Commons Chamber

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House Of Commons

Thursday 8 March 1979

The House met at half-past Two o'clock

PRAYERS

[Mr. SPEAKER in the Chair]

Private Business

BRITISH RAILWAYS (NO. 2) BILL ( By Order)

CHESHIRE COUNTY COUNCIL BILL [ Lords] ( By Order)

Orders for Second Reading read.

To be read a Second time upon Thursday next.

COUNTY OF MERSEYSIDE BILL [ Lords] ( By Order)

Order for Second Reading read.

To be read a Second time upon Tuesday next at Seven o'clock.

EAST KILBRIDE DISTRICT COUNCIL BILL ( By Order)

GREATER LONDON COUNCIL (GENERAL POWERS) BILL ( By Order)

LONDON TRANSPORT BILL ( By Order)

Orders for Second Reading read.

To be read a Second time upon Thursday next.

Oral Answers To Questions

Northern Ireland

Retention Of Troops

asked the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland if he will make a statement on the long-term retention of troops in Northern Ireland.

The role of the Army in Northern Ireland is to provide necessary support for the Royal Ulster Constabulary. The troops will be maintained at a level appropriate to the terrorist threat.

Does my right hon. Friend accept that it is recognised that the troops do a difficult and often dangerous job but that it is essentially a policing role which sometimes sits uneasily on their shoulders? Can he give any indication of when he sees the possibility of some diminution of the role of the Army—by partial or complete withdrawal in, for example, five years? What move is the Secretary of State making to facilitate that sort of move?

I have often said to the House that force levels will be maintained in Northern Ireland according to the security threat within the Province. We are making good progress. We now have six garrison units in Northern Ireland which are on 18-month tours. That means that about 6,000 or 7,000 personnel now serve four-month tours, and therefore that role is lessening as the garrison strength is reinforced. That is a noticeable step towards normality.

Last year we withdrew 1,000 troops because we thought that the threat had lessened sufficiently to allow such a reduction, and that is how I shall have to treat the matter in the future.

Does the Secretary of State agree that the Army has a role in Northern Ireland other than that of supporting the RUC? The Army has the role of garrisoning that part of the United Kingdom as part of the military strategy of the country?

Yes. The right hon. Gentleman is quite right, I think that many people in Great Britain tend to forget that Northern Ireland is part of the United Kingdom and therefore must have its garrison strength in the same way as Scotland, Wales and England.

In view of recent tragic events, has my right hon. Friend reviewed the suitability of young soldiers serving up to a maximum of three tours in Northern Ireland? Has he any intention of reviewing this matter, perhaps to impose a limit of two tours on such young soldiers?

That is not a matter for me specifically. It is for my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Defence. I have visited Northern Ireland for the past five years both as Secretary of State for Defence and as Secretary of State for Northern Ireland, and I have met the troops in all their roles—whether in Belfast, Londonderry or in the country—on many occasions. I have always found that their morale is very high. If they do go back on more than one tour, and it is to a different location within the Province, they find it interesting and regard it as part of their task as members of Her Majesty's Forces.

The tragic events to which my hon. Friend referred might or might not have occurred because of stress and strain. That has not yet been judged. I am not aware that that is prevalent among Her Majesty's Forces in the Province.

Is it not plain that the emotional call by the hon. Member for Keighley (Mr. Cryer) for a premature withdrawal of troops merely encourages the IRA to throw bombs and commit other acts in the hope that our nerve will break?

I do not think that my hon. Friend the Member for Keighley (Mr. Cryer) was pressing hard for immediate or rapid withdrawal of troops from Northern Ireland. However, people who involve themselves in what is called the "troops out" movement are certainly giving succour and solace to the Provisional IRA—they get the joy, but the people of the Province do not want the troops to withdraw.

Is not it a fact that throughout the five years that my right hon. Friend has been going to Northern Ireland he has found no comparison between the garrison in that part of the United Kingdom and garrisons in other parts of the United Kingdom where the troops do not roar round the streets armed to the teeth? Is it not a fact that at one time during the five years that my right hon Friend has been going to Northern Ireland, when he was Secretary of State for Defence, he made a speech in which he suggested that the Army might be withdrawn from Northern Ireland?

My hon. Friend fully realises that the reason why the troops do not run about with guns in their hands in England, Scotland and Wales is that they do not have to.

Political Discussions

asked the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland if he will summarise the progress of his new approach to political parties in the Province about a measure of devolution for Northern Ireland.

asked the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland if he will make a statement on recent political developments in Northern Ireland.

The leaders of three of the four main parties in Northern Ireland have replied to my letter of 16 January in which I set out the basis on which I believed that political progress could be made. I have received no formal reply from the Social Democratic and Labour Party, but I understand that it is preparing a policy statement. I have had further correspondence with the leaders of the Ulster Unionist Party and the Democratic Unionist Party to clarify certain issues. I hope soon to have further bilateral talks.

In a recent copy of Ulster Commentary the Secretary of State talks about the need to find common ground before any move towards devolution can take place. Is there any sign of that common ground in the reply that he has received? Does he think that the time has come to share his thoughts and those of the political parties in Northern Ireland with the House of Commons by publishing a Green Paper?

I do not think that it is necessary to publish a Green Paper. Those who take an interest in Northern Ireland affairs are fully aware of the problems. I am seeking common ground and appealing to the parties to take that approach. They often talk about their long-term aspirations—that highlights the differences between the major parties—instead of considering their short term aspirations and finding some common ground so that the common goal of devolution may be achieved.

Will the right hon. Gentleman assure the House that in the few remaining weeks available to him he will make a full attempt to achieve devolved government based on the principle of partnership and will not merely kick into touch?

I have no intention of kicking into touch. I have been constantly in communication with the four major parties to try to move on this plane of discussion towards devolution. Some of the party leaders probably feel that a general election is in the air, whether that is a British or European election. There is posturing by the political parties. No matter when the election comes and no matter who stands at the Dispatch Box as Secretary of State for Northern Ireland, the House has taken the decision that there should be devolution acceptable to the majority and the minority. That will have to be faced in due course no matter who stands at the Dispatch Box as Secretary of State for Northern Ireland.

Will the right hon. Gentleman undertake to study the Hansard report of last night's debate, in which he will find that all hon. Members representing Northern Ireland parties were agreed that bodies such as the housing executive should be brought under the control of and made accountable to locally elected representatives?

I undertake to read the views of the hon. Gentleman and his hon. Friends on that topic. I was in the Province yesterday. I lunched with the whole of the Northern Ireland Housing Executive. It has done and is doing a good job.

No.

Most people in the Province realise that more of them are getting a fairer housing deal now than they were some years ago.

Is not it a fact that up to the moment the political parties in Northern Ireland have not shifted on the restoration of majority rule in my right hon. Friend's discussions with them? Is not that completely opposed to the precept of the British Government, who are seeking a partnership administration that would bring broadly acceptable solutions to the problems in Northern Ireland? That is why there has been no progress in the talks.

I have continually stressed that if devolution in Northern Ireland is to be achieved it will have to be on a basis that is acceptable to all the parties in the Province and acceptable to the majority and minority communities. The demand for the restoration of a majority convention is often put to me by the Democratic Unionist Party and the official Unionist Party. However, my hon. Friend will recognise that the unionist parties were prepared to discuss with me something less than their demand for a majority convention. That in itself has been a progressive step towards finding a solution.

Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that he should take the advice of the hon. Member for Antrim, South (Mr. Molyneaux) and read the Hansard report of last night's debate? If he does so, he will recognise that there is full justification for having a locally elected forum in Northern Ireland. Is he aware that we regret that such little progress has so far been made with his plans for interim devolution? Does he not think that the appointment of an eminent judicial figure or other person, not to delay decisions but to work out a formula for one or more widely acceptable elected regional councils, is the answer?

I am aware of that view. Harry West, who is the leader of the official Unionist Party, has discussed openly the various alternatives. If they could obtain and if there could be a major form of local government in Northern Ireland based on majority rule. that would satisfy the Unionists but it would not satisfy the minority in the Province. I am aware of the hon. Gentleman's proposal, but I do not think that that is worth considering until I finalise the bilateral talks with the official parties.

Will my right hon. Friend give an undertaking that it will not be Her Majesty's Government's intention to seek to prolong their life by making an agreement on local government reform in Northern Ireland so as to get the Ulster Unionists into the Government Lobby?

I think that my hon. Friend can rest assured that I shall not make any pact, deal or agreement of that sort.

Will the right hon. Gentleman take it from me that the vast majority in Northern Ireland do not want local government reform? Does he agree that the majority want a devolved parliament and devolved government in Northern Ireland? Will he give an assurance that the people of Northern Ireland will have the same right as the people of Wales and Scotland to express their view in a referendum when Parliament comes up with a so-called solution, and that they will be able to decide whether that is acceptable to them?

I think that the hon. Gentleman is correct in saying that the majority want devolution to Northern Ireland. As for a referendum, we had better wait and see what sort of devolution proposals are brought before Parliament and whether Parliament wants to take that decision about a referendum.

asked the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland what plans he has to hold discussions with the Social Democratic and Labour Party of Northern Ireland.

I hope that the leaders of all four major parties in Northern Ireland including the Social Democratic and Labour Party, will agree to join with me in a further exploration of arrangements which could lead to the creation of an acceptable form of devolved government.

I thank my right hon. Friend for that answer. In view of his answer to an earlier question, does he agree that throughout the years of the terrible emergency in Northern Ireland, especially for the people of Northern Ireland, the Social and Democratic Labour Party has been the firmest friend that the Government have had in Northern Ireland? Its leader, under terrible conditions, has always been in this place to sustain the Government. It is significant that there is laughter from the other side of the Chamber. However, in view of the change of policy of the Southern Irish Government, of the Opposition in Southern Ireland, Fine Gael, and the SDLP on the issue of the troops, will my right hon. Friend take the greatest care to ensure that what is a developing gulf between the British Government and the SDLP is healed as quickly as possible so that we do not in any way blunder into widening the gulf?

I think that my hon. Friend has it wrong on many counts.

So the Opposition parties say.

No, so I say. I am trying to be fair to my hon. Friend. He must not make such generalisations, that will be heard and read in Northern Ireland, as if they are fact. The SDLP is not in favour of pulling out the troops from Northern Ireland.

I did not say that it was.

Neither is Fine Gael.

Stop misrepresenting my hon. Friend the Member for Sheffield, Hillsborough (Mr. Flannery).

On a point of order, Mr. Speaker.

Will the hon. Member for Sheffield, Hillsborough (Mr. Flannery) leave his point of order until the end of Question Time?

I should prefer to make it now, Mr. Speaker.

If the hon. Gentleman wishes to make it now, I shall answer it quickly.

My right hon. Friend the Secretary of State, albeit innocently perhaps, is totally distorting my supplementary question. I said "In view of the change of policy" about the troops. I did not say anything about troops out.

But what changes of policy have there been?

If you do not know, who does?

Her Majesty's Government have not changed the policy on troops. In its recent paper Fine Gael did not say that the troops should be withdrawn. The SDLP at its last major conference decided that withdrawal of British troops was desirable and inevitable but should be in keeping with a political solution. That is the core of the matter and that is what we must try to do.

Order. We are proceeding very slowly. Supplementary questions and answers should be briefer.

When the Secretary of State meets the leaders of the SDLP, will he again press them not only to support the RUC, but to encourage young Roman Catholics in Northern Ireland to join?

That would be a most helpful initiative from political and Church leaders. With the remarkable success of the RUC, and its increased credibility and esteem in the Province, it would be good to get more of the minority community involved in law and order. After the court case of the Shankill butchers, no one can say that the RUC is leaning one way or the other.

Maze Prison (H Block)

asked the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland what new measures he intends to undertake to counter misleading propaganda about H block, Maze prison.

I realise that the public need to have accurate information about the protest against the refusal of special category status. A detailed memorandum about the protest was recently placed in the library of the House, I have resumed annual general interest visits by Members of Parliament; and I am considering whether there is scope for visits on a wider basis. I shall keep in mind the possibility of further broadsheets on the lines of the one published last month.

As the self-inflicted condition of some prisoners has recently gained notoriety, will the Minister initiate a major exercise to ensure that the facts are known at home and abroad? Will he at the same time emphasise the great forbearance of members of the prison staff who have been working under such difficulties?

I thank the hon. Member for the compliment to the prison staff. The prison staff in Northern Ireland have had much to put up with, not only because of that protest but in their work generally. We are working hard to counter the IRA propaganda, and would appreciate help and assistance from any hon. Member.

