European Union

Debate between Emma Reynolds and Lord McCrea of Magherafelt and Cookstown

Tuesday 13th December 2011 Commons Chamber

[Dr McCrea]

I agree. The European Union has been used to raiding our coffers over the years; we have been paying for many of its wonderful, unique programmes, which have in fact been an abuse of some of the finances hard earned by the people of this country.

[Emma Reynolds]

Will the hon. Gentleman confirm that the decision-making procedure for any financial transaction tax is subject to unanimity, not to qualified majority voting, and that no attempt at all was made to impose such a tax on us at last Thursday’s summit?

[Dr McCrea]

The hon. Lady has come to the Dispatch Box today, but has not yet told us what the official Opposition would have done had they been in government, so it is rich of her to ask questions of other Members about the issue.

What has happened is that Europe has been taught a salutary lesson, which it will not forget. Perhaps it will be one of the last lessons that Mr Sarkozy will face on the international stage; the presidential elections are coming and one never knows the results of those. Since the Prime Minister’s justifiable action in Brussels, many commentators have tried to suggest that he has lost credibility on the European stage. What kind of influence could our Prime Minister have had if he had failed to honour his pledge to act in the best interests of the British people? It is clear that Mr Cameron has the support of a vast number of people throughout the United Kingdom on this issue, and we want and encourage him to continue to stand firm.

I suggest that if some Liberal Democrats feel that this does not have the support of the community, they can test it in two ways. First, they could have a referendum; certainly, it would be interesting for them to support that idea, as they wanted a referendum recently on something that was also a side, rather than an important, issue. Secondly, they could allow the electorate to decide. If they thought that Mr Cameron did not have the backing of the people, they could allow an election to take place and let the electorate make their decision based on that situation.

It is absolutely disgraceful that the leader of the Liberal Democrats stayed away from the House but was happy enough to go to bed in his constituency when the Prime Minister was standing up for the interests of the United Kingdom. He was happy to agree with a certain standard, but whenever the chips were down he claimed that Mr Cameron was yielding to his Back Benchers. I suggest that the change came over Mr Clegg because he was yielding to the shouts from his own Back Benchers. We do not need Mr Flip-Flop on this issue. We need a definite stand for the interests of the United Kingdom, and I am delighted that our Prime Minister took that stand in Europe.