Category: 1991

Below is the text of Mr Major’s press conference in Maastricht on Wednesday 11th December 1991.

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PRIME MINISTER:

Thanks to all of you for staying so late for this press conference. We have had two and a half days of intense, detailed and occasionally tough negotiation. I am very happy with the outcome, I think it is a success both for Britain and for the whole of the Community.

What we have agreed in the last couple of days is a treaty on European Union covering economic and monetary union and also political union. It marks a very significant step forward for Community cooperation, it settles the argument as to whether we should deepen or widen the Community, because we will now, as we have advocated for some time, do both of those things.

Let me turn firstly to economic and monetary union. Our main objective in the economic and monetary union treaty was to secure a legally water-tight provision so that the United Kingdom can decide whether it wants to join a single currency or not and if it does, when it should join a single currency. We have achieved that in a legally binding protocol which forms an integral part of the treaty. We have secured also strict convergence conditions before any of the Community countries can move to Stage 3. We have retained absolute control over monetary policy in Stage 2 and of course whether we move to Stage 3 at all will require a separate decision by the British government and Parliament. Those were precisely the objectives we came here to achieve in this treaty.

The text on political union preserves the separate pillared treaty structure which we have long argued for on defence, on foreign policy and on interior and justice cooperation. What that means is no Community competence in those areas and no jurisdiction by the European Court of Justice. That was a vital requirement for the United Kingdom and we have achieved it in full.

For foreign policy we have preserved unanimity in decision-making, that also was vital for us. If there are to be any implementing decisions capable of majority voting then those decisions themselves will be first identified by unanimity, again an absolute requirement when we came here.

On defence, the outcome is good for the Alliance and it is good for us. We have agreed that any new arrangements must be compatible with NATO, that defence issues should be dealt with by the Western European Union and not the Community and that the Western European Union will not be subordinated to the Union. A common defence policy will be a matter for the long term.

We have also agreed a separate Western European Union declaration annex to the treaty which further reaffirms the independent status and decision making of the Western European Union, confirms that any new arrangements will be compatible with NATO and that the Western European Union will act in conformity with the Alliance. This is absolutely the outcome that we required.

There has been a lot of concern, and not I think just in the United Kingdom, at creeping competence in the Community, the Commission using whatever articles are available to create an unjustified legal base for Community action. That has been particularly true and has caused us especial concern in the social area.

Let me say, without equivocation, that we accept that there is a social dimension to the Community. Eighteen out of the 32 measures in the social action programme have been adopted, all of them, all of them, have been implemented by the United Kingdom. What we could not accept was further extensions of Community competence, not to deal with health and safety, but to do with employer, employee relations.

I said before I came that I could not accept a text that would allow the Community to adopt measures that would drive a coach and horses through the trade union reforms we have won over the last decade which have, just to give you an illustration of their effectiveness, reduced the days lost through strikes from 29 million in 1979 to less than 2 million last year. As you will know, the social chapter has been dropped entirely.

In the social area the treaty text is completely unchanged from the existing Treaty of Rome, there are no extensions of Community competence, no additional provisions for majority voting, there is no new treaty text on social issues. The other eleven member states, who have different backgrounds and different traditions in this area, will make their own separate arrangements for extra measures which will affect only their countries and for which they only will pay.

One of the features of the negotiations has been the recognition that the Community should not just step in because it feels like it but only when there is a good reason for the Community to do so. And this is reflected in the treaty text, proposed by Britain and Germany, which implements the principle of subsidiarity, the principle in essence that the Community should only take action if and insofar as its objectives cannot be better achieved at national level. That was important to us and it has been agreed and sanctified in the treaty.

We have reduced unanimity for major areas of Community spending and in particular research and development. Now that is an important gain. At the same time we have strengthened the Community so as to help our citizens. We have improved the effectiveness, efficiency and accountability of the Community.

We have given the European Parliament a new power to investigate maladministration. We have created a European Community ombudsman. We have given European citizens a right to petition the European Parliament. All of those that I have just listed were British initiatives that are now in the treaty.

