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European Affairs

I think that the hon. Gentleman makes a powerful case about Zimbabwean asylum seekers, but I would want my home affairs colleagues to make any Conservative party commitments. The hon. Gentleman makes a powerful case, as I said, but this and future Governments will have to ensure that any decisions are made in line with a robust overall asylum policy. We should have regard to what the hon. Gentleman says, but all cases have to be considered on their merits. The severity of the economic downturn's impact on each country has depended on how well the Governments of each country have prepared for less easy times—in other words, on whether they fixed the roof while the sun was shining, which did not happen in this country. When he was Chancellor, the Prime Minister used to enjoy lecturing other European Governments on how to run their economies, and was notorious at ECOFIN meetings for his patent lack of interest in anything that they had to say. I hope that when he goes to the summit on Thursday he will show a bit of humility and contrition. I know that there is very little chance of that: I merely express a hope that the Prime Minister will begin to show those attributes. The Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development predicts that Britain will experience the steepest rise in unemployment in the G7. The European Commission has said that this country will experience the deepest recession of any nation in the G7. After 16 years of global economic growth, the United Kingdom has entered the present downturn with a larger budget deficit than more than 100 other countries, including countries such as Kazakhstan and Uganda. According to the European Commission's autumn economic forecast—the Foreign Secretary quoted a few percentages and statistics—Britain's cyclically adjusted budget balance will be minus 5 per cent. next year and minus 5.5 per cent. in 2010, compared to minus 0.3 per cent. in Germany and a surplus in Germany subsequently. That might be why Mrs. Merkel was not at the meeting yesterday. Each European Union member state's appropriate response to the downturn is determined by its domestic situation and, of course, domestic views. The European Commission was absolutely right to emphasise that in its announcement on economic recovery, when it said"““Those that have used the good times to achieve stable public finances have most room for manoeuvre.””" Such a sharply pointed reminder that Governments that failed to put public finances on a sound basis now have very little room to manoeuvre ought to have caused some pain in Downing street.