The Rt. Hon. Sir John Major KG CH

Tag: European Union

  • Mr Major’s Comments on Europe – 7 June 1994

    Below is the text of Mr Major’s comments on Europe during an interview given in 10 Downing Street, London on 7th June 1994.

    QUESTION:

    [Mr Major was asked if Britain should go further towards European integration].

    PRIME MINISTER:

    I think, over the last few years, we’ve moved towards a consensus in Europe on the way in which it should develop. What I think many people misunderstand in the way in which the European debate has been moving. Too often it’s conducted in extremes – one is either a Euro-sceptic, wants nothing to do with Europe, or one’s a Euro-enthusiast and wants total federalist integration. Now, the reality is, the vast majority of people listening to this interview will want neither of those two things, they will want sensible cooperation with Europe and sensible decisions taken on the basis of changing circumstances, and that is what I want.

    QUESTION:

    [Mr Major was asked about John Gummer’s comments about Britain isn’t going slower than the rest of the Europe].

    PRIME MINISTER:

    Well, what is meant by a slower speed? I think we have to determine precisely what is meant by that. Different people mean different things by it. The position of the British Government is quite clear – we need to be at the centre of the European debate, what I once called the “heart of Europe”. What that emphatically does not mean is that whenever an idea is suggested in Europe that we automatically agree with it and go along with it if we think it’s not in the interest of the British nation or indeed of Europe as a whole. And there have been many areas where we’ve taken a sharply contrary view to our partners and persuaded them that our view is right, the Single Market for example, reform of the Common Agricultural Policy for example, deregulation. Many countries were hostile to deregulation, Britain and Germany, in partnership now, leading the Community more towards deregulation. Subsidiarity – the concept of handing powers that ought not to be held by Brussels back to the nation state, pushed by the British because we are at the centre of Europe, adopted by others now producing their own lists. That’s what I mean by being at the heart of Europe.

    Now some people would have said, we were in the slow lane because we objected to what the majority view was, but in reality we were right and eventually they followed our position.

  • Mr Major’s Press Conference on the Competitiveness White Paper – 24 May 1994

    Below is the text of Mr Major’s press conference on the competitiveness White Paper, held in London on Tuesday 24th May 1994.

    PRIME MINISTER:

    Perhaps I can just make a few brief opening remarks. You have all no doubt heard the statements by Michael [Heseltine] and David [Hunt] already this afternoon and I hope all of you have a copy of the press pack and the White Paper.

    Let me just make three overriding points right at the outset. All of us would like to see higher living standards and better public services, but if we are going to achieve that, over time, there are really only two ways to improve and sustain the level of quality of public services that we want, the first of those is business success yielding higher taxes, and the second of those would be higher tax rates. There is no doubt which is preferable. Secondly, there is no doubt that long term business success needs long term policies in order to obtain it, the long term policies we need are those we have in place and those we have set out in the White Paper today, we have brought them together in this way I believe for the first time. And thirdly, let me just make a point about the world in which our businesses have to compete, both large businesses and small.

    It is becoming a truism to say that the world is more competitive than ever before and it is becoming more so day after day. Technology and free trade have created a global environment, there is a global market place, there are new opportunities but we are only going to take those opportunities if we can keep up and beat the best of the competition. And many countries around the world who used to be fairly easy markets for us many years ago are now very firm competitors for us, there is no sentiment in the market place, we have to be better or our companies simply will not win in the sort of world market that exists at present.

    The White Paper shows what we can do to help our businesses to win and demonstrates our commitment to industry, manufacturing industry and services. As I think a number of you present will know, not least because you will have been with us on the trips, a number of my colleagues and I travel frequently batting for Britain with delegations of British exporters. Many of those visits have led to very substantial orders for the United Kingdom, bringing jobs and better living standards here. Those visits have brought home to me two lessons – the first is the accelerating pace of change and the quality of competition which businesses face; and the second is the need for active partnership between government and industry if we are to maximise the possibilities for businesses and companies in this country.

    It is of course the private sector companies, employees abroad, decision-makers often here at home, those who work on product development and marketing, who actually win the orders for us, it is on them that our living standards and our future depends. It was against that sort of background that I asked Michael Heseltine some months ago with colleagues right the way across government to have a look at the way in which the government could maximise its part in order to help our businesses win in that very competitive world market.

    A great deal inevitably must rest on work that has been done throughout the past 15 years and we are building on that with low inflation, deregulated, flexible and an open economy. But in addition to that the White Paper looks at a wide range of specific key areas and especially of course education and training. We have to give our youngsters the best start at school, that of course is the reason for our education reforms and it is the reason we are now introducing more vocational options for our 14 – 16 year olds.

    But of course a great many of those people, upon whom our future success depends, do not necessarily go on to college, so we also have to help them manage the transition from school to the early years of work and that is precisely what our apprenticeship programmes are about. Our intention is really very straightforward and very simple, whether children follow the academic path, the vocational path, or a mix of both, they will be given the opportunity to acquire the qualifications and the skills that they will need to get on in life and that we as a country need to assist our businesses in the competitive world in which they must compete. But we owe that I think both to our businesses and to those children and we owe it to our country to provide the best foundation for a competitive Britain in the next century.

    This is a long term look, there are no short term fixes in this White Paper, this is a comprehensive look at things that need to be done, some in the short term, some in the long term, in order to give us the best opportunity in the world’s business environment.

    I would just now like to ask Michael to say a word or two, and then David, and then we will take your questions. Can I say a word about questions? I have with me the Secretaries of State, all of whom in separate ways have been involved in the production of this White Paper, so I hope we will have questions of detail, we have the people here who will be only too happy to respond to those questions.

    MICHAEL HESELTINE:

    Prime Minister, when you entrusted some of us with the preparation for your consideration of this White Paper, you gave us some very clear steers. The first was to be absolutely certain that nothing was to be proposed that would upset the main macro-economic priorities of the government which we believe to be at the essence of remaining a competitive economy. The second was that if within the dialogue and within the public expenditure constraints we could find re-apportionment or realignment of priorities, then it was your particular concern that they should be directed towards improving the educational and training opportunities of our people. The next guideline that you gave us was that you wanted us to analyse Britain’s position in the long term context, as you said, to do so in a non-partisan way, to seek to unite the nation behind a whole range of initiatives in which every company and everybody would identify a purpose for them.

    We have done our best to fulfil that remit, it has required a superhuman endeavour by civil servants working right across government, it has involved the widest possible consultation outside government with organisations that have a role to play, and it is a particular indication of the significance that we give to the exercise that not only have we done that in the first place but that the committee that you entrusted with the initial task is to remain in existence and will as appropriate at given times update the work if the government believes that that will help. We are very pleased to have played a role in this.

    DAVID HUNT:

    Prime Minister, in setting the framework for a stronger partnership between government and industry, the role that John and I in particular have played is to put people right at the heart of the drive to ensure that the UK wins through in the 21st century, and programmes have got to be tailored to the needs of individuals, they must offer opportunities to individuals and they must ensure that individuals are motivated to take advantage of them. So our ambition is for our people to succeed. So we have a range of ambitious measures aimed at bringing out the best of the talent and skills of our people, you have heard the figures, you have heard the programmes.

    Right at the heart of the strategy, Prime Minister, something that I know you personally have always been strongly committed to, which is the new modern apprenticeship scheme offering real opportunities to youngsters to play a key role in adding to Britain’s brain power. And these new fast track apprenticeships are something that many organisations, many individuals, have been pressing for, we are now extending the opportunities beyond the 16 and 17 year olds to those aged 18 and 19, and key is a revolution in careers guidance now involving independent advice, probably to about 1.5 million one-to-one interviews and giving school children the opportunity to get the best possible advice at 13, at 15 and at 17, and also that small firms skill sharing scheme, a whole range of schemes. But, Prime Minister, the key to all is investing in people, that is a programme that we strongly support, that came from the CBI, we are carrying it through into every aspect of education and training.

    QUESTION:

    Why was it felt unnecessary to accept the main recommendations of the all party Trade and Industry Select Committee, such as a training levy on employers and a programme to combat short-termism in the City?

    MICHAEL HESELTINE:

    I think there were about 4 or 5 areas which we were not able to accept in the Select Committee report, by and large we accepted and agreed with the analysis and the proposals. But actually the Select Committee did not propose a training levy, if you look at the Select Committee report they admire the direction in which we are going and what they say is that we should come back to and consider a training levy if no better results are forthcoming in other ways, so they did not make that recommendation and it was a mistake for people to suggest in the House that they did. There were a number of other things that we were not able to agree, we were not able to agree with the suggestion that targets should be set right through every sector of the economy, I think that frankly is not realistic and I know of no government that has ever tried that ever succeeded, there are some who have tried but they have never succeeded.

    QUESTION:

    Prime Minister, why do you look so grim?

    PRIME MINISTER:

    I am glad you are so concerned about that, I am trying to peer through those television lights, if you really wish to know the truth, if anyone whom I have known for years stands up and I do not recognise them, the answer is that beyond those lights all you can see are black spots, so I am not grim, just peering to see who is there.

    QUESTION:

    [Indistinct] 4.55 in the paper on accelerated modern apprenticeships, you say if industry plays its part government will provide funding of 107 million pounds over three years, what precise part do you want industry to play for these modern apprenticeships for 19 and 18 year olds, and is this 107 million pounds over three years additional to any previous funding?

    DAVID HUNT:

    This is an additional commitment of 107 million pounds over 3 years and what this will do is to produce a fast track for those who have stayed at school, done A levels, GNVQs, etc, to move into work-based training. We calculate it will take them around about 18 months on average to get up to that key point of NVQ level 3, and what we are doing by introducing this fast track approach is giving many more people an opportunity, and we calculate that this will increase the numbers of those achieving NVQ level 3 from around about just over 10,000 at the moment to over 70,000 NVQ level 3s achieved every year, and the way we will do it is by working closely, as we are at the moment, through the industry training organisations, the training and enterprise councils, all the other key partners and bodies, working up models which then to form the basis of the new scheme.

    QUESTION:

    What precisely does industry have to do to get the government to provide the funding?

    DAVID HUNT:

    We have got 14, now just gone up to 17, pilot areas which we are starting this autumn. Each apprenticeship will have a different cost, apprenticeships in some of the more specialised engineering sectors will differ in cost from those in other areas and I am now awaiting reports coming from the working parties working up these pilots which will start later this year with a view then to introducing the full scheme in 1995, and we will be looking for a partnership whereby taxpayers’ money will be put alongside the private sector to secure through that training credit the opportunity for that youngster at 16 or 17 to have a 3 – 4 year apprenticeship and for the 18 and 19 year olds that 18 month fast track apprenticeship.

    QUESTION:

    There is a section in the document which allows pupils to spend what are presumed to be a voucher on a place at the school, college or training institution of their choice. The reforms were originally parent-power driven, this seems to be pupil-power driven, how far will it descend down through the school year, what age are we talking about and will it lead to an all in voucher system.

    PRIME MINISTER:

    It is at very early stages here, let me ask David to say something, John might wish to as well.

    DAVID HUNT:

    What we have said in paragraph 4.56 is that we see attractions in providing all 16, 17, 18, 19 year olds with learning credits with a real cash value, and that would give power to young people to buy their own education and training from schools, colleges, employers and other recognised providers. But we recognise that that would be a far reaching change in funding which is why John and I have said that we need careful preparation and we are going to consult further on the practical implications of learning credits and to discuss the issues widely and openly and also to introduce some pilot schemes on the basis of local partnerships.

    JOHN PATTEN:

    I would only add one thing to what David has said, and that is that yes we are totally devoted to parent power and parent choice for the parents of children of 5 – 16, but those of 16 plus are young adults, they are out and about in the world, they should be making their own choices. What we want to see is for those between 16 and 19 a good range of choices, whether it is city technology colleges, technology colleges, grant maintained schools, further education colleges, and we want them to have a wide range of examination qualifications, not forcing them into a rigid straitjacket, that is why we have got our gold standard, the A level, that is why David Hunt and myself have been developing the GNVQ, that is why we are very happy for the international baccalaureate to be taken, we have got to treat 16 and 17 year olds as young adults.

    QUESTION:

    The Prime Minister admitted that this White Paper brought together for the first time a range of initiatives, and right at the back of the document, on page 159, we discover that all it does is report on matters already announced and in progress, it is in effect a snapshot of the work in hand across government, basically the previous 158 pages are covering up for the fact that there is nothing new at all in this.

    PRIME MINISTER:

    That is, with great respect, rubbish. But let me ask the coordinator to spell out some of the details of why it is rubbish.

    MICHAEL HESELTINE:

    There are 60, I think, new proposals, 59, 60, 61 depends on the precise classification and I could mention a whole range of the ones that are announced here, the whole of the education and apprenticeship announcement that has been made are new, new money; the fact that we are spending 150 – 200 million pounds on a regional challenge is a new fact; the fact that we are producing a civil service White Paper is a new fact; you can go on. Quite frankly, the suggestion that you put that there is nothing new in it can only be charitably understood on the basis that you have not yet had time to read it.

    QUESTION:

    In the section on public purchasing you mention that you want a constructive partnership rather than an adversarial relationship in the government’s construction programme, could you outline how that will work?

    MICHAEL HESELTINE:

    On public purchasing, we believe that there is an opportunity to get a greater degree of professionalism into the purchasing machinery of government and a significant part of the initiative here is to improve training. But there is then another aspect to that and that is to set up a machinery across the country in order to make it easier for small companies to get access to large contracts and to so organise those contracts that they are more capable of being competed for by small companies. We are also going to work with the supply chain in order to encourage companies that are buying without thought to local sourcing the opportunities that they could create for British companies if they were to do so, there are a whole range of partnership arrangements that can be developed within such a framework and it is to bring professional management and an opportunity for particularly small and medium size companies in this huge public procurement process that is under way.

    PANEL SPEAKER:

    Also, we constituted our sponsorship side for the construction industry which fits in with this and of course throughout government we will be ensuring that the purchasing arrangements will be on the basis in which we also introduce the environmentally friendly kinds of concepts which enable our industries to be able to compete throughout the world. One of the things about competition is that you have to have the highest standards in this country in order to win markets elsewhere and that is very much driven by the standards which government demands as well, so this is inter-related with the kinds of contracts which we are now winning in places as far apart as the United States and Australia for the sort of environmentally friendly programmes which the water companies are now able to do because of competition, because of privatisation and because of the kind of government programme of purchasing which we are now demanding.

    QUESTION:

    You say that the basic thrust of this is to produce a more long-term vision so are there any measures in here to stop this haemorrhage of funds out of companies as dividend payments which obviously prevents companies from reinvesting in the very long-term things that you want such as R&D and education and training?

    PRIME MINISTER:

    Let William firstly just say something about R&D because I think often there are many comments made about the levels of research and development expenditure and investment which frankly are not right.

    WILLIAM WALDEGRAVE:

    The Government contribution on R&D is in the middle of the pack for the G7 and we remain one of the big five or six science countries of the world. Indeed, in terms of one of the indices, the citation index, we are probably the second biggest producer of innovative science ideas after the United States of America.

    The importance of getting longer-term decision-taking into companies is emphasised in the Paper but of course the fundamental thing that brings down time horizons is inflation and the establishment of real stability in the economy is already leading in this last period of the recession that is now over to a greater degree of protection for companies’ R&D budgets. That is a very hopeful sign for the future but the Paper makes absolutely no doubt about the fact that we want the best, that we want the average and the below-average to be brought up to the standard of the best investing companies in this country. Michael Heseltine talked earlier about for example the pharmaceutical industry. If we could have all our companies taking the same view about R&D in the long-term as the pharmaceutical industry does we would do very well.

    KENNETH CLARKE:

    We are having what we call a “Finance for Industry Study” in the Treasury and we are having a look at the views of companies themselves, the banks and other people about the flow of finance into industry in this country. Certainly, one of the things we will have a look at is the fact that, as you say, compared with some continental European countries certainly a greater proportion of profits are distributed in dividends here than are retained and we will look at that and decide the extent to which that gets the right balance between having properly functioning capital markets and on the other hand making sure that you can use some retained profits to build up your financial base. All these matters we will be considering in the run-up to the next budget.

    We have already shown that we are prepared to take measures in the budget to stimulate the kind of investment we require, particularly longer-term risk investment in small and medium-sized businesses but we are widening the scope of the studies that Stephen Dorrell and Tony Nelson have been carrying out. All of us in the Treasury are now settling down to this and I see the work we are doing looking at the flow of finance to industrial investment in this country all sitting alongside what is being done to help business improve its supply-side performance as well. We are very actively looking at that and the Government certainly is going to form a view on what we can do to improve the working of our capital markets in this country.

    PRIME MINISTER:

    The intention is of course that these various examinations should interlock. As Ken has just illustrated, there are in effect four areas that the Treasury are looking at at the moment: savings, the working of capital markets, the flow of funds to business and as a result of that, the implications for taxation and I think it is very desirable that that work should be done. It is but part of the whole patchwork but I think an important part.

    QUESTION:

    Prime Minister, you have said today’s initiative is probably unprecedented. Why has it taken almost fifteen years of Conservative Government before it could happen? Isn’t today’s White Paper somehow an implicit recognition that so far the Government was not helping British businesses enough?

    PRIME MINISTER:

    No, I don’t think so. A great deal has been done in the 1980s. Government is usually about the language of priorities and throughout the 1980s the first priorities were to deal with many of the macro-elements of the economy, not just the incipient inflation difficulty we had in this country but a range of other things as well, a range of supply-side measures and most obviously but not exclusively the reform of our then trade union laws.

    Those matters have been done. We are operating against a quite different background of better macro-structure, a better supply-side performance. What we now need to do is to move on to the things that still remain to be done and that is of course what has led to this particular White Paper. It comes on the back of the best inflation performance, the lowest interest rates that we have seen for a very long time. A number of people in this room were probably still in their nappies the last time we had interest rates at the present level and inflation at the present level.

    So we operate against that background and against that background there is every opportunity of maximising the competitive position that we have. It was an opportunity to be taken and that was the genesis of the White Paper.

    QUESTION:

    There are many small businesses who have wanted to expand up to now and recently. They say they can’t expand because they can’t find skilled workers and they can’t afford to pay apprentices. How, tomorrow, will they be able to say: “Ah! What you have announced today helps me, I can go ahead and expand now!”?

