European Union

Damian Collins Excerpts

Tuesday 13th December 2011 Commons Chamber

[Chris Heaton-Harris]

Yes, I do. I expect the highest standards of reporting from out national newspapers, but I take my hon. Friend’s point on board.

[Damian Collins (Folkestone and Hythe) (Con)]

Will my hon. Friend give way?

[Chris Heaton-Harris]

I will, very briefly.

[Damian Collins]

Has my hon. Friend noted that other respected financial newspapers, such as The Wall Street Journal, have congratulated the Prime Minister on the stand that he took?

--- Later in debate ---

[Damian Collins (Folkestone and Hythe) (Con)]

It was stated earlier in the debate that there was some surprise at the British negotiating position in Europe and that other member states were not fully apprised of the stand that we would take. That came as a great surprise to me, because I think that the Prime Minister was incredibly clear about what he was going to do. Last week, he wrote an article in The Times setting out what he would do, and then when he got to the negotiating chamber, and had no alternative, he did what he said he would do. Perhaps if there was surprise in Europe it was at the fact that we have a British Prime Minister who actually does what he says he is going to do and does not roll over in the negotiating chamber at the last minute in the face of pressure from other countries.

The hon. Member for Wolverhampton North East (Emma Reynolds) said that when John Major was Prime Minister he secured, under threat of veto, the British opt-out from the single currency. That is quite right. To my mind, that suggests that it was his Conservative Government who kept us out of the euro by creating the mechanism by which we could stay out. However, that was not the only opt-out that he secured at the Maastricht negotiations; he also secured the opt-outs from the social chapter and the working time directive, which were given away by the Labour Government with nothing in return. One of the reasons we now have a big debate about returning powers to this country and to this Parliament is that those opt-outs were given away, together with the powers that went with them.

As the right hon. Member for Belfast North (Mr Dodds) said, this is by no means a done deal. It is not true that we are isolated and that every other country is lined up against us and is committed to the compact that was set out by the eurozone members. It is clear from what we read in the European press today that the Parliaments of countries such as Denmark and Poland are raising severe doubts about what is in the compact. Speaking from the negotiating table itself, Hungary and the Czech Republic have said that they need to go back to their own countries to ask the permission of their Parliaments.

Given the wording in the compact, it is hardly surprising that people are starting to raise those concerns. For the sake of the record, I should like to share with Members some of the things that it says. For example, it says that the rule on deficit and debt reduction

“will contain an automatic correction mechanism that shall be triggered in the event of deviation. It will be defined by each Member State on the basis of principles proposed by the Commission…Member States shall converge towards their specific reference level, according to a calendar proposed by the Commission…the Commission will in particular examine the key parameters of the fiscal stance in the draft budgetary plans and will, if needed, adopt an opinion on these plans.”

[Mark Reckless (Rochester and Strood) (Con)]

Can my hon. Friend explain those repeated references to the Commission? I understood that the Prime Minister had said that we were not going to allow the fiscal union to use the EU institutions of the Commission and the European Court of Justice.

[Damian Collins]

My hon. Friend makes a perfectly valid point. Of course, this is only a communiqué produced by the eurozone countries, not a binding agreement. However, it is clear that these decisions will be taken at European level. It will be the Commission’s decision, or that of whatever European body is created to police this compact, to determine how quickly countries should reduce their deficit, to decide whether they are keeping on track, to propose what measures of intervention should take place if they fail to do so, and to create what it calls a common economic policy that is the stated aim and objective of these countries. If the eurozone members wish to proceed down that path, then that is a decision that they will take. It should be clear to all that Britain would never go down that path. We would never countenance such a transfer of power and sovereignty over our economic affairs to the European level. In setting out his objections and vetoing a treaty of 27, the Prime Minister clearly reinforced that point. There can have been no doubt and no surprise.

A question that has been asked is, what next for Britain and Europe? The summit in Brussels on Thursday and Friday was not about Great Britain, it was about the eurozone and its crisis. My concern, and that of other hon. Members, is that the crisis has not been fixed and that the measures that have been put in place do not provide the guarantees that the financial markets want. That makes it more likely that there will be a default in the eurozone, and that countries may leave the euro. The economic consequences of that are unknown, but most countries around the world predict that it will not help the world economy and, if anything, will make its problems greater. Europe has to overcome that problem.

