asked the Minister of Aviation Supply when he expects to receive the report of the external accountants on Rolls-Royce.

asked the Minister of Aviation Supply if he will make a further statement on the Government loan to Rolls-Royce.

I expect to receive the accountant's report in the early part of next year. There is nothing to add at present to my previous statements about the additional launching aid which will be given to Rolls-Royce to enable it to complete development of the RB211–22 engine.—[Vol. 806, c. 398–407; Vol. 807, c. 149–58.]

Will it, perhaps understandably, be confidential?

Yes. I do not anticipate for one moment that it will be appropriate to publish the report to which the hon. Gentleman refers.

What will the Minister do if as a result of the accountant's report it is shown that more than the £42 million is required? Would the right hon. Gentleman come to the House and ask for a further increase in the loan?

I would do what anyone else would do: consider the matter as it arises and not jump fences before reaching them.

Is there any precedent for the Government refusing to publish accountants' reports on matters which involve the investment of large sums of public funds? How are we to judge whether the further investment in Rolls-Royce is indeed justified if we are debarred from close scrutiny of the professional accountant's report?

The accountant's report will go into far greater detail than the question to which my hon. Friend refers. When it is available I shall consider what information from it is appropriate to be disclosed in relation to this problem.

Will the Minister confirm that, whatever the accountant's report discloses, the amount which he has already informed this House that the Government will invest will still be invested?

Yes. I think that that is a glimpse of the obvious.

Order. I understand that the amplification has been restored. Hon. Members will still do well to speak up.

asked the Minister of Aviation Supply whether he will publish the Industrial Reorganisation Corporation's Report on Rolls-Royce.

The report is a confidential document which it would be quite improper to publish.

Is my right hon. Friend aware that before the last debate on Rolls-Royce that company, despite receiving £89 million of the taxpayers' money, circulated absolutely no information to hon. Members about its affairs? Will he make sure that in future companies in receipt of huge sums of public money are forced to make the facts and figures available to this House?

This is a most important aspect and one which I am considering very closely in relation to the terms of the contract that will govern the launching aid which I mentioned in my statement.

Will not the right hon. Gentleman admit that his policy has not saved Rolls-Royce but has merely propped it up a little? Would he agree that the substitution of civil servants, able though they are—nevertheless derided by some of his hon. Friends—is no substitute for the I.R.C., particularly at this critical stage of relationships with Rolls-Royce?

I remind the hon. Gentleman of what I have said previously—that the I.R.C. was not designed primarily for this sort of exercise and that it had considerable defects because of its inability to carry out this type of investigation. If the hon. Gentleman will refer to what his right hon. Friend the Member for Bristol, South-East (Mr. Benn) said during the discussion of the Industrial Expansion Bill, he will see these words:

"Schemes under the Bill, just like work done by the I.R.C, would be of such a nature that the tightest security would be necessary on commercial and financial grounds."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 1st Feb., 1968; Vol. 757, c. 1582.]