Is not the best way to counteract that propaganda by allowing the Red Cross and a delegation from this House—and not a hand-picked delegation—to go in and have a look?

A joint visit from the House has taken place. I asked the chairman of the Labour Party's Northern Ireland group, if he would go. He is elected by the members of that group. The previous night we stayed in the House until the early hours of the morning arguing the issue. My hon. Friend the Member for Kingston upon Hull, Central (Mr. McNamara), who can well look after himself, will take those remarks badly.

Is the Minister aware that the Secretary of State is greatly to be congratulated on his robust observations in an interview a fortnight ago on "Panorama"? But should not the Government react in future more rapidly to combat malicious statements, especially in the United States of America? Is he prepared to discuss with the Opposition and hon. Members for Northern Ireland in this House joint action to ensure that the United Kingdom's case is fully understood by American and European opinion?

At present much is being done in this field, but, as I said, any help or assistance will be appreciated.

I am grateful for the Minister's compliment that I can look after myself, particularly as I have been looking after him for the past 13 years. But perhaps in many ways the victims of the unhappy situation are not the men in H block or the prison warders, but the relatives of both groups? We should find some way to convince those relatives that the men are being treated properly and fairly as possible in the conditions that they have imposed on themselves. Privilege visits should be allowed for the sake of the relatives, if not the men.

That point emerged when the visit to the Maze occurred. That and other considerations that arose on humanitarian grounds are being considered. But it is a propaganda exercise by the men to regain special status. We must be careful therefore not to weaken in our attitude.

Public Investment

asked the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland what has been the total public investment in Northern Ireland since February 1974.

Over the five financial years from 1974–75 to 1978–79 about £1,850 million will have been used for capital investment purposes on services for which my right hon. Friend is responsible. Total public expenditure on those services over the same period was approximately £7,900 million.

Does the Minister agree that every man, woman and child in Northern Ireland has benefited from public expenditure? Because of that, will he also agree that it is hypocritical for a Northern Ireland public representative to oppose public expenditure or indeed to offer comfort and allegiance to the Conservative Party, which is pledged massively to reduce public expenditure throughout the United Kingdom?

Northern Ireland has benefited from the regional policy of the United Kingdom as a whole, and if we have a regional policy, it deserves to. I have often twitted Conservative Members for voting one way the previous night and asking me for money the next day, but they say that they are voting politically and not economically.

Will the Minister confirm that the Government believe that it is necessary to put a limit on public expenditure, and the issue is the priorities within that limit?

Priorities in public expenditure are always important. But Northern Ireland has a generous share of public expenditure.

Is the present net annual cost to the British taxpayer of sustaining Northern Ireland as part of this policy approximately £1,500 million? Is not a political party that claims to represent Northern Ireland but which for ideological reasons presumes to criticise our attitude to public expenditure, playing a peculiar double game, which we hope will back-fire on it.

My job is to look after the affairs of Northern Ireland and the people of the Province. If we are to have a regional policy, we should be aware that in Northern Ireland we have one of our poorer areas. We should take pride in our efforts here. I wish that that would have greater recognition.

Republic Of Ireland (Foreign Minister)

asked the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland whether he will make a statement about the recent discussions with the Foreign Minister of the Irish Republic.

asked the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland if he will make a statement on his meeting on 14 February with the Foreign Minister of the Irish Republic.

On 14 February I met the Minister for Foreign Affairs of the Republic of Ireland in London.

Our discussions were wide-ranging and constructive and followed in the series of regular contacts which our two Governments have established. They covered political developments, security co-operation and economic questions.

In what areas are the Republic of Ireland Government not taking measures of cross-border security which he would like them to take?

I cannot honestly and frankly give a list to the House. We have progressively developed our co-operation across the border. We now have as good a co-operation as we could wish between the RUC and the Garda. When the bombings occurred last November, the Garda successfully stopped a car and arrested five of its occupants who were fleeing from a raid in Londonderry back to Donegal. Contacts by telephone have been made right along the border between the RUC and the Garda. There is a regular exchange between the RUC Chief Constable and the Garda Commissioner. Between us we are doing our utmost to ensure that the border is lessened in importance for the Provos.

Would it be a correct inference from the Secretary of State's original answer that relations between the Republic of Ireland and this country have improved? Has the Secretary of State been able to put over the argument that, in countering terrorism in the whole of Ireland, we must look at that island as one area and that no one part of it can contract out of the operation?

Yes, it is true that relations between the British Government and the Republic are good. The Irish Government have recognised and said publicly, as we have, that the Provisional IRA in the whole of Ireland is our common enemy. I must give credit to the Taoiseach, Jack Lynch, for the sterling effort that he has made in the United States of America to explain the truth about the Provisional IRA's main goal and objective, and this has cut back the flow of funds to its cause.

In that part of the discussion which related to security, did the participants recognise that it is not only the IRA which is the common enemy of the Irish people? The Shankill butchers, for example, are also the common enemy of the Irish people. Did they, at any time, discuss the derisory and insulting compensation which is given to people who have succeeded in bringing before the courts people like the Shankill butchers? Will the right hon. Gentleman indicate that he regards this whole question of compensation in such circumstances as being so ludicrous that his Department will look at it again?

Yes, we recognise that there is more than one paramilitary organisation in Northern Ireland. The IRA is not the only one. My hon. Friend the Member for Belfast, West (Mr. Fitt) must also recognise that the RUC has proved that it was active against the Ulster Defence Association and others involved with it. The RUC found a cache of arms and bomb-making equipment in its headquarters in Belfast recently. This has been highlighted in the Province, and the Foreign Secretary of the Republic and I are fully aware of it.

I am sorry that my hon. Friend is exploiting the case of Mr. McLaverty in the way that he is. An offer of £750 was made to Mr. McLaverty nearly a year ago, but as soon as the court case began the negotiations were held up. It has become evident during the court case that the man is suffering mentally more than people imagined a year ago. The negotiations between the parties have begun, and that is now sub judice until an agreement on the final offer is made.

What exactly is cross-border security when 22 Provisional IRA men can gather arms in the Republic and take three vehicles into my constituency? Luckily they were chased back by the soldiers but a few days later they were able to hijack a lorry in the Republic, drive it to Keady in County Armagh and murder two innocent Roman Catholic boys. If such things can happen, how good is cross-border security?

It is not an easy matter when there are 280 miles of border. There is no doubt that this fact has been exploited, particularly by the Provisional IRA. We can only hope that the growing co-operation between the RUC and the Garda will lessen that sort of operation.

In view of the fact that there is little difference of opinion between the two Front Benches in this House, judging by the exchanges so far today, will the Secretary of State indicate how he is operating in order to prevent the Leader of the Oppostion from taking his position after the next election? Is he aware that such a development would result in a considerable worsening of the situation in Northern Ireland?

I do not take the position that the Conservatives will succeed. I shall go into battle and I intend to win. However, we have an agreement that on security, economic progress and political advancement in Northern Ireland there is a bipartisan policy. I think that we are making progress on all three fronts—none of them is static.

I fully appreciate that Mr. Lynch's Government are as anxious as anyone else to see an end to terrorism in Ireland. However, is it not sad that the law which allows the courts in the South to try people accused of acts of terrorism in the North has not functioned nearly as well as we had hoped?

The Criminal Jurisdiction Act 1976 is in operation. There have been three convictions in the North under our Act, and one conviction in the South under their comparable Act.

Security

10.

asked the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland whether he will make a statement about the security position.

13.

asked the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland if he will make a statement about the security of the Province.

In the past five weeks, five civilians and one soldier have met their deaths at the hands of terrorists. Among the civilians, two teenage boys were killed by a bomb intended for a security force patrol. Five persons have so far been charged in respect of three of these killings. So far this year, the level of terrorist attacks against commercial premises has been relatively low, but the security forces remain alert to the terrorists' capability and will continue to counter all aspects of the threat. This is illustrated by the recovery earlier this week of over 40 explosive devices during a planned RUC search of the Short Strand area of Belfast.

I congratulate the armed forces on their success and steadfastness in protecting the people of Northern Ireland. Is it not plain that much of the intelligence needed for a successful operation such as the disarming of the 42 bombs in Belfast the other night depends on the successful interrogation of suspects by skilled interrogators? Is it not true that anything that limits such interrogation is harmful to the protection of the community?

First and foremost, it depends upon intelligence. The British Army now, using the SAS and special patrol groups in each battalion, has built up a good intelligence network in the Province, and that is bearing fruit. It is an indication of how the Army manages to get sufficient information to thwart planned attacks upon the Province. I am aware that interrogation plays a part, but it must be done fairly and properly without anyone feeling that extraction of information is being got by other than fair means.

At this time, when the House and the people of Northern Ireland feel a particular debt of gratitude to the security forces, will the Government not be deterred by surmountable problems of comparability in other services and come to a decision on the award of a general service medal to the RUC and the RUC Reserve? Does not the Secretary of State agree that a long time has elapsed since my hon. Friend the Member for Abingdon (Mr. Neave) and the hon. Member for Antrim, South (Mr. Molyneaux) raised this matter?

I am aware of the calls that have been made by hon. Members opposite, but I am not satisfied that the RUC particularly wants this sort of recognition. Its members get regular recognition in the gallantry awards and distinctions that are given to them every year in the Honours List.

In view of the Secretary of State's concern about the amount of propaganda for the IRA, will he ensure that taxpayers' money is not used to give Seamus Twomey another opportunity to ventilate his views through the Arts Council or any other body in Northern Ireland which is financed from British taxpayers' money?

No doubt this was raised during yesterday's debate, but, to be fair, the hon. Gentleman should recognise that offers are made to many other people to put forward their views in some of these magazines. I was not particularly aware of the case of Seamus Twomey. I shall certainly have a look at it.

On a point of order, Mr. Speaker. May I be told why I have not been called to ask a supplementary question—

Order. Will the hon. Gentleman please wait until after Question Time to make his point of order? He will find that he has plenty of company.

Will the Secretary of State tell the House what contribution to the security of Northern Ireland was made by the arrest in Edinburgh on Monday of this week of Mr. Brendan Gallagher, a citizen of Strabane? That was his three hundred and sixty-third arrest at the hands of the British authorities.

First, that is a matter for the Home Secretary and not for me. Secondly, I am sure that Brendan Gallagher has taken my hon. Friend for a ride at least 300 times.

Select Committee On Procedure (Recommendation)

11.

asked the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland what consideration he has given to paragraph 2.40 of the First Report from the Select Committee on Procedure so far as it relates to Northern Ireland.

The Government will shortly be putting forward proposals to the House for the further consideration of the Procedure Committee's report.

I recognise the improvement in the process of legislation for Northern Ireland due to the negative procedure clause device, but may I ask the Minister to discuss with his colleague the Lord President of the Council the advantages of the procedure recommended by the Select Committee, following on the recommendation of the Renton committee's report, to meet his wish to keep the Northern Ireland statute book intact?

I am obliged to the right hon. Gentleman. As he knows, I should like to keep the Northern Ireland statute book intact. I shall have discussions with my right hon. Friend the Leader of the House because of the specific reference to Northern Ireland in the report.

Prisoners

12.

asked the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland if he will list the nature of the offences for which prisoners in Northern Ireland who are currently engaged in unhygienic and other protests were convicted.

The great majority of the prisoners protesting for special category status at Maze prison have been convicted of very serious crimes. Of 369 protesting on 28 February, 54 were convicted of murder, 57 of attempted murder, 110 of explosive offences and 91 of firearms offences.

Does my right hon. Friend agree that that information should not be overlooked? Will he tell us what arrangements are being made in the case of those prisoners known to the House as the Shankill butchers?

I assure my hon. Friend that I do not overlook the figures and the persons who have committed those crimes. The notorious Shankill butchers will not be given special category status, because some of their heinous crimese were committed after 1 March 1976.

Will the right hon. Gentleman tell us how many of those prisoners who are "on the blanket" are believed to be members of the official IRA?

I do not differentiate between prisoners. They are there for their crimes, and I shall not differentiate between them one way or the other.

My right hon. Friend will recognise that the IRA propaganda is to the effect that many of those prisoners in block H in the Maze prison are there because of false confessions, whether that is to be believed or not. Has my right hon. Friend the report of the Bennett committee, which inquired into the interrogation methods of the RUC in Castlereagh, on his desk? When will the report be published?

The report has been submitted to my right hon. Friend and will be published shortly. My hon. Friend will have to wait for the publication. The prisoners are in prisons for the crimes that they have committed. They have gone through the courts and are there to serve their sentences.

