European and External Relations Committee, 12 Apr 2005

Meeting date: Tuesday, April 12, 2005

Official Report 116KB pdf

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Pre and Post-council Scrutiny

Item 3 on our agenda is pre and post-council scrutiny. We have a paper containing notes on various council meetings that are scheduled or have already taken place. No notes have been specifically highlighted for our attention, but do members have any comments?

Several issues in annex B, on the economic and financial affairs council, are hard to understand. Perhaps someone here can explain them, or perhaps we could receive more information. What is meant by

"enhancing governance and national ownership of the fiscal framework"?

The phrase suggests to me that, somewhere along the line, we will abandon the euro and go for governance by nations of their own economies again. I would welcome that, but I do not think that everyone would.

I think I would describe your interpretation as wishful thinking.

Perhaps you could explain what the phrase means.

What it means to me is, I think, what we heard about during our visit to Europe a few weeks ago. It means encouraging national Governments to come to an agreement and endorse the financial framework within which the EU will operate and to build into their policy decisions some of the components arising from the Lisbon agenda. The Lisbon agenda and the financial framework depend very much on the actions of individual member states. That is the meaning I would read into the phrase but, as you know, I am not an expert on Eurospeak. You have spent more time absorbed in it than I have.

Your explanation is quite reasonable until we read the third bullet point in that particular section, which refers to

"safeguarding the sustainability of public finances in the long run",

and consider what has been happening in the weeks since the ECOFIN meeting. The parameters within which the public finances of France and Germany operate seem to have been changed substantially to allow those countries to maintain existing levels of public expenditure. That cuts right across the objectives of the Lisbon agreement on the structures of the European economy.

That is the nature of the debate on the extent to which member states wish to buy into the Lisbon agenda, with all the requirements that it places on member states.

Could we ask the minister for his views on the report that is mentioned in annex B and on what he expects will happen at the next ECOFIN meeting?

We will do that. The clerks have just pointed out to me that that meeting is taking place as we speak. Those momentous shifts in opinion might be happening at this very moment.

They are probably tuned into you, Phil.

Page 11 of our briefing paper deals with land transport and road user charging. I had not spotted this problem before but it occurs to me that the average distance that is travelled per tonne of goods delivered will tend to be rather higher in an area such as Scotland than in other parts of the European Union. That might have a disproportionate impact in relation to costs for the road haulage industry and for businesses and consumers in rural areas of Scotland. I presume that the Executive will be making representations on the proposal through the United Kingdom Government but it might be sensible if the relevant committees of this Parliament gave the issue some thought as well.

The page that you are referring to says that

"Scottish Executive officials are working closely with HMCE"

—HM Customs and Excise—

"to ensure that Scottish concerns are considered in taking the policy forward."

It continues:

"We see it as particularly important that a Regional Regulatory Impact Assessment is taken forward at an early date to determine what the implications of the tax for Scotland's road haulage industry and its ports may be."

That sounds to me as if the horse has bolted out of the stable door and that only now is the impact of the proposal beginning to be worked out.

We will write to the Minister for Transport immediately after today's meeting—

It might be worth flagging up the issue to the Local Government and Transport Committee as well.

That council does not meet until 21 April, so we will make those representations to the Minister for Transport and copy our letter to the convener of the Local Government and Transport Committee.

One aspect of the issue that has been brought to my attention by various freight users in my constituency is that the high level of fuel tax disadvantages them because people coming into this country from the continent can fill up on much cheaper fuel before they arrive, which means that they can travel long distances at a much cheaper rate and fill up their tanks once again when they get back to the continent.

We should include the issue of fuel tax in the letter to the Minister for Transport. I know that taxation is a reserved matter and that there are issues about European levies and the decisions that might be taken in that regard but we should not forget that fuel tax is an important aspect of the impact that the initiative could have on our road haulage industry.

My understanding is that the intention of the initiative is to ensure that trucks from mainland European countries that travel on British roads will have to pay, whereas they have not had to in the past. We should find out whether that is the case.

That matter is part of the debate around the cost of road haulage. It is a material factor.

Page 14 of the paper deals with a

"Proposal for a Regulation of the European Parliament and of the Council on the rights of air passengers with reduced mobility".

The proposal seems to be creating an open house with regard to the number of passengers with reduced mobility that an airline can carry.

On the low-cost airlines, there is usually a limit of four wheelchair passengers on any one flight. It is my belief that that is, to a large degree, because of safety issues rather than costs to the airline. The opening up of the situation might have further implications. It might, therefore, be worth finding out a little bit more about that as well.

We can do. We will carry out the appropriate investigations.

Page 9 of the paper talks about "ITER". Could you enlighten me as to what that is? I think that it is something to do with the development of a nuclear reactor, but I am not quite sure.

We will secure the necessary translation.

I am trying to read page 2 of the paper.

That is what you are supposed to do before you come to the meeting.

I was merely trying to see whether I had made any notes on that page. I made several as I went through the paper carefully earlier.

Page 28 of the paper deals with the EU budget and talks about the importance of "budgetary discipline" and of

"complying with the existing Financial Perspective"

and so on.

Has anybody inquired as to whether any audited accounts have been produced in relation to the budget? I would be interested to find out the position in that regard as I am extremely concerned about the EU budget.

We can make that inquiry.

I think that the European Parliament is discussing that subject in Strasbourg this week.

We will get an update on that and pass it to members.