    PRIME MINISTER:

    I will get David to elaborate upon the apprenticeship point but can I just say something about small businesses before I ask him to do that. It is a quite staggering statistic that about 97% of the people employed in this country are employed by companies who have a very small number of employees, under 25 employees, that sort of size, so the implications for employment apart from anything else of the success of the small business sector are self-evident. What we believe is happening at the moment as the economy recovers is that many of those small companies are beginning to re-employ again. I think there is unmistakable evidence that that is the case. We hope our measures will give a kick-start to that.

    DAVID HUNT:

    Prime Minister, I have already spoken in the few moments I have had since leaving the House of Commons to several people who represent the small business sector who enthusiastically welcomed this White Paper. There are a whole set of provisions specifically for small firms. I will just mention one which is its identification with the assistance of small firms of up to 24,000 key workers who have got skills who just need that extra training to be able to pass on those skills to the next generation. That, allied with the new apprenticeship scheme, is directly targeted at small firms worth £63 million over three years.

    As Michael announced, we also of course have the innovation credits. That is another example. They are worth up to £1,000 a company for the innovation counsellors to enable the companies to pay for the best possible information or advice about innovation.

    Those are just two examples of a whole list of packages of opportunities for small firms because we recognise that much of the job-generation, the new jobs that are coming in the economy, about 25 million now, have come from small and medium-sized enterprises.

    QUESTION:

    Prime Minister, in considering the problems of making Britain more competitive, did you find yourself casting envious glances at Germany where short-termism is not a problem because financial institutions are more closely locked into the companies in whom they invest, where managers and workers get along perhaps more constructively because they sit on management and supervisory boards and where there is the so-called “Mittelstand” – the medium-sized businesses – which provide a solid core for industry beneath the big boys on the one hand and the smaller corner-shop industries on the other?

    PRIME MINISTER:

    I certainly didn’t cast envious glances at Germany. I think over the years there have been things we have been able to learn from Germany. There are things I very much admire about the way they conduct their affairs. I am not sure that their interlocking shareholdings are one of the things that I would necessarily wish to replicate here, I think they were a product of particular circumstances in Germany.

    In terms of some of their industrial training, the particular emphasis in factories that you will see given to the foremen for example, I think there are areas there where there is something for British industry to learn but generally, no, I am not envious. If you look at the German economy at the moment, you will see that it is facing some difficulties. There has been massive job-shedding, there are over 4 million unemployed at the moment. Like every other nation, they are emerging from extremely difficult economic circumstances.

    I will ask the Chancellor to add to this because I think I heard a Chancellorial grunt on my left which suggests he wants to say something!

    KENNETH CLARKE:

    I happen to have had the chance to meet quite a lot of German ministers, bankers and businessmen recently and I don’t think they will actually share your view. Obviously, currently as we know, their unemployment is higher than ours, theirs is not yet coming down, their rate of growth is slower than ours and quite importantly, they have actually lost their competitive edge vis-a-vis British businesses in quite a lot of fields. I meet British businessmen now exporting components in the automobile industry into Germany because this is a better manufacturing base currently than Germany.

    Like the Prime Minister, I admire a lot of things German. Theirs is a very powerful economy where they are putting right the things they know they have to put right to improve their competitiveness but at the moment we have the edge over them and we have got to address the things we are addressing to make sure we do our best to take advantage of the position we now have where at last we are able to compete with the Germans on level terms.

    The reason I grunted, smiled or whatever I did, was that recently I met a whole lot of people from a German private bank and one of the German bankers amused me by saying: “What we need here in Germany is a bit more of your British short-termism!”. Because half their banks are nationalised – they are about to privatise more of them – they have this system of interlocking shareholding and they do actually feel they lack some of the advantages we have of more fluid capital markets.

    That doesn’t go back on my previous answer. We know here that we do lack sufficient long-term capital for small businesses in particular. I agree with you that we don’t have that middle range of companies that the Germans are much stronger in. We have always thought the Germans had a lead over us in technical training and somebody a moment ago suggested we had been inactive. What David Hunt and John Patten are announcing builds on a process now of seven or eight years that started with a situation when we had absolutely no structure of technical qualifications in this country, we had no commitment to vocational training and to move into the areas they are now moving into, apprenticeships for 18-year-olds and so on, is catching up the Germans very rapidly and it is with the aim of seeking to overtake them in that great strength of theirs as well.

    We have got to compete with the Germans and there are a lot of good things in Germany but the idea that we sit here envious of the German situation is not true. For the first time in my lifetime we have the prospect of being a more competitive economy than Germany and we have got to take advantage of that finally and not least by aligning with German ministers who want to get deregulation going in Europe and in Germany of the kind that we have already got going in the DTI in the United Kingdom and which we are going to get going in Europe with German assistance.

    PRIME MINISTER:

    You raised one other point about the middle range of companies and I am going to ask Michael to say something about that but if I can just add one point to what Ken said a second or so ago, we have a very close alliance indeed with Germany in terms of seeking deregulation in the European Community. I will be very surprised indeed if deregulation across the Community isn’t one of the principal aims of the German Presidency of the Community in the second half of this year and the Germans and the British work in very close alliance on this and have done for some time I think to the benefit of both our countries and to the benefit of the rest of the European Union.

    MICHAEL HESELTINE:

    A very important question and nothing so reveals the long-term nature of changing relativities in the strength of the economy than this question of why we have fewer medium-sized companies than Germany.

    The reason basically for it is that for much of the post-War period, particularly under Labour governments, income tax was at 98p in the pound which meant that nobody earning money was capable of retaining any money with which to start a small business. You cannot start a medium-sized business, you start with small businesses, so there was a choke around the creative process of the capital system as far as individuals were concerned.

    We then had the existing businesses that had already started and many of them were medium-sized. What then happened is that we created a tax regime in which there was massive preferential treatment for the publicly-quoted company to take over the businesses that were middle-sized which were forced onto the market-place by death duties and capital transfer or wealth taxes of one sort and another and when the family businesses came to look at the consequence of the business on death or transfer, they discovered that if they sold their business for cash, which is all a small or medium-sized business could offer, then they would be taxed into oblivion and so they looked at the publicly-quoted companies, the giants who could give them shares, and there was no tax paid at that time and so not only did we put a choke on creation, we put a block on the transfer of inheritance and the sustenance therefore of the sector and that explains why under Socialist taxation policies we wiped out a whole raft of medium-sized companies.

    The exciting long-term thing of the 1990s is that there are today 600,000 more small businesses than there were in 1979. The latest published figures by Barclays Bank indicate there is now a net capital asset creation of small businesses after the recession and so what we have to do is keep that macro-economic climate developing in the very benign tax climate we have now got so that the small businesses created in the ’80s become the medium-sized businesses of the ’90s.

    JOHN PATTEN:

    On this issue of training and education in Germany often held up, rightly, to us over decades as a model, I think actually the Germans are beginning to look to us and the sort of innovative work being done by David Hunt and by people in the Department for Education to produce new higher-level vocational qualifications in a way which will leap over some of those that the Germans have.

    Just two other things: we do need, all of us in industry and in education and in the world of the employer, to link up in a national crusade to hit the national education training targets that we have set ourselves by 1997 otherwise we are not going to be as competitive as we wish by the end of this century. An awful lot has been achieved over the last fifteen years, standards are going up, standards are improving and best of all from the employers’ point of view, more young people than ever before are staying on at school post-16; back in 1979 it was about 40%, now it is round about 75% and I think it is our ambition as a government to see the 16-year-old school-leaver as rare as the dodo by the year 2000.

    QUESTION:

    Prime Minister, if this report is as successful as you say it will be, how many jobs do you think it will create long-term?

    PRIME MINISTER:

    I don’t think you can produce an estimate of that. We can see at the moment that the rate of unemployment is falling rather larger than we had imagined just a few months ago. I very much hope that will continue and it looks at the moment as though it is certainly going to continue for some time but I think it is very unwise to forecast the levels of unemployment and of employment. No previous Government has done it and I think it would be very unwise of us to try. What one can certainly say is that if the economy becomes more successful, it generates more growth, it generates the growth of small businesses, then it is going to create more employment but quantifying that I think would be an impossible task.

    QUESTION:

    The modern apprenticeship system as presently proposed is going to cost £1.25 billion over the next three years. Now you are proposing £107 million extra to almost double apprentice numbers. I accept the point that the apprenticeship will be shorter but when you talk to people from Techs and ITOs they say that the modern apprenticeship scheme will last two years, maybe two-and-a-half years and now you are talking about eighteen months. How do you expect £107 million to virtually double apprentice numbers and is this where you expect a greater contribution from industry?

    DAVID HUNT:

    May I just explain the background to the figures. What we are talking about now is a total budget over the next three years which is up to £2.5 billion – £2,500 million – which the Department of Employment is going to invest over a three-year period to help our young people get modern training leading to high-quality qualifications.

    The £107 million investment over three years is what my officials tell me after consultation is necessary to introduce a short fast-track apprenticeship for round about at any one point in time 57,000 individuals participating in the new modern apprenticeship.

    The actual quantification of the cost of each sector will follow the detailed negotiations that are now taking place but all of this is against that background of £2.5 billion.

    Finally, Prime Minister, can I say about employment something just revealed in the House of Commons which I don’t think many people are aware of and that is when you look at the percentage of our working population now in work, we are just about the highest with one other country in the Europe in the league table in Europe. We have 70% of the male and female population aged 15-64 in work and that compares to Germany 65%, France 60%, Italy 56%, Ireland 52%, Spain 49%.

    QUESTION:

    Regarding the sections in the White Paper both on transport and London, Could you tell us what is happening to the “Crossrail” project and whether it will be built?

    JOHN MACGREGOR:

    We remain firmly committed to the “Crossrail” project. The promoters are currently looking to see whether they can revive the Bill.

    JOHN GUMMER:

    It is very important for London and we are determined to ensure that this range of new opportunities are made available. The fact of the matter is that even though we are spending an enormous amount of money, much more than was ever spent when there was a GLC, it is still true that the standards which we are trying to produce and the opportunities go on increasing and that is why this is another step on a course which we started a long time ago.

    It is incremental but it will be all the more exciting if we can get “Crossrail” as well.

  • PMQT – 24 May 1994

    Below is the text of Prime Minister’s Question Time from 24th May 1994.

    PRIME MINISTER:

     

    Engagements

    Q1. Dr. Wright : To ask the Prime Minister if he will list his official engagements for Tuesday 24 May.

    The Prime Minister (Mr. John Major) : This morning, I had meetings with ministerial colleagues and others. In addition to my duties in the House, I shall be having further meetings later today.

    Dr. Wright : What does the Prime Minister say to the woman in my constituency who phoned my office the other day to thank me for taking up her husband’s case in relation to the Child Support Agency, but who said that I could close the file–the file that I have here–because her husband had just killed himself? Has not the time come when it is no longer enough to say that we all support the principle of the agency–which we do–or that it is being kept under continuing review–which it no doubt is ? Has not it become a monstrous and inhuman shambles that has to be changed and changed now?

    The Prime Minister : The hon. Gentleman knows what I had to say about that recently. I have nothing to add to that today. On the personal circumstances that he mentioned, neither he nor I can know all the circumstances behind that tragedy. On reflection, he may think that it was unwise to raise it in that fashion.

    Sir Cranley Onslow : As the British electorate clearly cannot expect Opposition Members to spell out the full horrors of the sort of centralised and federal European Union for which they want people to vote on 9 June, will my right hon. Friend consider inviting Mr. Delors to come over here and do the job for them?

    The Prime Minister : The President of the Commission is welcome here in the United Kingdom at any time. I hope that when he comes, if he comes, he will spell out yet again that he believes that the fact that we are not part of the social chapter will make us a great magnet for external investment–I am sure that he is right about that.

    Mrs. Beckett : Does the Prime Minister recall what his party promised the British people in its last Euro-manifesto? It included the promise that the Conservatives would not put value added tax on gas and electricity, saying :

    “We stand by that pledge; we will honour it”.

    Has not it become clear that the Government are incapable of honouring any pledge?

    The Prime Minister : It is not remotely clear. Like every Government, we have to respond to the reality of events in the interests of the people of this country. The right hon. Lady should bear in mind some of the contradictions in what she and her colleagues have said and done. On one day they attack our tax proposals and on the next day they propose a string of new taxes. They then ask for fresh expenditure, but the shadow Chancellor says that there is no commitment. There is no consistency whatsoever in any of their policies.

    Mrs. Beckett : If that is the Prime Minister’s answer to why the Government broke the promises in their last Euro-manifesto, will he explain why, at the general election in 1992, he and his party promised not to extend or increase VAT, not to increase national insurance contributions and not to impose any other taxes and charges, and even promised tax cuts year on year? Why is it that, in manifesto after manifesto, the Government make promises that they then betray?

    The Prime Minister : The right hon. Lady is misquoting and misunderstanding. If she wants to talk about movements away from manifestos, she might look at the distinctions between the European socialist manifesto to which the Labour party is committed and the domestic Labour party manifesto for the European elections. She might then explain to the British people why, in this election, what it is saying domestically is not what it has agreed to internationally.

    Mrs. Beckett : Did not the Government prove at the last Euro- election and general election that they will say and do anything to get elected? The people now know that after the broken promises of the Euro- election and general election campaigns. Why should anyone trust the Government ever again?

    The Prime Minister : The right hon. Lady will also know that we made it clear that we would create the right circumstances for growth, and we have; that we would bring unemployment down, and we are ; that we would get interest rates down, and we have ; and that we would create the conditions for sustained growth without inflation, and we have.

    Only a few weeks ago, the Labour party was signing up to promises in Europe to which it dare not admit domestically in the current election. If the right hon. Lady will not admit to that, she will find that, throughout the campaign, quote after quote after quote of what the Labour party has signed up to not long ago will be brought up. The Labour party is now trying to duck, dodge and weave around those promises because it knows that the British people will not stand for its policies on Europe.

    Mr. Dykes : I thank my right hon. Friend for yesterday reminding the British public yet again that we gain enormously in real sovereignty and strength in Europe by working closely, harmoniously and positively with the other member countries.

    The Prime Minister : As I said last night in my speech, which I know that my hon. Friend will have read, our policy is to make a success of the European Community and to make sure that it regains the affection of people, not only in this country, but right across Europe. That is the policy of the Government, and I set out a range of ways in which we believe that that can and must be brought about. It is essential to the future well-being of the country that we are able to ensure not only that the European Union is accepted by the people but that it continues successfully for many years to come.

    Mr. Ashdown : The Prime Minister will be aware that, for as long as he continues to hold firmly to the view that there will be no question of negotiation with the men of murder in Northern Ireland for as long as they continue with violence and unless and until they renounce it permanently, he will continue to enjoy the full support of the vast majority of this House and, I believe, the majority of the country. However, is he aware of just how much the momentum for peace in Northern Ireland is now evaporating? Does he accept that it is urgent and important that the British and Irish Governments should now put forward joint proposals based on the joint declaration through the constitutional parties in Northern Ireland, if the high hopes for peace which we enjoyed at Christmas are not to be killed off by the new wave of terrorism being implemented by both sides?

    The Prime Minister : I think that the whole House will share the right hon. Gentleman’s wish to see an end to violence. Where I would take issue with him is in his assertion that there is an evaporation of the movement toward peace in Ireland, both north and south of the border. I do not believe that that is the case, and it is not the information which comes to me.

    After what has happened in recent weeks, but one question remains to be answered : when will the IRA give up violence? There never has been any justification–now, clearly and undoubtedly, there is not a single shred of justification in anyone’s mind–for its barbaric murders. It is losing support on all sides and becoming increasingly isolated. We should stick with the joint declaration and pursue the discussions that we are having with the constitutional parties and with the Government of the Republic of Ireland. We should also pursue the mechanism that we have been following for the past two years, which is bringing us nearer to peace than we have been for many years.

    Mr. Kynoch : Will my right hon. Friend take time to consider what would be the impact on traditional British interests were we to forgo completely the national veto in Europe, as urged by the sell-out Liberal Democrats?

    The Prime Minister : I think that it is

    Mr. Skinner : It is that lot behind me.

    The Prime Minister : Tempting though it is to respond to the hon. Member for Bolsover (Mr. Skinner), I shall respond first to my hon. Friend.

    It is inconceivable that any responsible party would wish completely to eliminate the national veto or dilute it in any way. On vital issues, it is important that that national veto remain. I shall give just one example. Had we had no national veto at Edinburgh, where we discussed future financing, under qualified majority voting we could have lost our rebate of £3 billion a year, which was so hard-fought for by my predecessor and retained in those discussions.

     

    Q3. Mr. Ainger : To ask the Prime Minister if he will list his official engagements for Tuesday 24 May.

    The Prime Minister : I refer the hon. Member to the reply that I gave some moments ago.

    Mr. Ainger : The Prime Minister will be aware–it is now a matter of public record–that, on 20 April, the Minister for Social Security and Disabled

    Madam Speaker : Order. I am sure that the hon. Gentleman will put a direct question to the Prime Minister.

    Mr. Ainger : Is the Prime Minister aware that, on 20 April, the Minister for Social Security and Disabled People instructed his civil servants to produce amendments designed to ensure that the Civil Rights (Disabled Persons) Bill would be talked out? Is he also aware–I am sure that he is–that, only 16 days later, the same Minister denied to the House that he gave those instructions? Will the Prime Minister now do the honourable thing and, first, apologise to the 6.5 million disabled people for the deceitful and shabby way in which they have been treated and, secondly, sack the Minister for Social Security and Disabled People for misleading the House, the disabled and the country?

    The Prime Minister : The answer to the direct questions is certainly not.

    The Government’s record on assisting people who are disabled is very good. We have made it perfectly clear that, over the next few months, we shall consult to try to find a Bill that will achieve assistance for disabled people, but not a Bill with a cost of £17 billion. Until and unless the Opposition say that they are prepared to impose costs of £17 billion on private industry, their attitude over the Bill is utterly and totally bogus.

    Mr. Allason : Tonight, the House will be asked to review the provisions of the prevention of terrorism order. Does my right hon. Friend agree that it is high time that the abuse of the broadcasting ban, which is so widely circumvented by all the broadcasting media, should be reviewed so as to prevent known terrorists from appearing on television and having their voices dubbed by out-of-work actors from Northern Ireland?

    The Prime Minister : I understand the frustration that my hon. Friend feels about that matter. A number of complex matters are involved, but I will certainly discuss them with my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for National Heritage.

