European Single Market

Lord Hamilton of Epsom Excerpts

Thursday 9th December 2010 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Wilcox]

I think I will not comment on the euro today. The noble Lord is absolutely right; we must encourage wherever we can to make the market work as well as possible. To go back to the original Question, which, if I may remind your Lordships, was about our response to the British Chambers of Commerce eight-point plan for the European single market, there are things there that we would be very keen to support. We need to talk about creating effective digital single markets and all the other things like that that can make the market work better. We have enough problems at the moment, and anything positive that we can say is a good idea.

[Lord Hamilton of Epsom]

I am sorry that my noble friend does not want to talk about the euro today, because one reason why we have a very satisfactory export performance to the eurozone is that we are not in it. Sterling has depreciated against the euro, making life much easier for our exporters. Is she not very glad that we have not joined the eurozone?

[Baroness Wilcox]

The United Kingdom is not a member of the euro at the moment, and I see no time in future when we are likely to ask to join.