Committee condemns Government’s failure to schedule debates on EU documents
10 December 2014
The Government is failing to schedule the debates that the European Scrutiny Committee recommends on EU documents, and, as a result, the Committee has today published a list of outstanding debate recommendations.
Chairman of the Committee, Sir William Cash, said:
"The Prime Minister has said that national Parliaments are the true source of real democratic legitimacy and accountability in the EU. But in this House, we now see a systematic, wilful failure in the way that the Government handles EU business. Matters which are of vital national importance, in particular the free movement of EU citizens and the recent developments in relation to the EU Budget, are being left undebated.
The Government must now review the list of outstanding debate recommendations published on my Committee’s website today as matter of urgency, and arrange for these debates to take place in the near future. Scrutiny of EU matters is of the utmost importance, and Members across the House should have the opportunity to debate these highly relevant issues; an opportunity that the Government has been denying them."
Background
The Committee has the power to recommend that the Government arrange debates on EU documents which Members consider legally and/or politically important.
Only four debates recommended by the Committee have taken place since September, and the list shows that the Government is yet to arrange 12 other debates.
These debates concern issues such as the Rule of Law in EU Member States, the Commission’s relations with national Parliaments and European Defence.
In January 2014, the Committee recommended that an EU document concerning the free movement of EU citizens be debated on the floor of the House. More than ten months later, the Government is still yet to schedule this debate.