     

    Q4. Mrs. Bridget Prentice : To ask the Prime Minister if he will list his official engagements for Tuesday 24 May.

    The Prime Minister : I refer the hon. Member to the reply that I gave some moments ago.

    Mrs. Prentice : Why do so many people believe that foreign millionaires can queue jump their way into Britain? Can they do that because they give substantial donations to the Conservative party?

    The Prime Minister : I do not think that the hon. Lady quite understands the immigration rules, which are very complex. If she did, she would know that for a long time–even under the last Labour Government and I believe since 1970 or before–the immigration rules have allowed people of independent means to come to the United Kingdom. That has been the position for a very long time.

    Mr. Bill Walker : During his very busy day, will my right hon. Friend consider having a wee dram to celebrate the fact that the Scotch whisky industry is now in its 500th year? Is he aware that that industry provides massive employment in Scotland, provides export earnings of £2,000 million and brings pleasure to many?

    The Prime Minister : I am more amenable to the suggestion that I might have a wee dram than I am to many that I get these days, and I would be happy to take up that suggestion. I am happy to join my hon. Friend in his congratulations to the Scotch whisky industry, which has been a huge success. It is increasing its exports of a product which is enjoyed in every part of the world.

  • Mr Major’s Speech to Scottish Conservative Party Conference – 13 May 1994

    Below is the text of Mr Major’s speech to the Scottish Conservative Party Conference in Inverness on 13th May 1994.

    PRIME MINISTER:

    Today of all days I want to talk not of partisan politics, but of our country and its prospects.

    There are occasions when it is right to turn aside from the clamour of political differences.

    Yesterday, this conference adjourned to mark its respect for one of our country’s political leaders. An opponent, yes. A gifted and an honourable opponent. Undoubtedly. But a partner, too. A partner in that mission which is central to politics. The guest to build a stronger democracy, a better country, a richer life for all.

    All of us here are people to whom our families matter deeply. John Smith was a family man. And our thoughts and prayers go out, above all, to his family in their grief – in a time of loss for which no words suffice, and into which no-one should seek to intrude.

    The reaction to John’s death tells us much about our country. It showed the priceless asset of the essential decency of the British. We can weep for a good man – even an opponent – because we recognise his qualities.

    This reminds us that there are things higher than politics and, across all divisions, common bonds of humanity that unite us all.

    I liked John Smith. The nation saw us set up in artificial confrontation twice a week in the House of Commons. That was part of our political process – and I make no complaint of that.

    But people did not see behind the scenes. There is friendship in politics, there is decency, there are private relationships across all Parties, there is principle and there is respect and understanding for the beliefs and the convictions of others. What a shame it is that that becomes apparent so rarely.

    Mr President, I must confess to you that I often have little taste for the politics of point-scoring or for the belittling of others. I have none today. I care passionately for what I believe in. But I don’t care passionately for damning what other people believe in. If we could attack the policies of others, but respect their motives, then politics would have a fresher feel than it does today.

    Let us be truthful with ourselves. Across all Europe there is a lower regard for politics than I can ever remember. And, as democrats, we should worry about that.

    Politics isn’t just about power. As you grow more experienced you see the limits on the power of action, limits set by the need to persuade others and carry them with you. Limits set by the capacity of our country to create the wealth and resources needed to fulfil our ambitions.

    No, it isn’t just about power. It’s about ideals. Hopes. Ambitions.

    In politics you never lose the ideals of youth. You always travel in hope. And you never forget your long-term principles.

    There are twists and turns, moments of exhilaration and achievement, and times, too, of disappointment and despair. But you pick yourself up, take on the next task, and go on forward. Because you always have a long-term aim in view.

    Mr President, I sometimes wish that side of politics was more evident. I know politicians of all Parties. And they are not the cynical, power-hungry, self-servers that fiction so often portrays. There is such a thing as public service in this country. And our politicians generally subscribe to it.

    Too often our politics is rooted in old battles, not new opportunities.

    Of course we differ greatly in our philosophy; in our beliefs as to how to do the best for Britain. But sometimes, too, we share a common purpose.

    The War-time coalition and the Labour and Conservative Governments that followed all worked to strengthen the welfare state, develop the Health Service, put in place the modern system of education that Rab Butler had worked to create, and which culminated in his great Education Act of 1944.

    The achievement of Conservatism in the present generation has been to redress the balance between the state and the individual. To extend choice and ownership, to build the right climate for industrial growth and expansion, to set the ambitions, the hopes, and the capacity of every family free.

    I don’t believe those achievements either will ever be challenged or changed. We have created a special British cocktail of free enterprise, tempered with social justice. A wider ownership of homes, shares and pensions than almost any nation in Europe, but a free health service which those overseas envy and admire.

    That will never change. When my parents were old and unwell and without any money, they were well treated. It made an abiding impression on me that they had the security and comfort of mind to know that. While I am Prime Minister, that will never change.

    All of us in politics – national or local – have our role to play. Whether we are players on the stage, or supporters in the wings, or commentators in the front of house, we all have our responsibilities.

    Sometimes I feel – and I don’t only mean in the reporting of politics – that there is too much knocking, too much carping, too much sneering. Too much setting up of Aunt Sally against Aunt Sally.

    Being negative can be an addictive drug. It’s easy. Because we all know how easy it is to do something, if you don’t have to do it yourself. But like any drug it corrodes and destroys the body in which it exists. And one body it runs the risk of corrupting is the body politic of the nation itself.

    If politicians fight – in Party and across Party – like ferrets in a sack on every issue, is it surprising if the public turns away?

    Let’s not be negative here today. Let’s be positive. And look at what’s happened in Britain in the last two years alone, and at our prospects for the future.

    We have achieved an impressive revival from recession – well ahead of the rest of Europe.

    We have the lowest inflation and interest rates for a generation.

    We have growth in the UK – twice as high as anywhere in Europe, and set to continue next year.

    We have public services forced by the Citizen’s Charter to tailor their performance to the needs of the public and to raise their standards year by year.

    We have a National Health Service, in which local doctors have more say than ever, and in which we are treating more patients than ever before – and treating them better.

    We have set reforms in place to raise standards in our schools and to improve the quality of training for young people.

    One third of our young people are now going on to university.

    And crime is now falling in Scotland and throughout the UK.

    That is the reality of what’s happening.

    Mr President, I have not come here to hide the challenges we still face. On the back of a world-wide recession Government is a tough business everywhere. We often have to do things that seem perverse today because we believe they will be right tomorrow.

    Our job is to look long-term, plan long-term, achieve long- term. Set a framework for lasting prosperity. To ensure we don’t go through such difficulties again.

    Some people may not like some of the action we’ve had to take – but our duty is to make the right choices for Britain’s future. It isn’t our job to do things to court short-term popularity, if they have a long-term cost.

    Obligations are painful things. So are difficult decisions. But often they are necessary for the sake of future generations. So that their prospects are not just as good, but better than ours.

    But that is what we’re in Government for.

    “The elevation of the condition of the people”. That’s how Disraeli once put it.

    “The elevation of the condition of the people” – Mr President, that is why I am a Conservative – why we are all Conservatives. And why this party must always frame its policies, not by the yardstick of ideology, but by how closely they touch the everyday lives of the people.

    We mustn’t live in a world of theory. Our theatre must not be the academic clique or the Party caucus. Our theatre is the home, the family, the business, the voluntary group. That is the world from which Conservatism grows.

    Our Party is at its strongest wherever it strikes a chord with the commonsense of the British people. When Conservative canvassers came to my door in Lambeth all those years ago they spoke a language I and the people I knew could readily understand.

    The things they cared about were the things we all care about – how to get on in life, how to take our own decisions, how to acquire new skills, save money, own a home and leave a better start for our children and grandchildren than we ever had ourselves.

    Even to the dependent Conservatism spoke the language of independence. Even to the insecure it offered security.

    It did then. And it must today. Somehow we must break through the artificial frenzy that so often masquerades as political debate and focus attention once more on the essential concerns of the people we represent. That, I believe, is what people want and what our political system needs.

    The Conservative agenda

    Last autumn I spoke of a malaise that I saw creeping across our country. A cloud of unease and uncertainty in the face of constant challenges to the standards that people hold dear.

    I said that our first duty was to dispel that anxiety, answer the worries people have, and draw deep at the well of commonsense instinct as we did.

    I set out there my programme for the rest of this Parliament.

    First, to see through – come what may – our policies for a strong stable economy. That we are doing – through low inflation, low interest rates and falling unemployment.

    It is easy to write off now the importance of the fight against inflation. That is a mistake that I will never allow this Government to make.

    I know from experience what inflation does. What it is like at the end of the week if you’re not sure you’re going to have enough money left over to pay the bills. I grew up in a hard part of London. We shared the house with all sorts of odd characters. Inflation wasn’t our only problem – but it was one of the worst. I know what it is like at the sharp end, what it’s like to struggle on fixed incomes. And so long as I am Prime Minister containing inflation will continue to be a cornerstone of our policy and a touchstone of its success.

    The second goal I set in Blackpool was to bring about a seachange in our approach to crime. Shift the balance in criminal policy decisively against the villain after a generation of liberal ideas. Put punishment back on the agenda. Reject forever the fatal idea that crime can ever be excused.

    If you don’t give young people guidelines and rules you are not helping them. Children who start with a small offence and are not brought up short will commit a bigger offence and then a bigger one, and, before you know it, they’re into serious crime. It is no good if when a young criminal gets caught all he gets is a slap on the wrist and sent on his way.

    We have embarked on a shift in policy on crime, not to turn back the clock – of course not, Dickensian attitudes have no relevance today – but to turn up the heat on the criminal. I make not a shred of apology for that. The British people are heartily sick of the apologists for crime. And the crackdown that’s needed has only begun.

    The third target I have set for the ‘90s is to raise standards in our schools. Without that Britain will not be able to compete in the world. We need to sweep aside the progressive dogma that has done so much damage. Extend parents’ choice. Insist on the basics. Make sure we get the best results for every child. And see that those results are reported, and, what is equally essential, tested.

    Mr President, I simply do not understand opposition to testing. I sent my children to school to learn – so do all parents. You can’t just wrap children in cottonwool. Life itself is a test – and you have to prepare them for it. Compete is what children do naturally. Just put four small children together and see what they do. They see who can run fastest or jump highest. So we will be introducing more competitive games and we will stick to our guns on testing.

    Mr President, in the last six months we have taken huge strides in carrying forward the agenda I set out in Blackpool. Inflation is right down. We have the biggest crime-fighting bill for years before Parliament. And, through teacher training reform, we are putting the last pieces into the mosaic of education reform.

    That is the road this country must follow – and that is the road down which I and this Party will lead.

    Mr President, the mandate we won from over 14 million people was a mandate which runs for 5 years. We are not yet half way through – and I intend to complete it. And then I shall say:

    “Judge me on my whole term of office. All of it. You can’t judge a house when only the foundations are laid”.

    A changing world

    If we are to achieve our social objectives we must have strong economic foundations on which to build.

    There are new and ever greater demands on our resources. But there’s only one way to create the wealth that we need. Through business success.

    We have to lift our eyes from the short-term headlines. Look to the long-term. The world is changing faster than ever before. Just look at the changes there have been.

    Operations that 15 years ago were unheard of now happen almost every day. Young people today have opportunities that our parents’ generation wouldn’t have dreamed of. In future it will not be enough to learn just one skill at 16 and do the same thing all through a lifetime.

    People are living longer than ever before. More people are going into higher education than ever before. Those are all good changes, changes we’ve worked for, changes we want, changes that are making people’s lives better.

    But they all have a cost. We need to pay for them. But we don’t want high taxation. So the challenge for us is to make our economy as competitive as possible, so that we can generate the wealth that we need for the improvements we wish to bring about.

    For today we face a world more competitive than ever before. Not just from America and Japan but from new countries in the Far East, once our captive markets, now our active competitors.

    We must look forward to the world in which our children will live. In the 21st century we’re going to have a world dominated by Japan, the United States and China. The European Community has a choice to make – will it be with those players or will it not?

    The importance of Europe

    I hope it will be, but it is not certain unless Europe follows the right policies. I would give Europe this warning. Unless it makes the right choices about policy today – unless it adopts free market policies – and believes in them – Europe won’t be up there in the next century with the US, Japan and China. It will slide behind.

    That is why Britain must play its full part in Europe. Not just for our own sake, but for Europe’s too.

    Nearly 200 years ago William Pitt said Britain “has saved herself by her exertions, and will, as I trust, save Europe by her example.”

    I know that the issue of Europe runs deep in British politics. It touches emotions more profoundly than routine political differences. It raises concerns and fears that are too often played on too readily. For too long Europe has been the poison in the well of British politics.

    Here, too, far too many people present the European debate in fundamentalist terms.

    People are “for it” or “against it”.

    We “must do this” or “mustn’t do that”.

    Everyone, to paraphrase Gilbert & Sullivan, is either “a little Eurosceptic” or “a little Europhile”.

    This approach misses the real debate. The real debate must be about how we make Europe a success; how to make sure it raises enthusiasm, not resentment; how to make sure it raises the quality of our life and is not seen as threatening the nature of our life.

    What we are talking about in the debate on Europe is our national interest. Our jobs. Our future. And yet far too many people on both sides of the argument miss this wider point. They focus on narrow arguments as though we were fighting a holy war.

    So let us remember the fundamental economic realities.

    British business depends on Europe. Well over half of what we export, we export to Europe.

    We need a place in European Community if we are to continue to attract inward investors to Britain.

    And we need influence in Europe, if we are to make sure that our businesses have the right conditions in which to trade.

    Europe is absolutely fundamental to this country’s national interest. We cannot turn our backs on that. It would be the ultimate abdication, a supreme folly. Limit our horizons and we limit our future. A little country in a lost world.

    I am a Euro realist. I look at Britain’s interests with a cold and clear eye. Britain has a special place in the world. Alone of all nations we live and move in three distinct circles – NATO, the Commonwealth, and the European Community. Each and everyone is a shaping factor in our long-term foreign policy and our own national interest.

    We have a special feeling about America. We are intimately bound up with its history, language and culture. I am one- quarter American. My father lived in America for a number of years. But Americans are realists, too. They want a good relationship with Britain. But, today, one of the main reasons they do is because Britain is in Europe. If Britain’s commitment to Europe was in question, have no doubt – the Americans would look elsewhere for their closest allies – to Germany or to France. They are no more dreamy-eyed about international relations than we are.

    Diplomacy is a calculation of where long-term advantage lies. And, for Britain, that advantage is in Europe.

    Mr President, I don’t accept the argument that a British government, fully involved in Europe, cannot win the battle to shape and mould the future of Europe.

    Who says we can’t win the argument against centralism in Europe? We can and we must.

    Conservative Governments won on the rebate.

    Won on the Single Market.

    Won on subsidiarity.

    And we are winning on deregulation.

    Britain should be confident in Europe.

    One final point. I don’t believe the prevailing orthodoxy that if you disagree with current fashionable opinions in Europe that you are anti-European.

    That is not true. The good European does not rush like Pavlov’s dog to every European fancy.

    He judges what is right for Europe. What will attract the support of the people of Europe. What will retain their liberties – their traditions. And then he fights for it – and that is what we will do.

    Why Conservative?

    Mr President, for the moment the world of politics pauses.

    But in a short while the people of this country will be called, with the rest of Europe, to take up the work of democracy again. And in the European elections we shall put our case to the country on the kind of Europe we want to build.

    You know what I believe in.

    I want to see a wider Europe, which spreads the protective mantle of peace, security and prosperity to the troubled countries of the East.

    I want to see an open Europe in which the weight of bureaucracy and regulation is reduced, and we embrace wholeheartedly the goal of a great single market open for business, competition and trade.

    And I want to see a people’s Europe. One that is not the remote preserve of a circle of planners. But a Community that addresses the concerns of ordinary people – and never seeks to interfere where it does not need.

    Our guiding lights are the principles of free trade, free enterprise and free association.

    Our aim is still to build closer co-operation between a growing number of nations.

    But we shall stand always for individual choice.

    Cherish always national diversity.

    And never deviate for one instant from defence of Britain’s own national interest.

    Our vision remains as it ever has been – a strong Britain in a strong Europe. That vision is supported by all but a handful of the people in these islands.

    Conclusion

    Mr President, I am proud of what Conservative Governments have achieved for our country. And I am full of hope and confidence in what this country still can and will achieve.

    Over the last 15 years we have helped change Britain.

    When I entered Parliament Britain faced real and visible threats.

    Our economy was ravaged by inflation.

    Our industrial strength was sapped by trade union power.

    Our country was threatened by the armed might of the Communist bloc.

    Together we have seen that great external threat dissolve.

    And we have seen many of our internal problems so successfully resolved that many have forgotten the dragons that once stalked the land.

    Of course, in the modern world, new challenges constantly arise. And the pace of invention lays new opportunities and new ambitions in our path.

    But it is all too easy to forget how remarkably the face of our country has changed for the better.

    Today, a child growing up in Scotland is twice as likely to go to university, twice as likely to become a homeowner, and has far better job prospects. Not jobs in declining state owned industries, but jobs in growing industries – profitable businesses with better pay and better working conditions than we’ve ever known before.

    So whenever the storm blows, remember the successes we’ve had – and why we had them.

    We had them because, even when the going was toughest, we stuck to our last, stuck to our guns; we kept cool and we kept faith.

    Throughout all the ups and downs of the last 15 years – and together we’ve seen a few of them both – fashionable opinion has carped and criticised.

    I know many of you were with me in Edinburgh two years ago at that great rally in our General election campaign.

    We didn’t bow then to fashionable opinion. We took it on, shook it by the scruff of the neck, and turned it on its head.

    That Election was about something more profound than many before it. About the very structure and fabric of the nation state our ancestors fought to create. People saw clearly two great threats to our Kingdom – the siren songs of separation at home and surrender abroad.

    It was here in Scotland that we drew the line in the sand. We declared that we could not – we would not – whatever the cost, whatever the risk – compromise our deepest core beliefs, and put our nation at risk.

    We stand – by gut instinct – in defence of the ancient Union between four great nations. For one strong, united country whose voice is heard and respected abroad, as four small nations – however proud – could never be.

    The values we care about are the values that generation after generation in this country have lived for and lived by. I believe that Britain needs those values now, more than ever before.

    So, when the work of politics begins again, let us go out and campaign positively for what we believe in – with pride in our principles, confidence in our future, and faith in our country, the United Kingdom – that unique and special country – that means so much to us all.