European leaders may well reflect on the negotiations in Brussels and say that it would have been better to give the Prime Minister the concessions and reassurances that he was seeking rather than force us out and force us into using the veto, thereby delaying the possibility of a proper and sensible negotiation of a resolution for the eurozone crisis. That will be seen to be an error.

Turning to our own position, there has always been much talk about the amount of trading that we do with the European Union. As a bloc, it is worth more than 50% of our trade. Over the past 10 years, however, our trade with the developing economies around the world— Brazil, India, Russia and China—has been increasing, as has that of countries such as Germany. Those are large, developing consumer markets, and it is reasonable to expect our exports there to increase in relative terms and those to the European markets that have been the major home of our trade in the past to decrease in relative terms.

[Kelvin Hopkins (Luton North) (Lab)]

Of course, we have a massive trade deficit with the rest of the European Union, so it needs us more than we need it.

[Damian Collins]

The hon. Gentleman makes a clear point about our trading relationship, but the point that I was seeking to make was that in the decades to come, our trading relationship with other countries around the world will become increasingly important. The idea that the only expression of British wealth and interest comes through the EU is not correct. Also, not just us but other EU members will have to put far greater priority on developing and expanding markets in other countries. That issue of trade policy has been neglected, particularly by countries in the eurozone.

Our focus has to be on making our economy more competitive both within the European market and around the world and on developing our trade interests around the world. That should be a priority for Europe as well. The idea that we can ignore the euro crisis, the challenges that Europe faces and the challenge of the emerging and dynamic economies is false.

My concern about what happened in Brussels is not about the fact that Britain took a firm stand and made it clear that we would not be part of policies that are an outdated solution to an old problem. We see the world not as a series of competing blocs, with the EU fighting against China and the United States, but as a developing patchwork of economies that we want to engage broadly with. We took a stand for what I believe will be the future direction of the world. My concern is that other members of the European Union have missed that challenge and missed the opportunity to put their own house in order, which was what the summit was supposed to be about.

Council of Europe (UK Chairmanship)

Damian Collins Excerpts

Thursday 27th October 2011 Commons Chamber

[Damian Collins (Folkestone and Hythe) (Con)]

It is a pleasure to be called, and a privilege to have the chance to play a small part in this debate. The UK chairmanship of the Council of Europe comes round not very often, so we can truly say that we will not see the like of this parliamentary occasion for decades to come.

I concur with many colleagues who have spoken, particularly on the urgent need for reform of the European Court of Human Rights and the terrible problems caused by the large backlog of cases. I am sure that all hon. Members know of constituents who simply do not know whether a case that they have submitted will ever be heard, and who do not know where they stand.

My hon. Friend the Member for North Thanet (Mr Gale) and others commented on the importance of internet governance in Europe. That is important in terms not only of internet freedoms, which were an important part of the Arab spring, but of personal security and trade. We need the internet to work as an open common trading environment. People who seek to pass off goods or to break copyright and intellectual property protections on goods and services in the EU, and who use the internet to facilitate that, should know that the force of law will come down on them. That is a challenge for the Council of Europe, the Government and the EU.

I should like to use the time allowed not to go over some of the matters that have already been covered, but to ask the Minister to consider ethics and integrity in sport—another important matter—as part of the work of the UK chairmanship of the Council of Europe. The debate is timely, given the Council’s work on match fixing, on which it has engaged with UEFA. It is also part of the general debate on the reform of FIFA, the governing body of world football, about which members of the Council have also had things to say.

Sport and the ethics of sport have played an important role in the Council of Europe since it was started in 1949. Through the years, the Council has built up significant competence in specialised areas such as quality assurance in sport, and agreements adopted at world and European political levels. The Council of Europe has a unique and important role to play within the sporting environment. It is not a member state Government, an EU institution or an international Government or body, but a forum that brings together people who have concerns about the future of Europe, how countries work together, and the rights and freedoms that we all enjoy. It works across the political spectrum, including in the world of culture and sport.

