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Treaty of Lisbon (No. 4)

The point I am making is that the current balance is not quite right and that regulation is too heavy-handed. Ministers share that point of view, although I am unsure whether the hon. Lady does. Given the consensus we have on wishing to bring down trade barriers and on the regulatory burdens in the EU being too high, we must examine how the treaty performs in addressing those problems—and it clearly fails. The heart of the matter is the issue that my hon. Friend the Member for Runnymede and Weybridge (Mr. Hammond) and other Members have raised: the dropping of the objective of free and undistorted competition from the objectives of the EU. That is important. That was a concession made by Tony Blair to the French President, shortly before President Sarkozy became the leading supporter of Mr. Blair's campaign to become president of Europe, but the Government argue that it does not really matter, as it is all in a protocol. What that point of view fails to appreciate is that European Court of Justice interpretations of the provisions of treaties tend to place greater weight on the preamble and the early articles. Evidence to support that comes from Professor Alan Riley of the City university in London, who wrote for the Centre of Policy Studies:"““No mere protocol can achieve the same interpretative status as the preamble and the first few articles””," and he supports that assertion with a long list of examples from case law. Antonio Bavasso, visiting professor of competition law at University college London and a partner with Allen & Overy, said the following about the changes as a consequences of this deal:"““the political significance of the change cannot be overstated…The foundations of competition enforcement are now weaker.””" Both those independent experts make the argument that the change will weaken what we see as our objective—free and undistorted competition. I know that many Labour Members do not support that view.