EU Working Time Directive (NHS)

Debate between Chris Heaton-Harris and Ian Paisley

Thursday 26th April 2012 Westminster Hall

[Ian Paisley]

The hon. Gentleman pre-empts me. He is a mind reader. He seems to be able to find something that perhaps we are all agreed on. If the directive is a complete disaster; if it is starving our patients of good care and our junior doctors and senior physicians of being able to deliver what they are brilliant at delivering, we should address the problem at its root. The root cause is that we have a poison in the body politic of this kingdom. We are being regulated by people who do not live in this kingdom, do not care about this kingdom, are not part of this kingdom or do not have the needs of this kingdom at their heart, and we should stand up and recognise that. The over-regulatory practice that is being put upon us by Brussels is destroying this country. The sooner that we realise that, the better, and the sooner that the Government realise that and recognise that they should address the root cause of the problem, the better for us all.

[Chris Heaton-Harris]

The hon. Gentleman should just come off the fence. I have to declare that I was a member of the European Parliament for 10 years and served alongside his father. On two occasions, I attended an employment committee meeting in Brussels and saw Labour Ministers pleading with representatives to not allow the various connotations of the directive to flow through. Back in 2004, when the Commission opened up its first rethinking of this process, Labour Ministers came to the Parliament to plead with their MEPs not to vote to insist that this went ahead and to plead with the rest of the Parliament to allow Britain to do the right thing for its own people.

[Ian Paisley]

The hon. Gentleman gives us a valuable insight, or an inside track, into what the horse trading is really like in Brussels. This is not about the needs of the constituency or of the people, but about horse trading. It is about what we can achieve here to solve something in Brussels, Lithuania or Greece that is completely unrelated to the health needs of this nation. That horse-trading mentality is failing this nation. The insight that the hon. Gentleman provides is useful, and I am glad that he has come out from the shadows of Europe and, like me, is standing here in this Parliament. I know the happy times that he spent with my father when he was in Europe.

Other nations do not gild the lily as we do. We are pretty special at gilding the lily. We can really implement regulations like no one else. Why do the Government do it? Every other European nation seems to interpret the European working time directive in whatever way they want and get away with it. I am amazed that Ireland—the other bit—has been able to interpret the directive its way and get away with it. Surely, if it can say that training is not part of being a doctor, we too can find the flexibility—a word used by the hon. Member for Bristol North West (Charlotte Leslie)—necessary to make this work for us. Let us use the F-word; let us be flexible and get this right for our patients, our hospitals and our services.

In Lithuania, there is poor EWTD compliance because of the recession, so it can get away with it. Greece, too, has got away with not implementing the European working time directive because of its poor economic financial state. Surely, we can get away with implementing the European directive our way, and in a way that is flexible for our people and for our country. Apparently, Portugal is fully EWTD-compliant. However, many doctors and surgeons there now work more than their contracts say that they should. Surely, if the rest of Europe can find a way to be flexible to suit the needs of their people, it is not beyond the kith of men or beyond our wonderful Health Minister who is here today and our wonderful Department of Health to come up with a way to make the directive flexible for our people, for our nation, for our kingdom and—most importantly—for the needs of our patients, and to allow our doctors to deliver the service that they need to deliver?

I believe that we have a complete erosion of fundamental realities when we look at how the EWTD is being implemented to the destruction of the delivery of service and patient care. I hope that the Minister and the Department are listening to a voice that is coming across from all this kingdom, which says that the directive needs to be changed and changed fast.

European Union Bill

Debate between Chris Heaton-Harris and Ian Paisley

Tuesday 11th January 2011 Commons Chamber

[Chris Heaton-Harris]

I thank my hon. Friend for his intervention. However, during my 10 years as a Member of the European Parliament I gained a rough idea of what sovereignty was and how it is viewed by different member states within the European Union. His amendment would have some strength if we had market-tested it on the academic experts who appeared before the European Scrutiny Committee. I truly believe that if we had said, “This is what clause 18 states. What do you think of that?” they would all have said what we have said about the clause, which has been repeated a number of times. If we had asked whether adding this sentence to the clause would protect us in any way, I am pretty sure they would have said, “No, not really. This is all a matter of interpretation for the lawyers. We won’t get anywhere like that.”

