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European Communities (Finance) Bill

Thank you, Sir Michael. In any case, if I have not reached that level yet, I will continue to practise. Ministers will not achieve the UK's objectives by giving away their bargaining chips as the price of admission to the game rather than trading them in the game itself. That is not generally regarded as good practice. This is all about the negotiating competence of the Government. The truth is that Labour walked away from the table at Brussels as good as empty-handed. The only thing that it brought back was the promise of a review, and unless we give some teeth to that promise and show that this Parliament will insist on its being delivered in good faith, it will have effectively come away with nothing. We must take the opportunity to restore the Government's negotiating position, because the British people would expect us to deal with their failures at Brussels in 2005. The new clause sets a test for the review having taken place, and for its conclusions being satisfactory to the United Kingdom Government of the day. That will restore some of the bargaining power that the Government have thrown away. The rebate concession was agreed on the back of a pledge; let us see that pledge delivered on in good faith. Let us test the Government's assertion that they have secured a genuine and far-reaching review of EU finances. The hurdle that we set was deliberately not set high. There is no objective test of whether the outcome of the review is in the United Kingdom's interest; the new clause simply requires the Government of the day to align themselves with the outcome as being"““satisfactory to the interests of the United Kingdom””." We ask the Government to sign up to that outcome, and to say clearly and loudly to the British people, ““Yes, this is the outcome for which we gave away £7 billion””—and counting—““of Britain's budget rebate.”” If the Government do not believe that they will be able to do that—if they themselves have no confidence in the review, and no expectation of a satisfactory outcome—what on earth were they doing trading the rebate for a review in the first place? The new clause would give Ministers a tool with which to bargain, to ensure that the review is meaningful and far-reaching and can lead to a genuine overhaul of the EU's finances rather than a whitewash. We are in a very different place economically from where we were in the summer and autumn of 2005. The economy faces many pressures, and many people who might have taken a much more cavalier attitude to the billions of pounds involved in 2005 will certainly take a different view today. If the new clause is carried and if the review is not concluded by the end of 2008—incidentally, there is absolutely no reason why it should not be, given that the UK will now have an incentive to offer its partners to proceed with it speedily—the existing own resources decision will remain in force. The ceiling will not fall in, there will be no crisis, there will be no question of renegotiating the budget and the financial perspective or of cancelling enlargement. The position will be exactly as it is now, with the previous own resources decision implemented and continued. When the new own resources decision comes into effect as a result of the Treasury's certifying that it is satisfied with the outcome of the review, it will have effect retrospectively. Provided that the review is fair and open and the Treasury is able to certify that it considers the outcome satisfactory to the UK's interests, the own resources decision will be implemented in full in due course.