we can all agree. We support the enlargement of the Community to include those states which wish to join, which meet the economic and political criteria and which can take on all the responsibilities of European Community membership.