Dr Julian Lewis: Can my right hon. Friend explain to me and the House what exactly senior Ministers mean when they talk about the remorseless logic of fiscal integration? Do they mean that it will lead inevitably to political integration, and if they do, is it no longer the case that we regard the emergence of a single power on the continent of Europe as fundamentally not in the UK's national interest?

[The Minister for Europe (Mr David Lidington): What it means is that we accept that, as Conservative politicians have argued since the euro was created, for a single currency zone to operate successfully over a number of different national economies there would need to be a measure of fiscal and economic integration, so that those economic differences can be managed successfully and in a stable fashion in that currency union. It is for the countries of the eurozone to work out exactly which economic and political measures will be right for their particular circumstances.]