The Council passed the enlarged partial agreement on sport, which provides a forum for a discussion of ethics in sport and for championing those issues. In 2005 the Committee of Ministers adopted a recommendation that called on the Council to consider that

“good governance in sport is a complex network of policy measures and private regulations used to promote integrity in the management of the core values of sport such as democratic, ethical, efficient and accountable sports activities; and that these measures apply equally to the public administration sector of sport and to the non-governmental sports sector”.

The Committee also called on the Council to consider setting up

“mechanisms to monitor the implementation of good governance in sport principles, and put in place mechanisms to deal with inappropriate or unethical behaviours in sport, including prosecution where necessary.”

Those are fundamental points, and I am pleased that the Council considered them in its working activities. It could bring those recommendations to bear and raise the issue of good governance with FIFA, the world football body. An active debate on that has been led by Members of this Parliament—the Select Committee on Culture, Media and Sport this year produced a report on FIFA reform and allegations of corruption against senior officials within the game.

FIFA is based in Europe, and as we have heard, almost every country is represented in the Council of Europe. One country that is not represented is the Vatican, which FIFA is like in some ways. It has an extremely powerful global figure—Sepp Blatter—who is beyond the protection of government. He certainly moves around the world like a latter-day pontiff or monarch, and is above the counsel of both court and Parliament.

People who love the game of football, which is played around the world, including within the jurisdiction of this Parliament, ask, “Is that right? Is there a role for international bodies such as the Council of Europe and parliamentary bodies and Parliaments to speak up?” Allegations of corruption against senior members of FIFA and members of the FIFA executive committee have been made in this Parliament. It is right that we take those allegations up with such governing bodies, and that we challenge the president of FIFA, Sepp Blatter. It is also right to ask whether FIFA is putting its house in order, and whether the concerns of the citizens of Europe, including citizens of this country, are being dealt with by governing bodies. Should we not seek to prosecute people who have done wrong, and launch independent investigations into allegations of wrongdoing?

FIFA is a particularly good—or rather, bad—example of a body challenged by allegations of corruption against its most senior people. In the past 12 months, of the leading 24 FIFA members who make up the executive committee, 11 have faced serious allegations of corruption, two have been suspended, one has been banned for life, one has resigned and four are currently under investigation. This is a body in considerable crisis. In June Sepp Blatter, the president of FIFA, committed the organisation to leading a process of internal reform. I believe that that process needs to move a lot more quickly. I believe that no real progress has been made. At the FIFA congress earlier this month, Sepp Blatter set out a taskforce.

[Mr Binley]

My hon. Friend knows that I am very interested in football, and in fact played for a long time. Does he not think that Sepp Blatter is part of the problem, not part of the answer, and that the review of FIFA ought to be independent and made up of a global group of people who really understand football?

[Damian Collins]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right. For a review of FIFA to have any meaning, there needs to be a fully independent investigation into all the allegations made. Transparency International, which conducted a report for FIFA, said that this should be the first step towards cleaning up FIFA. It should involve people from outside the organisation and from different walks of life—perhaps judges, people in politics and people with experience of governance in other sporting institutions—who could take the lead and have the power to initiate their own investigations, produce their own reports and do so in public. FIFA has set up a taskforce to look at good governance within FIFA. I think that that needs to move faster and that it should consider commissioning people from outside the organisation to lead the investigations internally. That is absolutely key.

We know of the concerns expressed by some of the judges who have served on FIFA’s ethics committee. In January one of Germany’s most respected judges, Günter Hirsch, left the committee in disgust and said:

“The events of the past few weeks have raised and strengthened the impression that responsible persons in Fifa have no real interest in playing an active role in resolving, punishing and avoiding violations against ethic regulations of Fifa.”

These are legitimate areas of public concern, and it is legitimate for Parliament to take an interest in them too. FIFA has taken some steps forward in the past few weeks. The idea that the location of the World cup should be decided not by an elite few people in the game, but by representatives of every FIFA member, is a step in the right direction. However, widespread investigations are needed into all the allegations of corruption made so far, so that there can be a clean slate.

