Rickmansworth speech

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Key-Note Speech to Chilterns Liberal Democrat Conference, Rickmansworth, 20 February 1999

FOUR THINGS TO CELEBRATE

[Emma Nicholson is likely to represent 60% of Chilterns Region in the European Parliament. I am only likely to represent 40%. I hope you do not feel short-changed. She and I have collaborated closely over several years on European matters, and now look forward to doing so as part of a large, strong team at Brussels and Strasbourg.]

So the great campaign begins.

All things being equal, 1999 will indeed be a great campaign for Liberal Democrats. We start with four outstanding advantages, and I want to spell out how we as a party should exploit and profit from them.

1. Successful start for the euro First up is the European single currency. On 1 January the euro was launched, and launched successfully. For years we had to listen to the dire warnings of the many British euro-sceptics: the euro wouldn't happen on time, or wouldn't happen at all, or wouldn't happen according to the Treaty, or, even if it did happen, would then collapse. Well, the euro has landed - and no ceiling has fallen in, no economy has collapsed, and there has been no fierce outbreak of global speculation. What has happened is that prospects for the euro look set fair, and a lively dialogue is being opened up at European Union level between the central bankers and politicians about how best to manage the euro regime in the interests of stability and prosperity. The UK has excluded itself from this. What has happened is that eleven member states of the EU now enjoy robust conditions of lower inflation, lower interest rates, cheaper borrowing, greater price transparency and lower transaction costs at home - as well as much greater political influence in Brussels and worldwide - than do us British citizens and businesses. What has happened is that the British euro-sceptics have been thoroughly confounded, the Tories hopelessly split - and Mr Blair and Mr Brown still dither about sterling's membership. The government's strategy of 'prepare and decide' is falling apart. Soon it will be to all practical intents and purposes indistinguishable from the Tory stance of 'wait and see'. So the first thing Liberal Democrats must do is to campaign for an early decision on British entry to the single currency. We must rise to this, the most important challenge the country now faces. For those who worry about our distinctiveness with Labour, it should be quite clear that whereas Liberal Democrats can locate, articulate and then act in the national interest, Labour seemingly cannot. Next week we are to have the much delayed 'National Changeover Plan' - a putative schedule and a hypothetical timetable , with absolutely no calendar. How pusillanimous can you get? Quite frankly, compared to Mr Blair's prevarication faced with his euro challenge, the response of Mr Kevin Keegan to his Euro 2000 challenge looks like a model of decisiveness, resolution and commitment.

2. PR for Europe The second thing we have to celebrate, clearly, is the great prize of proportional representation for the European Parliament. This was the prize that eluded us in 1977 under the Lib Lab Pact. PR for Europe widens voter choice and strengthens European parliamentary democracy. It is not just a prize for the party, but for the citizen. And Paddy Ashdown's part in bringing this change about can never be over-stated. Let's be proud of that. The arrival of a large band of British Lib Dem MEPs is warmly anticipated in Brussels and Strasbourg by our colleagues in ELDR, the European Liberal Party. Together we will be the vital third force in the Parliament, a force that has recently won new respect and praise for its role in the great Commission censure debate. We can be proud of the fact that no group is being more united or decisive in the campaign to root out waste, fraud, nepotism and mismanagement wherever it can be traced inside the institutions of the EU or in the administration of member states. Pat Cox, leader of the European Liberals, deserves a warm welcome indeed at our Edinburgh Spring Conference.

3. Power for the European Parliament In December and January, the public saw for the first time the European Parliament performing like parliaments are supposed to perform, becoming fully engaged in a constitutional struggle for power between rulers and ruled. For the British all this was an especially refreshing sight, because what we saw was not an ersazt model of Westminster - where the government is drawn from the parliament and then controls it - but a parliament more in the federal, American style - where parliament acts as counterpoise to the executive, scrutinising, questioning, checking. For British Liberal Democrats the new assertiveness of the European Parliament is especially to be celebrated because it confounds those many of our opponents who have been cynically contemptuous of the first international parliament in history. Our candidates and MEPs need have no fear that we are an irrelevant side-show. As the single currency beds in, as the Treaty of Amsterdam comes into force, as the EU struggles to face up to its grave challenges abroad and its big reform programme at home, the role of the European Parliamentarian has never been more needed or justified. This is our third bonus.

4. Growth of the regions In Britain, too, the new electoral system based on regional constituencies helps to define and refine the role of the MEP as spokesmen for their regions. Here is the fourth, and last cause for Liberal Democrat celebration this spring: the establishment at long last of regional development authorities. I know that Mr Prescott seems unsure where the RDAs are headed, and that the absence of clear, cogent thinking about the decentralisation of England (to say nothing about Scottish Home Rule) is a worry.

But Lib Dems have done the thinking about 'joined up government' for years and we should now be pushing up the bidding, going with the grain of change, and working hard to make the RDAs develop quickly into forceful agents for regional enterprise and strategic planning. Central to our purpose - and their potential - is to develop the democratic credentials and accountability of the regional chambers. I know that some of our excellent councillors are suspicious of the insertion of a regional tier, and for its effect on local government. But if handled well, decentralisation from Whitehall to the regions will be wholly beneficial for English local government, and to the local communities we serve. The political prizes will surely go to the party that leads the dispersal of power, not that hides from it. The public want and deserve politicians who speak the truth about the purpose, scale and scope of necessary change, as well as the risks. I know that our campaigning and motivated party is sometimes tempted to make unrealistic demands on our potential supporters. But the fact is that 'federal union now!' is not the stuff of modern campaigning. We must be sensitive to genuine public fears of euro-creep. We can't escape the fact, however, that the country badly lacks self-confidence in European matters, and if Labour won't provide leadership and the Tories can't, we must - and will. We will appeal to our professionalism on Europe, our consistency over time and our unity. Our integrated campaign will have the same messages about better public services, more investment, an educated and skilled citizenship, wider social justice, a cleaner environment, more integrity and transparency in public life, more liberty and democracy.

These are our values for modern Britain. And these are the values that will help us to shape Liberal Democracy in Europe too.

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