Is the Minister aware that the conditions in the Maze prison, particularly in H block which I have visited, are considerably better than the normal conditions of United Kingdom prisons?

I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for his remarks. Most hon. Members who have tearaway constituents in prisons in the United Kingdom know that the constituents do not have the benefits that prisoners in the Maze and other prisons in Northern Ireland are entitled to.

Will the Minister tell the House if any of the men who were on these protests have now ceased them?

This is a continuing process. In December, 12 prisoners went on protest and eight came off; in January, 17 prisoners went on protest and eight came off and in February, 14 prisoners went on protest and 11 came off. During the period of the protest, more than 50 prisoners who have been on protest have come off.

Nationalised Industries

Q1.

asked the Prime Minister when he plans next to meet the heads of nationalised industries.

I do not meet the heads of nationalised industries as a group, but I see them individually from time to time.

Will my right hon. Friend make a special effort to meet the chairman of British Shipbuilders to discuss how efficiency in the shipbuilding industry can be rewarded, not just in terms of wages but in security of employment? Will my right hon. Friend arrange to have discussions with the chairman of British Shipbuiders and Government Departments to see that orders are brought forward early in order to provide jobs which would help companies such as the excellent one in my own constituency, Hall Russell?

I shall convey the views of my hon. Friend to the Secretary of State for Industry. He is considering the corporate plan put forward by British Shipbuilders. As regards security for the future, shipbuilding industries all over the world face redundancies because of the shortage of orders. We have attempted to safeguard the position of workers in British shipyards as far as possible through our intervention funds.

Could the Prime Minister persuade the chairman of British Rail that, before large sums of additional money are spent on projects such as the high-speed train, something should be done to restore to the hundreds and thousands of London commuters a modest standard of civilised comfort?

I shall convey the hon. Gentleman's remarks to my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Transport. In trying to improve the conditions of commuters, which I hope is the constant preoccupation of those concerned, I hope that we shall not depart from recognising the great benefit that the high-speed trains provide. They are a good advertisement for British enterprise.

Will my right hon. Friend include among his visits to the nationalised industries a visit to the Governor of the Bank of England to discuss with him the unedifying aspects of the tap stocks and security lodgings on 22 February? Does my right hon. Friend agree that those matters were about as edifying as the Gadarene swine rushing to the Sea of Galilee?

My hon. Friend is under a misapprehension. I am not proposing to visit the heads of nationalised industries. He has made that deduction, no doubt, in order to get in his supplementary question. As regards the conditions on the issue of the last tap stocks, many of us have felt for some time that there is a good case for reviewing the methods of funding the Government debt. The methods do not seem to be based on logic at present.

Does not the right hon. Gentleman recognise that the list of nationalised firms is over 14 ft long and consists of more than 1,000 firms? The sooner the list is abolished, the sooner the national economy will improve.

I do not agree with the hon. Gentleman. I have the list before me and I note that a great many of the major concerns are able, as a result of their surpluses, to finance their own capital investment, to the tune of more than £2 billion a year. It seems an odd day for the hon. Gentleman to talk of reducing the list. The Opposition spokesman on shipbuilding has just announced that one of the first actions of a Conservative Government would be to abandon their plans to denationalise shipbuilding.

Trades Union Congress

Q2.

asked the Prime Minister when he plans next to meet the Trades Union Congress.

I meet representatives of the TUC from time to time at the National Economic Development Council and on other occasions. Further meetings will be arranged as necessary.

Those of us on this side of the House welcome, as does the TUC, the appointment of the Standing Commission on comparability which the Prime Minister announced yesterday, but is my right hon. Friend aware that an incomes policy for the next pay round will not work unless the work of the Commission is extended to consider private sector settlements, where the leapfrogging starts?

There has been a welcome for the establishment of the Standing Commission, except on the Conservative Benches where, as The Daily Telegraph said today, there was nothing but scorn. It would be helpful if the Opposition would tell us whether the Commission is one of the institutions which they propose to abandon if they ever get the chance of coming to office. That would influence a great many people in their approach to these questions.

On the general matter of the relationship of the Commission to the private sector, I think that we should wait and see how the Commission develops. I am certain that there must be a period of experiment first in order to see whether the Commission can establish the authority that I believe would introduce a much better atmosphere into the sectors of the economy that it will handle.

When the Prime Minister meets the TUC, will he discuss the pay of ambulance men? Is he aware that three services—the ambulance men, police and the fire brigade—are called to accidents? Does he agree that the pay of ambulance men should be considered by the Standing Commission on the basis that the ambulance service is an emergency service comparable to the other two?

It would be quite improper for me to do any such thing. The purpose of the Commission will be to examine all those sorts of arguments advanced by the ambulance men or others and to reach conclusions on them. There is no point in setting up such a Commission, only for hon. Members to ask me to declare myself on what should be the basis of its judgments.

When the Prime Minister meets the TUC, will he explain why the nurses, who will not strike, are being offered the same pay rise as are employees who are prepared to use patients as hostages in their pay battle? Is that not another example of the Government conveying that militancy pays and dedication to duty does not?

That is an entirely false conclusion. I do not know that we should introduce, as a basis for fixing remuneration, the question whether people default on their duties.—[HON. MEMBERS: "Why not"?] Will hon. Members please hear me out? That matter should be dealt with by stopping the remuneration of those concerned when they strike. That is the way in which it should be done. The offer made to the nurses—and the House and the country should understand this—is worth more than £6 a week to an unqualified nurse, more than £7 a week to a qualified enrolled nurse and between £7 and £8 a week to the next grade up. In addition, an offer has been made that the nurses should go, without any reservations, and with the prior acceptance by the Government of any objective assessment, to the new comparability Commission. For anyone to suggest that such an offer is derisory is to lose touch with reality.

When my right hon. Friend next meets the TUC, will he discuss the trade deal with China? What assurances will he be able to give the TUC that, as a result of the deal, there will be no increased import penetration in sensitive industries such as textiles and footwear?

I cannot give any assurance today on those matters. It will clearly depend on the contracts that are entered into with China and I understand that they have still to be concluded. If we are to export, we must obviously import. Both sides of the equation go together, but we have taken action with selective import controls to protect some of our sensitive industries.

Prime Minister (Engagements)

Q3.

asked the Prime Minister if he will list his official engagements for Thursday 8th March.

This morning I presided at a meeting of the Cabinet. In addition to my duties in the House, I shall be holding further meetings with ministerial colleagues and others, including one with the president of the European Commission.

Now that the Prime Minister has had a week to ponder on the results of the referendums and also had the opportunity of a full Cabinet meeting, will he be more forthcoming about his intentions concerning the orders to annul the Scotland and Wales Acts? If it is not his intention imminently to lay the orders before the House, will he explain fully his reticence?

The hon. Gentleman is right. There was a discussion this morning and we are continuing our discussions on the matter. The House need not fear. We shall not unduly delay the laying of the orders. There is no intention to do that, but as I said on Tuesday—and I have nothing to add to that—there is a need to take time for a proper reflection of the matter and not to rush into decisions.

Could my right hon. Friend find time today to come to the London borough of Lewisham, where he once lived? Is he aware that if he did he would discover that, although, there is general satisfaction in the rest of the country that the local authority manual workers' strike is finishing, unofficial groups have stepped up action in Lewisham to the point where labour is being withdrawn even from homes for spastics? Will my right hon. Friend make clear that we on this side of the House condemn that sort of action as much as does anyone else?

My hon. Friend was good enough to ring 10 Downing Street about this matter last night and I am glad to say that those who assist me followed up the matter. I understand that there is a meeting this afternoon between the people concerned in Lewisham and I certainly hope that they will bring their action to an end. There is no authority for it in the agreement made with the TUC and that agreement is, I am glad to say, being increasingly observed.

May I press the Prime Minister a little further on his reply to my hon. Friend the Member for Hereford (Mr. Shepherd)? Does the Prime Minister recall that when he was interviewed on "Panorama" last week about what would happen to the Scottish and Welsh Assemblies in the event of the 40 per cent. rule not being reached, he replied with words to the effect that he would answer the question next week when he knew what the voting had been. Here we are in next week. Why does the Prime Minister still shrink from laying the orders and allowing the House time to debate them?

The answer may not be satisfactory to the right hon. Lady, but at least I have given it. Even I did not see at that time that the result would be so close. [Interruption.] I am sure that all Opposition Members foresaw that. They get everything right. When we have a result that is as close at is was in Scotland, we face a serious issue and the House should not take it lightly. Our task is to preserve the unity of the United Kingdom and the unity of Scotland. I do not intend to delay unduly on this matter, nor do I intend to be pushed into action just because Conservative Back Benchers are shouting at me. I give the right hon. Lady the further assurance that there will be no undue delay on this matter. It is 10 years since the argument started and two years since legislation was introduced. It is not unreasonable to have a few weeks to consider what should be done.

I invite the Prime Minister to look at what Mr. Gladstone said in 1890 on this matter. He complained that he had been endeavouring for four years to persuade the voters to accept Irish autonomy and pointed out that he had rolled the great stone up to the top of the hill only to see it roll down again. May I ask the Prime Minister not to let this matter rest for a few weeks without making any statement at all. The important thing is not whether the Act is repealed but whether the definition of a genuine form of devolution remains.

There is no doubt that the Government remain committed to a policy of devolution. How it is to be achieved is another matter. We are giving most earnest consideration to seeing how the matter raised by the right hon. Gentleman can be carried forward in the light of the majority that was secured in Scotland. I shall be ready to come to the House again after reasonable consideration. There will not be any undue delay. I ask the House to accept that. We shall come to the House and indicate what we think is the best way forward.

Is my right hon. Friend aware that most Scottish MPs sitting behind him at least applaud his decision to take some time over this matter? Will he remind the Leader of the Opposition that the "Yes" side actually won? Can my right hon. Friend think of any major Act of Parliament in this Parliament or any other Parliament in the last 20 years that could withstand successfully a well and mysteriously financed campaign of misrepresentation so successfully put to the nation?

Yes, Sir. What my right hon. Friend says is true. There was a majority.

Four to one against.

I am talking about Scotland. This needs to be taken carefully into account when the House decides what is the best way forward on this matter. It would be irresponsible to come forward at this stage when there is a majority and to say that all the wishes of that majority are to be flouted. That is why we need time to consider the matter and, if possible, to arrive at a conclusion. I would like a conclusion that was shared by the whole House, if such a thing were possible.

Since there was a clear majority for "Yes", and in view of the firm commitment of the Labour Party to provide Scotland with an assembly, will the Prime Minister explain why there should be any further delay?

I dare say that the right hon. Gentleman has not overlooked the fact that Parliament inserted certain provisions into the Act which have not been fulfilled in the result that was secured. It is this matter which must be taken into account by hon. Members and by the House as a whole.

Business Of The House

May I ask the Lord President of the Council to state the business for next week?

The business for next week will be as follows:

MONDAY 12 MARCH—Second Reading of the Local Government Grants (Ethnic Groups) Bill and of the Local Government Finance Bill.

TUESDAY 13 MARCH—Supply [11th allotted day]: debate on the operation of the courts in Scotland, which will arise on a motion for the Adjournment of the House. Proceedings on the following Lords consolidation measures:

Capital Gains Tax Bill.
Agricultural Statistics Bill.
Electricity (Scotland) Bill
Wages Councils Bill.

At Seven o'clock, the Chairman of Ways and Means has named opposed private business for consideration.

WEDNESDAY 14 MARCH—Remaining stages of the Industry Bill.

Motions on the European Assembly elections regulations.

THURSDAY 15 MARCH—Proceedings on the Consolidated Fund Bill.

FRIDAY 16 MARCH—Private Members' motions.

MONDAY 19 MARCH—Second Reading of the Road Traffic (Seat Belts) Bill.

Why has the Leader of the House not yet arranged a debate on the public expenditure White Paper? He is aware that it has been published for nearly two months and that the report from the Select Committee is now available. It is time the House had an opportunity to give its views on a matter central to the Budget, which will be coming soon. When will he arrange that debate?

The point raised by the right hon. Lady is a reasonable one, although I am sure that she takes into account, as I do and I think the House will, that the report of the Expenditure Committee came out last night and there has not been very long for the matter to be considered. I fully take into account what the right hon. Lady says. I hope to be able to make a statement about it next week.

