11/03/2016 Politics Europe

Hello and welcome to Politics Europe,

your regular guide to the top stories in Brussels and Strasbourg.

On today's programme:

Ahead of another EU summit called to agree

a deal with Turkey on the migrant crisis, questions pile

up about how the plan will work.

Could David Cameron's EU reform deal be scuppered by the

European Parliament?

We report from Strasbourg.

Euro officials consider plans for a dedicated chauffeur service

for MEPs as a security measure.

And in the latest of our series profiling other EU

member states, we report from the divided island of Cyprus.

All that to come and more in the next half-an-hour.

All that to come and more in the next half-an-hour.

First, though, here's our guide to the latest

from Europe just 60 seconds.

from Europe in just 60 seconds.

On Monday the EU and Turkey agreed a plan,

they'll concentrate all migrants arriving in Greece from Turkey will

be returned but for every Syrian sent back, a Syrian already in

Turkey will be resettled in the EU.

their economic weaknesses risk destabilising the other economies

with difficult times ahead.

EU states want to tax e-cigarettes in the same way

as their tobacco counterparts, but the vaping lobby just the move

just punishes those trying to quit.

Leaders of the Conservative Parties Group in the European Parliament

asked members of the German anti-immigration AFD to leave

the group after comments made about using guns against immigrants.

And a limousine service for the European Parliament is

in doubt after MEPs questioned the 3 million euros cost.

Drivers' uniforms alone add up to 116,000 euros a year.

And with us for the next 30 minutes, I'm joined by the Conservative MEP

Charles Tannock and the Scottish National Party MEP Alyn Smith.

Let's talk about one of these stories in more detail, the idea of

a new car service to transport MEPs around Brussels and Strasbourg.

Looking forward to being chauffeur driven with a chauffeur

in uniform in the back of a limo?

These are proposals, there is an existing car service,

there's a lot of going back and forward to the airport.

If we were all getting taxis that would be very expensive.

So the Parliament already has a fleet of many buses, and there's

a security question there as well.

But these proposals, have been shelved, and we will vote against.

And you will vote against?

So will it happen?

I don't think it will.

Can it only happen if the European Parliament agree to it?

Exactly, if the MEPs sign of the budget, this was a proposal that's

Exactly, the MEPs sign off the budget, this was a proposal that's

been made, it's been shelved, but the proposal was reported in every

single newspaper, we're discussing it on this programme, the fact that

it has been shelved hasn't actually been mentioned at all.

It has now.

Is security really a concern?

Nobody really knows who you are.

It's security of the drivers because they're not vetted properly

in the current contracts, which are externalised.

You think the drivers could be a security risk?

They wanted to bring the drivers' employment in-house.

They would be fully screened for security reasons

and have panic buttons in the car.

That would make sense.

It was done entirely for security reasons.

the costs in my view are too high and the

Conservatives will be submitting an amendment to the budgets committee

to amend this, so I think it's highly unlikely it will go through.

So on Politics Europe we can kill it now dead?

Hopefully dead.

Very well, you see, we make the news here.

All the big stuff.

And UKIP by the way use the cars before you get anything different.

in a minute, though.

German Chancellor Merkel has spearheaded a proposed deal with

the Turkish government to stem the flow of migrants into Greece.

It's yet to be approved by all EU members.

Under the plan Turkey would take

back migrants crossing from Turkey into Greece.

In return, the EU would resettle Syrian refugees directly

from Turkey, pay Turkey about 6 billion euros, and agree to visa

visa-free travel for Turkish

citizens in the Schengen area from June.

Mrs Merkel didn't include the president of the European

Council, Donald Tusk, in the negotiations, but it looks like he's

going along with it nonetheless.

The Prime Minister confirmed Turkey's commitment to accept the

rapid return of all migrants coming from Turkey to Greece that are not

in need of international protection.

The EU will support Greece in ensuring comprehensive large-scale

and fast track returns to Turkey.

We also welcome the establishment of the Nato activity in the

Aegean Sea, and we look forward to its contribution to enhance

intelligence and surveillance with a view to stemming migrant crossings.

That was President Tusk.

Were joined by the UKIP MEP Diane James.

Welcome to you.

What do you make of this deal?

There's never going to be a good deal because we're dealing

with a humanitarian crisis.

On the one hand we are very concerned about what's going on

in Turkey, we're seeing increasing repression domesticly.

Even this week Zaman newspaper was shut down by the government.

So the government has been doing a lot of stuff that we have vocal

about criticising.

But on the other hand, Turkey has been a key partner

in hosting 2.6 million refugees and I think they do deserve a bit

of credit and support for that.

