Tapadh leibh—thank you, Mr Williams. I apologise for not being able to say that in Welsh despite your attempts at tuition last night. I will keep practising.
It struck me after hearing the first two speakers in the debate that we had spent an hour and 45 minutes discussing the Bill and the only point of contention appeared to be whether the Government should write letters, and, if so, how many. If we are serious about sorting out great European institutions that are inefficient and have a lot of waste, I suspect that many of the audience of millions watching live on television will ask us to hold a mirror up to our own face. A debate such as this surely cannot be what this place was designed for.
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I have found it quite interesting that, although in theory the Bill is about agreeing how the European Union brings in its money, a lot of today’s discussion has been about what happens to the money afterwards. One big problem with the way the European Union manages—or does not manage—its finances is there is still a complete divorce between decisions on how much money it needs and who pays it, and on how much
money is going to be spent and how. Until the European Union brings those two big decisions closer together, we are always likely to have anomalies.
We talk all the time about what the EU costs, but at some point in the future perhaps we will talk about the benefits we get—or could hope to get—from it. I am an accountant by profession, and, if it is true that an accountant is someone who knows the cost of everything and the value of nothing, the Government Benches are today full of accountants. We have had a lot of questions about whose fault is it that costs have gone up, and who gets the credit for costs coming down. We have not heard an awful lot about the benefits, and that is worrying when we are approaching a referendum that could see us torn out of the European Union—even if we vote to stay in. Talking about the benefits should mean talking about not just getting more money out than we put in, however, because it does not take a genius or even an accountant to work out that not everybody in the European Union can carry on taking out more than they put in.
As a trading island state, surely there is a benefit to the removal of trade barriers. I can remember the trade wars, as a wee boy, when the United Kingdom did something to upset the French, so the French discovered that British lamb was no longer fit for French consumers, and in retaliation, and completely by coincidence, the United Kingdom discovered that French apples did not quite come up to our standards—and so it went on. It was great for lawyers; it was probably quite good for the politicians; but it did not help the producers of those foodstuffs, because they spent longer arguing about who was allowed to buy and sell what, and less time producing and making their businesses more efficient.
We should never allow ourselves to forget that this year we mark 70 years since the United Kingdom was at war with Germany. I do not think that condition has existed at any time before 1945. I have been back through the books and cannot find a period of 75 years without a major war between the countries of western Europe. Surely that has to be celebrated, and it is no coincidence that it started with the establishment of the common market and with European nations looking for ways to settle their disputes without going to war. That has to be a massive benefit of continued co-operation among European nations.
My position, and that of the Scottish National party, is that we want to be citizens of the European Union in such a way that we can have a state of co-operation with our European neighbours without losing the sovereign rights of the people of Scotland. We want our co-operative relationship with our neighbours across the North Sea to be exactly the same as that with our neighbours across the Irish Sea and, indeed, across the River Tweed.
There has been a lot of talk about the common fisheries policy and common agricultural policy. It should hardly be a surprise that Scotland does not get a good deal out of the common agricultural policy, because the longest-serving, most respected Agriculture Minister in the whole of Europe, possibly in the whole world, is not allowed to take part in those discussions, as he is not a Minister of a member state. We are represented by somebody who has not even been elected—who has never faced the test of public accountability at the ballot box. We in Scotland have an Agriculture Minister who is quite possibly unique in the world, in that he
holds the full confidence of his Government and the absolute trust of farmers at the same time, but he is not let through the door to be part of those discussions.
It should not be any surprise that the common fisheries policy has never worked for Scotland, when Luxembourg gets a vote on it and we do not. Luxembourg’s population is the same size as Edinburgh’s. I do not consider myself to have a coastal constituency, but my constituency has a bigger coastline than Luxembourg—indeed, my constituency has a coastline. Is it any surprise that so many of the major pillars of EU policy do not work in the communities where they have an effect, when so many decisions are taken by people who represent nations that do not have a fishing industry, and where agriculture is peripheral to their economy, rather than central not only to their economic but social well being, as in nations such as Scotland and, indeed, Northern Ireland and Wales?
A Conservative Member asked about the SNP’s position on Europe. I would love to see what deal Scotland could get out of Europe if we had a voice in Europe. At the moment every representation that we make to Europe has to go through the Westminster filter, and I do not blame that filter for changing them to act in the interests of the majority of the citizens of the United Kingdom. We are outnumbered by 10, 11, or 12-1 in population terms, so the representations that the UK Government make to Europe will always be loaded towards what they see to be in the best interest of the major nation.