Will the Leader of the House say when, at long last, the Northern Ireland homosexual offences draft order is to be laid before the House? Will he explain how a matter affecting men whose unfortunate and difficult destiny is to be homosexual should become the victim of squalid inter-party discussion? Will he remind the Unionist Party that in a unitary State it is essential that a man who has full civil freedom in Birmingham, Liverpool and London should not be treated as a criminal in Belfast?

This is not a matter that is subject to inter-party discussion in the formal manner suggested by my hon. Friend. He, as the principal author of the Bill that went through this House dealing with England, knows that it was Private Member's legislation. That is the normal method of dealing with this kind of legislation. That is not the only factor that is involved, but I cannot tell my hon. Friend exactly when we shall proceed further.

Would it not be for the general convenience of the House if the right hon. Gentleman told us which item of private business the Chairman of Ways and Means has named for consideration on Tuesday and made it his practice to do so generally?

There is a possibility of seeing whether that could be done as a normal method, but some considerations would have to be taken into account before that decision could be made.

Does the Leader of the House remember saying, at the end of the recent two-day debate on procedure under pressure from all parts of the House, that there would be an opportunity of a further day on which a decision in principle could be taken on some of the specific recommendations of the report on procedure? Would he indicate when that further day might be given?

I stand by what I said at the end of that debate, namely, that we should have discussions on the matter. I said that I was prepared to have those discussions through the usual channels and through some of the unusual channels. I think that that undertaking was generally accepted by the House, and we are proceeding on that basis.

At the time of the last business questions before the short recess for devolution, the right hon. Gentleman was kind enough to say that the Government would consider either a debate or a statement on the question of sending observers to monitor the Rhodesian elections. What progress has been made? Can we hope for a statement in the coming week?

I have nothing further to say on that subject. A considerable amount of time is available before the event might take place.

I wish to pursue the question of the orders for the repeal of the Scotland and Wales Acts. If the Leader of the House is not prepared to be firmer than the Prime Minister on the timetable, will he at least indicate what will be his advice to his own party? Will there be a vote of confidence on this issue, thereby reflecting the election manifesto commitment, or are we to see a continuing lack of commitment from the Labour Party, whose own inactivity contributed to the low majority?

I cannot accept the comments made by the hon. Lady in the latter part of her intervention. I thought that the statement made by my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister a few minutes ago on this subject commanded universal satisfaction throughout the House.

Is my right hon. Friend aware that the bringing forward of the seat belts legislation will be widely welcomed, particularly by motoring organisations and the medical profession? The legislation will save over 1,000 lives and many tens of thousands of serious injuries every year. Will the Government do everything possible to see that the Bill gets a fair wind through the House and reaches the statute book?

My hon. Friend knows as well as any hon. Member how these matters proceed through the House. He knows that this is a controversial measure. The Government are carrying out the obligations and undertakings that we previously made on the subject.

Does the Lord President agree that it is just as important for the House to have an opportunity to vote upon the devolution orders as it is for those orders to be laid? Will he give a guarantee this afternoon that, as soon as the orders are laid, we shall have an opportunity to vote on them, or will he be a deputy violet and shrink from that as well?

I do not know from where the hon. Gentleman gets his violet ideas. It must be from the tie that he is wearing. There is certainly nothing retiring in my attitude to this matter. As I said before, I think that the Prime Minister has dealt with this question, and I advise the hon. Gentleman and the rest of the House to await the further statement on the subject that the Government will obviously make.

Does my right hon. Friend recall that it is now some weeks since he advised me that it would be necessary for the Cabinet to think very seriously about the rejection by the House of Lords of the further inquiry into Bingham? What consideration has been given to this? Can he tell us quite specifically that, as soon as possible, he will lay a resolution empowering this House to set up the commission of inquiry that is now urgently needed?

I recall very well the exchanges on this subject that I had with my hon. Friend at the conclusion of that debate. What he prophesied, or at any rate feared, has come to pass, namely, that another place did not accept the motion in the terms that were accepted by the House. That poses important questions for the House, and I believe that the matter will have to be brought back for it to decide, because it is this House of Commons that should have the final word on such questions. However, we are having discussions to see how best we can proceed in that direction.

On the question of observers at the Rhodesian elections, will the right hon. Gentleman consider the possibility of sending them as representatives not of the Government but of Parliament? Will he look up the precedent of Mr. Herbert Morrison in December 1945, when observers from Parliament—not from the Government—were sent to the Indian sub-continent?

I think that the situation in the Indian sub-continent in 1946–47 was very different from the situation in Rhodesia at the present time. One of the differences was that the Indian Government at that time were not in rebellion against this House of Commons and its authority. But, as I said in response to the right hon. Member for Brighton, Pavilion (Mr. Amery), there is some time yet before we have to decide the matter.

Can my right hon. Friend tell us when we are likely to have a debate on the renewal of the Prevention of Terrorism Act order? Will he confirm that we shall have a debate on the Shackleton report at the same time, and give an undertaking that it will be a longer debate?

I cannot now give my hon. Friend the answer for which she asks, but I shall certainly examine the matter and see whether I can communicate with her and with other hon. Members who are interested, in order to give some indication within the next few days on both the matters that have been raised.

When will the Lord President find time for a debate on early-day motions Nos. 4 and 295, which relate to hospital closures in Camden?

[That this House urges the continuation of the specialised work of the Elizabeth Garrett Anderson Hospital on its present site; believes that women patients should have the right to be treated by women doctors if they so wish; while welcoming the setting up by the Secretary of State of a Working Party to consider the future of the hospital would have preferred an independent public inquiry; but insists that meanwhile essential maintenance, especially to the lifts, should be carried out immediately so that the hospital can function to full capacity.]

[That this House bitterly resents the actions of the Kensington, Chelsea and Westminster Area Health Authority in deciding to close the long established St. Columba's Hospital for six months in such a way as to evade any process ofconsultation; calls upon the Secretary of State to prevent this decision being implemented and to instruct the Area Health Authority to go through consultation even though their closure proposals are alleged to be temporary; and further believes that it is only because the Area Health Authority is heartless and afraid of public consultation that they have used such a back-door method which will cause great anguish to those patients and their relatives who have enjoyed the loving care and attention given to them at St. Columba's.]

May I advise him that, if he does not find time, Government business may well start being blocked, since the hon. Member for Islington, South and Finsbury (Mr. Cunningham) showed that such action at least forces the Government to take a decision?

I do not think that any hon. Gentleman should talk about blocking Government business, or House of Commons business, on that account. The hon. Gentleman should consider his words afresh in that respect. But there are other ways in which he and others can raise this matter, either by representations to Ministers or in the House itself.

Has my right hon. Friend seen early-day motion No. 300, about a better way of wage negotiations for nurses?

[That this House records its appreciation of the decision of nurses not to strike in pursuance of their justified pay claim; notes that in considering their own interests and that of their patients they have reaffirmed their devotion to their patients; and now urges Her Majesty's Government to seize this opportunity to demonstrate that responsible negotiation can secure results as good as those secured after strike action in other sectors of public service.]

Has he noticed that there are a number of other motions from all parts of the House indicating that there is widespread support for this motion? In view of that, in view of the fact that this may well have been discussed in the Cabinet this morning, and since the Whitley Council meets tomorrow, will he ensure that there is an early statement next week? In addition, will he ensure that there is a possibility of this House being able to discuss whatever arises from these matters?

I am not sure whether a debate on this matter in the next few days or weeks is the best way of proceeding, but I take note of the early-day motion, which is an important one. I hope that my hon. Friend and the House will also take note of what my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister said on this subject a few minutes ago.

Does the right hon. Gentleman recall telling the House that he hoped that early-day motion No. 223, in respect of the Honourable Sir Desmond Ackner, would be withdrawn?

[That an humble Address be presented to Her Majesty, praying that she will be pleased to remove the Honourable Sir Desmond Ackner from the office which he holds as Justice of the High Court.] Has it been withdrawn? If not, how long will that early-day motion remain on the Order Paper before we are given the opportunity to negative it?

I still think that the best way of dealing with it is the way that I initially suggested. I still hope that hon. Members will deal with it in that way, but I cannot promise an early debate.

Some time ago, my right hon. Friend promised to give further consideration to early-day motion No. 187 on violence on television, which has now been signed by 132 hon. Members from both sides of the House.

[That this House is strongly of the opinion that films which are categorised as ' X ' films at cinemas and which it is prohibited to show to persons under the age of 18 years should not be shown on television.]

Is he aware that the Home Secretary has stated that violence on television affects the actions of young people? Is it not about time that we had a debate, so that proposals can be made for future action on this very urgent problem?

I cannot promise an early debate on the subject, although I hope that my hon. Friend will again consider the reply that I gave on an earlier occasion. Of course, this is a fitting subject for private Members' debate, and there are plenty of such opportunities.

Bearing in mind that for the first time in its 200-year history the general hospital in Birmingham is faced with total closure today because of industrial action, will the Lord President guarantee that next week the Secretary of State will make a statement on the callous action of the trade unions involved, particularly if, by that time, lives are at risk?

I do not accept all the language that was used by the hon. Gentleman, but I shall see whether a statement should be made on that and kindred subjects next week. I am not making a promise; I am merely saying that I shall consider it.

Will my right hon. Friend find time—not next week, of course—to debate the report of the Royal Commission on gambling? This report took a long time to prepare, and has now been published for many months. It is imperative that we have a debate on a motion to take note in order to learn the views not only of the Government but of the Opposition. Will my right hon. Friend undertake to have discussions through the usual channels? I am sure that he will find that the Opposition would also welcome a debate on this important subject.

My right hon. Friend has a strong claim for the debate for which he is asking. In the light of what he said, I shall look into the matter.

Since the matter of Namibia has for some months now been considered of such significance that five senior Foreign Ministers of the West have, in one way or another, been dancing attendance on Pretoria, and since serious allegations have been made in a speech by the South African Prime Minister within the last two days affecting the honour and integrity of the position of the West, is it not of the utmost importance that this matter should be debated in the very near future?

Of course, that is a matter of the greatest importance. However, I hope that the hon. Gentleman's question does not mean that he accepts automatically a statement made by a South African Minister.

Is the Leader of the House aware that some months ago the Government wrongly announced that they were going to pay the same salaries to the so-called European parliamentarians as are paid to Members of this House? There was no statutory authority to do that. However, only yesterday the Minister concerned said that he hoped to obtain statuory authority for this. Will the Lord President say when we shall obtain statutory authority to enable the Government to carry out the promise and the pledge which they wrongly made weeks and months ago?

As to action on the principle of the matter, the Government were responding to representations that had been made in the House. However, I cannot be sure when we shall have an opportunity of further discussing the matter. Certainly it would need consideration in the House before being put into operation.

Will the Leader of the House say when we shall have a debate on the White Paper dealing with the national heritage fund?

It is not a question of a debate on the White Paper. Those interested in the subject are even more eager to see the Bill brought forward. Certainly I am eager to see it brought forward. As we are pressing ahead with it as satisfactorily as we can, I hope that we shall be able to have a debate on the Bill rather than the White Paper.

Is my right hon. Friend aware of the concern felt in the shipbuilding and ship repair industries, by Members of Parliament representing those constituencies and by workers working in the industry about the corporate plan? Will he make an early arrangement to have the corporate plan discussed on the Floor of the House so that some of those concerns that have been expressed may be removed?

My hon. Friend and others have asked me for a debate on this subject. We are still awaiting the consideration by the Government on different aspects of the matter. However, I shall see whether there is a possibility of a fairly early debate. I cannot promise it for next week or the week after. I shall consider when we may discuss the matter.

Will the Lord President arrange for the Prime Minister to make a statement next week to clarify the following matter? On Tuesday the Prime Minister told the House that he held the Secretary of State for Scotland and the Secretary of State for Wales responsible for any continuing expenditure on providing Assembly buildings and fittings, yet those two Ministers refused to answer questions tabled to them on that matter.

I shall certainly look into the apparent allegation that the hon. Gentleman makes in the latter part of his question. If there is anything in it. I shall see what is the most appropriate way of solving the matter. However, it does not seem to be a great problem.

Is the Lord President concerned that discussions initiated by the Secretary of State for Employment seem to have reached a position that will enable the management of Times Newspapers Ltd. to resume the publication of its newspapers? Will he arrange for the Secretary of State to make a statement on this matter tomorrow, in view of the great importance of, and previous debates on, the matter?

Not necessarily a statement tomorrow. Let us hope that the agreement is able to go forward. The House will wish to pay a tribute to my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Employment. If The Times and the other newspapers reappear—and if the workers obtain or retain their jobs—the highest credit will be due to him. We think that we must leave it to him to choose the best time to make a statement to the House.