We have taken measures to improve the implementation of Community measures, on which Britain’s record on implementation is one of the best. And in particular, the European Court of Justice in future will be able to impose fines on those governments which fail to carry out their legal obligations.

I referred a few moments ago to deepening as well as widening. In its conclusions the Community, at our suggestion, has agreed that new membership negotiations can begin in 1992. The Commission will undertake a study of enlargement and will report back to the European Council in Lisbon next June. Enlargement will then be something for Britain to carry forward during our Presidency in the second half of next year. We look forward to doing that.

The greatest challenge to the Community is not our internal development but how the Community as a whole matches up to the dramatic events taking place all around us, particularly to the East of Europe.

We have agreed a number of statements on foreign policy issues as well. Let me draw your attention just to two of them. The first on the Soviet Union is designed to encourage peaceful and democratic development in the Soviet Union, it calls on the republics to respect the rights of minorities, to put into effect international agreements on arms control and nuclear non-proliferation, to control and secure their nuclear weapons and to honour their obligations in respect of the Soviet Union’s external debt.

As many of you may know, I discussed developments in the Soviet Union with President Mitterrand and we have kept in close touch with the Americans over the last two days.

The Political Directors of Britain, France and the United States will be meeting later this week and I hope the Foreign Ministers of the three countries will meet to discuss these developments, I hope, next week.

The European Council has endorsed the demands which we, France and the United States have made to the Libyan government requiring them to abandon their support of terrorism and hand over the perpetrators of the Lockerbie bombing.

So those are some of the things that have happened over the last couple of days. Tonight’s agreement of course was not just achieve in two days, it reflects a great deal of work over many months. It reflects enormous credit on Ruud Lubbers and the Dutch Presidency who have been unfailingly courteous and helpful throughout the lead-up to the negotiations and during the negotiations.

And tough though the negotiations have sometimes been, there has been a genuine spirit of give and take amongst the Member States, I believe that the agreement that we have agreed this evening fully reflects Britain’s interests on economic and monetary union, foreign policy, defence and the future development of the Community. I shall have no hesitation in recommending it to Parliament and to the British people.

And finally, I told you when I came here that the term federal vocation would have gone by Tuesday night – it has.

 

QUESTIONS AND ANSWERS:

QUESTION (John Sergeant):

Could you confirm that the eleven countries who have agreed the protocol on the social chapter will not be able to act within the structures of the European Community and that any policies they agree together will not become part of Community law?

PRIME MINISTER:

That is correct. They will be able to use the Commission, they will be able to do that, it will be specially funded, it will be separately funded and it will not become Community law as far as the United Kingdom is concerned.

QUESTION (Keith Rockwell, Journal of Commerce):

You mentioned that you thought that the social aspects of this treaty would result in damage to the competitiveness of Europe, I wonder if you think that the outcome of this treaty or this opting out or however we are going to phrase it here, may give Britain a let up on its competitors in terms of foreign investment and trade in the future?

PRIME MINISTER:

It certainly will do us no harm. One of the prominent European figures indicated some time ago that a country that did not have these obligations would act as a magnet to investment. I do not know whether that is true or not. I can certainly say that in the United Kingdom in recent years we have had the fastest job growth since the war, 75 percent increase in the number of self-employed since 1979, 33 percent rise in the number of registered businesses.

These were developments over the last decade that I was simply not prepared to put at risk and I believe that the provisions that were there in the social chapter, for reasons that I spelt out to our Community partners, would have damaged that competitiveness and would have damaged that job creation. And it was for that reason, not only anti-communautaire spirit, that I decided that those were provisions that it was not in Britain’s interests to sign up to. We have certainly retained our competitiveness, I look forward to welcoming a great deal more of inward investment and to sustaining our competitiveness in the short and medium term.