  • PMQT – 10 May 1994

    Below is the text of Prime Minister’s Question Time from 10th May 1994.

    PRIME MINISTER:

     

    Engagements

    Q1. Mr. Colin Shepherd : To ask the Prime Minister if he will list his official engagements for Tuesday 10 May.

    The Prime Minister (Mr. John Major) : This morning, I had meetings with ministerial colleagues and others. In addition to my duties in the House, I shall be having further meetings later today.

    Mr. Shepherd : During the course of his busy day, will my right hon. Friend reflect on the fact that over the past year, industrial output in the United Kingdom rose– [Hon. Members :– “Oh.”] Will my right hon. Friend reflect on the fact that industrial output in this country rose by 3.7 per cent.– [Interruption.] –while in Germany, Japan, France and Italy industrial output fell? Does my right hon. Friend agree that that is but one of a large number of good news stories abounding in this country at this time that deserve wider currency? Will my right hon. Friend confirm– [Interruption.] Will he confirm that it is still permissible to publish good news in this country?

    The Prime Minister : As far as I could hear my hon. Friend over a fairly turbulent House, I believe that he was referring to the good news about the economy that has been evident over recent weeks. Good news is certainly allowed, but I fear that it may often be masked by less important matters these days. The fact is that the British economy is growing, has been growing for some time and is expected to continue to grow. Thankfully, unemployment is falling and is expected to continue to fall.

    Mr. John Smith : Is not the cry for a referendum on Europe further and compelling evidence that the Prime Minister’s Cabinet and party are hopelessly divided? Is not it astonishing that battle is permitted to rage even within the Treasury? Does the Prime Minister support his Chancellor or his Chief Secretary?

    The Prime Minister : As the right hon. and learned Gentleman knows, and as I have made clear to the House on many occasions, I am sceptical about referendums. I made that clear during the Maastricht debate, and I have not changed my mind. There is not even a specific agenda for the intergovernmental conference yet. I do not believe that the question of a referendum arises now, and it certainly does not need to be decided now. It is not yet possible to say what the outcome of the conference will be, and I can assure the right hon. and learned Gentleman that I do not intend to come back to the House with a package that the House would find unacceptable.

    Mr. John Smith : On the question of referendums, does the Prime Minister recall saying something to the House on 6 May last year? His exact words were :

    “We are a parliamentary democracy, and I am not in favour of referendums.”- -[ Official Report , 6 May 1993 ; Vol. 224, c. 284.] Today he expressed scepticism. Is the movement from opposition to scepticism because he is running in front of the anti-Europeans?

    The Prime Minister : If he had listened carefully, the right hon. and learned Gentleman would have also heard me say a moment or so ago that I have not changed my mind. As to a single European currency, as I have said before, decisions on that are a long way off. That will not be determined in 1996. No one expects that this Parliament is going to be asked to decide on a single European currency. That would be a matter for a future Parliament, in circumstances that no one can predict. It was my negotiating at Maastricht that made it clear that this Department would have the right to decide on that matter at a future date. Even if I wish to, I could not bind a future Parliament on its decisions.

    Mr. John Smith : If that answer by the Prime Minister is to be construed as ruling out a referendum in the future, can we be assured that every member of his Government will be asked to support it or will be asked to resign?

    The Prime Minister : I have just set out the position clearly for the right hon. and learned Gentleman and I have made it entirely clear to him that it would not be appropriate to make a commitment now about a future Parliament’s decision. Even if I wished to, I could not bind a future Parliament. My personal decision on referendums has been made entirely clear on other occasions and again today. I reiterate that I have not changed my mind.

     

    Q2. Mr. Trotter : To ask the Prime Minister if he will list his official engagements for Tuesday 10 May.

    The Prime Minister : I refer my hon. Friend to the answer I gave some moments ago.

    Mr. Trotter : Does my right hon. Friend agree that it is a fact that if we were to have a Labour Government, we would inevitably have higher taxation and weaker defences, and that our policy on Europe would be destroyed by socialism? Is not that a message that all of us on the Government Benches should be constantly conveying?

    The Prime Minister : I am glad to say that a Labour Government would be a very improbable premise. Even last Thursday, which appears to have buoyed them, they secured a lower share of the vote than we secured in the last general election. My hon. Friend is entirely right. A Labour Government would mean substantial defence cuts, higher expenditure and higher taxation, and would also mean signing up as part of a federal European state. That is no future for this country and will not be accepted by the people of this country at the next general election.

    Mr. Ashdown : Does the Prime Minister realise that his answer on the question of a referendum will serve only to confirm his reputation as the maybe man? How can the British people be asked to vote on the question of Europe by a Government who are so divided on that issue and a Prime Minister whose answer on the key questions cannot get further than “perhaps”? Will he now tell us whether his answer is supposed to construe the meaning that he is opposed to a referendum, under any circumstances, as a result of which there might be a substantial change in Britain’s relation with Brussels–yes or no?

    The Prime Minister : The right hon. Gentleman is at his own game as a veritable opportunist for all seasons. I made perfectly clear a few moments ago what is my personal position on referendums. I also made it clear that, in 1996, I am not going to bring back anything remotely likely to be unacceptable to the House and I made it clear that on a far future date, the decision on a single European currency must be made by this House. I cannot bind the House and I do not intend to try to bind the House at this distance in time.

    Sir Terence Higgins : Is not it the case that the Leader of the Opposition was a member of a Government who introduced a referendum–an alien concept, inconsistent with our system of representative parliamentary democracy? Is not it absurd for those who argue that the authority of this House is being usurped by Brussels to advocate the use of a device that would undermine the authority of the House?

    The Prime Minister : My right hon. Friend points to something with which the House has become familiar–the selective memory of the Leader of the Opposition about what he has stood for in the past. The points made by my right hon. Friend are undeniable and I agree with them.

     

    Q3. Mr. Wicks : To ask the Prime Minister if he will list his official engagements for Tuesday 10 May.

    The Prime Minister : I refer the hon. Member to the answer I gave some moments ago.

    Mr. Wicks : Has the Prime Minister been told that since his campaign visit to Croydon, the wise people of Croydon threw out the Tory council after more than 100 years and elected a majority Labour council for the first time ever?

    We thank him for that visit. Whom does he blame for the Croydon Tory disaster : the local Conservatives or his own Government?

    The Prime Minister : Let me mention that I visited Westminster and Wandsworth as well. I congratulate the new Croydon councillors on their success in the elections and I sympathise with the Croydon electors who will have higher bills to pay and a less efficient administration.

     

    Q4. Mr. Deva : To ask the Prime Minister if he will list his official engagements for Tuesday 10 May.

    The Prime Minister : I refer my hon. Friend to the answer I gave some moments ago.

    Mr. Deva : Is my right hon. Friend aware that the United Kingdom attracted the highest level of foreign investment of any country in the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development in 1991 and 1992? Would the Labour party’s proposed increases in business taxes, enunciated in the European socialist manifesto, add encouragement to that vote of confidence in Britain?

    The Prime Minister : My hon. Friend is right. We have built up a position over many years as a favoured country for inward investment. That is apparent in Scotland, the north-east, the north-west, Wales and many other places. There is no doubt that that position would fall away if we followed the policies advocated by Opposition Front-Bench Members. A social chapter would inhibit inward investment, as would the 35-hour week, a minimum wage and plans to harmonise taxes upwards, all of which the Leader of the Opposition has signed up to in the socialist European manifesto. That manifesto is binding on the Labour party as, I hope, the Labour party will make clear to every elector in the forthcoming European elections.

     

    Q5. Mr. Connarty : To ask the Prime Minister if he will list his official engagements for Tuesday 10 May.

    The Prime Minister : I refer the hon. Member to the answer I gave some moments ago.

    Mr. Connarty : Does the Prime Minister accept that there are hundreds of thousands of pensioners who are now genuinely concerned that, should they fall ill, their pensions and savings will be used to pay for care that they thought they had paid for through their taxes? Will he take on the bloodsuckers in the Treasury and in the Department of Social Security who are threatening the last vestige of compassion in the national health service?

    The Prime Minister : As the hon. Gentleman knows, we are increasing resources in the national health service and increasing the provision of assistance to people in the national health service. Indeed, the national health service is the one service in Government that is guaranteed a real- terms increase, year on year, as we examine the relative proportions of public expenditure. There is no doubt about the growth, both for the elderly and for other people, in the national health service, and that growth will continue.

    Mr. Lester : I am delighted to hear my right hon. Friend’s wise words on the subject of a referendum. Will he reflect on the fact that when the Labour party had a referendum to provide party unity, that not only created the Social Democrat party but kept it in opposition for 14 years?

    The Prime Minister : So far; there are more years of opposition to come.

     

    Q6. Mr. Mudie : To ask the Prime Minister if he will list his official engagements for Tuesday 10 May.

    The Prime Minister : I refer the hon. Member to the answer I gave some moments ago.

    Mr. Mudie : Why, only two weeks after expressing support for the aims of the Civil Rights (Disabled Persons) Bill, did the Prime Minister allow the cynical, Government-inspired sabotage of the Bill last Friday?

    The Prime Minister : No one could have accepted a Bill, as drafted, with a cost compliance calculated at £17 billion and a yearly on-cost of £1 billion. However, as my right hon. Friend the Minister for Social Security and Disabled People made clear in the debate on Friday, we intend within the next six months to consult on proposals to eliminate unjustified discrimination in employment, access to goods and services, financial services and access to buildings. We also intend to consult on the establishment of a new advisory body on disability. Those consultations will take account of the views of everyone with an interest in disability. At the end of that process, we shall consider assisting in the drafting of practical and workable legislation that will help the disabled.

    Sir Fergus Montgomery : Is my right hon. Friend aware that one of the great problems facing not only this country but the rest of the world is the increase in drugs and the terrible effect that that has on crime? Can he give an assurance that the Government and the police will give top priority to tackling the drug barons and their vile trade?

    The Prime Minister : Yes, I can certainly give my hon. Friend that assurance. The sum total of expenditure to tackle the drugs menace exceeds something like £500 million a year. We are seeking, under the chairmanship of my right hon. Friend the Lord President, to bring together all the action that exists across Government so that we can most effectively target the drugs programme. We are also consulting our European partners–notably Germany–to see what can be done at the European level to assist in preventing drugs from coming to this country in the first place.

     

    Q7. Mr. George Howarth : To ask the Prime Minister if he will list his official engagements for Tuesday 10 May.

    The Prime Minister : I refer the hon. Gentleman to the reply I gave some moments ago.

    Mr. Howarth : As the leader of the most unpopular Government this century and with a divided shambles of a party beside and behind him, does the Prime Minister think that it would be better to clear the air and have a general election now?

    The Prime Minister : At the last election, we received the highest number of votes that any party has ever received in a general election, and we received a five-year mandate to carry out our policies. I intend to exercise that five-year mandate. Then the hon. Gentleman will get his election and then if he personally is re-elected, he can continue to sit where he sits now.

  • Mr Major’s Joint Press Conference with Chancellor Helmut Kohl – 27 April 1994

    Below is the text of Mr Major’s joint press conference with the German Chancellor, Helmut Kohl, held in London on Wednesday 27th April 1994.

    PRIME MINISTER:

    We have had today at Chequers, and with other Ministers elsewhere around London, a formal summit but frankly with a fairly informal side. It has certainly, judging from the reports of the plenary, both been very easy natured and very productive. Many of the meetings that have been held have produced some initiatives and I will touch on some of those in a few moments time.

    In the discussions I had with the Chancellor at Chequers we spent the bulk of our time looking at the broad picture of what will happen in the European Union and in our European continent beyond the boundaries of the European Union in the years immediately ahead.

    The key issue we were keen to exchange views on today was how to extend the security and prosperity that we have become used to in Western Europe to our neighbours further to the East, and we agreed that Germany and the United Kingdom should continue to work together on that particular objective.

    We agreed on three specific projects: first, we will jointly make a proposal to Hungary for our armed forces to hold a trilateral peace-keeping exercise in 1995 in the broad framework of the Partnership for Peace Agreement; secondly, we have agreed to coordinate our national efforts to help Ukraine remove all nuclear weapons from her soil; and thirdly, we agreed to enlarge our traditional bilateral defence seminar and enlarge it by inviting representatives of Partnership for Peace countries to take part next year at our seminar in Hamburg.

    We also discussed relations with Russia, Ukraine, the Baltic States and other countries of central and eastern Europe. I do not think I need to go into those discussions in depth, our approach to them is virtually identical and our governments continue to cooperate very closely in these areas.

    We spent some time this morning looking at the problems of Bosnia. I think there is no doubt after the set-back earlier this month that UNPROFOR has taken a step forward today with the withdrawal of Serb heavy weapons from the surrounds of Gorazde. That was the result of some very difficult and some very carefully measured decisions by NATO and of skilful and courageous work yet again by the United Nations protection forces on the ground. We are both determined to help NATO and UNPROFOR defer aggression against any of the safe areas, but we agreed this morning that the real prize is a negotiated settlement. Both the United Kingdom and Germany are represented in the new contact group that has now been established and that will try to help the United Nations achieve a comprehensive ceasefire which must be linked to the settlement negotiations.

    Neither of us were in any doubt that achieving a settlement, a lasting settlement, was likely to be an immensely difficult task, but we share the view that we will have the best chance of achieving that by pooling the diplomatic effort between Europe, the United Nations, Russia and the United States in the contact group that has been established.

    We spent some time on European Union matters. The Chancellor of course takes over the Presidency of the Community in a couple of months time and he may wish to say more about that himself in a few moments. But before then we hope to see the accession treaties of the four EFTAn applicants through the European Parliament and signed. During the German Presidency we agreed we wish to work together on specific steps to build up the Union’s relations with the countries to the east.

    We also identified a fairly long list of European Union subjects where we share a common approach. Simply to list them for you illustrates the scale of the areas of agreement: competitiveness; subsidiarity; deregulation; the single market, especially telecommunications, energy, transport and budgetary discipline; a more effective foreign policy; and common action under the Justice and Home Affairs pillar on illegal immigration, asylum, terrorism, drugs and other forms of crime. We have issued a joint statement on cooperation in those areas which I think you should have by now.

    There is no doubt you are going to hear a good deal more about deregulation in Europe. The Chancellor and I wish to see a substantial reduction in the regulatory burdens on European business because we both believe it will help growth and help competitiveness.

    We have agreed today to work with the Commission and other members to ensure that deregulation is at the heart of European policy-making in order to promote real increases in competitiveness, employment and economic growth.

    At their bilateral the President of the Board of Trade and Herr Rexrodt agreed that an Anglo-German group of businessmen should be invited to scrutinise European Union regulation and to act as a stimulus for specific deregulatory measures in Europe.

    I do not wish in these brief remarks to cover all the subjects we discussed, though I should emphasise to you the importance to both countries of the South African elections today. Both Britain and Germany have worked for many years, very often very closely together, to help bring about change in South Africa, so we both wish to do all we can to assist the in-coming government after the elections are concluded in South Africa. We hope to see business investing there and both competing and collaborating to develop the enormous economic potential that we both believe exists in South Africa.

    What was clear from our discussions was that the Anglo-German relationship is in very good heart indeed. Our politicians, our professionals, our businessmen, our performers, our cultural figures, all of them know one another, I believe they both like and respect one another as well.

    But we did discuss one other matter, we do wish to bring our young people closer together if we possibly can and improve our understanding of each other’s countries. So the Chancellor and I agreed this morning that we would ask our officials to come up with specific and imaginative proposals on this and we will discuss them and take decisions on that at our next meeting later this year.

    So that is a broad summary of what has been happening, I will invite the Chancellor to add, or if he wishes, subtract from what I have just said.

    CHANCELLOR KOHL:

    First of all, I will gladly take this opportunity here to thank you and the members of the British Cabinet on my own behalf and also on behalf of my colleagues in the Cabinet, for these very frank, very open, very fruitful talks that were characterised by a spirit of mutual friendship.

    The relationship between our two countries are of the utmost importance, particularly if we look towards the future development of the European Union. We have taken different courses during this century and this century will soon end in only a few years time and it was a century that was characterised by a lot of suffering, death and pain, and we see it as our task, looking to our children and generations to come, to build a cooperation characterised by friendship and mutual trust in all possible areas.

    And John, here in front of the public of your country, l would like to thank you personally, John, for the fact that during your time in office we have been able to discuss matters in such a frank, open and very warm atmosphere and I trust that we might be able to continue that.

    The Prime Minister has just mentioned in his introduction most of the issues that we discussed, I would just like to make a few remarks. The first remark is that another subject which we discussed was one that may not be the most dramatic one, but that is important too, we agreed that until the next Anglo-German consultations to enlarge and intensify the exchange of young people, I think that this is a very important subject indeed. You know that we should foster this to the best of our abilities and I think there should be very many possibilities for young people to meet and to get to know each other.

    On 3 September in Berlin we will, together with Vice President Al Gore, Francois Mitterrand and John Major, take leave of the allied troops that have been stationed in Berlin for so long and I would like to use this opportunity to thank the hundreds and thousands of British soldiers who served in our country and who lived together with their families in our country and the fact that we, before unification the Federal Republic of Germany, were able to maintain our freedom and peace and the fact that we have been given this gift of German unification is due to the fact that they have served and done their duty in our country. I know it is not fashionable these days to say “Thank You”, but I would like to use this opportunity to say a very warm “Thank You” to you.

    The Prime Minister mentioned a number of issues that we discussed this morning, we were totally in agreement that we should do everything in our power in order to give help for self help to the reforming countries in central and eastern Europe and I think that we have after all entered into a promise here and we have said to those people who were subjugated under the yoke of communism, should you throw off that yoke, should you introduce democracy, the rule of law and a market economy, we will help you, and we have to keep this promise now.

    We talked about the important vote that will be taken next week in the European Parliament on the accession of the EFTA countries -Norway, Sweden, Finland and Norway – and we hope that there will be a clear majority of the European Parliament for this accession.

    Another important issue was the German Presidency, Germany will take over the Presidency of the European Union in only a few weeks and we have agreed on trying to promote a number of very important issues together in very close coordination and cooperation, close cooperation also of the immediate members of our personal staff.

