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European Communities (Finance) Bill

Ireland is successful today because it plays a full role in the European Union. Were Scotland to quit the Union, I would be interested to see the price it would have to pay to enter the EU, because it would be a tricky renegotiation. However, we are veering way off the subject. What counts is that the Irish used the moneys that they got from the EU better than almost any other country. They were combined with enormous investment in education and a sensible taxation policy—a point that I concede to the hon. Member for Stone. None the less, are we saying that after 1973, Britain should not, to a lesser degree than Germany or the Netherlands, have made significant fiscal transfers that have allowed Ireland as a nation during the past 33 years to become richer and happier than it ever was when it was an independent state before it joined the EU, or when under English control? I do not think so. It must have been in our interests to do so. It is why Ireland today is a country of immigration, not emigration. Immigration brings its own problems, as we know, but it is far better to be a country that is so successful it needs to attract workers to do jobs that nationals are not prepared to do. That ought to be our ambition for the rest of Europe. Many hon. Members will remember travelling to Spain, southern Italy or even bits of France not so long ago and being able to see rural and social poverty. It was quaint, and it was nice for the British ex-pats who could buy houses and drinks that did not cost very much, but now it is far better that Italians and Spaniards can, in contrast to their position in the 1950s and 1960s, stay in their own countries, and that those countries are rich enough to attract people to work in them. That is my ambition for Poland and the Baltic states. In order to achieve that ambition, some generosity on our part, and some lessening of the assumption that it is only the Germans, Dutch and Swedes that should pay, would be welcome. We can see the success that membership of the European Union brings to all countries. I have explained why it makes us all more wealthy, and I hope that the figures are not in question.