QUESTION (John Palmer, Guardian):

As you have told us, this European Summit has embarked upon an accelerated timetable in many ways for full European Union, Britain reserves the right to remain outside. Eleven countries, we have heard tonight, have announced their intention, using the European Commission and the European Parliament and with the British Ministers abstaining in the Council of Ministers, to press ahead with social legislation. Is it the position that we have now got a two-speed Europe and you have put Britain embedded down in the slow lane?

PRIME MINISTER:

Absolutely not. Let me take the first point which I assume was aimed at economic and monetary union. You said that we have reserved the right not to go in, but that is only half the story, John, we have also reserved the right to go in if we think it is right of the British economy at that stage, it is not a one-way option. Everybody else seems to have decided now, irrespective of the circumstances at a later stage, irrespective of their own economic development and what the world looks like, that they wish to commit themselves to that providing the convergence conditions are met.

We have a two-way option. If we think it is right, we can go in. If we think it is wrong, we can stay out. So we have surrendered nothing and we have lost nothing, the option is there for us to go in or not to go in as we choose.

Upon the second point about the social charter. The social charter is of course a misnomer because it really relates essentially to employment matters and what is important is that you actually look at what is proposed in that social charter and see what it actually means and the extent to which it would effect, badly in my judgment, upon British practices and British competitiveness.

Some people say: “But the social charter, it must be good for British workers.” I can only say to you, John, that costing British workers jobs is not good for British workers and that is why we decided not to go in it.

QUESTION:

If I could look at the issue of foreign policy, what is the current British stance on asylum seekers and refugee seekers that are going to potentially be coming in from Eastern Europe given the current instability in the Ukraine and Belorussia and Russia as well? What is your stance and how is Britain prepared to deal with the potential influx of asylum seekers and refugees?

PRIME MINISTER:

This has been discussed over recent weeks, not just of course in the discussions over the last couple of days, but has also been discussed more extensively amongst the Foreign Ministers. Now by good fortune I have the Foreign Secretary with me, so he will respond to you.

FOREIGN SECRETARY:

You will see the declaration that was put out today about the Soviet Union, that gives the general background as to how we analyse the position there. But as regards the asylum seekers and refugees, of course there is a problem right across Europe and I think we are all agreed that we hold strictly to the UN definition of a refugee, asylum-seeker, as someone who has a well founded fear of individual persecution. Those people we accept, all the countries of Europe accept, as is our duty under international law. But what we do not accept of course is the right of people to come to Europe, whether it is Britain or Germany or wherever, simply in order to better their economic position and we have legislation going through the British Parliament at the present time to deal with that.

So one of the things that has been agreed here at Maastricht is that the countries of Europe should work together more intensely on this and similar problems, not under the jurisdiction of the Community, not with the competence of the Community, but between governments. And that work I think is going to be increasingly important as the months pass.

QUESTION (Andrew Marr, Economist):

Mr Major, you have said that there has been a lot of give and take in these negotiations and you very helpfully listed for us all those areas where you have taken. Could you list for us now those areas where you have given?

PRIME MINISTER:

I am sure lots of other people will do that for you, Andrew. But let me set out some of them. There are some areas of increased competence, a good deal of it by decisions by unanimity rather than qualified majority vote and there has been an extension of a negative assent procedure.

We have also given in terms of what is in the treaty. Many of those individual matters that give greater powers to the European Parliament, and I listed them earlier in my opening remarks, were in fact British initiatives. I think what we have also done in some areas is to ensure that decisions are taken which are good for the Community, not just for the United Kingdom but for the Community as a whole. So I think we have given a great deal to these treaties and I believe dispassionate observers would acknowledge that,

QUESTION (Robin Oakley, The Times):

There have been indications that some national parliaments might not ratify the deal reached tonight if it is not agreed by the European Parliament and also there is some expectation that the European Parliament might not like the deal. If it is not ratified by various national parliaments and your 11 partners come hack to you and say they need a new deal, a new arrangement on the social chapter, would you be willing to start talking about it again?