    Of the many issues that we discussed this morning that will play a role in the second half of this year, I would like to only mention a few. First of all a discussion of the white book on employment and economic growth. In spite of the positive developments that we see in our economic systems the problem of the loss of jobs is a concern, one of the most important concerns that we both share, the problems that many people have to find jobs. And John Major talked about the intensification of cooperation in the common foreign and security field, and there is another area where we should cooperate, namely in home matters, in domestic matters, would like to mention here particularly the fight against organised crime, against the mafia. In only few weeks time there will be a summit meeting under the Greek Presidency and we will have this on the agenda.

    Another important subject obviously is the issue of migration and the whole complex of issues related to asylum. Then another subject that we discussed already in Edinburgh but which I think has not really developed in a very positive sense, something that is at the real heart of the integration of Europe, namely the subject of deregulation, getting away from too much rhetoric, too much bureaucracy on a European level, and that is a subject that I take a personal interest in.

    In Germany we are very satisfied, although one would have to wait and see whether optimism is really in place here, but there seems to be a bit of light at least at the end of the tunnel in former Yugoslavia in view of the developments this morning. We sincerely hope that those who have political responsibility in Serbia understand the message that the civilised world has sent to them, and last but not least, that NATO has sent to them.

    A last point. Since we have waged so many battles together, the British government and the German government, over the past 10 years on South Africa on abolishing apartheid, racial discrimination, I would like to say that we both note with particular pleasure and satisfaction that the elections are now going on in South Africa and let me say that I am hopeful that they will be democratic and free elections, obviously we would all have to remember here in Europe that this is an enormous undertaking and we all hope I think for peaceful developments there in South Africa.

    In one word and in a nutshell, John, thank you for the very warm and friendly reception and we will go on and continue to work together closely.

     

    QUESTIONS AND ANSWERS

    QUESTION:

    Chancellor, two questions, the first one as to the relationship between the UK and Germany. One sees that the mood seems to have improved considerably since the predecessor of Mr. Major left office.

    CHANCELLOR KOHL:

    He has his own complex, John, you know!

    SAME MAN:

    There are certain irritations in the press however on for example the commemoration of D-Day. Do you feel that this is something normal or do you think that this is a burden on the relationship?

    The second question is on Europe where too one has mentioned a number of different accents that seem to be put on different parts of policy by the two governments. Do you think that what has been the policy enumerated in the Maastricht Treaty is no longer realistic in the light of present developments? And then the development of Europe will not go without blood, sweat and tears?

    CHANCELLOR KOHL:

    Well, John, I have known this esteemed colleague from the British press for a long time and I would have been very disappointed had he not mentioned your predecessor in office. That has been his standard subject for many years.

    The relationship is an excellent one and has been for a long time and I don’t think one should make any bones about it and as far as I can see, in every family however there are obviously disagreements and there are as far as I can see also in every newspaper editor’s room about this.

    As to the events that will commemorates what happened fifty years ago, I must say quite frankly that I really don’t understand what people are talking about. When I read these reports in the press I am really surprised because at no point in time did I ever seek to get invited to the commemorations for D-Day and had I been invited I would not have attended and this was very well known so this has never been an issue between us but what is I think quite a matter of course and understandable to everyone is that we want to learn our lesson from history and if next year for example, looking back on the end of the Second World War, we agree to meet and to remember the dead of that war and to pay our respects to the victims of that particular war it will be in the joint conviction that it is our duty – and let me say this on a very personal note; after all I was 15 years old when the war ended so I have a very personal memory of it – that we feel obliged to see to it that no generation will ever be in such a situation again in Europe that there be war between them.

    As to enlargement, I think we have a common policy concert and we will have to obviously discuss that during the Presidency.

    As to the question of union, from the German point of view there has always been a very clear list of priorities. The first and most important point has been and will always be that a future joint European currency will have to be subordinated to the laws of stability and that stability is more important than anything else.

    As to the date, I think you should wait and see a little but after all I was in Paris six years ago and had I said at the time that the Common European market will be introduced and if I had given you the date and people would have been very doubtful five years ago had I told you we would agree on the Maastricht Treaty and adopt it. People here would have said: “Well now he has finally gone round the bend! That treaty will never come!” People said it would never be ratified and now it has been ratified and is being ratified so please be a bit patient with us!

    Here in this house you can feel history in every nook and cranny and you can feel also that time is very relevant if you look back into history. What is important now is that we make the right decision and this is what we want.

    QUESTION:

    I wanted to know if the chances of the Belgian Prime Minister for the Presidency of the EC Commission are stronger after this summit than before.

    PRIME MINISTER:

    I read in the newspapers today, those that I read, that the Chancellor and I were supposed to be having “sharp disagreements” I think was the expression over the Presidency of the Commission, I hate to disappoint you but we haven’t managed a sharp disagreement today on any subject at all!

    As far as the Commission Presidency is concerned, the question is now only beginning to come under discussion around European capitals. It didn’t feature high on our agenda and it is not something which will be decided between Britain and Germany or indeed between any two member states; it is a collective decision for all the members of the European Union.

    The matter will almost certainly be discussed at the Corfu Council which is still two months away and the Twelve will collectively look for a well-qualified candidate who can command general support. It is not absolutely necessary that the decision is made at Corfu but clearly we will examine it there. At this stage it isn’t yet wholly clear who all the candidates might be. I have heard at least half a dozen names mentioned; it may be others will be mentioned as well so there is no sharp disagreement, no determination who the next President of the Commission will be, it is a decision for a later time in a larger group.

    CHANCELLOR KOHL:

    John, let me comment if I may. I would like to say that the Federal Government has not in any way made any firm choice or is trying to push any particular candidate. The purported talks that have been reported in the papers have never taken place. Obviously we will consult about this matter with partners in the European Union, with colleagues of state and government so whoever is reporting that we have already fixed a candidate will report something that is totally wrong and if you think that I am a candidate you may rest assured that I will certainly not be a candidate for this particular post.

    QUESTION:

    Prime Minister, your former colleague in government, Lord Young, who is now Chairman of Cable & Wireless launched a very strong attack yesterday on the European Community. He suggested Britain was wasting its time being a member of it and should actually look to the emerging markets in the Far East. He also gave a very strong warning about unemployment in Europe and the rise of fascism. Could I have your response to that please?

    PRIME MINISTER:

    I think there is total agreement certainly between the Chancellor and I and amongst the other European Heads of Government as well that Europe can’t be inward-looking, that Europe does have to look to the Far East and elsewhere. It is with those markets that we have to compete. Germany and Britain don’t just have to compete against Spain and against France; we have to compete against Japan, the United States, the Pacific Basin and Latin America as well so to that extent Lord Young is right to say that the whole of the European Union must lift its sights and make sure that it collectively can compete with the rest of the world. There is nothing startling about that. The Chancellor and I would absolutely agree with that point.

    We also think that within the European Union a great deal has been gained collectively by the development of the Community into the present Union. That would be our view on the latter point but of course we must look beyond the European Union. We are not, we can’t be and we never will be a narrow inward-looking group that doesn’t raise its sights to what goes on in the rest of the world so of course we will compete beyond it. A great deal of Britain’s trade is with the European Union, we are massive trading partners of Germany, Germany are our largest trading partners in the European Union but we also have very substantial trade in the Far East, America, Africa and elsewhere and so of course do our partners so I think Lord Young on the substantive part of his thesis was preaching a gospel that would be generally accepted.

    QUESTION (Barnaby Mason, BBC World Service):

    Prime Minister and Chancellor, you are both in favour I think of opening up the European Union towards the countries of central and eastern Europe. What changes, what reforms do you think there are going to have to be in the structure of the European Union in order among other things that it should be able to pay for the financial implications of enlargement?

    CHANCELLOR KOHL:

    Before I answer the question, allow me to make just one remark on what Lord Young said. In the Federal Republic of Germany every fourth job comes from export into countries of the European Union and allow me half in jest to say that the productivity of the European Union cannot be seen if you look at the atlas of 1914, you have to look at the map of today of 1994; then you can see very clearly that the world is a very changed place and that the world has changed for the United Kingdom, changed for Germany and changed for all.

    Right now we are in the final phase of enlargement of the European Union with new members Norway, Finland, Sweden and Austria coming in and obviously after the referenda are taken in these countries and the decision has been made there needs.to be a certain phase of tranquillity, a certain breathing space when one has to discuss the consequences for institutions, for the Parliament, for the budget in the European Union because after all we must not have a situation where enlargement means that we raise the number of funds to an unlimited number; we also have to achieve budget stability.

    Secondly, under German Presidency – and I am saying this in such a general way because I don’t want to preempt anything that anyone else might want to say – we will have to discuss in public an enlargement at a later point in time. I don’t want to mention any dates here but obviously under the precondition that these countries themselves actually want it and actually create at home the necessary preconditions for that it will have to be seen in such a way that the Czech Republic, Slovakia, Poland and Hungary would be the first candidates for that enlargement. Then we will have to talk very frankly about where we see limits to enlargement and in all the discussions that are now going on about enlargement, further enlargement will certainly not be possible. We will have to discuss the possibilities of concluding Treaties of Association in the security field and the foreign policy field and in the economic field and enlargement over and above the countries that I have mentioned and on the list of the Parliament for next week for the vote but that will only be possible in a number of years and when this will be no-one is able to say and certainly only after the present enlargement has been concluded.

    PRIME MINISTER:

    Those who are familiar with the British position on enlargement will have been familiar with what the Chancellor has just said. I think it indicates the degree of practical agreement between us on many of these issues. Clearly, we have to look at institutional change. It also means looking at policies. As the Chancellor said, there is no bottomless budgetary pit and we have to take account of the economic readiness of applicant countries as staging posts. We will wish to see what we can do in a variety of ways – trade liberalisation and other ways as well – to help encourage the next tranche of members to become ready for membership and to look at Association and other agreements to achieve it. That is very much a matter that we will need to address not in the far distance but in the near distance so that we can begin to prepare the path for those applicant countries we have identified and assist them to become ready to join the Union.

    QUESTION (Andrew Marr):

    Could I ask the two leaders whether they believe that the historical drive for a deeper Union is now over?

    CHANCELLOR KOHL:

    I certainly don’t think so, certainly not. We are right now at the front of a development that may have both possibilities in it. We will have to do a lot of work, we will have to increase the awareness of people in our countries about what is going on. We have to disseminate information but I must say I am very clear in my mind that if we were to be asked how do we want to shape the future of countries going back on what we have achieved would mean yesterday and then there is a common future in a European Union that is not a centralist state, not a supranational entity that takes care of everything. Quite the contrary would be a Community where we all of us maintain our identity, where we bring in our traditions, our culture, where the British stay British, the French French, the Germans German and it would be a rather boring sort of club if we were not to maintain our national peculiarities.

    In the decisive questions however as they relate to the acceptance of our people we would not be able to cope with matters. Just look at the worldwide challenge posed by the subject of environmental pollution and other matters like development policy, the gap between rich and poor countries; look at the European Union! In spite of all the difficulties that we may have it is actually a community of the rich nations. If I look at the task that we have in order to maintain peace, freedom and security on our continent no-one should believe that these terrible spectres of the past, these terrible ghosts of the past, are only at home on the Balkans; they may raise their ugly heads at any minute and there are a number of other issues where I feel we have to work strongly together. I think that we are now at a historical cross-roads where we have the possibility to ensure that one’s own country enjoys prosperity and wealth and together with our partners we go into the future and create that sort of prosperity for all of us.

    PRIME MINISTER:

    As the Chancellor said, we illustrated earlier some areas of greater cooperation not a centralist state as the Chancellor indicated a moment or so ago but if one pitches one’s mind forward for a few years and looks at the sort of world we will be living in – Japan, a much, more powerful China, United States, Russia – there are going to be areas where in the collective European interest one will wish to have the collective European muscle and those are areas of cooperation where it is very much in the interests of each individual country in Europe to seek cooperation. The Chancellor touched on some, I would offer others! The initiatives that were developed between our Home and Interior Ministers today on crime are an illustration where it is practical for us to work together. You can call that “deepening” if you wish. The development of the foreign policy pillars is another illustration where one works as individual nations but collectively exercising muscle. They both arise – the home affairs pillar and the foreign affairs pillar – out of the Maastricht Treaty and there are developments like this where it is going to be collectively in the interests of the European states without, as the Chancellor emphasised, creating a centralist state which so many people not just in the United Kingdom are concerned about, where it is in the interests of all of us in the European Union to cooperate so I think there are many areas.

    QUESTION (Robin Oakley, BBC):

    Could I ask Chancellor Kohl please: we are at the moment in the European elections campaign. Does he think that the European Parliament has sufficient powers at present and if not, how would he like to see those powers enhanced at the next intergovernmental conference in 1996?

    CHANCELLOR KOHL:

    I think that the European Parliament now has an enlarged competence after the Maastricht Treaty. One may obviously discuss whether one has actually gone a step further in adopting the Maastricht Treaty but I do think that we have gone a step further. Now the new Parliament will be elected and will have to deal with its rights and obligations. There will be a certain phase of transition which we will have to get used to it and you will see after a certain phase of consolidation that for the first time the European Parliament will actually be able to have a say and a very significant say in the appointment of the President of the Commission.

    I am for pragmatic solutions. I don’t think that one should hold any dogma. I must say that I am rather surprised that the Germans should be all of a sudden the pragmatists and that there are others in Europe who look at the subject in a way that I think is particularly German. I am for a number of many small steps but I am for making those steps. As to how they may develop also in view of the intergovernmental conference in 1996 one would have to look at that in the light of developments.

    There is one thing that I would like to mention here. If I look back fifteen years ago when we discussed the question of competency at the European Parliament, if I remember my first EC summit meeting in December 1982 in Copenhagen at what was possible then and what is now reality now, I am not pessimistic at all.

  • Mr Major’s Joint Doorstep Interview with Helmut Kohl – 27 April 1994

    Below is the text of Mr Major’s joint doorstep interview with Chancellor Helmut Kohl, held at Northolt on Wednesday 27th April 1994.

    [Some of Chancellor Kohl’s comments were inaudible due to the translation being heard at the same time].

    PRIME MINISTER:

    May I just say at the outset how pleased I am to see the Chancellor back in the United Kingdom. Over the last few years we have met in a number of countries, quite apart from the United Kingdom and in Germany, we have had meetings at chalets in Austria and many European Councils, I am delighted to see such a good friend of the United Kingdom back here for a meeting today at Chequers.

    We have a wide range of European Union and wider European matters to discuss today and no doubt we will report on those at our press conference later on this afternoon.

    Let me just say at the outset that I am pleased to say it does seem we had a pretty quiet night in Gorazde. At the moment aid is getting into Gorazde and patients are getting out and I am delighted that that proves to be the case and I hope further examination this morning will show that the Serb armaments have been moved to 20 kilometres away, as requested, we will know about that I think fairly shortly.

    I think the Chancellor and I will also wish to discuss the South African elections, both Germany and the United Kingdom have taken a great interest in moving South Africa towards democracy in recent years and despite the further disgraceful bomb incident this morning, it does seem that the election is proceeding satisfactorily and we look forward to the new government being formed and to the role that both Germany and the United Kingdom can play in helping South Africa move forward to the future.

    I think on bilateral and other matters I will reserve any comments until after our press conference this afternoon, but I will invite the Chancellor to say just a word or two at the outset.

    CHANCELLOR KOHL:

    It is a very great pleasure to be here once again. We have had a very strong and [indistinct] cooperation and we have been able to achieve a lot together. And the relationships between our countries are not like the weather today, the relationships are very sunny, they are excellent, we have [indistinct] and if there are questions or problems then we always manage to discuss them in a very friendly atmosphere.

    We have a lot of understanding for each other, we understand each other well. Britain and Germany are amongst the important countries of the European Union and from my perspective as the German Chancellor it is particularly important that the common European future is actually done together with Britain. We have different histories, we have different traditions and it is quite natural and obvious to me that we take into consideration how the other countries have come this long way [indistinct].

    [Indistinct] very particular day because the truth is that it was the British government [indistinct] who during these whole years [indistinct] in South Africa have actually committed themselves to this course of action. It was a process that often one had to wonder whether it [indistinct] success and neither of us has any illusions, we know how very difficult it is and we know how difficult it is to achieve what [indistinct] and to achieve it in a useful way. But if I look at the many meetings in the European Council where we talked about it over the last 10 years or so, and if I think of the Conference of the G7, it is a very great pleasure to think that today we really have made enormous progress.

    And I wish all of those who are suffering in the former Yugoslavia that what has been attempted now and what has been started will actually lead to success and that all those who are active there will understand that a civilised international community cannot [indistinct] where one changes orders with brutal violence.

    I am looking forward to our day, a day amongst friends, and I would like [indistinct].

    QUESTION:

    Do you still believe Sir Leon Brittan should be the next Commission President?

    PRIME MINISTER:

    There are a number of very good candidates, we think Leon Brittan is a very strong candidate for the Presidency of the Commission, there are other candidates as well. It is our view that Leon is the best candidate, we will need to discuss that with all our colleagues and there will be a collective decision.

  • PMQT – 26 April 1994

    Below is the text of Prime Minister’s Question Time from 26th April 1994.

    PRIME MINISTER:

     

    Engagements

    Q1. Mr. Morgan : To ask the Prime Minister if he will list his official engagements for Tuesday 26 April.

    The Prime Minister (Mr. John Major) : This morning, I had meetings with ministerial colleagues and others. In addition to my duties in the House, I shall be having further meetings later today.

    Mr. Morgan : Does the Prime Minister agree with the words of the Home Secretary to the Institute of Directors convention this morning, when he said that the police, the courts and the prison services were having to pick up the pieces for the failures of others? Does he agree that the word “others” may include those who have been governing this country for the last 15 years?

    The Prime Minister : I have not seen the text of what my right hon. and learned Friend said, but I am sure that he was seeking to convey that the causes of crime are many and varied; that it is not possible to let all the aspects of crime simply be dealt with by the police and others; and that everyone in authority, whatever that authority may be, may have to, and should be prepared to, take their share of responsibility.

    Mr. Rathbone : Will the Prime Minister send a special message of encouragement to South Africa as the democratic elections continue there in order to welcome this final step away from apartheid ? Will he continue to bend his energy to bringing South Africa back into the Commonwealth?

    The Prime Minister : I think that people around the world welcome the elections that are taking place in South Africa and hope that they can be concluded without any more of the violence that has scarred events in the last few days. When the election is concluded and a new multi-racial government is formed, I very much hope that South Africa will decide to rejoin the Commonwealth. As far as this Government is concerned, it will be a very welcome entrant.

