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European Union (Amendment) Bill

The one good thing about the Lisbon treaty is that it gives us an opportunity to talk about important things that perhaps we do not tackle too often in our debates. The amendments refer to agriculture and the role that the European Parliament might have in the future, so we are perfectly entitled to discuss it. We have had many good speeches and the European Parliament has been ably defended by two former Members of that body, but I wonder whether it is worth defending. I refer to the article in the FT today. I have been itching to find something with which to support the Government and this article gives me the opportunity. I will quote three paragraphs. The headline is, ““Chancellor fires blast at EU’s farm policy””. The article says: "““The chancellor will urge fellow European Union finance ministers to support the dismantling of the CAP, saying it is costing EU consumers billions of pounds a year in higher food bills, while hurting farmers in the developing world.""In a strongly worded letter, Mr Darling calls current EU farm policies ‘unacceptable’. He urges an end to direct support for European farmers and all measures that keep farm prices above world market levels.""The chancellor also repeats Britain’s insistence that Europe must review its target to increase the use of biofuels to 10 per cent of fuel use. He believes that this could be forcing up food prices in developing nations””." That is one of the best condemnations of the CAP that I have heard for a long time—and hooray for that. It would appear from what the Chancellor is recommending to his European colleagues that he, too, believes in a free market in agriculture. We are moving together. The Chancellor of the Exchequer, who should know what he is talking about and in my view does, is talking sound sense that many of us agree with—including some on the Liberal Democrat Benches, who are very well disposed to the European Union. It seems that all sides are coming together to the view that the CAP is a ruinous policy—for Governments, for people and for the developing world. We are coming together in the hope that we can get rid of this absurd policy and find a market solution to the agricultural problems that we have, and to the food shortages and price increases that we will face in future, which cannot be found as long as we have the CAP.