On the migration and refugee question, a priority

surely has to keep people safe.

We can keep people safe in our country all we can keep

people safe in Turkey by supporting the Turks to do that.

We're finally starting to see progress towards a political

solution in Syria, which will halt people being refugees at all.

Refugees don't want to be refugees.

That could be a long way down the road.

There are still Syrian refugees trying to get into Turkey now.

What do you make of it?

Clearly Turkey has the upper hand, it's the gatekeeper, it has control

of the flow of migrants leaving its territory crossing to Greece.

So we have to do a deal with Turkey irrespective of the nature

of the current government, and I'm a huge critic of President

Erdogan and what he's been up to internally in terms of repression,

arresting journalists and so on.

So we're going to give 6 billion euros to an increasingly

authoritarian Turkish government?

We have no choice to be honest because ultimately people are

choosing that particular route via Greece and the Balkans,

and it's only through Turkey stabilising refugees in

its own camps that we can stop the large flow of people into Europe.

What makes you think that the Turks won't just pocket the 6 billion

euros and nothing much will happen?

There is of course a risk of that.

Clearly the thing has to be very closely monitored.

If that were the case then the whole thing would be immediately

suspended as a deal.

But at the moment I think Turkey is also demanding quite a heavy price,

these liberalisation, the lifting on the blockage of the four chapters

visa liberalisation, the lifting on the blockage of the four chapters

for negotiating EU accession, just do give you a few examples.

That is pretty controversial to be honest.

If I understand that that it looks like Mrs Merkel wants a

European Union to do it too, and she's going to argue for it.

What's your view?

Well, it's typical German bullying, which were very used to in the

parliament, and we have Mr Schultz, who in his address this week,

made the point that the EU needs Turkey as much as Turkey needs you.

You couldn't have had a clearer message if you had wanted it.

And the fact that this is going to fast track Turkey in terms

of access and into the EU, of which all of the political parties in

the UK except UKIP have supported, and David Cameron in particular has

supported Turkey's membership.

It's still unclear when Turkey will get full membership.

In terms of their time frame, what I've read

and picked up this week, is that it's gone from a 10-year potential

timeframe to a timeframe between this five-year parliamentary term.

That's absolute nonsense.

I'm a raconteur for a Western Balkans nation, Montenegro,

I presented my report this week.

Even tiny Montenegro, which poses no problem whatsoever in terms

of integrating into the European Union, isn't going to be in the

European Union within five years.

Turkey being in within five years is absolute nonsense.

And the fact of the matter, Diane, is that only if the House

of Commons were to say yes.

It's subject to each member state's national parliament ratifying

the accession.

So our sovereign House of Commons would have to say yes.

So if it were ever to happen it would require the British

government and the British Parliament to have to agree to it.

Charles, with all due respect, Mrs Merkel didn't consult

David Cameron over the deal she put on the table this week.

And this is the second time she's done this

in terms of the 28 member states.

There's another summit where the MEPs will be able to have

our say on it as well.

OK.

One of the key issues here, we're not discussing this,

it hasn't come up yet, this is Mrs Merkel trying to satisfy a domestic

agenda as much as an EU agenda.

The visa liberalisation doesn't apply to the United Kingdom.

This is for the Schengen area.

We said that in the introduction.

Although the actual agreement said it apply to all member nations,

it was wrongly drafted.

That was wrongly drafted, it was clearly wrong.

Let me ask you this, it's quite a key part of this that I

don't understand, the deal, or the proposal, I think I'll call it

the Merkel proposal at the moment, is that those Syrians and other

refugees, or asylum seekers, or economic migrants, whatever they

are, who has made it to Greece will be returned to Turkey and then

the Syrians will be picked out, processed and bit by bit they'll be

sent back in a more legitimate way.

How in a democracy like Greece do you forcibly return migrants?

That's where there are legal questions to be unpacked

about this whole proposal.

The idea that you can blanket and throw people back to where there

may or may not be secure third countries.

Which isn't a full signatory to the Geneva Convention.

Even this week we had the UN High Commissioner for Refugees

in the Parliament expressing his doubts about these proposals.

There's an element of pragmatism that needs to be done

here, and this is where Charles and I completely agree.

The support that Turkey is going to get to provide a safe haven to

people is in the teeth of what the regime has been up to, and we

do have our doubts about that.

I'm not just talking about the legality of the situation,

which is a big question, I'm talking about the practicality

of a situation in which...

We've got pictures there of migrants in camps.

Are we seriously...

Who's going to do it?

Are the Greek police going to move in

with guns and forcibly remove them?