PRIME MINISTER:

I honestly do not think that problem will arise. The European Parliament will accept this deal, I have no doubt about it. I dare say in some areas the European Parliament would have liked the deal to have gone further, that is undoubtedly the case. There is no-one, no national government that sat round that table that got everything it wanted, all of them have conceded something, all of them will have some things in the treaty that they would have preferred not to have had. They have made the decision as national governments to endorse the treaty, the European Parliament finds itself in the same place, it has got a great deal that it will like, it has not got some things that it wanted, but do not myself believe that it will fail to ratify the treaty.

QUESTION (David Marsh, FT):

Two questions about monetary union. What is the likelihood that a sufficiently large number of countries will actually reach the very tough convergence criteria to make monetary union a meaningful possibility either in 1996 or in 1999? And at what stage will you be moving to make the Bank of England independent to at least prepare yourself for the possibility of Britain opting in?

PRIME MINISTER:

On the first point, it is very speculative as to when people will actually achieve that state of convergence. The convergence conditions that people have to meet are quite tough and yet it is absolutely essential that those convergence conditions are there, otherwise there would be an economic catastrophe for Europe. I cannot make a judgment as to how rapidly those countries will get to convergence, it is certainly possible that they will not have achieved it by 1996/97, which is why the French for example, who are very enthusiastic about it, have produced the proposition of looking at it again two years later. Whether a sufficient number, a critical mass, will have reached it then is still a moot point. So that is speculative and I cannot make a judgment about that.

On your second point, the Bank of England would become independent if we went into Stage 3 and when we went into Stage 3,

QUESTION (Radio CB international):

How can it be that in this year there is carrying on a bloody civil war in Europe, people are being killed, Dubrovnik which happens to be a favourite town of mine is being destroyed, and there sit the twelve Heads of government of the European Community and nothing is being done and can anything be done and what can be done to stop it after the 83rd ceasefire?

PRIME MINISTER:

I do not think anyone has done more than the Foreign Secretary and his counterparts in Europe to try and bring it to an end. If the combatants in Yugoslavia continue fighting it is not necessarily possible for other people to stop them. But there is a wider answer to your question. Thirty years ago people might well have said: “How can you stop the Western European nations fighting against one another?” Today, such a question in Western Europe would be ludicrous, the integration and the inter-relationship between the European Community has effectively stopped conflict in Western Europe for good. One of the reasons that the decisions on enlargement are so important is that perhaps not in my political lifetime but beyond that, we can look forward to a Community that stretches right the way across the whole of Europe and that will prevent the prospects of conflict right the way across the whole of Europe. We have started a trail today that might provide the only comprehensive answer to your question in due course.

QUESTION:

Are you an optimist for the Balkans?

PRIME MINISTER:

It is not for me to declare whether I am an optimist or a pessimist.

Below is Mr Major’s statement made in the House of Commons on 11th December 1991 on the European Council held at Maastricht.

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The Prime Minister (Mr. John Major): With permission, Mr. Speaker, I should like to make a statement on the European Council in Maastricht which I attended with my right hon. Friends the Foreign Secretary and the Chancellor of the Exchequer.

The European Council has reached agreement on a treaty on European union. The relevant texts have been deposited along with the presidency conclusions. The House will be invited to debate the outcome next week.

Let me set out the main provisions of the agreements we reached. The treaty covers economic and monetary union and political union. It follows the structure for which the United Kingdom has consistently argued.

The treaty creates a new legal framework for co-operation between member states in foreign and security policy and in the fight against international crime. That co-operation will take place on an intergovernmental basis outside the treaty of Rome. That means that the Commission will not have the sole right of initiative and the European Court will have no jurisdiction.

On defence, we have agreed a framework for co-operation in which the primacy of the Atlantic alliance has been confirmed and the role of the Western European Union has been enhanced.

As the House knows, there was strong pressure over many months for all aspects of co-operation to come within European Community competence. That was not acceptable to this country. Instead, an alternative route to European co-operation has been opened up. I believe that this will be seen as an increasingly significant development as the Community opens its doors to new members, and more flexible structures are required.