There has to be greater transparency in the work of FIFA and in how its money is spent, particularly in developing football countries around the world, so that it can be audited and publicly accounted for, just as the work of Parliament or the Government is. The backgrounds of people who serve on international bodies such as FIFA should be clear. If they have any conflicts of interest those should be made clear, as is the case for a member of the Government or a Member of Parliament. If they have financial interests, or their family members have financial interests, in football, it should be on the public record. Any pounds spent by FIFA anywhere in the world should be accounted for. We should know where they go. That is what is required to put football’s governing body back on an even keel and to restore faith in it. However, because of how it is constituted, that change has to be driven by FIFA and Sepp Blatter.

The pace of that change and reform must be greatly accelerated, and it must have a degree of transparency that it simply does not have now. The Council of Europe, and the UK’s chairmanship of it, could consider that matter as part of the work of the Council’s sub-committee on youth and sport. We should debate those issues within that forum, alongside its work on other areas of ethics in sport, particularly match fixing, as I mentioned earlier. It should produce its own report and view to add to the external pressure that must be placed on FIFA, if the necessary reforms are to be put in place and we are to have confidence in FIFA as a world governing body. That would be an incredibly important and popular thing for the Council of Europe to do, and a great way for the UK’s chairmanship to demonstrate its commitment to ethics and sport, as well as the other important areas of work that the Minister outlined.

National Referendum on the European Union

Damian Collins Excerpts

Monday 24th October 2011 Commons Chamber

[Mark Pritchard]

My hon. Friend makes his point eloquently. He and others signed up to a common market, but that has not turned out to be the case. The millions of people in the group that I call the “great disenfranchised” need to be enfranchised. They are the lost generation of voters that the political establishment in this country has left behind.

[Damian Collins (Folkestone and Hythe) (Con)]

Will my hon. Friend give way?

North Africa and the Middle East

Damian Collins Excerpts

Thursday 17th March 2011 Commons Chamber

[Yasmin Qureshi]

I happened to spend two years working in Kosovo after the armed conflict and after the Serbian bombing. Having seen the situation, I can say that that was an immediate international humanitarian disaster that followed the massacre of 100,000 Muslim Bosnians. It was very much an effort by the United Nations to do with that particular war.

As has been mentioned, one cannot compare two things as though they are the same. Libya is a very different ball game to Kosovo and Serbia. Everybody knows what happened in the former Yugoslavia—hundreds of thousands of people were massacred and something had to be done. That is not the situation that we are talking about here.

[Damian Collins (Folkestone and Hythe) (Con)]

I think the point being made by the right hon. Member for Rotherham (Mr MacShane) was that there was not a British commercial interest in going into Kosovo—we did it to save lives and because it was the right thing to do. That is the comparison that we are seeking to draw here.

[Yasmin Qureshi]

A number of people in this country, even at that time, did not want to go into Kosovo. One might say that there was no economic rationale for going into Kosovo, but there was certainly an American strategic reason. The listening post in Cyprus was soon coming to an end and they wanted an additional listening post in the area of Kosovo. I spent two years in Kosovo and I saw the Americans’ Camp Bastion, which was a solid construction while most other countries had NATO flat-pack constructions, so there was certainly a strategic reason for the Americans to go in there. I agree that Robin Cook was able to persuade the then Government regarding Kosovo, but that has been the only honourable exception in all the disputes of the past 30 to 40 years.

--- Later in debate ---

[Neil Carmichael (Stroud) (Con)]

This has been a timely and excellent debate, and Members on both sides of the House have made valuable contributions. I wish to follow on from the comments of my hon. Friend the Member for Penrith and The Border (Rory Stewart), who made some very good points. One was about the amount of time that we should allow for significant changes to take place in north Africa and the middle east. He talked about it taking two decades or more, and I think he was absolutely right. Although things are happening very fast in the immediate situation, we have to take a long-term view.

My hon. Friend was also right to say that we have to be more engaged and flexible with the various nation states that we are dealing with and make use of collective European values as well as the experiences of individual states. The relationship between France and Morocco is a good example, but not the only one, and we need to be intelligent about how we respond to developments.

