Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2005-11-16-Speech-3-324"
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"en.20051116.21.3-324"2
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"Mr President, Madam Commissioner, in discussing defence matters we are entering into important and sensitive areas of national sovereignty. Many of us feel that the EU’s defence ambitions are wholly misplaced. If you want to empower the European Union as a global actor or if you believe in an integrated European State or, indeed, a European Defence Union, as we heard earlier, then you will have a different view.
We are opposed to EU meddling in defence, both in principle and in terms of its practical consequences. However, we recognise that there are areas in which a multilateral approach can be beneficial, and this is particularly true in relation to non-proliferation and arms export controls.
Turning firstly to defence procurement, the Wuermeling report is driven by a very strong integrationist impulse. It even poses the question, in paragraph 12, as to ‘what extent any meaningful distinction at all can still be drawn between national and common European security interests’. Certainly the report seeks to entrench the European Commission’s role in defence procurement and wants such matters dealt with under EU rather than national legislation.
We already have a situation where the British defence procurement market is open to foreign competition in a way in which the market in France, for example, is not. We see British defence companies – important national strategic assets – being taken over by foreign firms.
While British Conservatives are most supportive of measures to strengthen a genuine single market in most sectors, defence should continue to be the exception and should be safeguarded.
On the subject of WMD, we attach enormous importance to combating proliferation and to strengthening the security of component materials. At the same time, the UK’s independent nuclear deterrent force continues to be a vital element of our defence strategy and one which has not lost relevance in spite of the changed security environment in which we live.
The British Government must not only take the necessary decisions to maintain our nuclear capability; it must also be prepared to adapt our weapons and the doctrine for their use.
On the subject of arms exports, while we welcome calls for better verification of the end-use of exported goods and the maintenance of the arms embargo on China, we continue, however, to have difficulty with the idea of a legally binding code of conduct. This would extend judicial authority into areas that are more properly the preserve of government and would further extend the reach of EU institutions, including the European Court of Justice. Tonight we have a dangerous mixture under discussion."@en1
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