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Europe in the World (EUC Report)

My Lords, I thank all noble Lords for their contributions and presence this afternoon. In closing, I underline the fact that the common foreign and security policy and ESDP already exist in the treaties. The Commission’s paper made it clear that it was not reopening the debate on the constitutional treaty and was looking at how to enhance the implementation of policies under the existing treaties. That was how the committee viewed the Commission proposal and the committee was largely supportive of those proposals in that context. I accept that there may well be, as my noble friend Lord Astor of Hever said, practical limits to achieving a common foreign policy in every case, but we should take every opportunity to enhance the prospect of achieving the consensus to which the noble Lord referred where it is possible—and where it is possible to find it we need effective means of implementing and projecting it throughout the world. That is in our interests and the interests of the European Union. Lastly, I thank all noble Lords for their kind remarks to me personally as chairman of the sub-committee and I wish every success to the noble Lord, Lord Roper, and the new sub-committee, as well as its new clerk, Kathryn Colvin. On Question, Motion agreed to.