Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2008-02-18-Speech-1-132"
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"en.20080218.23.1-132"2
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"Mr President, I would like to start by thanking Mr Newton Dunn, another honourable Member of this institution, for eloquently painting the picture of how EU matters are dealt with – or how he believes they are dealt with – in London.
Perhaps I can explain what was going on in London and why they came to a Conservative Member of the European Parliament rather than go to a Labour MEP, or indeed to himself. Actually, I think they should have gone to him, and I cannot believe they did not. He might not believe me, but I had more contact with the current Presidency-in-Office than I did with anybody from London or the British civil service.
But perhaps it was just the fact that this young civil servant he described had forgotten to read the newspapers and believed that the general election had been called in October, that my party had won it and that the Prime Minister had not dithered, and that, therefore, he was dealing with a member of the Government party.
Alas, that is not the case. But I do understand what he says about London being concerned about giving OLAF a finger and it taking an arm. This actually goes back to the structure of OLAF itself, to the wise men’s paper back in 1999, and the fact that OLAF is simply not independent of the Commission – something that will be addressed in the future.
There were other problems with this particular dossier: the fact that VAT was being dragged between pillars, possibly – and we needed to get legal advice on that – and the fact that much of this information is already exchanged electronically. The British Government did believe – and I can see from reading between the lines how it came to that conclusion – that it would need a permanent coordination unit and would need to second people to this, therefore having lots of people in a place rather than just exchanging information electronically.
However, there is no problem with the amendments. There is no problem with the debate. This should go through very quickly, and I hope it does."@en1
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