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European Affairs

No, I have taken enough interventions. [Interruption.] The hon. Gentleman can make a speech later rather than intervene on mine. We say to the Foreign Secretary that the one person he should listen to is the former Member for Bath and Commissioner, Lord Patten, who was both a mentor to the current Prime Minister and also, I think, an employer of the current Deputy Prime Minister when he was a Commissioner. Lord Patten said recently that the sensible thing would be for the Conservative party to move back to centre where big players sit around the table and make the big decisions affecting Europe. We do not want the British Prime Minister going to the European Council to represent the whole of the UK and be sitting in the corridor while the European Peoples party and the Progressive Alliance of Socialists and Democrats Heads of Government make the real decisions and invite him—the only Head of Government not to attend either of those meetings—along afterwards only for a toast. There are big decisions to be made in Europe: they need leadership and good judgment. That is the basis on which we will hold the Government to account.