    Mr. John Smith : How can the Prime Minister justify his Government’s spending £500 million of taxpayers’ money in fees to private consultants when, as is revealed in today’s Financial Times, only £10 million was gained as a result?

    The Prime Minister : Let me set out some of the points related to that, because I think that the right hon. and learned Gentleman may tend to agree with much of what I have to say about it. The right hon. and learned Gentleman is asking questions that I myself asked, which is the reason why the scrutiny was established in the first place. It was set up because of the growth in expenditure on consultants and in order to find out whether it is good value for money or whether better value for money can be obtained. If it confirms that the expenditure is producing good results, we will maintain it ; if not, we will make the changes required.

    As far as savings are concerned, the spending is on specialist advice to support programmes. It is not a search to find savings especially.

    Mr. John Smith : In other words, it is true : another grotesque waste of taxpayers’ money has occurred. Is not the Prime Minister’s game to delay this and any other bad news until after the local and European elections are over? Why not tell the truth for once before an election?

    Hon. Members : Withdraw!

    Madam Speaker : Order. I believe that I heard the right hon. and learned Gentleman correctly and found nothing unparliamentary in what he said, but would he care to repeat it so that it is clear to all of us?

    Mr. John Smith : What I suggested to the Prime Minister was that for once he should tell the truth before an election.

    The Prime Minister : If there was an intention to hide anything, perhaps the right hon. and learned Gentleman could explain why we established the scrutiny in the first place–it is precisely to determine that the expenditure is conducted properly. However, since the right hon. and learned Gentleman wishes to judge without having seen the report, before the report is completed and without any understanding of the report or what is in it, let me give him a little more information. The examination of where the money is spent includes matters such as helping to design and evaluate weapons systems for the armed forces–not something that the civil service could do–and conducting feasibility studies on technical aspects of the road programme, which is not something that could be done without specialist advice. The right hon. and learned Gentleman should find out some facts before he smears.

    Mr. John Smith : Does not the Prime Minister realise that families all over Britain–the real quiet majority–who are now paying huge tax increases imposed by his Government will bitterly resent this further example of the Government’s now legendary incompetence?

    The Prime Minister : The whole House will have noted that the right hon. and learned Gentleman was prepared to criticise, was wrong and was not prepared to apologise. I am glad at last that he is taking a closer interest in value for money and efficiency. I hope that he will apply the same test to Labour local authorities up and down the country–every single one he knows. If he were really concerned about tax, perhaps he would indicate what aspects of public expenditure restraint he would support. If he were concerned about local authority tax, perhaps he will explain why he and his party oppose compulsory competitive tendering despite the savings that it has made in councils up and down the country. Every single thing that he has said today is bogus.

    Mr. Rowe : Is my right hon. Friend aware that, despite having inherited a remarkably sound economy and having driven up the council tax quite unnecessarily, the Labour-Liberal coalition which runs Kent has decided to cut the police budget? Will he comment on the amazing gap between the statements of the Front-Bench spokesmen of the two Opposition parties and what they do when they have office?

    The Prime Minister : My hon. Friend has made the point very clearly. I am not familiar with the particular illustration that he produced, but there are many similar illustrations of which the House is well aware.

     

    Q2. Mr. Callaghan : To ask the Prime Minister if he will list his official engagements for Tuesday 26 April.

    The Prime Minister : I refer the hon. Gentleman to the answer I gave some moments ago.

    Mr. Callaghan : Is the Prime Minister aware of the statistics that have just been produced by the North West health authority which show a 60 per cent. increase over three years in the number of youngsters aged 18 and under who have to attend hospital for treatment for drug abuse? In view of those alarming figures and the fact that there is a connection between serious crime and drug abuse, as evidenced by the number of murders in our cities, will the Prime Minister tell the House exactly what he intends to do to combat the evils of drug abuse and serious crime?

    The Prime Minister : The hon. Gentleman touches on a very important matter and I am pleased to respond to him. The sum total of expenditure by the Government on drug-related programmes and other matters related to drugs now exceeds £500 million a year. I have asked my right hon. Friend the Lord President to bring together the expenditure all across Government to make sure that we can target it at the right Departments and at the right problems to begin to cope with the problem of drugs, which exists right across the world but which I think every hon. Member would wish us to tackle at the roots as speedily as possible.

     

    Q3. Sir George Gardiner : To ask the Prime Minister if he will list his official engagements for Tuesday 26 April.

    The Prime Minister : I refer my hon. Friend to the reply I gave some moments ago.

    Sir George Gardiner : In the course of his day, my right hon. Friend may have time to look at the final draft of the Conservative manifesto for the European elections. When he does, will he make doubly sure that it emphasises the crucial choice that faces our people in those elections– between Conservative resistance to further moves towards Euro federalism, while we protect British jobs by staying out of the social chapter, and Labour and Liberal eagerness to sign up to anything, to hand over control to the Eurocrats in Brussels and to saddle us with employment costs that would hit directly at British jobs?

    The Prime Minister : My hon. Friend is entirely right. There is a sharp contrast between our policies on Europe and those of both the main Opposition parties, whose policies are almost indistinguishable. We believe in a free trade, deregulated, outward-looking Europe of independent nation states–unlike either of the Opposition parties, both of which want regulation, intervention and more high spending in a federal European state. That is not for us and I do not believe that it is the wish of the British nation either.

     

    Q4. Ms Quin : To ask the Prime Minister if he will list his official engagements for Tuesday 26 April.

    The Prime Minister : I refer the hon. Member to the reply I gave some moments ago.

    Ms Quin : Following the previous question, and as the Prime Minister feels that he has a lot in common with the four countries that hope to join the European Union next year, will he tell the House how many of them have supported his Government in requesting an opt-out from the social chapter?

    The Prime Minister : I think that one will find that across Europe– [Interruption.] Across Europe, as the hon. Lady knows, countries are recognising that Britain is more competitive because we had the courage to stand up and say that destroying jobs in Europe was not a good idea. There are 19 million people unemployed in Europe; only in this country is unemployment falling. Only this country is becoming more competitive, and that is because we were prepared to say no to policies that destroy jobs and yes to policies that create jobs.

     

    Q5. Mr. Kynoch : To ask the Prime Minister if he will list his official engagements for Tuesday 26 April.

    The Prime Minister : I refer my hon. Friend to the reply I gave some moments ago.

    Mr. Kynoch : Although controlling inflation is not an end in itself, does my right hon. Friend agree with me and the many business men in my constituency that it is, however, a precondition for falling unemployment, low interest rates and, ultimately, sound and stable economic growth?

    The Prime Minister : My hon. Friend is entirely right about that. The necessity to get inflation down is self-evident, as is the necessity to keep it down to have the economy growing steadily. As a result of the disinflationary policy that we have followed, we have now had growth for eight successive quarters, unemployment has fallen by a quarter of a million and we have a higher growth pattern than any other nation in the European Community. A CBI survey published this morning showed business optimism continuing to rise. That is a scenario which most other nations in Europe would be pleased to have.

     

    Q6. Mr. Alan W. Williams : To ask the Prime Minister if he will list his official engagements for Tuesday 26 April.

    The Prime Minister : I refer the hon. Member to the reply I gave some moments ago.

    Mr. Williams : On this historic day in South Africa, will the Prime Minister congratulate Nelson Mandela, the African National Congress and everyone else involved in the anti-apartheid movement for bringing democracy at last to South Africa?

    The Prime Minister : I am happy to extend my congratulations to Mr. Mandela, to President de Klerk and to everyone else who over the years has worked towards a non-racial South Africa. That will be welcomed by people across the world, and I hope that it will bring greater stability for South Africa in the future.

    Mr. Jonathan Evans : Has my right hon. Friend noticed the recent extensive and co-ordinated press attention to concerns about the Government’s proposals to deal with new age travellers? Perhaps I can tell my right hon. Friend that the quiet majority in my constituency very much support the Government’s plans as contained in the Criminal Justice and Public Order Bill, which will give them real protection from those unlawful activities.

    The Prime Minister : My hon. Friend is entirely right. New age travellers have been an immense nuisance, not least, of course, in the west country over recent years. The legislation proposed by my right hon. and learned Friend the Home Secretary will give the police far more powers to deal with them. In view of the difficulty that there has been in the west country, I am surprised that we have not had more support from the Liberal Democrats on that matter.

     

    Q7. Mr. Enright : To ask the Prime Minister if he will list his official engagements for Tuesday 26 April.

    The Prime Minister : I refer the hon. Gentleman to the reply that I gave some moments ago.

    Mr. Enright : How does the Prime Minister square the suppression of the sleaze about Westminster on the “Panorama” programme with his aim of open government?

    The Prime Minister : No Government have ever been more open than this one and there is no suspicion of sleaze.

  • Mr Major’s Speech to the Institute of Directors in Belfast – 30 March 1994

    Below is the text of Mr Major’s speech, made to the Institute of Directors at Culloden Hotel, Hollywood, County Down on Wednesday 30th March 1994.

    PRIME MINISTER:

    Mr Chairman, Ladies and Gentlemen. It is just possible that some of you reading the newspapers may be surprised to see me here tonight. You really should not be. I have made many visits to Northern Ireland in the past, I intend to go on coming in the future and whenever possible I look forward to bringing Norma with me as well.

    And I will tell you why, because you touched on it just briefly a moment or so ago. Northern Ireland is in the centre of my political interest and I promise you tonight that is precisely where I intend that it will stay in the future. In those visits I have made here to the Province I have seen a great deal of what happens in this particular part of the world. I have seen aircraft made at Shorts in Belfast; tee-shirts by the million at the Fruit of the Loom in Londonderry, indeed my son stole mine before I had been home for 5 seconds; I have shopped in Coleraine and in Larne; I have sung carols in St George’s Church, Belfast; last summer I had the pleasure, as your guest, Mr Chairman, of visiting the Castleward Opera. And on those visits and on many other occasions in London I have met your church leaders, your political leaders, many leaders of community groups, and as I am doing this evening, leading businessmen and their wives and families.

    And above all, of course, I have had on these opportunities the good fortune to meet thousands of Northern Irish people from all walks of life. And on these occasions there have been two things that have particularly struck me: the first is the extraordinary warmth of Northern Ireland, in my experience, in their welcome and in their generosity, the people of Northern Ireland are second to none; and second, I have been invariably struck by how much is changing here and by how fast that change is occurring. The Northern Ireland of today is far removed from the images formed at a distance by many people, not just elsewhere in the United Kingdom, perhaps in many countries around the world. I would like to see far more people coming here to Northern Ireland to see precisely for themselves what is happening, to see the changes and to judge the opportunities that I believe are increasingly becoming apparent for the future.

    I wish to turn in a moment to economic matters and then perhaps a little to security matters. But I want first, with your indulgence, to say a word or two about a topic of the moment, to say a word or two about Europe.

    Throughout my time as Prime Minister the government has been taking a determined, a collective and a positive approach to Europe with clearly defined objectives. We intend to go on doing precisely that and if anyone is in any doubt of our course, I invite them to read again, if they have read it before, and for the first time if they have not, the article I wrote on holiday in Portugal last year that the Economist were kind enough to publish last September. That sets out our course.

    Much of the comment I hear these days about Europe is, to be frank, a crude parody of the real debate we should be having. Much of it is Euro-nonsense, the simplicities of Europhobia and Euro-enthusiasm frankly short change the public on a debate that is vital to our future. I am neither phobe nor enthusiast but I am a Euro-realist seeking to secure our success across the European continent. Neither am I prepared to bend policy either to appease the phobe or to appease the enthusiast. I will seek the policy that I believe to be right and they may follow me or not, as they choose. I wish to see Europe succeed and I wish that to happen because it is vital to the interests of the United Kingdom that it does, because for us there is no alternative to playing a strong part in Europe and there is no future in petty insularity.

    In an ideal world European problems would be decided through quiet, reasoned discussion. But that is not the way that Europe works and sadly at the moment it is not the way our domestic debate upon Europe is being conducted either. If you are to make progress in the European debate you must be prepared to fight very hard, you must fight for the best deal available to your interests and for your country. And of course in Europe we from the United Kingdom are just one of Twelve, we will not always get all that we want but we must carry on and step by step secure the changes that are of importance to us.

    And that is what in recent days we have been doing over Europe’s voting system, despite the grotesque misrepresentation of events that many people will have read and seen. I learned long ago that the world outside Westminster is very different from the rather feverish atmosphere within. But even so you may be understandably confused to find the arcane question of qualified majority voting causing such banner headlines.

    Let me say to you tonight, if we had decided, if the British government had decided to accept 27 as the blocking minority, there would have been outrage among many people and we would have been accused of not fighting for Britain’s interest. If we had blocked enlargement because we could not obtain 23 of the blocking minority, we would have thrown away a prime British foreign policy objective. And as it was, after tough negotiations, we secured enlargement and safeguards for Britain’s position. It was a fierce argument but at the end of that we did win agreement that the qualified majority voting system will be fundamentally reviewed at the 1996 intergovernmental conference.

    We did not win all that we wanted for the transitional period until then but we have secured a legally binding obligation to respect minority positions and to protect our own position. A negotiation, any negotiation, certainly a negotiation among twelve within Europe, that requires often concessions on all sides and on this occasion an acceptable deal has been struck. In the circumstances known to the Cabinet I believe it was right to accept that deal.

    And let me say tonight, I will go on striking deals for the United Kingdom if I think they are right, whatever the opposition to those deals may be. But a deal is only acceptable if it sticks and it is not acceptable to mis-use treaty provisions on health and safety to bring in social directives by the back door, it is not acceptable to try and circumvent the opt-out from the social chapter that I negotiated at the time of the Maastricht Treaty. We have discussed this matter with the Commission, they have given us assurances on this and they must keep to them scrupulously if confidence here is to be restored and our partners must respect both the letter and the spirit of the deal on majority voting.

    If this deal were not to be upheld then nobody should expect the United Kingdom to continue the normal process of Community business. A deal is a deal, if deals are not respected then normal business becomes impossible.

    But arguments over voting systems should not obscure the real progress that has been made: the establishment of a single market; the enlargement of the Union; the GATT deal, the biggest most important trade deal that the world has ever seen; steps to control the budget; reform of the Common Agricultural Policy; subsidiarity meaning 25 percent of Community legislation will either be repealed or reformed, by which I mean minimised; closer cooperation; foreign policy; and the fight against crime.

    All those are practical areas of constructive cooperation with our partners in Europe in recent years and we would not have made headway on any one of those issues if we had not argued very robustly for our point of view. We will continue to seek to build the sort of the Europe which is important I believe to you and important to me. Because it is by engaging all our efforts that we can promote that crucial, that critical positive view of a decentralised, deregulated, less bureaucratic, more competitive outward looking European Union, a Union that is friendly to business and better able to compete successfully with the United States and Asia.

    And there is no purpose with inside Europe in deciding that France can compete with Germany, can compete with Britain and can compete with Spain, the whole of Europe has to compete with Asia, with Japan and the United States and if it fails to do that then our livelihoods here in Northern Ireland and right the way across the European Union will be at risk. We seek a Union, a Union that makes a wider Europe of nation states, a Europe that works for the citizen, gives choice to the consumer and freedom to the traveller.

    It is of course this Europe, important to all of us, it is important to business in Northern Ireland and so of course is the state of the economy to which I would now like to turn. It was a long recession, a deep recession, a difficult recession within many parts of the United Kingdom it has left its scars. But for the last 7 successive quarters we have been back in growth across the United Kingdom and that has given us the strongest recovery of any of the large European economies. So far the growth has been modest and steady rather than spectacular. But even so, in many ways it has been stronger and more secure than the first phase of the long recovery after the recession at the beginning of the 1980s. In manufacturing, for example, we have seen a much faster recovery in production this time. Productivity reached an all time high in January and we have been sharpening a competitive edge by keeping a far better grip on costs than either Germany or Japan.

    But to realise their full potential, and unless we realise our full potential in a competitive world we will face difficulties in the decades ahead, but to realise their full potential all areas of the United Kingdom must improve their competitiveness. This morning I held a meeting of senior Ministers who are preparing a wide ranging White Paper on competitiveness, a White Paper of the sort we frankly have not seen for very many years. And we are looking at everything the government does, from one end of government to the other, to see what more we can do to help business in the United Kingdom win in world markets.

    It is a very wide ranging review. Take prices for example, they are now rising less than for a generation, that has enabled us to bring borrowing costs down which are now among the lowest in Europe. It helps us bring our wage costs under control, today we have less than half the wage inflation of the 1980s.

    And it has brought more industrial peace. These days of course we almost take that for granted, yet we are losing fewer days through strikes than at any time since records were first kept. And then of course one might take the jobs market. Unemployment remains far higher than any of us would wish, here in the Province and across the rest of the United Kingdom. But it is falling and it is falling at an earlier stage of the recovery than in the 1980s. In Northern Ireland it has come down by 6 percent over the last year and in the United Kingdom as a whole unemployment has dropped by well over 200,000 in the past year whilst across the rest of Europe it has still been rising, over 12 percent in France, over 20 percent in Spain, over 4 million unemployed in Germany, falling, thank goodness, in the United Kingdom.

    And yet within that broad picture how is Northern Ireland doing? As you will know, it is doing rather well. Over the past 5 years Northern Ireland has out-performed the national economy. In the last decade 74,000 extra jobs have been created here – a 13 percent increase. Output and employment fell less here than in most other regions during the recession of the early 1990s and with recovery output and employment grew more rapidly than elsewhere in the United Kingdom. I believe that this growth will be maintained.

    Well over half the companies here expect to expand in 1994. You are having increasing, in some cases dramatic, success in attracting inward investment. Last year was one of the best your industrial development has ever had, and over the past 6 years United States companies alone have invested nearly 600 million pounds here, promoting nearly 5,000 jobs. And they come here, not out of charity, not out of goodwill, they come here because Northern Ireland is a good place in which to do business, they come here to share in success and we must continue to encourage this. You have world reaching companies, both large and small: Shorts, now privatised; highly successful medium sized companies like Desmonds, Powerscreen and Moy Park. Your economic well being of course is vital, it is important in its own right, but it is I believe doubly important because of its impact on political development.

    In the past as you look down the long years of Irish history, hardship and economic injustice have played into the hands of extremists, the greater the prosperity of Northern Ireland, the better the prospects for peace. And that peace of course would bring still greater prosperity, it would bring a surge in business activity, in investment and in tourism, it would help us to relegate the bad times to the history books where I truly believe they now belong.