Will the Lord President arrange for a statement to be made next week on the memorandum from the Treasury by Sir Douglas Wass—[Interruption.] If the hon. Member for Keighley (Mr. Cryer) would be quiet rather than mouthing abuse in his normal fashion, it would be helpful to our proceedings.

Order. The hon. Gentleman has a right to be heard in the same silence as that in which others are heard.

Will the Lord President arrange for a debate next week on the Treasury memorandum by Sir Douglas Wass on certain major items of Government expenditure? Is the Lord President aware that unless Sir Douglas made up the figures that are contained in his memorandum, Industry Ministers have misled the House by giving completely wrong accounts of the commercial viability of various projects for which they have asked for taxpayers' money.

I repudiate any suggestion that Ministers have misled the House on this matter. The rumour is that the hon. Gentleman has recovered his position of influence with the leaders of his party. If that were so, this matter would be an eminently good subject for a Supply debate. [Interruption.] In spite of the raucous cries from the Opposition, they have not selected the subject for debate. We should be happy to debate it.

Has my right hon. Friend had time to consider the constitutional propriety of an Order in Council which purports to authorise expenditure of £3¼ million to the European Coal and Steel Community? Under our procedure that order must be considered by this House and the House of Lords, although the House of Lords has no standing in financial matters. Will he delay laying the order until the constitutional question has been cleared up?

My hon. Friend is on a serious matter. We must be careful about these matters. I should have thought that this question had been covered. However, I shall certainly look at what the hon. Gentleman said.

Will the Leader of the House say when we shall debate the defence White Paper?

I cannot give a date. However, an opportunity to debate the White Paper will be found in the fairly near future. There are a number of other competing topics for debate, as the right hon. Gentleman will have heard in the past quarter of an hour. However, we shall debate the matter fairly soon.

Will my right hon. Friend bear in mind the fact that several weeks ago he made a promise to me and to the House to consider the possibility of a debate on the Health and Safety at Work etc. Act report? That is an important subject. Will he give an indication that it will be in his thoughts?

Secondly, does my right hon. Friend feel that we should have a debate some time in the near future on the role that multinational companies play in our economy? For example, a gigantic firm such as Thorn, which is highly profitable, may close down a factory in Bradford yet receive Government grant aid for development in London and Gosport. Surely the arbitrary actions by these multinationals in sacking people without any regard for the national interest should be debated in the House.

Those are two good subjects for debate. Many more than two could be pressed upon me. However, I shall certainly take account of what my hon. Friend said.

In view of the dilemma of the Lord President and the Government about laying the draft order to repeal the Scotland Act, will the Lord President explain what is the Government's dilemma about laying the order to repeal the Wales Act? Surely we could have a debate on that order next week.

We could not conveniently have that debate next week in any case. There are a number of items that I have already read out for the business for next week. I think that we should approach it in that way. We are taking into account the different positions in the two countries. There is a difference. However, the Opposition must also take into account the fact that a majority voted in Scotland.

May I refer to the reply that the Lord President gave to my hon. Friend the Member for Sheffield, Heeley (Mr. Hooley)? Is my right hon. Friend aware that this definition of treaties order pays £3 million out of the Consolidated Fund by a statutory instrument that must be approved by the House of Lords? As the Lord President admitted that this raised grave constitutional questions, will he undertake not to lay that order next week, and to let my hon. Friend and the House know his conclusions on this matter before he does so?

I shall consider the points made by my hon. Friend. This is a perfectly reasonable approach for me to make. That is what I shall do. After I have considered the matter I shall see what recommendation I should make about how we proceed. I shall not say that before I have considered the matter.

Bearing in mind the Minister's statement of his intention to have a debate on the Royal Commission on gambling, will he say whether we shall have that debate before Easter? More particularly, will he say whether he will make representations to the Home Secretary to have ready and available answers on the future of lotteries and the racecourse authority that is proposed to be set up under the terms of the Royal Commission? Time is short, and these matters should be considered this year and, indeed, before a general election.

I gave what I thought was a reasonably forthcoming reply to my right hon. Friend the Member for Bermondsey (Mr. Mellish). I did not promise a debate before Easter, and I cannot promise that, in the light of the many other matters being pressed upon me.

Will my right hon. Friend repudiate the scurrilous stories in the press today that the Government are actually against the Official Information Bill and are trying to sabotage it by introducing some sort of Green Paper instead? Is he aware that this is a heaven-sent opportunity for the Government to implement a manifesto promise of 1974? In view of this, will he give an assurance that the Government will provide adequate time on Report for this Bill, which was not opposed on Second Reading and has had such a smooth and happy path in Committee?

As my hon. Friend knows as well as anybody else, no Government are in the habit of giving undertakings in advance about the time that is to be allotted for Private Members' Bills on Report and other stages. If I were to spend my time repudiating all the scurrilous tales in the newspapers, I should be here all night.

As Foreign Office Ministers have supported the principle of Parliament deciding whether observers should be sent to Rhodesia, will the Leader of the House give today a specific assurance that this House will have the right to make that decision well before the elections in Rhodesia?

I gave that undertaking in the form in which the hon. Gentleman has asked for it. I refer him to the answers that I have already given on the subject to two of his hon. Friends.

rose—

Order. We have a very important debate to follow business questions, and I must be fair, as it is a Supply day. If hon. Members are really brief, I shall call them all. Sir Anthony Meyer.

In view of the fact that 40 per cent. of those entitled to vote in the referendum in Wales voted "No" instead of "Yes", including nine out of 10 of those who voted in the constituency of the Leader of the House, what possible pretext is there now for not laying the order repealing the Wales Act?

One of the first considerations to be taken into account by the hon. Gentleman is that it is not possible for anyone to know exactly what were the numbers voting "Yes" and "No" in my constituency. I certainly do not believe that the figures would bear any resemblance to the distorted suggestion made by the hon. Gentleman. He must not leap to these conclusions so speedily. He must have a little coolness in his approach to these matters. I am sure that that is the mood in which the whole House would prefer to approach them.

May I remind the Lord President that the Government's own working party on direct labour reported last summer, and that since that date Ministers have stated that there will be a Bill? Is there a Bill that we can expect in the next few weeks?

Not next week, anyway.

Will the Lord President provide time next week for progress on the Ghost Workers (Abolition) Bill, which the House gave me leave to introduce, in view of the fact that the Revenue has now decided, with ministerial connivance, not to claim tax due from casual workers in Fleet Street—thereby breaking the tradition that all citizens are treated equally and also causing the old, the low paid and others to have to pay more tax—just because these Fleet Street workers are members of trade unions?

I will give due consideration to all the Bills introduced by the hon. Gentleman. I do not suppose that any of them has a chance of reaching the statute book.

Will the Lord President reconsider the answer that he gave to my hon. Friend the Member for Burton (Mr. Lawrence) about the early-day motion calling for the dismissal of a High Court judge? Is it not the case that many of the Lord President's hon. Friends want to see the dismissal of that judge because he delivered a judgment with which they do not agree? In fairness to the judge, and in fairness to the judiciary as a whole, should we not therefore debate that motion without any further delay?

I understand that there is a case for such a debate, but I understand also the case for asking my hon. Friends to withdraw the motion. I think that that would be the best way of dealing with the matter. I know that the practice has grown that quite often early-day motions are tabled by Members who wish in that way to express opinions. We ought to exercise some care as to the way in which we use the Order Paper. That comment applies to hon. Members in all parts of the House.

Has the right hon. Gentleman's attention been drawn to early-day motion No. 237, relating to the increase in fees for certificates for certain arms and ammunition?

[That an humble Address be presented to Her Majesty, praying that the Firearms (Variation and Fees) Order 1979 (S.I., 1979, No. 86), dated 30 January 1979, a copy of which was laid before this House on 7 February, be annulled.]

In view of the fact that these increases are due to come into effect very shortly, and that a large number of hon. Members have already signed the motion, will the right hon. Gentleman arrange time for a debate in the House before the increases become due?

I cannot give a promise, but I will look at the timetable referred to by the hon. Gentleman.

If I may return to the subject of devolution, Mr. Speaker, may I ask the Lord President whether he will allow time for a post mortem debate on this vital subject—after the results of the referendums have been disposed of, of course—so that he may explain to the House, in as much detail as possible, how he and the Prime Minister made such an error of judgment on this vital constitutional matter?

If the hon. Gentleman is referring to the Scottish position in particular, I point out to him that before a post mortem debate can be held the body has to be dead, and that is not the case here.

As the international situation appears to be more threatening than at any time since the Cuban crisis of 1962, are the Government planning to have a debate on international affairs in their own time?

We are not planning to have such a debate in the immediate future. If it were thought at any time, however, that a debate in the House would generally assist the situation, the Government would, of course, be eager to provide it. The Government have been taking action on the whole range of these matters, as the hon. Gentleman may have seen. So far, none of the hon. Gentleman's other hon. Friends has raised any of them.

Consolidated Fund (No 2) Bill

For the debate on Thursday 15 March, on the Second Reading of the Consolidated Fund (No. 2) Bill, hon. Members may hand in to my office by 9 a.m. on Wednesday 14 March their names and the topics that they wish to raise. The ballot will be carried out as on the last occasion. An hon. Member may hand in only his own name and one topic.

The Consolidated Fund (No. 2) Bill includes certain Defence Supplementary Estimates for the current year, as set out in House of Commons Paper No. 198, certain Civil Supplementary Estimates for the current year, as set out in House of Commons Papers Nos. 199 and 221, and Excesses in Defence and Civil Estimates for 1977–78, as set out in House of Commons Paper No. 229.

It will be in order on Second Reading of the Bill to raise topics falling within the ambit of the expenditure proposed in these papers.

I shall put out the result of the ballot later in the day on 14 March.

Income Tax

I beg to ask leave to move the Adjournment of the House, under Standing Order No. 9, for the purpose of discussing a specific and important matter that should have urgent consideration, namely,

" the need to review the Inland Revenue's decision to negotiate an agreement with trade unions on individuals' alleged evasion of income tax so that they are thus excused payment and are not subject to criminal penalties."

My application arises from a report late last night on television, and in the press today, that casual workers in Fleet Street who are members of trade unions are to be given a tax amnesty.

I shall be very brief, Mr. Speaker, because there are important matters for debate on the Order Paper. I do not wish to discuss the substantive issues but simply to persuade you that a debate on this subject should be given priority over other matters.

I have to convince you, Mr. Speaker, that the matter is urgent, specific and important. It may not be immediately apparent why the matter is so urgent. The reason why I have brought the matter before the House at the earliest possible moment is that, if we do not review it, an important and dangerous precedent will have been created by administrative action.

Alternatively, the House would be faced with the difficult task of reversing retrospectively a concession which the Inland Revenue had made to taxpayers, and that is something which the House has always been very reluctant to do. I fully appreciate that we have before the House the Ghost Workers (Abolition) Bill introduced by my hon. Friend the Member for Cirencester and Tewkesbury (Mr. Ridley). I hope that it will proceed and make rapid progress, but it does not cover the point about urgency that I wish to stress.

I do not think that there can be any doubt whatever, Mr. Speaker, on the question whether the matter is specific, because the Inland Revenue has made an administrative decision and has announced it.

I turn, therefore, to the question whether the matter is important. I believe that this decision of the Inland Revenue is vitally important because it fundamentally affects the equitable basis on which our tax system operates and, indeed, the whole question whether individuals are equal before the law.

I am not proposing that we should debate the tax affairs of any individual. That would be contrary to the practices of the House. What we should debate is the fact that the Inland Revenue has apparently negotiated with certain trade unions on a matter which concerns individuals and their liability under the law. It is that aspect on which I concentrate.

I understand that a spokesman for the Inland Revenue has said that what has been done is not without precedent. It is true that the Inland Revenue has administrative discretion in individual cases. That is a different matter from negotiating with trade unions a blanket amnesty of this kind, and I believe that that goes far beyond any discretion which this House should give a Government Department.

It is a matter not for administrative action but for legislation. That being so, it is overwhelmingly important that we should debate this matter at the earliest moment, otherwise we are in danger of having one tax law for trade unionists and another for everyone else. There is much dispute in the House about the rule of law and its relation to trade union affairs. It is true that trade unions, in a number of respects, are in a privileged position in the civil and criminal law. But no one can argue that it is right that a trade union should be able to negotiate individual tax returns on behalf of its members. This seems to be wholly unreasonable.

