European Council — House of Lords, 2015-03-23
Topic: International Affairs
Tina Stowell (Conservative, Centre-right): My Lords, with the leave of the House, I will now repeat a Statement given by my right honourable friend the Prime Minister in the other place. The Statement is as follows: "I know that the whole House will join me in welcoming David Natzler as the new Clerk of the House. Mr Speaker, you went to the ends of the earth in search for the best candidate, but I am glad that we found the answer right here in Britain Before turning to the main focus of the Council, which was the situation in the eurozone, let me say a word about the discussions on Tunisia and Libya, on the situation in Ukraine, and on the nuclear talks with Iran I am sure that the whole House will join me in sending our deepest condolences to the friends and family of Sally Adey, a British holidaymaker who was among at least 20 tourists and two Tunisians brutally murdered in the terrorist attack at the Bardo museum last week. I have written to President Essebsi to assure him that Britain will stand with the people of Tunisia as they seek to defeat the terrorists and build a peaceful and prosperous future. The EU has agreed to offer practical assistance, and Britain will play its part, deploying SO15 and military counterterrorism experts and continuing to provide assistance in aviation security and tourist resort protection The suggestion that some of the terrorists involved had been trained in Libya is the latest evidence of the very difficult situation in that country. The Council agreed on the need for a political solution, supporting UN-led efforts to bring the different parties in Libya together to agree a national unity Government. Britain has provided Libya with aid and military training, and we will continue to do all we can to assist. I know that some people are looking at this situation and asking whether Britain, France and America were right to act to stop Colonel Gaddafi when we did. We should be clear that the answer is yes. Gaddafi was on the brink of massacring his own people in Benghazi. We prevented what would have been a wide-scale, brutal, murderous assault. It was the right thing to do, and we should be very proud of the British service men and women who carried out this vital task Turning to the situation in eastern Ukraine, the Council welcomed the significant reduction in fighting and the progress on the withdrawal of heavy weapons. But, as President Obama, President Hollande, Chancellor Merkel and I agreed earlier this month, it is essential to send a clear signal that sanctions will not be eased until Russia delivers on its promises and the Minsk agreements are fully implemented. This European Council did exactly that. The conclusions state that, ‘the duration of the restrictive measures … should be clearly linked to the complete implementation of the Minsk agreements’ They also underline our readiness to take further measures if required One of the best things we can do to help Russia’s neighbours is to help them fight corruption and strengthen their democracy. Just as the Know-How Fund set up by Margaret Thatcher did a great job of helping Eastern European countries after the fall of the Berlin Wall, so we need the same approach today. At the Council, I announced a new good governance fund with an initial £20 million to support reforms in countries in the eastern neighbourhood and western Balkans. This will complement support from other donors. It will accelerate efforts to fight corruption, strengthening the rule of law, reforming the police and justice system and supporting free markets by liberalising key sectors such as energy and banking. The fund will be up and running by the summer. As well as Ukraine, it will initially cover Georgia, Moldova, Serbia and Bosnia-Herzegovina Turning to Iran, I met Chancellor Merkel and President Hollande in the margins of the Council to discuss progress in the vital talks on Iran’s nuclear programme. We are absolutely clear and united in our purpose. Iran must never be allowed to develop a nuclear weapon, but there is a peaceful path to civil nuclear energy. We believe that a comprehensive, durable and verifiable deal is possible, but only if Iran shows greater flexibility and takes some tough decisions during the talks this week We also discussed proposals co-ordinating Europe’s energy policy, ensuring transparency of gas supply agreements and that Europe’s energy policies are consistent with reaching the vital deal at the climate change summit in Paris this December Turning to the eurozone, the Council welcomed the agreement between Greece and the euro area to extend their programme. Let me say again: this is the last of these Statements of this Parliament, and I think I have uttered this sentence probably 11 times, but Britain is not in the eurozone and we are not going to join the eurozone. But we need the eurozone to work properly. A disorderly Greek exit from the euro remains a major threat to Europe’s economic stability, and it could be very damaging to the British economy. Protecting our economy from these wider risks in the eurozone means sticking to this Government’s long-term economic plan Five years ago, Britain’s economy was close to the edge. We had the biggest budget deficit in our peacetime history: a deficit that was forecast to be bigger than that of Greece or any other developed country on the planet. Five years on, the deficit has been halved and our national debt is falling as a share of GDP. We have the fastest growth of any major western economy. We have 1.8 million more people in work, more jobs created in Yorkshire than in the whole of France, and more jobs created in the UK than in the rest of the European Union".