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European Union (Amendment) Bill

The Chairman of the Foreign Affairs Committee asked whether we agreed with ““any measures””, and that is a question in principle. The answer in principle is that we do not agree with ““any measures””; we are here to debate the detail of the treaty line by line. The Chairman attempts to inveigle me, but he will have to forgive me if I do not walk into his little trap. I will say, however, that I do agree with the conclusion of the Committee's other report that, on foreign affairs, the constitution and the Lisbon treaty were almost exactly the same. The treaty's provisions on energy sum up much of what is wrong with the treaty as a whole. The provisions are unneeded and unwanted, and their presence is testimony to the Government's utter ineptitude at negotiating in the EU. The provisions offer no benefit to this country and neither we nor our European partners would be harmed by their rejection. They only have the potential to harm, and that is why we have tabled the amendment to reject them this evening.