It's clear the European Union will be providing additional assistance

to Europol, to experts to advise how you would return people.

Supposing these people say they've risked their lives to get out

of Turkey and into Greece, and they would quite like to say,

particularly those who aren't Syrians, because if you're not

Syrian then you have no hope of getting back and you've get sent

to Turkey, why would they say they're not returning.

Returning irregular migrants is always a very challenging past.

The fact of the matter is that's what's been agreed,

and it will be up to the authorities to implement this in a perfectly

legitimate and humane fashion.

Are we going to see the European Union round-up refugees and force

them onto boats in their thousands, is that your proposition?

I'm only saying what I've read in the agreement in which it has been

stated categorically that people who are illegal and irregular, who come

particularly from countries other than Syria, such as Afghanistan,

Eritrea, and they've come particularly from camps were there

already established as people with asylum pleas that are already

registered and accepted, that they have no right to be automatically

granted territorial rights in the European Union

and they have to go back.

How they force or implement that, I don't know,

it's up to them to deliver on.

The kind of backdrop that helps you in a referendum campaign?

It does, there's no doubt in my mind.

Neither of my two counterparts today have even touched on the bill to

the United Kingdom, ?500 million.

What would UKIP's solution be?

We're running out of time so I need to give Diane the last word, there's

two of you and one of Diane.

It helps the whole Brexit campaign, there's no doubt about that,

in terms of this.

But equally it helps the Eurosceptic movement across Europe and we seen

responses already to that.

how on earth is this going to be enforcable?

This is going to be what I call a migration merry-go-round.

Bringing them in, sending them back, and who actually is going to

marshal it and make it happened?

It's the normal European nonsense.

So give us a solution.

That will have to wait for another programme.

We've run out of time.

Diane, thank you.

We've seen plenty of all out in Britain since David Cameron struck

his infamous EU deal, but what about the people who get to vote on it?

Not the British public, because they will, but the MEPs in the European

Parliament will be able to amend the proposals and vote on the plan.

Ben Wright reports from Strasbourg.

It is a first-time they have met here

since EU leaders rustled up David Cameron's referendum hors d'oeuvre.

They signed it off but could any MEPs rip the thing to

beat when their turn comes?

I do not think MEPs will change it because they know what is at stake.

Would you imagine the Commons not having a say in the UK?

So we are in charge of making legislation for the EU.

We will do the job.

So is the state set for a show-down European Cameron Del?

So is the state set for a show-down European Cameron's deal?

It depends on who you ask and there is a wariness

about the British question.

They want the show to be over, one way or another.

Now, lots of the deal that David Cameron agreed with EU leaders

doesn't need MEPs to approve it but some of it does, in particular

the in-work benefit limits, so too the idea of linking child benefit

payments to EU citizens in the UK to the cost of living in

the country where that child lives.

The president of the European Parliament did not rule out

the possibility of changes when the plans are produced.

Our road starts when a yes vote has a majority.

We start immediately with the necessary legislation.

Can it be amended?

This is a question for the commission so it's too early

to answer that question.

But he is careful not to say anything that could fuel that UK

exit debate.

Like most MEPs, he wants the UK to remain in, unlike this man.

This Parliament can water down substantially and will water

down substantially any changes to benefits the UK pays.

Benefits changes are not signed off.

The UK decided not to change its rules in work benefits, for examples

so now we have to deal with these.

This is one of the main ambiguities of the settlement

and I am not happy for the British people because we have to be fair.

One people is going to vote in the referendum.

The conditions of the settlement should be clear and they are not.

But Madame Goulard, an enthusiastic federalist,

looks set to be outnumbered by MEPs who think the best thing to do is

wave the UK deal through.

There is a positive attitude in the House on this.

On this emergency brake.

We have to solve the British issue once and for all.

We can continue decades and decades of discussions.

I asked the Conservative MEP if she could guarantee the deal been sold

to UK voters would be delivered.

I am getting MEPs saying what can I d oto help, I am number checking,

I am getting MEPs saying what can I do to help, I am number checking,

and listening to what they say.

I do not need Farage, Le Pen or Schultz's vote - when it

is 376 votes in Parliament and the the MEPs are saying we want

to keep the Brits in they do not want to rock the boat on this deal.

And it seems while the MEPs are tired of what they view as British

Ben Wright reporting there.

Is it possible that we could vote to remain but the European Parliament

could then change elements of the deal that Mr Cameron has done?

No.

Because?

It is flat nonsense.

There he is a huge achievement amongst the member states.

The MEPs get to bump their guns about but there is no desire among

anybody serious to get into this.