    So let me turn for a few moments to political change and to the Joint Declaration. I find it extraordinary that some people are prepared to claim that we are indifferent to Northern Ireland and that we are prepared to abandon our interest in Northern Ireland. Nothing could be further from the truth. We have said that the British government has: “no selfish strategic or economic interest in Northern Ireland.” That phrase ought not to be perverted by anyone. As I am sure you will appreciate, the critical word there is “selfish”.

    If the people of Northern Ireland were themselves democratically of their own free will to choose a different future for themselves in a united Ireland we would not stand in their way. We would not insist that for some strategic or economic reason Northern Ireland must remain in the United Kingdom. But the converse equally applies. For so long as the greater number of the people of Northern Ireland wish to be part of the United Kingdom the British government will uphold and support their right to be so. And that is of course precisely what we are doing and in saying that I do not just refer to the level of the government’s economic support.

    For me violence in the counties of Northern Ireland is as intolerable as similar violence would be in any of the British counties. I believe that an exceptional effort needs to be made to end terrorism and move towards peace in Northern Ireland. There can be no time limit to that effort, it must go on for how ever long it may take.

    We will spare no effort to oppose terrorism. The security forces have the resources, the leadership and the support that they need and they will continue to get it. They have also achieved a great many successes. We have worked steadily and effectively to improve cooperation with the Republic of Ireland on cross-border security. Security cooperation has never been closer or better or more effective than it is today although both governments are determined to make it yet more effective and the passage, for example, of the Irish Extradition Bill will be another significant step.

    But it is not just enough to oppose the men of violence at either extreme. We must do more than that, we must demonstrate clearly and unequivocally that terrorism has no future, we must minimise support for it both here and in other countries, we must build and maintain a popular and confident consensus for peace, we must show those who might be tempted to sympathise that there is no valid cause and no conceivable excuse for violence, we must show that political objectives can be pursued by peaceful and political means on the basis of consent. And above all, for all the people of Northern Ireland, we must show there is a just and a democratic path which enjoys the overwhelming support of the people of Northern Ireland.

    Mr Chairman, that was my aim in negotiating the Joint Declaration, it is a broad approach to Northern Ireland’s future which has received unprecedented backing, it has shown that the British and the Irish governments, leaders on both sides of the community and very large numbers of the people of Northern Ireland, and of the island as a whole, can subscribe to a single balanced set of principles.

    Perhaps inevitably the Joint Declaration has been misunderstood or in some cases misrepresented by one group or another. Supporters of each tradition would have liked it tilted a little more in their direction and that perhaps in its own may be a back-handed testimony to the balance we have struck in that document. But it does not say what the solution must be and it does not rule out any outcome in advance. What it does say is that the future of Northern Ireland is to be determined by agreement and by consent.

    Some have raised the fear that it creates new institutions. Mr Chairman, it does not. Some have said that it embodies the principle of joint authority, it does not. Some have said that it gives the veto on change, emphatically it does not. I have even been told that it undermines the consent principle and the constitutional guarantee, the truth is precisely the opposite, it reinforces the consent principle and the constitutional guarantee and it spells them out and it endorses them in the name of both governments. At one extreme it has been claimed that the Joint Declaration surrenders to IRA terrorism and would allow Sinn Fein to enter the political process without renouncing violence. It does no such thing. The British and the Irish governments have been categoric in saying that there must be a permanent end to violence before those who have supported it can begin to enter the political process.

    And of course at the opposite extreme is the complaint that the joint declaration does not contain enough for nationalists, but that is not a view upheld by democratic nationalists or by the Irish government or by the people of Ireland as a whole. Over 80 percent of the people of Ireland say they support the joint declaration and they want the IRA to end violence now and for good.

    The IRA have given no coherent response, they have continued their violence, they have boasted of their attacks and they have tried to confuse by talking simultaneously of a possible ceasefire. If the IRA think that either tactic will change the situation they are sadly mistaken. Temporary ceasefires are of course welcome for the peace of mind that they bring for a period but unless they become permanent and unless they become irrevocable they will not end the conflict. Sinn Fein cannot enter the political process until it has renounced violence for good and demonstrated that that is its policy. Sooner or later the Provisionals must come to appreciate that violence drives them up a blind alley. The only road that will take them forward is the road to democratic politics. The Joint Declaration stands and it shows exactly where the British and the Irish governments stand.

    It is not a moveable peg and it will not be amended and it will not be renegotiated, and it is against this background that we have pressed ahead with the three stranded talks process. I know that progress in that arena has at times seemed frustratingly slow, it has to be, it surely must have done to you as well. But I think that perhaps is inevitable in a process designed to embrace two governments and the political parties across the spectrum. But by building patiently we have built well, we have now established large areas of potential agreement, we have a solid basis for future progress and we wish to use the three stranded talks to establish a more accountable form of government within Northern Ireland and a more productive relationship between the north and the south as well as between the British and the Irish governments.

    Mr Chairman, Ladies and Gentlemen. If I may quote Burke:

    “You can never plan the future by the past”. I look at Ireland not as an Irishman but as someone who looks on this island and these counties with some affection. For too long Ireland has been a prisoner of its past, too many coffins pay grizzly tribute to what that past has been. One cannot begin to understand Ireland without understanding its history. History, tradition, culture, are vital parts of all our lives but perhaps nowhere in the world are they more important than in the island of Ireland.

    Here in Northern Ireland things are changing, the economy has changed, it is open to the world as it has never been before, it is bringing in investment, it is sending out goods and services, it has brought very welcome change to your communities. And one need look, for example, no further than the remarkable improvement in Londonderry over the past decade or the new vigour in the industries and in Belfast. We can see that. Is it not surely time to look ahead politically as well as economically, to harness that deep desire that exists on both sides of the community for a more peaceful and a more prosperous life, to break away from a past of rigid confrontation and from the violence that has so savagely scarred the last quarter of a century.

    Mr Chairman, nothing that has happened in the past three months has undermined my belief that the overwhelming majority of the people of Northern Ireland wish to live in peace. We should not let temporary set-backs discourage us or deflect us. This is not just a task for the politicians, it is a task for everyone who has the best interests of Northern Ireland at heart. The leaders of this generation, be they churchmen, politicians, community workers, opinion formers, businessmen, the leaders must help build a better life for the next generation. No-one here in this room and no sensible person in Northern Ireland would wish to see the next generation inflicted with the scars and the sadnesses of the last 25 years. The groundwork to make sure that that has not happened has been laid, it is there, it must be cherished and it must be built upon. We must maintain our resolve to carry the process through until we reach a lasting political settlement and the wider prosperity that surely will follow.

    If I have an ambition for you and for me I would like people to look back at these early years in the 1990s, perhaps to look back from some years ahead, and say that at that time at the beginning of the 1990s the people of Ireland so demonstrated their concern for peace, so demonstrated their determination that the next generation would not suffer the privations that they have suffered, that they formed that massive constituency for peace that isolated and defeated those who would seek political ends through the gun and through the bullet. That is the opportunity that lies there for us now.

    I would say to the people of Northern Ireland, don’t ever expect it will happen overnight but it will happen and with your will and your determination you can play the central part in making it happen and I hope and believe in this generation that that is what we can achieve.

  • Mr Major’s Commons Statement on Qualified Majority Voting – 29 March 1994

    Below is the text of Mr Major’s Commons statement on Qualified Majority Voting, made on 29th March 1994.

    PRIME MINISTER:

    The Prime Minister (Mr. John Major): With permission, Madam Speaker, I shall make a statement on proposals to adjust qualified majority voting in the context of the European Union’s enlargement negotiations.

    In the negotiations, the Government had two principal objectives. First, we wished to see the negotiations succeed, provided the terms were acceptable. We have been strong and consistent supporters of enlargement. We look forward to welcoming Austria, Finland, Norway and Sweden at the beginning of 1995, provided their peoples and parliaments so decide in the referendums that lie ahead.

    On enlargement, it is necessary to amend article 148 of the treaty. Without a change, the blocking minority would automatically rise to 37 votes. Our second objective was to safeguard the rights of minorities in the period between enlargement and the 1996 intergovernmental conference, and to seek a fundamental review of qualified majority voting at that conference.

    We believed that there should not be an unqualified, mathematical extension of the blocking minority to 27. We were concerned that successive, unqualified extensions had weakened the democratic legitimacy of the Community. A large part of our concern stemmed from the handling by the European Commission of social measures. Article 118A of the treaty, which provides for health and safety at work, had been used as a vehicle for the adoption by qualified majority voting of measures affecting social affairs and employment. In addition, a proposal had recently been made to count the employees of multinational companies in the United Kingdom towards the threshold of the works council directive–although this measure had been brought forward under the social chapter, to which the United Kingdom is not a party. My right hon. Friend said yesterday that we were pursuing our concerns about the social affairs measures.

    I can now tell the House that we have received assurances from the Commission that it will not bring forward any further proposals under the health and safety articles under its term of office except for measures directly and demonstrably relevant to health and safety at work. This means that we shall not face a repetition from this Commission of our experience over the working time directive, which we are challenging in the European Court of Justice; or over the young persons directive, which is in dispute between the Council and the European Parliament. The Commission has also agreed now that proposals under the social chapter will not embrace in any way people or organisations in the United Kingdom. For the purposes of the social chapter, the United Kingdom will be entirely excluded from legislation. This meets a particular concern that we had with the works council proposal, which the other 11 member states are pursuing.

    The proposal on qualified majority voting negotiated by my right hon. Friend at the weekend meets many–although not all–of the Government’s concerns. We have secured agreement that the review of qualified majority voting at the next intergovernmental conference will now include the question of thresholds. These will be reopened and re-examined, as will the number of votes attributed to each member state in the Community. [An hon. Member :– “That was available before.”] This means, as my right hon. Friend said yesterday, that there will be a root and branch review of the system. This will have to take a fundamental look at the democratic legitimacy of decision-making.

    At the request of the United Kingdom and Spain, the transitional arrangements from accession until 1996 will no longer provide for unqualified extension of the blocking minority to 27. The Council is under a legal and binding obligation to seek agreement on the basis of a minority of at least 23 votes. My right hon. Friend ensured that there would be no time limit for the fulfilment of this obligation. The Commission and the presidency are required to take “any initiative necessary” to reach a solution adopted by at least 68 votes–that is to say, with no more than 22 votes against. This obligation is justiciable in the European Court of Justice. We expect it to be upheld scrupulously. Should there be any question of a breach of the obligation, we would reserve the right to take whatever action was necessary, and a number of avenues would be open to us. The first would be a legal challenge and the second would be use of the Luxembourg compromise.

    The binding nature of the obligation is clearly understood by our partners, and stems from the form of the Council’s decision. For example, Germany has said today that it regards the obligation as binding on the Council, and Germany has no doubt, it says, that all other member states of the Union will also fully respect these procedures.

    On this basis, the Cabinet has concluded that, since we wish to see enlargement proceed, progress on qualified majority voting was sufficient to be acceptable until 1996. We are informing the presidency that, provided the concessions made to the United Kingdom and Spain are accepted without qualification by the other member states, the United Kingdom can accept this interim proposal. Enlargement will bring into the Union countries which share Britain’s open trading instincts, and which will be net contributors to the budget. It will be another step towards the wider, less centralised, open trading Europe for which we have been working.

    Mr. John Smith (Monklands, East): However the Prime Minister seeks to camouflage his retreat from his vainglorious assertions of “no surrender” last week, is not the plain fact that the Government have accepted a blocking minority of 27, as the Foreign Secretary was forced to admit in the House yesterday?

    On the detail of the Foreign Ministers’ declaration, is not his supposed triumph of obtaining a minor period of delay hopelessly undermined by the text of the declaration, which says in paragraph (c) that it is all

    “without prejudice to the obligatory time limit laid down by the Treaties and by secondary Law”?

    Is it the case that if, at the end of the day, agreement has not been reached, the period of delay can be terminated by a simple majority, and then a blocking minority of 27 is required? On the so-called assurances from the Commission, is there a written agreement which can be made available to the House? Can any assurances, whatever they may be, extend beyond the end of this year when the Commission’s term of office expires?

    Now that the Prime Minister has had to make a humiliating climbdown, will he explain to the House why the question of qualified majority voting was not raised earlier in the enlargement discussions–for example, at the Lisbon summit or at the most recent Brussels summit, where all the key decisions on enlargement were taken?

    Is not the explanation for the timing and for this whole sorry fiasco that a Prime Minister, fearful of the warring factions in his own party, propelled himself into an unwise conflict, which he could not and did not win, but which has resulted in unnecessary and severe damage to friendly countries and no advantage to Britain?

    The Prime Minister: A number of points which were raised by the right hon. and learned Gentleman are factually inaccurate. On the question why qualified majority voting was not raised earlier, the fact is that it was raised earlier. It has been discussed during the past year and for many months between Ministers and officials, and it has not previously been agreed. But it has been discussed for a great deal of time at both official and Government level. Unfortunately, it was not possible to attain an earlier agreement.

    In what he has just said, the right hon. and learned Gentleman appears to have overlooked the fact that we have achieved a series of concessions that would not have been available if we had adopted his position of accepting, without let or hindrance, 27 for all areas immediately, which is what was sought by other people. We have not achieved the maintenance of the blocking majority of 23–I would ideally have preferred that–but neither have the other member states achieved what they would have wished, because we have obtained concessions, particularly concessions that protect our most vulnerable flank on social affairs.

    As for the obligatory time limit, I know that it is complex, but the right hon. and learned Gentleman has misunderstood it. That time limit relates to the European Parliament after a common position has been reached, and not during discussion among member states for reaching a common position ; the right hon. and learned Gentleman has misunderstood the point.

    On the right hon. and learned Gentleman’s simple majority point, if there were any attempt to use a simple majority to move forward to a qualified majority vote, under this agreement we would certainly be able to go to the European Court of Justice, and we would most certainly do so. I think that it is clear from what is being said by other member states that they would not be likely to go down that route. Certainly on previous occasions, they have not and they know what the impact would most certainly be.

    The agreement with the Commission lasts until the end of this year, because this Commission ends at the end of this year. But I can tell the right hon. and learned Gentleman that we will certainly seek an extension under the new Commission next year, and I see no reason to suppose that we will not achieve it.

    Dame Jill Knight (Birmingham, Edgbaston): Will my right hon. Friend get rid of some puzzlement outside this House? In the regulations, is there some mysterious rule that says that Britain may not make her case for a particular course of action, or that, for some reason or another, it will be impossible for Britain to get enough votes on her side for a reasonable case to enable it to be adopted?

    The Prime Minister: No, my hon. Friend is right that it is open to this country, as to any other country, to argue its case on areas of particular concern. We have said consistently throughout that it is necessary to safeguard certain areas of particular interest to the United Kingdom. Although, as I conceded to the House a moment ago, I would have preferred to retain 23 as a complete blocking minority until 1996, it is equally the case that there are areas of Community policy where a blocking minority of 27 suits this Government’s policies more than 23. The CAP, as the right hon. and learned Gentleman the Leader of the Opposition says, is a case in point. Fundamentally, we are seeking a root and branch reform of both the weighting of votes and the threshold of votes and that is what we have obtained in 1996. The hon. Gentleman opposite, who during the statement was shouting that that was available before, is wrong. The agreement on thresholds was available before, but not the agreement on thresholds and weighting.

    Mr. Paddy Ashdown (Yeovil): The Prime Minister must explain to his party why he asks them to celebrate today what last week he told them was unacceptable. For my part, I welcome the fact that he has arrived at a solution–even if it is by accident–that now allows us to reform the CAP in the interests of the British taxpayer, and to admit more quickly the four new members, who will make a net contribution to the budget, and who are likely to be Britain’s friends, provided we do not go on behaving as we have in the past two weeks.

    No amount of clever words or verbal gymnastics can hide the fact that the Government have made a fool of Britain in Europe; that the Cabinet has made a fool of the Foreign Secretary; and that the Prime Minister has frankly made rather a fool of himself.

    The Prime Minister: The right hon. Gentleman has clearly not understood the nature of the agreement that has been reached. If he had, he would have acknowledged the fact that the Council is under a binding agreement to aim for a basis of at least 23 rather than 27 votes when any blocking minority exceeds 22 but falls short of 27. That is likely to safeguard a number of our interests.

    The right hon. Gentleman made no mention of the fact that he would have surrendered the unanimity rule. He is not prepared to fight in Europe for matters that may be of direct concern to this country–we are, as is every other Government in the Community. It is interesting that the right hon. Gentleman would not support the Government in fighting for things that are plainly in the interests of the people of this country.

    Mr. Ian Taylor (Esher): Does my right hon. Friend recognise that this is an honourable solution to a difficult problem, which hopefully will allow the four applicant countries to join as soon as possible? Is he aware that it is important for those new countries to join before 1996, when negotiations begin at the intergovernmental conference? Is it not further important, if we are to achieve a thorough discussion of qualified majority voting, for those countries to realise what it is in this country’s interests to do–that is, to make the whole of the working of the Community an important vehicle for the future? There are both the intergovernmental and the qualified majority voting sides–the totality is important for this country’s interests.

    The Prime Minister: We shall now have a thorough examination of both thresholds and weighting. Of course, that will also now include any of the applicant members that join the Community on 1 January next year. As my hon. Friend said, we were foremost in arguing for enlargement. I believe that that is very much in the interests not only of this country, but of the Community as well. In due course, we look forward not only to the entry of the European Free Trade Association states, but–perhaps around the turn of the century–to that of some, or all, of the Visigrad states.

    Mr. Peter Mandelson (Hartlepool): If the figure of 27 was unacceptable to the Prime Minister in any form last Tuesday, why is it acceptable a week later?

    The Prime Minister: The hon. Gentleman heard me say a moment ago that, although I would have preferred 23, 27 has always been acceptable for some aspects–reform of the common agricultural policy being a case in point. What I said last week was that we insisted on safeguarding the rights of substantial minorities, and that is what we have achieved.

    Sir Teddy Taylor (Southend, East): As the tapes have reported what are referred to as “fierce denials” by the Commission a few minutes ago about the guarantees on social policy, can the Prime Minister explain who is going to decide whether a directive is relevant to health or safety? Will it be decided by the Commission or the Council, and will it be done by a majority vote?

    The Prime Minister: We know what the proposed directives are, unless fresh directives that are as yet wholly unconsidered are suddenly proposed, which is not likely. We know that only two directives are coming forward that will come under health and safety legislation, and those are two that we asked for.