I understand that a letter has been sent by the Society of Graphical and Allied Trades to its members. I shall not quote it at length because if my application is granted I shall return to it in the debate. One paragraph reads:

" We fully appreciate that a casual may find himself in something of a dilemma if he has not paid tax properly in the past and now wants to put matters in order. He may fear the consequences. What we are saying to him is that if there is a general acceptance of new procedures and if he co-operates fully with the Revenue, we "—

that is, SOGAT—

" will release him from most of the liabilities which the Revenue could demand."

That is an extraordinary situation for the House of Commons to be faced with.

We all know from experience that not infrequently the Inland Revenue pursues its tax demands with the utmost rigour, not only in cases of evasion and avoidance, but when a mistake has been made by the Inland Revenue itself. Those cases are pursued, as are those cases when payment of tax has been evaded. We are talking here of evasion, which is a criminal offence. Avoidance is not a criminal offence. In this instance people are being excused, and it seems to me grossly unfair to those who have paid their tax legitimately, including those in Fleet Street.

I gave previous notice that I wished to raise this matter, Mr. Speaker, but I have not had the opportunity of deploying the case. There is an overwhelming case for this matter to be debated by the House at the earliest opportunity. I hope you will agree to that.

The hon. Member gave me notice before 12 o'clock today that he wished to move the Adjournment of the House, under Standing Order No. 9, for the purpose of discussing a specific and important matter that should have urgent consideration, namely,

" the need to review the Inland Revenue's decision to negotiate an agreement with trade unions on individuals' alleged evasion of income tax so that they are thus excused payment and are not subject to criminal penalties ".

I listened with very great care to the hon. Gentleman. He has undoubtedly brought an important matter to our notice. As the House knows, I have to take into account the several factors set out in the Order and to give no reasons for my decision. I listened with care, but I have to rule that the hon. Gentleman's submission does not fall within the provisions of the Standing Order and, therefore, I cannot submit his application to the House.

Questions To Ministers

On a point of order, Mr. Speaker. I am sorry that I have not had an opportunity to give notice of this matter, but perhaps the question I shall raise can be looked at in general.

I read in the press that the Government were to appoint Professor Clegg as chairman of the Pay Comparability Commission at a salary of £18,000. I tabled a question to the Prime Minister on Monday. I asked him whether he would appoint Professor Hugh Clegg of Warwick university as chairman of the Government's proposed body on pay comparability in the public services, and whether the chairman's salary and the payments to the members of that committee would bear a relationship to the salaries of those persons whom they would be investigating.

I know that a Minister has the right to transfer a question without consulting the Chair, or anyone else, when there is no ministerial responsibility or when it is the concern of another Minister. My question was tabled on Monday, Mr. Speaker. I note that today it has been transferred to the Secretary of State for Employment. Hansard will bear out that only yesterday the Prime Minister, with your permission, made a statement. Strangely enough, he agreed with my suggestion that he should appoint Professor Clegg as chairman of the comparability body, though he did not then announce the amount of the salary.

Where are we going if, by subterfuge, Ministers are allowed to transfer questions on the excuse that it is not their ministerial responsibility, when the day following the tabling of the question they prove that it is their responsibility by making a statement which takes half an hour of the House's time?

Hon. Members on both sides of the House know that questions are switched when it is convenient to a Department. If it happens to be a particular Minister's day for answering, he will wait until the last moment and transfer the question to another Minister. This precludes the hon. Member concerned from having the opportunity of asking the question and putting his supplementary questions.

Therefore, I ask you, Mr. Speaker, as the protector of the rights of hon. Members, to ensure that this subterfuge, mainly by civil servants, with the aid and support of Ministers, shall cease. I hope that you will ensure that hon. Members will have the right to table questions to the appropriate Minister on the days of their choice in accordance with Standing Orders.

I have listened with care to the hon. Member, who became a Member of this House on the same day as myself, but he knows that Ministers are responsible for transferring questions if they wish. He has succeeded in bringing our attention to the matter.

I am sorry, Mr. Speaker. I quoted an actual case to prove my point, but I am interested in the principle. It is laid down—the Order Papers prove it, and it is in Standing Orders—that we shall have certain days for questions to certain Ministers who shall, on rota, answer those questions. The rule is that a Member may not put a question to any Minister unless there is ministerial responsibility. The Minister can switch questions. My point is that he can switch only when he can claim that the question is not within his ministerial responsibility. Yesterday, not last week or last month, the Prime Minister in his statement answered the very question that I had tabled on Monday. He replied to my question today. A proper procedure should be laid down. We cannot prevent Ministers switching questions to other Departments, but they must not dodge their responsibilities to the House.

I am obliged to the hon. Member. I shall look at the matters that he has raised.

On a point of order, Mr. Speaker.

Would the hon. Member please wait until we have finished with Standing Order No. 9 applications?

But, Mr. Speaker, you called the hon. Member for Newham, North-West (Mr. Lewis).

We are all equal in the House, but from time to time I recall that the hon. Member for Newham, North-West (Mr. Lewis) entered the House on the same day as I. I shall try not to remember that in future and make him wait in the same way as I make others wait.

National Health Service (Industrial Dispute)

I beg to ask leave to move the Adjournment of the House, under Standing Order No. 9, for the purpose of discussing a specific, urgent and important matter, namely,

" the intensification of industrial action in the National Health Service."

This matter is specific because it is the declared intention of the National Union of Public Employees to extend its action to hospitals where it has not yet taken place or has occurred only on a small scale. In other words, there is a major escalation of this callous action.

The matter is urgent because this action apparently is to go ahead straight away. It is important because, although any obstacle to the care of the sick must be regretted, this is a deliberate attack on the normal care of the sick on a major scale.

This is a matter of intense concern throughout the country which should be debated at the earliest opportunity. If you grant this application, Mr. Speaker, as I hope you will, I am sure that the House would not expect the Secretary of State for Social Services to be present against medical advice.

The hon. Member gave me notice before 12 o'clock that he would seek leave to move the Adjournment of the House for the purpose of discussing a specific and important matter that he believes should have urgent consideration, namely,

" the intensification of industrial action in the National Health Service."

The hon. Member has brought to our notice a serious matter. He knows that it is for me to decide not whether the matter should be debated but whether it should be debated tonight or on Monday.

I listened with great care to what the hon. Gentleman said, but I have to rule that his submission does not fall within the provisions of the Standing Order and, therefore, I cannot submit his application to the House.

European Communities (Draft Order)

On a point of order, Mr. Speaker. I hope that I am raising this matter at the right time.

My point of order concerns a question that has already been put to the Lord President about the statutory instrument the Draft European Communities (Definition of Treaties) (ECSC Decision on Supplementary Revenues) Order 1979. This order raises a serious question about the powers of this House and the powers of the House of Lords in relation to voting money.

The tradition is that the other House should in no circumstances grant or refuse Supply. That is an important constitutional principle, which goes back to 1640, when a monarch who wished to undermine that principle lost his head.

My point of order involves the question whether this order should have been introduced into the House and whether its introduction was a breach of the privilege of this House. The order means that the House of Lords has to give consent to the voting of Supply. When this matter was discussed in the Standing Committee on Statutory Instruments yesterday, the Minister in charge made an odd statement. He said that he did not think that it mattered so much because the Lords would have the power only to refuse Supply.

The power to refuse Supply is virtually the power to maintain or dismiss a Government. I am sure that I shall have support in asserting that only this House has the power to dismiss a Government. Therefore, I hope that you, Mr. Speaker, will consider this to be a serious issue which involves the privilege of the House and the future handling of statutory instruments.

I hope that you will be able to prevail on the powers-that-be so that no further action is taken until the position has been clarified and the privilege of the House safeguarded.

Further to that point of order, Mr. Speaker. I know that you will wish to rule on this matter, but of course I shall look into it urgently in the light of what hon. Members have said. A question of considerable importance is involved. There is also the question whether we should proceed until we have examined the matter. I underline my earlier promise.

I am obliged. I shall consider the matter and give a ruling early next week.

Business Of The House (Supply)

Motion made, and Question proposed,

That this day, as soon as the House has entered upon the Business of Supply, Mr. Speaker shall put forthwith the Questions which under the provisions of paragraph (11) of Standing Order No. 18 (Business of Supply) he is directed to put at Ten o'clock.—[ Mr. Snape.]

4.28 p.m.

In essence, this motion demands that we should accept and pass on the nod the expenditure of large sums of public money. A number of my hon. Friends and I find this indefensible.

My hon. Friend the Member for Swindon (Mr. Stoddart) referred briefly to the struggles of Parliament since 1640 to establish the right of ordinary Members to make decisions, to debate and question public expenditure. By motions such as this we are completely denied that right.

Last December many of us made it categorically clear that we were no longer prepared to accept considerable sums of public expenditure going through on the nod without any debate whatsoever.

Many in the press and the media suggested on that occasion that we were involved in some kind of conspiracy to prevent that day's business on sanctions policy. That was completely untrue. We raised the matter in all honesty and legitimately because of our concern that the few powers and privileges of Back Benchers were being eroded in that way by a motion which, if passed, would lead to the approval of the expenditure of considerable sums of money on the nod.

Commentators often refer to Members of Parliament as Pavlovian dogs who simply go into the Lobby when they are instructed to by the Whips. Many of my colleagues do not fall into that category. We refuse to accept that we cannot debate and question these large sums of money. I am disappointed that the Lord President cannot stay with us. I assume that he has a much more pressing engagement. The Lord President has a reputation for jealously guarding the rights of Back Bench Members—

He had. He has not now.

He has that reputation, and my colleagues and I were hoping also to appeal to him.

Will the hon. Member for Bristol, North-West (Mr. Thomas) give me one example when the Lord President has defended the rights of Back Benchers since he became Leader of the House? Does he agree with me that there is no more important task for the Lord President to perform than to be about his duties in the House of Commons?

I shall give an example in a moment when I come on to another aspect.

I was hoping that the Lord President would be here, because I wanted once again to appeal to him to do something about this matter. As you know, Mr. Speaker, we have raised this subject on many occasions and have been told that something will be done, but still nothing has been done.

People come forward with suggestions about the way in which we should deal with public expenditure, Estimates, and so on. They talk of having a more powerful Public Accounts Committee, or a form of Select Committee or Standing Committee to look at this expenditure, but I believe that these matters should be dealt with on the Floor of the House and not in a Committee.

I congratulate the Lord President on his response to the idea of further Committees being set up and taking away from this debating Chamber many matters which I think should still be dealt with on the Floor of the House. Certainly, one matter above all others which should be debated fundamentally is the whole question of public expenditure and estimates. I know that I am not allowed to say that many of us are opposed to the increase in defence expenditure as set down on the Order Paper. That is why we have put down an objection with the aim of reducing the total sum. We believe that it is indefensible to increase defence expenditure when we are cutting back expenditure on education, housing, the social services, health and other essential services.

A few moments ago Mr. Speaker said that we should be able to debate some of these matters when we considered the Consolidated Fund Bill next week, but by then these sums of money will have been voted and agreed to, and there is no point in debating or questioning them in a post mortem sense, after the event. Therefore, although many of my colleagues may take part in the debate on the Consolidated Fund Bill, that is not satisfactory. We find it indefensible that we should be expected, on the nod, to agree to large increases in defence and other expenditure. We therefore intend to register our protest today, and we shall continue to do so until this procedure is changed.

I am in a dilemma similar to that faced by my hon. Friend the Member for Bristol, North-West (Mr. Thomas). I am alarmed by the enormous amount of money which we are asked to pass. In the Supplementary Estimates Class 1 (Defence), set out in House of Commons Paper No. 198, on page 14 under the heading "Fuel and Utilities" there is an increase of a net £3 million, explained by the phrase "mainly higher prices and increased requirements". In that explanation some of the net figures presented by the Department and the Treasury in regard to inflation and high wages stand condemned because, clearly, inflation is the product of higher prices for gas, electricity and water, probably stemming from a Government decision to make those industries self-sufficient and to withdraw their subsidy. On page 15 there is an item of £2,800,000—

Is the hon. Member for Preston, South (Mr. Thorne) aware that what he is debating is whether the matter is or is not to be put to the House now?

I am aware of that, Mr. Deputy Speaker. The problem for me in deciding whether it should or should not be debated is the absence of any understanding of what these figures mean. I am speaking about an increase that we are asked to pass of nearly £3 million, which is explained as "mainly increased NATO construction work". I am not told where that construction work is, or whether it is in Europe using European labour. I am completely in the dark.