Even from my own party perspective, this is not a deal with what was

Even from my own party perspective, this is not a deal we thought was

necessary, but if that is the price, we can live with it.

The MEPs will be pragmatic about this stuff.

It is right that the European Parliament has a say on this.

There are wider implications but it is not going to be changed.

You are nodding in agreement?

I think Nigel was trying project fear.

He is not alone.

Vicky Ford was absolutely spot-on, my Conservative colleague, it is

absolutely no doubt the entire EPP the reformist and more the half

the socialist that is an inbuilt very large majority of the

Parliament.

The extreme right and left - it will be interesting to see

if Ukip tries to sabotage it - but it will be very bizarre it is

against the national interest...

I am not a member of the extreme right

and I do not appreciate the comment...

I do not doubt that the vast majority of MEPs will vote to keep

this in and the reason they would do that is that we contribute so much

in terms of the budget contribution to the European Union they cannot

afford to let the UK walk away but when it comes down to it,

ultimately, whatever decision the MEPs come up with, it is voters

here in the UK who have already seen what's on the table, they have

voiced their concern, it is why the polls are running

as close as they are...

I understand that.

We will have plenty of time to talk about that but zooming in on the

moment, although constitutionally it would be possible for the European

Parliament to make changes or to knock some of it down, in practice,

given the majorities, it is not going to happen so,

in their words, in practical terms it is a red herring?

I would say so.

Hold on.

I am not going to be voting it through.

I am not speaking personally, I think it is an absolutely poor deal

that David Cameron has brought back.

It suits the European Union and Europhiles

and my two colleagues here.

Very well.

Now, it is the most easterly member of the European Union.

Until Turkey joins.

Half-an-hour south of Turkey and with the latest profiles on EU

member states we report from Cyprus.

Nicosia is the last divided capital, on one side the Greek Cypriots

on the other, with a massive flag on the the Turkish

on the other, with a massive flag on the hill the

Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus.

Thank you.

There you go.

A quick swipe of the passport and I am across the border to

Northern Cyprus.

It's not exactly Deutschland 83, is it?

There were signs of the division all along

what is known as the Green Line.

It is mostly been like this since 1974 when Turkey invaded

the island, fearing it would be united with Greece which was led

by a military junta at the time.

Nowadays, both sides are separated by a slightly spooky buffer zone.

It is paced by United Nations peacekeepers like the soldier

from Slovakia.

To friends back home who say what on earth are you doing in Cyprus,

what you tell them?

You try to find out or you have a chance to find out how deep is

this problem in Cyprus?

Then you can understand how important the presence

of the military is.

It is not matter if they are from Slovakia or other states but we

really need to be here and just keep this stable environment until there

is a final settlement, let's say.

The peace process finally seems to be getting somewhere.

The leaders of both communities meet every other

week and officials negotiate three times a week but over what?

The governance in the way the executive

legislature judicially will be functioning in this new system.

Then we have the EU matters.

How are we going to take decisions within the European Union and how we

going to transpose.

Then there is the economy chapter.

How are we going to regulate the taxation, regular venues.

How will it be redistributed along the island.

Very complicated issues.

After the events of 1974, many Turkish Cypriots who used to

live south moved north and Greek Cypriots who lived

in the North moved to the south.

Leaving behind their properties.

Now the remaining chapters which not have touched the territorial

issues and security.

Those are really thorny issues.

Where exactly is the border between north and south and what happens to

the thousands of Turkish troops stationed on the island but everyone

involved reckons there will be a deal by the end of this year which

will then go to a referendum on both sides of the Green line.

After more than 40 years, the city might not be divided

Cyprus now has more resinence with all the talk of Turkey?

Absolutely and Cyprus is very important in all of these.

It is a Commonwealth country.

It also has the sovereign base so it is a very, very important country

from a British perspective and they feel particularly squeezed over

the Turkey deal because there is huge pressure by Erdogan

Turkey has never implemented

the 2005 additional Ankara protocols which recognise Cyprus and allow

ships to dock at the ports.

I feel sorry for the President who now has to resell package

for unification and also having to co-operate with the migrant issue.

Well, it is going to be interesting to see what we do with the migrant -

economic migrants, asylum seekers, whatever you want to call them,

that have been stranded on the southern bases.

Is that going to be part of the discussion as well?

What happens there?

Final thought?

It would be be glorious project to get a part of.

You think we will see progress on that?

I think there is a huge impetus to actually get

a deal done and that will take...

Good news for 2016.

We could do with some good news.

Look out and see if it happens.

Our thanks to all of my guess.

Our thanks to all of my guests.

We hope to see you again soon.

Bye-bye.