I turn now to the main features of the text. The treaty provides for the possibility that member states will wish to adopt a single currency later this decade, but they can do so only if they meet strict convergence conditions–conditions for which the British Government have pressed from the outset. These cover inflation, budget deficits, exchange rate stability and long-term interest rates.

A single currency may come into being in 1997, but only if a minimum of seven countries meet the convergence conditions, and eight of the Twelve vote in favour. The treaty lays down that a single currency will come into being by 1999, but only if those convergence conditions are met and only for those countries which meet them. It is therefore highly uncertain when such a currency will be created and which countries it will cover.

In the House on 20 November, I said that there must be a provision giving the United Kingdom the right to decide for ourselves whether or not to move to stage 3. That requirement has been secured. It is set out in a legally binding protocol which forms an integral part of the treaty. The protocol was drafted by the United Kingdom and fully protects the position of this House. The effect of the protocol is as follows. We have exactly the same option to join a single currency at the same time as other member states if we wish. We shall be involved in all the decisions. But, unlike other Governments, we have not bound ourselves to join regardless of whether it makes economic or political sense.

The treaty text on political union provides for enhanced intergovernmental co-operation on foreign and security policy, on defence policy and in the fight against terrorism, drug trafficking and other crimes.

International crime knows no frontiers. Terrorists and other criminals must not be allowed to escape justice or to retire abroad with the proceeds of their crime. This text gives us a new basis for co-operation with our partners in bringing these criminals to justice.

The text provides for joint action in foreign policy, building on what was already agreed in the Single European Act. But, as I told the House on 20 November, if Britain needs to act on its own, it must be free to do so. The treaty meets that requirement. Joint action can take place only if we agree. Where there is no joint action, each member state is entirely free to act on its own. If, after joint action has been agreed, a member state needs to take its own measures to meet changed circumstances, it may do so.

There was pressure from other member states to take foreign policy decisions by majority voting. I was not prepared to agree that Britain could be outvoted on any substantive issue of foreign policy. Some of our partners also sought to draw a distinction between decisions of principle, where unanimity would apply, and implementing decisions which could be subject to majority voting. No one was able to explain how that distinction would work. I told the European Council that, if such occasions did arise, we should consider the case for majority voting on its merits. The treaty reflects our view. It provides that the Council may, but only by unanimity, designate certain decisions to be taken by qualified majority voting. But we cannot be forced to subject our foreign policy to the will of other member states. We have, in fact, preserved unanimity for all decisions where we decide that we need it.

We are agreed that Europe must do more for its own defence. We should build up the Western European Union as the defence pillar of the European union, but the treaty embodies the view set out in the Anglo-Italian proposal two months ago, and endorsed at last month’s summit of the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation that whatever we do at European level must be compatible with NATO. The WEU must in no way be subordinate to the European Council. It is not. We have avoided the danger of setting up defence structures which would compete with NATO. We have created a framework in which Europe can develop its defence role in a way which complements the American presence in Europe and does not put it at risk.

In these negotiations, we put forward a series of proposals designed to be of direct benefit to the European citizen. All of them were accepted. The Community has agreed to increase the accountability of European Community institutions; to strengthen the European Parliament’s financial control over the Commission; to allow the European Parliament to investigate maladministration and to appoint a Community ombudsman accessible to all Community citizens; to build up the role of the Court of Auditors, which becomes an institution of the Community; and to ensure compliance with Community obligations by giving the European Court of Justice power to impose fines on Governments who sign directives but subsequently do not implement them.

We wanted–and secured–a sensible enhancement of the role of the European Parliament. We did not accept the proposal made by other member states for a power of co-decision between the Parliament and the Council. As I told the House on 20 November, the Council of Ministers must be the body that ultimately determines the Community’s laws and policies.

I also said then that we were prepared to consider some blocking power for the European Parliament. That has now been agreed. The treaty sets up, in a limited number of areas, a conciliation procedure where there is disagreement between the Council and Parliament. In the last analysis, the Parliament would be able to block a decision in those areas, but only if an absolute majority of its members turned out to vote the proposal down.