My hon. Friend the Member for North Thanet (Mr Gale) made an interesting point. He wondered why we were not in Hungary in 1956. The answer is that we were in Suez. He wondered why the west was not dealing with Czechoslovakia in 1968, and the answer is that we were in Vietnam. Well, we were not, but certainly the United States was. That is a signal that we have to think about our interests much more carefully than we have in the past.

There are some parallels between the current situation and 1989 to 1991, but one of the most important parallels is with 1975, when the Helsinki accords were agreed. They gave comfort to the people of the Warsaw pact countries, because President Gerald Ford and others insisted on including human rights as a key plank of the accords. We should remember that and think about what it did later. We need to give that type of comfort to the middle east and north Africa now.

The points that other hon. Members have made are worth embellishing. Democracy is a great thing, but the Foreign Secretary is absolutely right to say that we cannot rely on elections only—we also need democratic institutions, the rule of law and so forth. The Westminster Foundation is valuable in providing such help, but the EU needs to be willing to promote our values. Many hon. Members asked why the EU should show interest in the middle east and north Africa. The answer is that they are nearby, and we should have interests and links in nearby places.

[Damian Collins]

Will my hon. Friend give way?

[Neil Carmichael]

I cannot, because we have only five minutes left, and I know my hon. Friend the Member for Harrow East (Bob Blackman) wants to say a few words.

Developing economic links and ensuring that countries benefit from the opportunities of trade links and entrepreneurial activity is important. I have been to many countries in the middle east, including Morocco and Israel, and noted an interest in getting on with entrepreneurial activities, which we need to stimulate.

Interestingly, the shadow Foreign Secretary asked how Saudi involvement in Bahrain came about. I, too, wonder about that. Who invited the troops? Did the Saudis make the suggestion or was a request made? He was quite right to ask whether the Americans were involved. There is a danger in unilateral action; we need more collective and multilateral action, which is why I emphasised the role of the EU. We also need to work hard with other key nation states, notably America, but also those that neighbour north Africa and the middle east. In that respect, should Turkey, whose geopolitical role we need to think about carefully in this context, be involved?

I firmly believe that we need a two-state solution to the Israel-Palestine problem. Nothing less will do, and we must ensure that we encourage the US to think in the same terms. It was refreshing to hear other hon. Members say that the 1967 boundaries should, broadly speaking, give or take, be respected. The truth is that the Israelis, who must be fed up with wondering who will attack them next, will also benefit from a solution. We must make it abundantly clear that they need the security that will come from a two-state solution.

Obviously, things are moving fast in Libya and, worryingly, Colonel Gaddafi’s forces are moving towards Benghazi. I am not convinced that a no-fly zone will happen, and nor am I convinced that it would necessarily work, because there is an awful lot of ground activity rather than air activity. However, we must learn lessons. Our attitude to such crises must be based on a willingness to construct coalitions. We must also learn how to deal with such situations in future, because in some respects we have failed to act quickly enough.

However, we should never think that interventions should happen just because we feel like it. We must ensure that people in the countries involved want us to be there. This country, other EU members and other active nation states, but above all states in north Africa and the middle east, should encourage that.

BBC World Service

Damian Collins Excerpts

Wednesday 26th January 2011 Commons Chamber

[Mr Hague]

I have paid tribute on many occasions to the staff involved and to the BBC for the service that it provides around the world, and I do so again. I said that we might be able to find some additional help with the restructuring costs, and I mentioned in my initial answer the money that we have included in the settlement to underwrite the World Service’s move to new headquarters and to ensure that some new services can be developed. There is a strong commitment to the future of the World Service.

[Damian Collins (Folkestone and Hythe) (Con)]

In his correspondence with Sir Michael Lyons, which has been placed in the Library today, the Foreign Secretary states that he will

“seek to find ways to make some additional funding available this year, providing those funds can be used to generate savings in future years.”

What conversations has he had with the BBC Trust about that, and can he confirm whether he has met Sir Michael Lyons in person during his negotiations?

[Mr Hague]

Yes, I have met Sir Michael in person a couple of times. On the subject of what discussions are taking place, I am awaiting further details from the World Service of how it would use any additional money this year to help make the savings and rationalisations that we have discussed.