Downing Street Says » EU Treaty

Asked how the Prime Minister could be appearing before the Liaison Committee and go to Lisbon, the PMS replied since yesterday the Liaison Committee had announced that they will be bringing forward the start of the hearing. This was a sign that we were doing everything we could to enable the Prime Minister to be at Lisbon for some, if not all, of the ceremony and lunch. But journalists should not read anything into this whatsoever, there were lots of precedents where people other than the Prime Minister had signed these treaties. He was the Head of Government, he negotiated the treaty, and he took full responsibility for its content.

Put again that the Prime Minister would miss the signing ceremony, the PMS replied that there were still discussions with the Portuguese Presidency about the exact arrangements, so let’s see how that developed.

Asked if the Prime Minister would be the only Head of Government not to attend the signing of the Treaty, the PMS replied that he only spoke on behalf of the British Prime Minister.

Asked how these frightening summonses from the Liaison Committee come about, the PMS replied that Liaison Committee was the senior parliamentary committee and therefore it had to be treated very seriously, and with a very high degree of respect. As he was explaining yesterday, there had been quite a lot of uncertainty about when exactly the Treaty would be signed, the possibility it could be signed at the EU-Africa Summit, but our attendance at that depended on whether Mr Mugabe was there, and there was the possibility that it could have been signed in Brussels rather than Lisbon. So we were trying to juggle a number of balls simultaneously.

Asked who suggested the date and time of the Liaison Committee, the PMS replied that he did not have that information to hand, but did not want to get into the discussion of who said what when. We were doing everything we could, as was shown by the fact that the Liaison Committee had agreed to change the timing of their hearing.

Asked if the Prime Minister did not attend, would his fellow European chums not think he was snubbing them, the PMS replied not at all. There were lots of precedents for people other than the Head of Government signing treaties – Robin Cook signed the Amsterdam Treaty, Douglas Henderson signed the Nice Treaty, Douglas Hurd and Francis Maude signed the Maastricht Treaty, and Baroness Chalker signed the Single European Act. So there had been instances where people who were not even Cabinet Ministers had signed these treaties. Nobody got too excited about it then.

Asked if we had not asked the Liaison Committee to move the date, the PMS replied again that there was a lot of uncertainty about when the Treaty signing was happening, we also had to agree a date with the Liaison Committee and had to do this simultaneously. It was not straight forward.

Asked if the Liaison Committee took precedent over Lisbon, the PMS replied that the Prime Minister had to attend the Liaison Committee. The Liaison Committee was the senior UK parliamentary committee.

Put that it was entirely up to the Prime Minister whether he appeared before the Liaison Committee or not, the PMS replied that given the emphasis that he had placed on the importance of Parliament and parliamentary accountability, it would not send a particularly good signal for him not to respond to the Liaison Committee’s summons.

Asked if we had taken any steps to ensure that our European partners were aware of the fundamental importance of the Liaison Committee, the PMS replied that our European partners were fully aware of the difficulties we were facing, and were a lot less bothered about it than the Lobby were.

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» Thursday, December 6, 2007

EU Treaty

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