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Lisbon Treaty (No.1)

My right hon. Friend is right and I shall deal with that point towards the end of remarks. Let me consider, not thoroughly because I do not have the time, examples of the Lisbon treaty's not matching up to what the Government claim or the Government's opinion of it when the text was being negotiated in the past few years. Let me begin with article 61. The Home Secretary issued a parliamentary Labour party briefing today, which states:"““The European Court of Justice will have jurisdiction across all Justice & Home Affairs—except for some aspects of police co-operation and Member State action concerning law and order and internal security.””" Indeed, the Government have argued that internal security must remain a national issue, yet article 61 specifically provides:"““A standing committee shall be set up…to ensure that Operational cooperation on internal security is promoted and strengthened within the Union.””" The status of that committee and whether it is the embryo of a far more bureaucratic model for ensuring conformity in nation states remain entirely unclear. There is a generic power under article 61G for the Council to ““ensure administrative cooperation”” between national police and criminal justice systems, which will arguably allow the Commission to gain access to sensitive national information. During the negotiations, the Government criticised the article and said that they considered it to be unacceptable and unnecessary and sought to get it deleted, but failed to do so.