    Mr. Andrew Faulds (Warley, East): Does the Prime Minister really not realise that leadership, in the context of his enfeebled Government, requires that he be brutal with the eccentric excrescences to his right?

    The Prime Minister: I am always open to receive advice but, if the hon. Gentleman will forgive me, I shall not always take it.

    Mr. Hugh Dykes (Harrow, East): Can I offer my warm congratulations to my right hon. Friend and the Government on achieving a most important modernisation of the Luxembourg compromise arrangements? Will he confirm that it is the determined intention of the Government to go ahead with the other member states and to develop the European Union in accordance with the Maastricht treaty?

    The Prime Minister: Well, there is one serious qualification to an acknowledgment of that point–the fact that, whereas the rest of the European Union countries will proceed with the Maastricht treaty including the social protocol, we shall not. However, with that exception, we shall certainly proceed with developing the European Union, as set out in the treaty that this House passed.

    Mr. Peter Shore (Bethnal Green and Stepney): The Prime Minister is investing a lot of trust in the European Commission as far as assurances go. Does he recall that the Commission is the most arch-federalist of all the institutions in the Community and that its President is a certain Mr. Jacques Delors–a notorious socialist, who wants to do precisely those things that the Prime Minister does not want him to do? If those assurances are as strong as the Prime Minister claimed, why do we also need a legally binding and enforceable agreement that the Community will not resort to qualified majority voting? If that qualified majority voting is challenged, surely the other European federalist body, the European Court of Justice, will decide who is right and who is wrong?

    The Prime Minister: The right hon. Gentleman has set out very clearly precisely why we were unwilling to sign up to the proposals in front of us without the changes that we have now secured on social matters. It is precisely for the reasons that he has set out that we felt that we needed those commitments–and we have achieved them.

    Mr. Tony Marlow (Northampton, North): As no objective observer believes that this so-called compromise has achieved anything of real value for the United Kingdom, and as, as of now, my right hon. Friend has no authority, credibility or identifiable policy in this vital area of policy, why does he not stand aside and make way for somebody else who can provide the party and the country with direction and leadership? [Interruption.]

    Hon. Members: Resign!

    The Prime Minister: Anybody listening to what my hon. Friend has had to say, not just today but at any time in the past two and a half years, would in no sense suggest that my hon. Friend was an objective observer of any related matters. I remind my hon. Friend that it might be a useful novelty if, from time to time, he was prepared to support the Government whom he was elected to support.

    Hon. Members: More!

    Madam Speaker: Order.

    Mr. Dennis Skinner (Bolsover): Who is going to clean up the blood?

    Mr. John Hume (Foyle): When all the waffle on this subject has died down, would the Prime Minister please tell me what has changed? Would he agree that, under 12 member states, 23 was 30 per cent. of the total vote, and would he agree that, under 16 member states, 27 is now 30 per cent. of the total vote? What has changed?

    The Prime Minister: I think that the hon. Gentleman is incorrect. Twenty-seven is just over 40 per cent. of the votes– [Interruption.] –of population. When we joined the Community, the blocking minority was 30 per cent. of population; 27 is now over 40 per cent., and it is on that point that we think that in 1996 we need to change the system so that there is more democratic legitimacy for the way in which the Community reaches its decisions.

    Sir Cranley Onslow (Woking): Is my right hon. Friend aware that the really good news this afternoon is that the way is now clear to go ahead with the enlargement of the Community, which must be in this country’s best interests in the long term? The assurances from the Commission on the health and safety articles are important. We should not have had to fight for them, because they should not have been introduced by mismanagement and device by the Commission. My right hon. Friend will have the full support of the House in fighting against any repetition of the Commission’s abuse in that way–support which he could not expect from the Opposition.

    The Prime Minister: My right hon. Friend is entirely right about our commitment to enlargement and the importance of enlargement to the European Union, both in the short and the long term. He is equally right to say that we should not have had to fight for those concessions. It is our belief that the Commission misused the treaty-based article 118A, but the fact is that we did have to fight for them, we have fought for them, and we have achieved them.

    Mr. Tony Benn (Chesterfield): Is the Prime Minister not aware that the agreement that the Commission wanted, the Foreign Secretary supported, the Cabinet has accepted and the Prime Minister has announced makes it more and more likely that laws will be imposed on this country in Brussels, which will supersede British laws and will deny the British electors the right to determine the laws under which they are governed? Is the betrayal of this principle towards a federal Europe not a denial of the principle that no Parliament can commit its successor, and that the British people must have the right to vote for those who pass the laws under which they are governed?

    The Prime Minister: I am not entirely sure that the right hon. Gentleman would not have been better employed directing that question at those on his own Front Bench, who would have, first, unquestionably accepted 27 and, secondly, abolished unanimity.

    Sir Michael Marshall (Arundel): Will my right hon. Friend pause to reflect for a moment on the price of failure to agree? Would not a failure to enlarge or to protect minorities be disastrous? Away from the hothouse of this place, will it not be clear to everyone that this is the best agreement on offer?

    The Prime Minister: My hon. Friend is right. It was necessary to get enlargement and the extra protections to help minorities. By 1996, it will be apparent that a number of states will express concern at the present system and how qualified majority voting works. There is no proper equity between, for example, the populations of many of the countries and the votes that they can exercise in the Council of Ministers. That applies to the United Kingdom and other countries as well. But if the actions of the European Union as a whole are to retain the support of the peoples of Europe, we shall have to look carefully at how we reach our decisions. That is what we have now agreed will happen, with a root and branch reform in 1996.

    Mr. Geoffrey Hoon (Ashfield): The Prime Minister has conspicuously failed to convince 11 countries of the merits of his argument for 23 votes. Is he seriously suggesting that, during the next intergovernmental conference, he will be able to persuade 15 countries to turn back the clock and return to 23 votes?

    The Prime Minister: The hon. Gentleman misunderstands the nature of the discussions. A number of the countries were prepared to continue on the present basis because they were aware that there was to be a significant examination of this matter in 1996. They will welcome the fact that it will now be more significant than they had previously imagined.

    Sir Peter Hordern (Horsham): In view of the increasing competition from Japan, the far east and the United States to every business throughout the European Union due to the success of the GATT round, is it not essential that, in the intergovernmental conference in 1996, agreement is reached so that votes more nearly accord with populations, and businesses throughout the community are not burdened with extra costs?

    The Prime Minister: I entirely agree with my right hon. Friend. There is no doubt that the excessive social burdens laid on many companies throughout the European Union are making their exports less competitive than they otherwise would be, and no longer competitive with similar companies in Japan, the United States and many countries in the Pacific basin. That is one of the reasons why we were not prepared to accept the social chapter. It is also why we believe that we must look at the changes in the voting system that I have outlined to the House today.

    Mrs. Margaret Ewing (Moray): In the context of the transitional arrangements, will the Prime Minister explain how the Government will decide to use their votes at Council meetings in that interim period? For example, at the Fisheries Council to be held on 11 and 12 April, will there be qualified majority voting or the issue of unanimity, which is my understanding of the original treaty? Does he understand the concern within the fishing industry in Scotland that his only allies during these negotiations were the Spaniards, who want access to the North sea, and that that has been accelerated?

    The Prime Minister: There is no change in the items dealt with either by unanimity or qualified majority voting under what has been agreed. The method of deciding–whether qualified majority vote or unanimity–is laid down in earlier treaties, such as the Single European Act and the Maastricht treaty. That is not changed by anything decided in the past couple of days.

    Mr. Edward Leigh (Gainsborough and Horncastle): May I congratulate my right hon. Friend on his robust stance in defence of minorities in Europe? However, given the statements that have emanated from Europe this morning that a reasonable delay would entail only a few months, that any concessions would apply only to the present Commission, and that we could not claw back in 1996 what we lose now, does my right hon. Friend accept that there is a well-founded concern that we have conceded the figure of 27? Will he therefore give an absolute assurance to the House that, if we do obtain 23 votes, we can delay indefinitely directives with which we disagree?

    The Prime Minister: I think the remarks to which my hon. Friend refers may have come from one Foreign Minister. They do not reflect the view of the Heads of Government to whom I have spoken in recent days.

    I have no doubt that we will be able to delay under 23–quite how long will depend on the nature of the discussion. What is clear is that the time limit set out by that Foreign Minister is ludicrously wrong. If we feel that a matter has not been properly developed, we can, first, take it to the European Court of Justice, which may well take more than several years to determine it. Secondly, we can use the Luxembourg compromise. I give my hon. Friend the assurance that, if we feel it necessary, we shall take one or both of those actions, and we have made that clear to our partners.

    Mr. Derek Enright (Hemsworth): When I asked the hon. Member for Stafford (Mr. Cash) how on earth the Government got themselves on this hook, he replied, “I am a very good angler indeed.” Is not that at the heart of the matter? Is it not about time the Government started acting positively in Europe, with Europe, for Europe; is it not time they discussed, in full public court, the question of monetary union–instead of holding their discussions behind closed curtains, as they are now?

    The Prime Minister: I am not sure that the hon. Gentleman would make common cause with my hon. Friend the Member for Stafford on his last point.

    Dame Elaine Kellett-Bowman (Lancaster): Nobody else does.

    The Prime Minister: I do not think that I can better what my hon. Friend has said.

    Sir Archibald Hamilton (Epsom and Ewell): The principal objective of the Government’s negotiations was the enlargement of the Community. If we had refused to reach any agreement, that enlargement would probably have unravelled, much to the satisfaction of a number of countries in the EC. I therefore congratulate my right hon. Friend on the compromise reached–in particular, on the agreement that the voting structure should be looked at in 1996. If we continue to expand the Community to take in the Visigrad countries, we could reach the point where the main contributors–Britain, France and Germany–were outvoted by the rest of the Community.

    The Prime Minister: My right hon. Friend is entirely right. Unless there is reform, and if the mathematical formula followed through on this occasion were again followed on the next enlargement, France, Germany and the United Kingdom–three significant contributors to the Community–could be outvoted by qualified majority voting procedures. Clearly that would be absurd; it is one reason why I am confident that we will have a root and branch reform in 1996.

    My right hon. Friend is equally right about the importance of enlargement to us and the Community. I think that it will increasingly change the nature of the Community for the better.

    Mr. David Winnick (Walsall, North): Given the contrast between the angry defiance of the Prime Minister last week and the surrender today, is it not understandable that virtually every Tory newspaper has been highly dismissive of the Prime Minister’s conduct over this issue? The hon. Member for Northampton, North (Mr. Marlow) has had the courage to say what many other Tory Members would undoubtedly say if they had his courage : it is time for the Prime Minister to go.

    The Prime Minister: My hon. Friend the Member for Northampton, North is always ready with a quote, but I am not likely to be over- concerned about that. As for the earlier, more substantive, concern expressed by the hon. Gentleman, we set out last week the fact that we needed some changes to protect minorities–changes to protect the position being abused under article 118A. We have obtained what we sought in that regard. We have also required and obtained a much wider root and branch reform of voting procedures in 1996. That is not surrender; it is obtaining what we set out to obtain in the negotiations some time ago.

    Mr. Andrew Rowe (Mid-Kent): Is it not extraordinary cheek on the part of the leader of the Labour party to pour contempt on an honourable settlement, carefully negotiated? He would not even have tried to achieve such a negotiated outcome. Is not his cheek probably born of the fact that he has never been in a position to negotiate anything since the Labour party accepted our membership of the European Union?

    The Prime Minister: I am not entirely sure that my hon. Friend is totally accurate about the right hon. and learned Gentleman’s past. He may have had some part in seeking to negotiate devolution at some stage in the 1970s. If I recall correctly–and if not, of course I shall withdraw–he had a large responsibility in that, and it was not a notable success.

    Mr. Nigel Spearing (Newham, South): Does not the whole affair reflect the fragility of the claimed protection of unanimity? Have not the arguments now descended from negotiation into the throwing around of mutual ultimatums, showing that the Community, far from being an organisation of co-operation, as time passes becomes one of coercion?

    The Prime Minister: No, the hon. Gentleman is wrong about that. Nothing here affects unanimity or the national veto. We are still determined that that shall be retained, as are other countries. The only threat to unanimity comes from the fact that the Labour party is seeking qualified majority voting as the norm–which means, if it means anything, that a Labour Government, were there to be such a beast, would scrap unanimity and the national protection which that offers us.

    Mr. Nicholas Budgen (Wolverhampton, South-West): Is it not always in Europe jam tomorrow? We were told at the end of the Maastricht proceedings that there would be no further move towards federalism. We have suffered this defeat; we have seen our opt-out of the social chapter eroded; and we are now told that all will come right in 1996. Will not the British people at some stage say to their Government, “You must say no, and mean it”?

    The Prime Minister: The enlargement is something of which my hon. Friend would approve. It is of significant interest and, in the terminology of my hon. Friend, jam today. The enlargement will be of significant importance to the future working of the Community, as will subsequent enlargements from the Visigrad countries and perhaps in due course from others.

    Mr. Dennis Canavan (Falkirk, West): Does the Prime Minister recall that his predecessor was so adept at undermining the European efforts of her Foreign Secretary that eventually Geoffrey Howe was forced to exclaim during his resignation speech that it was like going onto the cricket pitch to find that his bat had been broken by the team captain. On this occasion, would it not be more appropriate for the bat to be broken over the team captain’s head?

    The Prime Minister: As my right hon. Friend and I both propose to use the bat in Britain’s interest, we shall have better use for it.

    Sir Peter Emery (Honiton): Will my right hon. Friend make it absolutely clear, particularly to those outside the House, that this decision makes no alteration to our absolute veto on the most important issues, and that that will not be open for renegotiation in 1996? Does he also accept that, despite what many other people may say, he has the vast support of the majority of right hon. and hon. Members sitting behind him?

    The Prime Minister: My right hon. Friend is entirely right to say that it makes no change whatever to the unanimity rule. As that is not understood by many people, and certainly not by many commentators who appear to have written about the matter recently, it is important that that message should be clearly understood in the House and beyond it.

    Mr. Mike Gapes (Ilford, South): Does the Prime Minister agree that talk of a veto is nonsense, and that his predecessor sold the pass on the British veto in 1985 with the Single European Act? Does he accept that it is all a big charade, and, because of internal divisions, he has turned Britain into a laughing stock throughout Europe?

    The Prime Minister: The hon. Gentleman understands less than most of his hon. Friends. The veto still exists. Indeed, it was largely because it did exist that I was able to say no–as my hon. Friend the Member for Wolverhampton, South-West (Mr. Budgen) said a moment ago–to the social chapter during the Maastricht negotiations. I was able to say no. The national veto stood behind me; had I not got that concession from our partners, I could have ceased to agree to the entire Maastricht treaty. The veto does exist; it is potent, it can be used, and I have used it.

    Mr. Anthony Coombs (Wyre Forest): I cautiously recognise the Commission’s position on the remit of health and safety legislation and the social chapter, and welcome the fact that the thresholds can be renegotiated in 1996. Does my right hon. Friend agree, however, that it is now more important than ever for a review of the scope of European legislation–and the amount of legislation that is dealt with through qualified majority voting–to be carried out between now and 1996, in line with the doctrine of subsidiarity that the Labour party so hypocritically opposed during the Maastricht treaty negotiations?

    The Prime Minister: My hon. Friend is entirely right in those ambitious thoughts. Indeed, that is beginning to happen. The amount of legislation from Europe has been halved over the past year to 18 months, and I thoroughly welcome that : such a reduction is long overdue, and it has now been obtained. As my hon. Friend will also know, under the subsidiarity provisions of the Maastricht treaty, the equivalent of 25 per cent. of Community legislation either has been repealed or is being revised.

    Mr. John Hutton (Barrow and Furness): How does today’s obvious climbdown–coupled with the miserable failure of Britain’s negotiating position over the reform of qualified majority voting–serve to advance the Prime Minister’s oft-stated policy of putting Britain at the heart of Europe?

    The Prime Minister: We seek, in this and in other matters, to influence what happens in the European Community in the direction that we think is right. We have done that very successfully with the enlargement procedure; we have done it very successfully with the reduction of legislation; we have done it very successfully with the subsidiarity provisions; and we have done it very successfully in other areas as well. As a number of my hon. Friends have said, that requires us from time to time to dissent from what happens to be the prevailing majority view in the European Union.

    There is nothing anti-European about doing that. It is also the case that other nations–the French, the Germans, the Spanish, whoever it may be– dissent from time to time from aspects of European Union legislation. It is right that they should do so, because only through arguments and discussions of that sort can a proper consensus be reached.

    Mr. John Wilkinson (Ruislip-Northwood): Just to dispel any residual doubts, will my right hon. Friend spell out unequivocally those points of principle on which, in the national interest, Her Majesty’s Government are prepared to stand, courageously and consistently, in our relations with the European Community?

    The Prime Minister: We have made perfectly clear, over a long period, the areas that are of particular principle to us. The fact that we were not prepared to accept the social charter, for no other reason than that it would make it more difficult for companies in this country to sell their goods and maintain jobs, is a matter of principle for us; similarly, the maintenance of the national veto is a matter of principle for us. We also seek to make changes to the system of qualified majority voting. Some we have obtained on this occasion; for others we have laid down a marker in 1996. Those and other areas are matters of great importance to us.

    Dr. Tony Wright (Cannock and Burntwood): Does the Prime Minister believe that we have more friends and allies in Europe as a result of this diplomatic disaster? Does he think that we shall have more friends and allies in 1996 as a result of what has happened? Has the Prime Minister learnt at least one thing from this debacle–that any attempt to found British European policy on the internal interests of the Conservative party will end badly, and will deserve to?

    The Prime Minister: I will tell the hon. Gentleman one thing that we have certainly learnt. We have learnt that we have obtained concessions in this negotiation that we would not have obtained if we had followed the Labour party’s advice and just lamely said yes to 27.

    Mr. Patrick Nicholls (Teignbridge): Will my right hon. Friend take this opportunity to remind the country that the fight that he has put up for its interests is in complete contrast to that of the Opposition party? That party would have not only watered down the whole concept of QMV, but abandoned our national veto. Is that not the dividing line between the parties on Europe, and will it not be the issue that the country will need to see as part of the European elections?

    The Prime Minister: My hon. Friend is entirely right about that–except that, with his characteristic generosity, he neglected to mention that the Liberal party has precisely the same policies as the Labour party.

    Several hon. Members rose

    Madam Speaker: Order. We shall now move to the next business.