[Ian Paisley]

Is not the reason why people do not get excited about this sort of stuff—the hon. Gentleman has put his finger on it—the way in which laws are changed in this country? He is right: it is not a bang theory. As someone who has worked in Europe and been a Member of the European Parliament, he will know that Europe changes laws in a very nuanced way. A European directive informs our officials what they should do and our officials make those changes, sometimes at the behest of our own courts. However, such changes happen as a result of a nuanced change in Europe. They are dumbing us down quite deliberately, so that this Parliament is no longer sovereign.

[Chris Heaton-Harris]

I agree, which is why I focused my attempts to amend the Bill on the parts of it where there are opportunities to get this place to debate matters more thoroughly. We should get the country more interested by having referendums on some of the big changes that happen in Europe. In the Lisbon treaty there is an awful clause—the passerelle clause—which has untold danger written across it.

There are many things that former Ministers for Europe did; I am talking not about the right hon. Member for Rotherham, but about a friend of mine, the right hon. Member for Leicester East (Keith Vaz) when he was Minister for Europe. The European charter of fundamental rights was meant to have no more relevance to British law than a copy of the “Beano,” but it is now enshrined in the Lisbon treaty. I am very wary of the process and how it works, which is why I am keen on tightening up many other matters in the Bill, and have tabled amendments to do that.

None of those issues are helped, or indeed hindered, by clause 18. The Government’s apparent intention is that the clause will combat any argument that parliamentary sovereignty is limited by EU treaties directly—in other words, that Parliament cannot act contrary to those treaties while they apply to the UK. A strict reading of clause 18 would not prevent someone from arguing that parliamentary sovereignty would be limited by the European Communities Act as applied by the courts. There are many different arguments on this matter, but I want to return to the simple fact that we can take from the expert witnesses’ testimony before the European Scrutiny Committee anything we like, to allow us to argue on any side of the issue. Sensibly, Professor Adam Tomkins submitted in written evidence to us that

“European Union law is far from being the only contemporary challenge to the doctrine of parliamentary sovereignty”.

That is a very salient point. Human rights law, and indeed common law itself, would also pose challenges, as would different types of law coming from different places through different courts. Those challenges will not be affected by what clause 18 states, and will not be changed or challenged by the amendment if it is passed. We will still be in the same position.

I am concerned because I have a strong belief that we will not be able to negotiate strongly with our European partners until we start banging our fists on the table, reminding them that we are the second largest net contributor to the European Union and using the vetoes that we have. We should do exactly what the French and the Spanish do in all budgetary and other negotiations, which is to play their hand as hard as they can for the best interests of their country. That is what I would like our Ministers to do, and what I would like to believe they are doing. I want to hear from our Ministers that we will not only talk and be good at the rhetoric, but that we will start instructing United Kingdom Permanent Representation to the European Union to do the right thing by our people. Again, none of that is affected by clause 18 or the amendment tabled to it.

I humbly suggest to my colleagues who may be excited by the clause that perhaps this is not the battle we should be fighting. There may be other areas where we can give the people we represent the referendum they want, and we should be angling for that. Perhaps there are ways in which we can tighten up the Bill through other amendments to other clauses. The timing of the implementation of the Bill means that it will apply to decisions made by the Government in the future. Perhaps we can do a much better job by tightening up the rest of the Bill, rather than getting excited about this clause.

Maybe at some point in this Parliament we can have a referendum on Europe, which is something on which I have not had the opportunity to express my view. I would love an “in or out” referendum; hon. Members can guess which way I would vote in that. Based on where we are now and what we have, it would certainly be “out”. I want the British people to have their say on our relationship with Europe and I also want them to be engaged in what is going on in their name in this place and in the negotiations. Other parts of the Bill, rather than this clause, are the place to try to bring that about.