Briefing from the Prime Minister’s Official Spokesman on: Iraq/Inquiry and European Council.
Iraq/Inquiry
The Prime Minister’s Official Spokesman (PMOS) advised journalists that the Prime Minister’s Director of Communications and Strategy, Alastair Campbell, would appear before the Foreign Affairs Select Committee on Wednesday at 3pm.
European Council
Asked if the Prime Minister had been indicating in his Statement on the European Council this afternoon that withdrawal from the EU was the consequence of what the Opposition was proposing, or whether withdrawal was the Opposition’s actual policy, the PMOS said that as a Civil Servant he was unable to comment on party political matters. That said, the Prime Minister had been drawing a logical conclusion to the proposals set out in a minority report put forward in the Convention which, he had said, would renegotiate Britain’s position with the rest of Europe and, in effect, ask Europe for a change in its basic rules. A judgement therefore had to be taken as to whether the rest of Europe would be likely to agree to such a fundamental change of position.
Asked why the Government had allowed the Charter of Rights to be ‘tossed into the pot’, the PMOS said that the Government’s position on the Charter remained unchanged. In the Government’s view, it was sensible as long as it didn’t invalidate domestic law in any way. We believed that it didn’t and we would ensure that was the case over the next year in the Charter’s wording. Questioned about the European Court of Justice, the PMOS said that the position regarding the European Court of Justice had remained the same over the last forty years. Put to him that the Charter was bound to be interpreted in such a way that it would apply across the EU, the PMOS said that there was nothing in the Charter which changed the fundamental balance between domestic and European law.
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