On page 34 there is a reference to an additional sum of £109 million in respect of air systems. Here again—

Order. None of those matters is any way persuasive as to why the matter should be decided now and not at 10 o'clock.

That is the kernel of my point, with respect, Mr. Deputy Speaker. I would be happy to pass the Estimates now if I understood what they meant. My problem, and that of other Back Benchers, is that we have no way of knowing whether the £109 million will be rightly spent.

Order. It would appear in those circumstances that the hon. Member for Preston, South wants the matter not to be decided now.

I am trying to get a statement from the Treasury Bench or from the Prime Minister, if that is appropriate, on why we should accept the Prime Minister's motion which we are presently discussing, to wit, that we should proceed to accept these Estimates. If that is not the procedure, Mr. Deputy Speaker, perhaps you would care to explain to me what the procedure is. Mr. Speaker indicated before he left the Chair that we would be debating the motion tabled by the Prime Minister relating to these Estimates. An objection has been raised, and we are addressing ourselves to that objection, which is that we should not permit those items of expenditure to go through the House without adequate debate. The reason why I believe that there should be adequate debate is that hundreds of millions of pounds of public money is being spent without there being an adequate explanation.

Order. This is not the moment for an adequate debate to take place. All that the hon. Gentleman can discuss at the moment is whether the Question is to be put now.

With respect, Mr. Deputy Speaker, I suggest that it should not be put now. I have attempted to explain why. The Question should not be put now because hon. Members have not been given an adequate amount of information upon which to make a reasoned judgment whether the amounts should be accepted, whether the decisions taken by the Department of Defence which is calling for that expenditure are decisions we want to support, whether the £109 million I mentioned might be better spent in the relief of overseas poverty, for example, or in providing nursery schools in my constituency, or in any other way.

I wonder whether my hon. Friend the Member for Preston, South (Mr. Thorne) is aware that this is not the first time this year that the Government have come forward with Supplementary Estimates. The Government came forward asking for £150 million last December. Now the Government want another £141 million for defence alone. It is for those reasons—I am sure that my hon. Friend will agree—that we object to the fact that we are not getting a proper debate on this matter today.

That point is extremely relevant, Mr. Deputy Speaker. When we consider the matters discussed in the House over the past two months, arising directly from lack of Government response to the needs of people across a wide sector, we discover that we are suddenly asked to meet needs amounting to £109 million for the provision of additional hardware which will not give one iota of assistance to ambulance men, nurses and other sections of the community facing difficulty at present. It is for that reason—

Order. If the hon. Gentleman reads the motion he will see that it seeks to achieve that these matters be determined without debate now, as opposed to later tonight, when there will still be no debate.

Obviously, Mr. Deputy speaker, my language is not well understood by you. I am seeking to argue that we cannot possibly accept the motion, because we do not have the ability to recognise—without even reading it, which is what the motion implies—that it is correct that we should pass the expenditure. I cannot go along with that. As my hon. Friend the Member for Bristol, North-West indicated, we had this debate in December last. We made it clear then that we were no longer prepared to accept items of expenditure such as this to pass through the House without debate.

There may be 610 hon. Members who are indifferent to the fact that we shall be spending the sort of money that is set out in the motion, but there are some hon. Members who are concerned about it. It seems to me that if the procedures of the House do not permit debate upon matters of that description, any claim that we make about this being a democratic Chamber are null and void.

May I proceed, Mr. Deputy Speaker?

Only in discussing the motion as I outlined it. If the hon. Gentleman does not want these matters voted on now, he can explain why he does not want them voted on now. However, the only step that he can take will be to vote against the motion.

On a point of order, Mr. Deputy Speaker. How can my hon. Friend the Member for Preston, South (Mr. Thorne) argue his case if you say that he should not argue why we should not debate the matter now? For the life of me, Mr. Deputy Speaker, I do not understand your ruling.

The motion has been set down to allow these matters to be determined without debate now. That is the matter before the House. If we are not to come to a conclusion on this matter without debate now, we can do so at 10 o'clock, but there will still be no debate.

I take your point, Mr. Deputy Speaker, on the question whether the Estimates should be debated now. If I were able, in debate, to put to the Minister certain questions about these Estimates that we are being asked to accept and to raise with him the question whether certain items are or are not justified—for example, whether it would have been better to do (a), (b), (c) and (d) rather than (f), (g) and (h)—I could come to some conclusion about these Estimates—

Unfortunately, that is just what the hon. Gentleman is not able to do.

As I understand you, Mr. Deputy Speaker, you are saying that I should address myself to the question why this matter should or should not be debated now. Is that so?

No. The matter to which the hon. Gentleman should be addressing his mind now is whether he wants the motion not debated now or whether he wants it not debated at 10 o'clock tonight.

I was giving those reasons, as far as I was aware, but clearly you do not interpret them in the way that I do, Mr. Deputy Speaker. I am seeking to argue that it is not possible for us to pass the motion urged upon us by the Prime Minister. That is why we have raised objections. Behind those objections is our complete inability as Back Benchers to question the expenditure of one farthing in these Supplementary Estimates, and we are dealing with hundreds of millions of pounds. Initially I sought to draw attention to specific items which clearly give us very little, even in the printed material, in the way of adequate explanation for the amounts involved.

I do not wish to trespass on the time of the House for more than a minute or so, Mr. Deputy Speaker. I could not disagree more with many of the things that the hon. Member for Bristol, North-West (Mr. Thomas) and the hon. Member for Preston, South (Mr. Thorne) stand for, and the subject of these Estimates—defence—is certainly something on which we are poles apart. If anything, I believe that the figures on the Order Paper are far too low. However, we must not talk about that.

I believe that the hon. Gentleman and his colleagues have a real argument that deserves support on both sides of the House. It is wrong—indeed, it is utterly absurd—that the House should pass enormous sums, for whatever purpose, without debate. There should be proper opportunity for scrutiny. The power of the purse should be in this place. The Executive should be answerable for their financial proposals and we should have ample opportunity for debate. In so far as the hon. Member for Preston, South is seeking to advance that argument—which is the only real point of substance so far as I see it—I agree with him.

This is an issue to which the House should return at an early date, because it is of great importance. The subject that has been chosen by the Opposition for the Supply day is also very important. I want us to get on to it very quickly.

I should like Labour Members to know that this is not merely a crusade on their behalf. There are many Conservative Members—indeed, I suggest almost all hon. Members on both sides of the House—who believe that there is a great deal of substance in the arguments that have been advanced.

I also wish to speak against the motion now standing on the Order Paper, to put the Question on the Supplementary Defence Estimates forthwith. As my hon. Friends have already pointed out, a number of us raised this issue of approving hundreds of millions of pounds on the nod when it was last proposed on 7 December—in fact, we raised it on previous occasions.

As I stated on 7 December, I was opposed not to all the expenditure which was put forward but to the principle of avoiding a debate on such vast sums. It is a serious principle which, as the hon. Member for Staffordshire, South-West (Mr. Cormack) said, ought to command the attention of all right hon. and hon. Members. Those of us who are raising the matter today are, first and foremost, concerned with that issue.

It was pointed out by Mr. Speaker that it was possible to debate these matters during the Consolidated Fund debate. However, as I understand it, the way that we could do that would not give us the opportunity of voting against the specific items with which we are concerned. There would be an opportunity for us, if we so wished, to avail ourselves of voting against the whole of the Consolidated Fund, but that certainly is not our intention. Even in these Estimates there are a number of Votes of which we heartily approve. The motion does not allow us the opportunity of differentiating between the sums which are being put forward today.

My hon. Friend referred to the Consolidated Fund debate. Does he agree that if we allow the Estimates to go through today we shall have granted the money and we shall not be able to do anything about that on Thursday or whenever?

I am sure that that is so. If we raised the matter in the Consolidated Fund debate, it would be a form of post mortem after the event. That would be nothing but a charade. We need a debate, and we should not allow the Estimates to be approved without debate as that will prevent us from having the opportunity of speaking about items with which we are especially concerned. If the motion to put the Question forthwith is carried, there will be no opportunity for a Minister to reply to the arguments that have been advanced.

Many of us find ourselves in considerable difficulty. We do not wish to oppose the immediate approval of certain Estimates. We do not wish to convey the impression that we are opposed, for example, to increases in pay for members of the forces. Many of us regard such increases as extremely important. If the motion is accepted to put these matters forthwith, none of us will have an opportunity to advance our arguments.

There is an amendment on the Order Paper that stands in the names of my hon. Friend the Member for Bristol, North-West (Mr. Thomas), others of my hon. Friends and myself that endeavours to clarify the arguments that are now being advanced. However, the motion that is now before the House precludes any discussion on that amendment. It is surely wrong that we should pass a motion that prevents the House from discussing an amendment of importance.

We wish only to refer to certain aspects of the Estimates. The argument that I advance is that if we pass the motion we shall be putting on one side important issues while, as we know, with due respect, the House spends a great deal of time on other occasions discussing comparatively trivial or piffling matters. Surely, we have a right to say that it is time that the House reconsidered its procedure and refused to allow motions to be passed, such as the one before us, that enabled important matters to be thrust on one side, debate to be shelved, and arguments not to be advanced while we allow the House to spend an infinite amount of time discussing matters that do not command the attention of all hon. Members.

I find it surprising that the Opposition Front Bench has not addressed itself previously to the issue that my hon. Friends and I have raised. It has been especially concerned about the scrutiny of public expenditure. If we are to say that when public expenditure relates to health, welfare, education and other important civilian matters it should be scrutinised and that defence Estimates should be passed through the House without the opportunity for scrutiny, that will be an unsatisfactory state of affairs.

Enshrined in the motion is a principle that I cannot support. I do not believe that the House is able to support it. It is the principle that we approve Supplementary Estimates on defence without a proper debate. For all the reasons that I have advanced, the motion before the House is totally unacceptable. Those who have views on defence expenditure should have the right to advance their arguments. That right will not be available if the Question is put forthwith. Therefore, the House should not accept the motion that will allow Estimates to be approved on the nod. I hope that my hon. Friends support that view and will be prepared to oppose the motion by voting against the Government.

It seems clear that the hon. Member for Bristol, North-West (Mr. Thomas) has spoken against the motion as a protest against defence expenditure. Whatever the reason for the exercise, I entirely agree with the hon. Member for Staffordshire, South-West (Mr. Cormack) that it raises an important matter of House of Commons principle.

We are in this place as guardians of public expenditure. We are bound to scrutinise public expenditure before we approve it. I do not know whether Labour Members below the Gangway would be equally enthusiastic to debate other forms of public expenditure, but whatever their views on defence expenditure they have raised an important matter.

The House of Commons should not approve on the nod large sums of expenditure by way of Supplementary Estimates. The Select Committee on Procedure should bear in mind that there should be a means of scrutinising expenditure of this nature and degree before it is approved.

I join the protest that has been made by my hon. Friends. Their protest is based on a cardinal principle.

I do not know of any other Parliament that has abrogated its responsibilities to such an extent. I cannot think of any other Parliament that has abrogated all control of Supply. Parliament exercises no control over the Executive unless it controls Supply. The issue is whether we shall have a general debate that will be noted by the Executive and no more, or whether we shall be specific and say "If you are asking for money, we shall examine the Estimates in detail before giving our approval."

This is an issue that the House must face. Unless and until Parliament exercises the power of control, Parliament will be ineffective. I express no view about the Votes that are at issue. I repeat that unless and until Parliament reasserts its control over Supply, Parliament will be ineffective.

We are concerned that Parliament should remain the centre of control. It will have control only when it re-establishes control of Supply. At present it is a farce to talk about the House in terms of a Committee on Supply. I remember when the House exercised control over Supplementary Estimates. We went through Estimates in great detail, but that no longer happens. I agree that the Committee on Procedure has done a good job on relatively minor matters, but we must have Parliament examining the estimates and having effective control.

This debate underlines what the right hon. Member for Sunderland North (Mr. Willey) has just hinted at, that there has been a weakening in our examination of expenditure of this kind, progressively over the years. It will be within the recollection of the right hon. Gentleman, I am sure, that some years ago we used to debate such matters in much greater depth, both in relation to defence and the Civil Estimates, whether Estimates or Supplementary Estimates similar to those now before the House. This debate has shown that we need a completely new and different procedure for dealing with these matters, and this needs to be looked at almost immediately by the Committee on Procedure. This is an urgent matter and I hope that those Ministers who are here today, while they may not agree with all that has been said in this short debate, will see the need for closer scrutiny of these matters before they are approved by the House.