The House has been rightly concerned at the creeping extension of Community competence over the last few years. The Commission has often brought forward proposals using a dubious legal base, and the Council has found it difficult to halt that practice in the European Court. We have taken significant steps to deal with that problem. First, the structure of the treaty puts the issues of foreign and security policy, interior and justice matters and defence policy beyond the reach of the Commission and the European Court. Secondly, the treaty itself embodies the vital principle of “subsidiarity”, making it clear that the Community should only be involved in decisions which cannot more effectively be taken at national level. Thirdly, in some areas–notably health protection, educational exchanges, vocational training and culture–we have defined Community competence clearly for the first time. Fourthly, there will be no extension of Community competence in employer-employee relations–the so-called social area. We have a high standard of social protection in this country. Our national health service, free at the point of use, is the envy of many in Europe, but we recognise the Community’s social dimension. Also–unlike some of our European partners–we have implemented that dimension too ; 19 out of the 33 measures in the social action programme have been agreed. But there is no reason for the Community to get involved in employment legislation, which must be for each country to decide for itself.
Over the past 12 years, we have transformed labour relations. In 1979, 29 million working days were lost in strikes. Last year the figure was less than 2 million. I was not prepared to see that record put in jeopardy. Nor was I prepared to risk Britain’s competitive position as the European magnet for inward investment. I was not prepared to put British jobs on the line. [Interruption.]

Mr. Speaker : Order. A great many people outside the House are interested in what the Prime Minister has to say.

The Prime Minister : Many of our partners have a wholly different tradition of employment practice which is reflected in the separate arrangements which they have agreed, which will affect only their countries and for which only they will pay. But even among these member states there are many who fear the effect of Community measures on their jobs and their ability to compete. Our arguments are based not only on our national interest but on the risks we perceive to the competitive position of the Community as a whole. This week’s events in the Soviet Union were a salutary reminder that reform in the Community is not an end in itself. The Community’s primary task must be to extend its own advantages of democracy, stability and prosperity to eastern Europe. At British initiative, we committed ourselves at Maastricht to the further enlargement of the Community, starting with the EFTA countries. When they and, in due course, the new democracies of eastern Europe are ready to join the Community, we shall be ready to welcome them. With this in mind, the Commission will report on enlargement to next June’s European Council in Lisbon. Thereafter, it will be for the British presidency to carry that work forward. I look forward to doing so.

We agreed a number of statements on foreign policy issues. I will single out two of them. On the Soviet Union, the European Council calls on the republics to respect the rights of minorities, to implement international agreements on arms control and nuclear non-proliferation, to control and secure their nuclear weapons, and to honour their obligations in respect of the Soviet Union’s external debt.

The European Council has endorsed the demands which we, France and the United States have made to the Libyan Government requiring them to abandon their support of terrorism and to hand over the alleged perpetrators of the Lockerbie bombing.

The founders of the Community knew that they could not create a viable organisation if they established goals that could never be achieved. In talking about European union, we are talking about concepts that have to be cast in the reality of national legislation and everyday life.

The Single European Act started as a grandiose design and ended up as a workmanlike blueprint for a free market. Those treaties have followed the same course.

Our role has been to put forward practical suggestions–and sometimes to rein in the larger ambitions of our partners. Where we believed their ideas would not work, we have put forward our own alternatives.

Those can be found throughout this treaty. As with all international negotiations, there has been give and take between all 12 member states. But the process was one in which Britain has played a leading role, and the result is one in which we can clearly see the imprint of our views.
This is a treaty which safeguards and advances our national interests. It advances the interests of Europe as a whole. It opens up new ways of co-operating in Europe. It clarifies and contains the powers of the Commission. It will allow the Community to develop in depth. It reaches out to other Europeans–the new democracies who want to share the benefits we already enjoy. It is a good agreement for Europe, and a good agreement for the United Kingdom. I commend it to the House.