---

Future EU Finances and Own Resources

I know that my hon. Friend is speaking in the blunt Glasgow tones that he has always used, but we have stuffed nobody’s mouth with gold. The deal was the one that we entered into as the champions of enlargement. [Interruption.] I see that my right hon. Friend the Member for Rotherham (Mr. MacShane), another former Minister for Europe, has just entered the Chamber—we have a former Ministers for Europe club here. Like me, and all who have occupied the position, he pushed the enlargement agenda forward. Many countries wanted to prevent enlargement, as we know from the fact that, even during the presidency, there was an attempt to prevent the opening of negotiations with Turkey. Various deals were done to ensure that that happened. We did drive the process forward and should be proud of the new countries that joined the European Union on 1 May 2004, because contrary to what Members on the Conservative Front Bench have said—I do not hold the hon. Member for Chipping Barnet (Mrs. Villiers) responsible because she was not an MP at the time, but I do hold the hon. Member for Altrincham and Sale, West responsible—there has not been chaos or a shambles. Conservative Front-Bench Members predicted that those who came to this country following 1 May 2004 would clog up our benefits system, but the latest report from Ernst and Young suggests that the arrival of people from the new member states—people similar to the ancestors of the hon. Member for Shrewsbury and Atcham (Daniel Kawczynski)—has benefited the British economy.