Liberty or Security? With Labour and Europe, we have both

By Claude Moraes

As an MEP, I am often asked to explain the role European institutions play in our daily lives.

In fact, I am often asked two things in particular: Does the EU contribute to British security? And does the EU add anything to British liberties?

To both questions, the answer is a resounding yes.

There is a clear role for co-operation in justice, policing, migration and the fight against trafficking and terrorism in the EU. And the latter is a deeply sensitive area, one where we must get the balance right between protecting our liberties and ensuring the small number of people who can cause terror outrages can be dealt with.

Recently a data sharing agreement between the EU and United States has been legislated on. This has been largely unreported in the British media but is of major media interest in countries like Germany, the Netherlands, Belgium and France.

For the first time, MEPs have in fact re-opened an international deal struck between the EU and the United States. The deal – known as “Swift” or the “Terrorist Finance Tracking Programme” (TFTP) – would have given American officials unrestricted access to data on the personal banking transactions of EU citizens and was initiated by the European Commission. As S&D group spokesman on civil liberties, and leading my group on these negotiations, I shared the concerns expressed by many that such a deal could diminish civil liberties in Europe. At the same time, we understand the importance of security in the modern world, as well as the crucial and beneficial aspects of transatlantic data-sharing.

MEPs have voted on the Swift deal and an overwhelming vote across political groups illustrated the fundamental changes to the agreement.

Instead of the banking data of EU citizens being sent in bulk to the United States, in the new deal there would be a guarantee of a European Union system with safe-guards, legal redress and extraction of individual pieces of information on EU soil with parliamentary accountability. In the timescale for this to happen, a recent vote in the European Parliament also opened the door to EU personnel working in the US treasury to block any illegitimate searches of our financial data and to provide oversight.

Meanwhile, the European Parliament will legislate on a general data protection agreement this year between the EU and US.

But why should it be the EU dealing with the US on these kind of issues. The reason is clear – the 27 bilateral agreements between EU counts and the US were a chaotic mess. An EU deal becomes more open and transparent, and because of the “economies of scale”, major safe guards and accountability structures are built in.

It is a move to a highest common denominator rather than a move the lowest.

In other words, we have in these negotiations an example of the European Parliament being democratic, accountable, and serious about liberties and securities in the modern world. With Labour’s influence in a democratic Europe, people living in the UK need not choose between security and liberty: they can have them both.

But we can only strike the balance and ensure accountability if a serious Parliament holds the executive to account, in this case the European Parliament using its new powers under the Lisbon Treaty struck down a bad data sharing deal between the EU and US and literally built a new transparent and effective agreement.