GB: We must never be an empty chair in Europe again
You know, there's three million reasons why we need to be part of the European Union, and they're called jobs. Three million jobs depend on our membership of the European Union. Half our trade is with the European Union. 750,000 businesses - I'm sorry it's not your business, raising the question about the building trade - but 750,000 businesses trade with Europe. The idea that we should again be isolated and on the margins and not in the mainstream of Europe would be a terrible, terrible mistake. Now, I worked with the European leaders through the global financial crisis. I had to persuade them that we had to restructure our banks and they had to restructure their banks. I had to persuade them they had to work with America in the G20, but when Europe and America works together, we are so much stronger. Stronger to deal with climate change, which is one much my priorities, stronger to deal with the economy, stronger to deal with international crime, stronger to deal with terrorism, let us never again be an empty chair in Europe. My fear is that David's policy would put us in that position.

Imagine a European Council meeting if David Cameron was in in charge two months from now. He'd have to go along as he said and say he wanted to repatriate the social chapter. That's what gives us paid holidays. He'd have to break up the European Union meeting and say, "Look, 26 of you are against this, I'm the only one who's standing for this". And what would happen? We are trying to get an economic recovery. That depends on economic recovery, depending on Germany, France and other countries growing as well. Taking our exports. We have to get an agreement on climate change because of what happened at Copenhagen. Again, that would be postponed because we would be having a big argument as we did in the past with a Conservative government about repatriating powers in Britain. We've got other props we've got to deal with and these include security and terrorism. These are the issues. Let's look to the future. Let's not have a Britain-only solution and let's not go back to the days when we were fighting with the rest of Europe in the past.

Immediately related elementsHow this works
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Visualizing the Prime Ministerial Debates »Visualizing the Prime Ministerial Debates
International questions »International questions
A. How would you tackle EU interference? »A. How would you tackle EU interference?
GB: We must never be an empty chair in Europe again
Conservatives would take Britain out of the mainstream of Europe »Conservatives would take Britain out of the mainstream of Europe
Must recognize and sort out problems with the EU »Must recognize and sort out problems with the EU
Work with the sensible people in Europe not the right-wing extremists »Work with the sensible people in Europe not the right-wing extremists
3m jobs depend on our membership of the EU »3m jobs depend on our membership of the EU
750,000 UK businesses trade with Europe »750,000 UK businesses trade with Europe
Half our trade is with the EU »Half our trade is with the EU
We are stronger when we work together with Europe »We are stronger when we work together with Europe
Gordon Brown (International) »Gordon Brown (International)
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