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Europe in the World (EUC Report)

My Lords, I speak as the current chairman of Sub-Committee C. I succeeded the noble Lord, Lord Bowness, last November, and I must begin by saying how much I appreciate the work that the sub-committee did, under his chairmanship, to produce the report that we are considering today. We have had a significant change in the membership of the committee, and we are grateful to members of the sub-committee who put in a serious amount of work in order to prepare this report. We appreciate the work that the noble Lord, Lord Bowness, did during his three years as chairman of Sub-Committee C, in the main European Union Committee, on which he still sits, and in his links with other foreign affairs and defence committees through the various groupings in which he has represented this House. He will be a difficult act to follow. The Commission paper to which this report refers was a response to one of the important developments of the British presidency during the second half of 2005: in the Hampton Court summit in October. I was in Berlin recently for a meeting called by the German foreign ministry to look at future developments of the European security and defence policy, and a number of references were made to the Hampton Court process. I was a little puzzled about what the Hampton Court process was; was it something to do with a maze or was it something else? In fact, the phrase ““the Hampton Court process”” is the taking forward of this set of relationships between the different pillars of the European Union. It was pleasing that the German foreign minister was able to refer to that as an important action that each presidency feels it has a responsibility to continue. The Commission document referred to increasing the coherence, effectiveness and visibility of the European Union in relation to the rest of the world. As my noble friend Lord Teverson said, at one level that is a technical and managerial matter. However, it is important to have the management working effectively if the resources that are made available to the European Union by our taxpayers are to be properly and usefully spent, and have the necessary effects to which he referred. It is sometimes said that one of the great strengths of the European Union in its relation to particular crises or more generally to other countries throughout the world is the range of instruments that it has available. Certain bodies have only a limited range of instruments, but the European Union has a particularly wide range, as was set out very clearly by the noble Lord, Lord Bowness, in his introduction. It has been interesting to see the remarkable development that has been made in the European security and defence policy in the relatively short period since the Nice Treaty in 2003 and the number of ESDP joint actions, not only in the Balkans, but in Africa and, until the end of last year, in Aceh in Asia. The European Union has experimented with a whole range of actions, some directly defence orientated, as was the force that went into the Congo to assist in peace-keeping for last year’s elections. Others are police missions, as in Macedonia and now in Bosnia, and in other places advice on justice is given. The European Union has therefore been able to develop a number of important instruments in these areas. As of January this year, the EU has two battle groups available for deployment at relatively short notice. However, the problem which is taken up so clearly in this report is inter-pillar co-ordination—co-ordination between those activities which are the responsibility of the Commission and those activities which are the responsibility of the Council. That is seen very clearly in the discussion, which was an important part of this report, on so-called ““double-hating””—that you will have in a country, as one has in Bosnia, a Commission representative responsible for all the economic activities and a European Union special representative responsible for political and security matters. They report back to different people in Brussels. That does not always mean particularly effective co-ordination. That is why, as the Committee’s report points out, the experience in Macedonia is so important. For the first time, a single individual is the European Union’s special representative as well as the Commission’s representative, and has therefore been able to co-ordinate and make much more effective the impact of the European Union’s activities in Macedonia. In the EU’s preparation for the future deployment in Kosovo—assuming that agreement is reached onMr Ahtisaari’s report on Kosovo—will the international civilian representative, who will bethe European Union’s special representative under the present planning, also represent the Commission, or will there be a double-hating on that occasion? That would obviously be of considerable interest. I comment briefly on some of the points which have been made. I speak on behalf of the sub-committee because it has had a chance to considerthe Government’s response to the report receivedat the end of last month. We are pleased thatthe Government have agreed or noted all the recommendations. They have taken a positive attitude, and, indeed, that is made clear by Mr Hoon in his covering letter to the formal response. As has already been said, there were two or three particular points on which we would like further consideration. The first point was referred to by the noble Lord, Lord Harrison. We recommended that encouragement should be given to Dr Solana, the high representative, to attend as often as possible the meetings of RELEX, the group of commissioners responsible for the external relations of the European Union. As the Government point out, that is not easy because of the amount of time that Dr Solana spends away from Brussels. None the less, I hope that despite what was said by the noble Lord, Lord Harrison, it will be possible for him to attend because, quite clearly, that is an important and practical level of co-operation. The second recommendation that we wish to watch and to continue to see develop is consular assistance. One is not talking about arrangements between different European Union member states to help each other’s countries but whether it is appropriate for the EU Commission’s representation in a member state to provide consular assistance. We believe that raises a number of important legal points and should be examined with a great deal of care. We thereforeagree with the Government that the situationshould continue to be watched, and if any proposals are brought forward by the Commission for consideration in that area the appropriate sub-committee of the European Union Committee will want to examine them with very great care. I was pleased that in his introduction, the noble Lord, Lord Bowness, referred to the presence of the high representative and the Commissioner for External Relations at the biennial meetings of COFAC; the meeting bringing together the foreign affairs chairmen of the national parliaments. Their presence gives a reality to those meetings and ensures that they are held to account by the national parliaments. That is important because, in these areas of intergovernmental co-operation, the national parliaments have particular responsibility. I conclude by once again thanking the noble Lord, Lord Bowness, for all that he has done. As we have learnt from the closing part of his speech, I am sure that he will maintain his active interest in these matters.