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The Tote

The hon. Gentleman is absolutely right, but may I guide him by saying that the use of the term ““fair price”” in the 2004 Act, instead of ““market price””, was where the whole thing fell down with Europe? We tried to defend the word ““fair”” as against ““market””, but Europe believed that that meant that we were giving a subsidy. Rightly or wrongly, that was the argument. We had a long debate and discussion with the EU about whether the price should be a fair price or a market price, and it demanded that it be a market price because of the distortion of trade. Whether we accept it or not, that was its argument. That was what Neelie Kroes, the Commissioner, insisted on, which was why we got into the long discussion about what the market price was. We paid millions to have assessments made by accountants' firms, and we found ourselves in difficulty. The process fundamentally broke down at the European Union at that time, and others hid behind that later on.