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Lisbon Treaty (No. 3)

I agree with my right hon. Friend. I am simply searching for an explanation and it may be that I have hit on the wrong one. I hope that I have, because none of the explanations that I can think of appears to carry much weight. If it is a matter of keeping the CBI sweet, I suggest that that is not the job of a Labour Government. Nor is it the responsibility of a Labour Government to implement what Tony Blair, the former Prime Minister, once commended to a business gathering as"““the most restrictive trade union legislation in the Western world””." We inherited that from the Conservatives. It is shameful that we are not proud to welcome the charter of fundamental rights into our own legislation, which every other nation in Europe has taken in its stride as the foundation of a civilised society. I cannot see what the problem is. We have continual discussions about whether it will make a difference, and I am not sure that it would, but I cannot see why we object to implementing it. It is far from clear whether the charter will affect UK law. The Government allowed the charter to be made legally binding, but then put forward a protocol that, they argue, will prevent the charter from affecting UK law or at least will limit its impact. However, others have queried the status of the protocol. The Swedish Prime Minister said on 26 June last year that the UK had accepted that the charter was legally binding, which is certainly true, and then added:"““It should be stressed that the UK was given a clarification, not an opt-out””." Significantly, when Tony Blair was presenting the protocol to the UK Parliament on the day before, he misread the text—[Interruption.] Well, I assume he misread it. He said that"““nothing in the Charter creates justiciable rights applicable to the United Kingdom””—[Official Report, 25 June 2007; Vol. 462, c. 21.]" However, the text of the protocol actually says:"““Nothing in Title IV of the Charter creates justiciable rights applicable to the United Kingdom””." The clear implication is that although one section of the charter cannot be used to create new rights, other sections almost certainly will be. In that respect, I am sympathetic to some of the arguments coming from the Opposition side. But even in respect of title IV on social rights, the text of the protocol states explicitly that the charter does not create justiciable rights applicable to the UK—and several people have quoted this—"““except in so far as the UK has provided for such rights in its national law””." It will presumably be left for the European Court of Justice to decide for itself whether the UK has attempted to provide for such rights in its national law and to decide whether the attempt to provide such rights is adequate in the light of the charter. Indeed, it is very difficult to see how this discrete carve-out, so methodically prepared, can work in practice. Firms operating in one member state will be affected, but if they operate in more than one member state, the charter will clearly apply. Migrants coming from another member state to the UK would presumably still be covered. Anyone who travelled to another member state from this country—for health services, for example—would presumably be able to use the charter. Moreover, there are 30 years of EU jurisprudence to say that there can be no two-tier system of European rights.