It is very undesirable that matters of this kind should be passed by the House, as the hon. and learned Member for Montgomery (Mr. Hooson) says, on the nod, which is a vivid description of what is happening. I do not believe any Ministers in any Government would wish things to be this way, or I hope not. I cannot conceive that they should, and I hope that there will now be pressure from both sides of the House in the months ahead for a different procedure to be recommended and adopted by this House.

I want to add just a few words to what has been said on both sides of the House, and in doing so I am very much encouraged by the support for a change of procedure in this matter. It is practically three months to the day—it was 7 December and today is 8 March—since we debated the same point on the then Supplementary Estimates. It is perfectly true, as the hon. and learned Member for Montgomery (Mr. Hooson) has pointed out, that we have, as it were, hung the problem on defence, but that is by way of drawing attention to it, although of course many of us do object to the extra money proposed to be spent on defence; but there are other things also, which each individual Member may have his or her own wish to debate in terms of the Supplementary Estimates, and we ought to have an opportunity to speak on them.

Does my hon. Friend agree that this is the first opportunity that we have had to make out protest again, and it would not have mattered whether the Estimates were on defence or anything else, we would have been making this protest today?

That is absolutely true. My hon. Friend is perfectly right. The hon. Member for Barry (Sir R. Gower) said that he hoped that over the next few months the Government and perhaps the Opposition would get together and consider how this matter could be put right. I remind him that not only did we debate this subject at some length, as far as we could, in December; we debated it at the same time last year, in March 1978.

We were then told that the matter would be seriously considered. It was probably debated the year before, though my memory does not go back that far; but certainly on every conceivable opportunity over the last few years this matter has been debated.

My right hon. Friend the Member for Sunderland, North (Mr. Willey) said that we ought to get back to the situation where Supply money that is voted in this way is scrutinised by this Parliament. Obviously, that has been done, however unsatisfactorily, at some stage in the past; so there has been a change in taking it away from the Floor of the House. Hon. Members on all sides, of all parties and in all groupings have to press to see that this does not go by any more without the possibility of debate on the Floor of the House.

Does my hon. Friend regard it as surprising that the Conservative Opposition, who are committed to cutting public expenditure in every conceivable place, because they agreed with the form of expenditure on the Order Paper, were prepared to see this kind of money go through on the nod?

Perhaps they have seen the error of their ways, or perhaps they are jumping on the bandwagon. In any event, I hope that their publicly voiced support for it will continue. We are always told by those who reply from our Front Bench "You need not worry. You are making a fuss about nothing. This is only a formality. On the Consolidated Fund debate you will have an opportunity to raise exactly what you want." As my hon. Friends have pointed out, that is too late, for it has already gone through by that time and the money has already been allocated so that there is absolutely nothing we can do at that stage.

Because some of my hon. Friends are interested in defence expenditure we have been told in previous debates "You will have plenty of opportunity to speak, because there will be two or three days of debate, probably a day each on the Army, the Royal Navy and the Air Force, and you can speak at that time". But that again is too late. Those debates are about the Army, the Navy and the Air Force and they do not lend themselves to the issue of whether or not we are to spend this or that amount of money.

We spend hours in this place trying to winkle money out of the Treasury for sums which, by comparison with the money that we are now asked to vote without debate, are chickenfeed. Recently, I have been on several deputations trying to get more money for non-contributory invalidity benefit for disabled married women. We were told that £23 million was a dreadful figure and could not be afforded; and in no way could I get anybody to consider that as a realistic possibility. Yet today we are giving away £109 million here and the odd £1 billion there on these Estimates. This expenditure may be very well worth while, but I just want an opportunity, as do other hon. Members, of scrutinising these Estimates and being able to debate them and ask questions on them, and then to vote on them, not before.

I hope that the Government will take very serious note of the urgency of this matter. I hope that in another six months' time, or whenever the next Supplementary Estimates are due, we shall not have this situation occurring again.

I wish to underline what has been said by my hon. Friend the Member for Barking (Miss Richardson) about the repetitious nature of these matters. First, I want to express appreciation of the diligence of my hon. Friend the Member for Bristol, North-West (Mr. Thomas) who has to look at the Order Paper most closely to know when an attempt is once again to be made to put matters of this kind through the House without proper debate. When we have a reply from the Front Bench, though I do not know whether the appropriate Ministers are there to give one, I hope that there will be some explanation of why this subject is always treated in such an inept fashion. It is absolutely true that a fuss was made about this over a year ago and, I believe, a year before that. As my hon. Friend the Member for Barking has said, just three months ago a whole day's business was lost because a motion was put down in this form. Therefore, it is with amazement that I this week again observe exactly the same thing has happened, as if there had never been a protest, as if a day's business had never been lost, as if there had never been quite a fuss from below the Gangway on this side and the same noises of support from the other side. What bothers me is that it seems that the same kind of faceless bureaucrats continue to give the some inept advice to whichever side of the House may be in power.

I do not take the view that faceless bureaucrats are responsible. I take the view that faceless bureaucrats are involved. I do not think we should be mealy-mouthed about the role that civil servants play in these matters, but the real kernel of it is that the two Front Benches agree to getting these things, or anything else for that matter, through without any consultation with the Beck Benchers. It is a well-known fact that in the course of the last few days my hon. Friend the Member for Bristol—[Interruption.]

The hon. Gentleman may not believe it, but the House is anxious to see him.

Will you put that in writing, Mr. Speaker, and get all hon. Members to sign it? My hon. Friend the Member for Bristol, North-West (Mr. Thomas) has been trying in the course of the past few days to negotiate over this matter and we know that people on our Front Bench have been trying to resist these pressures. The more that we get this message across, the better it will be. The more we assert ourselves, the more chance shall we have of debating these things, as my hon. Friends want.

My hon. Friend is being less than charitable about this. The faceless bureaucrats that I was referring to are not those at the Treasury or the Ministry of Defence but those who lurk in this building and purport to give advice to Government Whips. My hon. Friend the Member for Bolsover (Mr. Skinner) was being slightly uncharitable. I understood that the Government Chief Whip sincerely believed that there was no other way by which we could have adequate debate. I always accept what the Government Chief Whip says at its face value. I do not question his sincerity or the genuineness of his belief that there is no alternative. My hon. Friend may criticise me, but I have volunteered that, if these chaps cannot give better advice to the Government Chief Whip, I can suggest ways and means in which these matters may be discussed. I am talking not about going to the Whips' Office or about a quango but about those who are supposed to know procedure so that House of Commons accountability can be practised.

Instead of the motion on the Order Paper that we must vote forthwith or you, Mr. Speaker, must put the Question forthwith without discussion, there should be a proposition for you to put the Question after whatever is the appropriate time for the House to debate the Supplementary Estimates. Business managers are bound to put it in that way. An opportunity could be given for a full debate on the substantive motions. Under the rules of order, Mr. Speaker, you and others deputising for you will rightly say that we are out of order if we discuss the substance of the matter. Therefore, we can seek to make the point within the rules of order only by debating why we are not allowed to debate the subject matter. That is farcical.

If everyone rises for just one minute to say that we would like to discuss £141 million of Supplementary Estimates but are not allowed to, the business managers will laugh up their sleeves at the making of one-minute speeches and the House will agree to put forthwith Questions on vitally important matters.

Let me remind the House of the nature of what we are asked not to debate and that you, Mr. Speaker, are asked to put forthwith. The Order Paper says that we have Supplementary Estimates to ensure that Votes will not be overspent as presented in the spring in the light of the latest available forecast outturn on the individual Votes. In plain English, the House is being asked without debate not merely to vote Supplementary Estimates but, in effect, to cook the books. If we deal with Supplementary Estimates under any other heading or public expenditure in general, there is an imposition of cash limits. Local authorities and others are asked to stay within the limit fixed by the Treasury and not overspend. As the Prime Minister said only a few days ago, there is nothing in the kitty. But here, in order to ensure that we do not overspend, we adjust the Estimates before we hit the limit and reach the overspending. The rules for defence expenditure are different from those for any other expenditure. That is a vitally important issue of principle. It is quite wrong that we are asked once again to let this through without debate.

The scrutiny of expenditure is extended to all civil expenditure. It is not merely in this sphere that the House has fallen down on its job. It is throughout all Government expenditure.

Whatever is remiss in regard to surveillance of other expenditure, this is the most scandalous. The Order Paper spells out that it is not possible to give us details of the overspending at present but that somebody in the Treasury or the Ministry of Defence has guessed that they might go over the limit. Therefore, the figures must be adjusted so that when, at the end of the period, the accounting is done it will be found that there has not been overspending. That goes far beyond non-scrutiny of expenditure. It is writing a blank cheque. Earlier in the year the House approves a figure. The House is then told that the figure on the cheque has been altered. We are not allowed to discuss the sum. You, Mr. Speaker, are bound by the motion on the Order Paper. We are not given an explanation, let alone an opportunity to discuss why that figure is being altered.

The hon. Member for Paddington (Mr. Latham) has given the impression that we are confined to defence expenditure. It is not. On the Order Paper there are Civil Estimates with exactly the same wording.

In the document that we are not allowed to discuss, there are references as to why particular adjustments must be made on defence and why it is not possible to give the House details. So it is even worse in that regard.

My hon. Friend the Member for Bristol, North-West has many times raised this matter. Each time there are sympathetic noises from the business managers. The Chair is always put in difficulty because it is hard to know what is in order, how something which should not be debated can be debated. Conservative Members agree that it is a bad procedure. It can be suggested that some of us are unhappy about increases in defence expenditure. That may be true but that is not what is being discussed. Whatever party is in Government, eventually Governments understand only winning votes.

What is before the House is not the Civil Estimates to which the hon. and learned Member for Montgomery (Mr. Hooson) referred, nor is it defence, but whether we may debate these matters. If the motion to put the Questions forthwith is defeated, those Supplementary Estimates will not fall, but the House will be able to debate the items before voting. That is what we are asking for.

There is no point in making noises of sympathy—they are not words, because they do not have meaning—unless people are prepared to back them up in the Division Lobby. It is no good raising protests, asking for a commission to investigate procedure, saying that we have been remiss about finances, that there is £14 million not accounted for and that that is not unusual. That nonsense makes the House the farce that it often can be. When the Question is put, those same people will troop into the Lobby and vote for it being put forthwith or disappear into the Tea Room and allow the payroll vote to go through. If the House wishes to assert itself, hon. Members must go into the Division Lobby—I urge that they do so today—to put their votes where their mouths are and vote against putting the Question forthwith so that we can have proper debate of these considerable Supplementary Estimates of public expenditure.

It is two years since we had an undertaking from the Leader of the House about propositions of this character. He said that something would be done, but since then there has been a deafening silence.

I meet organised groups of my constituents regularly and I know that in the next two or three weeks someone from my constituency will ask me why an extra £577 million was required for military and Civil Estimates, and how it was spent. That is a perfectly reasonable question for a constituent to ask his Member of Parliament. My problem is that I shall not be able to reply. There is no way in which I can give an intelligent reply on the basis of what exists today.

The Government are telling us to give them the money and not ask why. They appear to believe that they have the right to demand that we sanction the release of our constituents' money for an unknown and unknowable purpose. That is a total negation of our function as Members of Parliament. We are supposed to scrutinise the spending of the Executive and to provide factual detailed accounts of the way in which the money is spent. We are being forced today—not for the first time—into a position in which we are unable to explain these matters to our constituents. Therefore, our purpose is rendered nugatory.

The Government are creating a hideously inconsistent situation in public expenditure. I am painfully aware that my local authority, which is a representative body and which is responsible to my constituents for its spending, is being held in check by the Executive of the State. At the same time, the Executive claims the right not to be responsible for the decisions of the representative local authorities. It imposes cash limits on them, but no one can impose cash limits on the Executive.

During the last few weeks we have heard time and time again from the Government that if certain wage claims are granted certain things will follow automatically because of the operation of cash limits. The Government are imposing constraints on the spending activities of local authorities, but at the same time they are demanding that we—the representatives of the nation—shall not impose constraints on them. In fact, they go further and say that we shall not even debate what they intend to do with this £577 million. That money represents what is in effect an error by the Government. Put in the most charitable light, they underestimated the amount of money they needed. Fair enough—that can happen in the best run household. Nevertheless, we have the right to ask the Government in what circumstances and areas this overspending arose. Without the answers to those questions we have no idea whether the Government are efficient or incompetent.

I hope that hon. Members on both sides who respect this House and themselves as Members of Parliament will think carefully about their vote today. This has nothing to do with whether a Member is Labour, Liberal or Conservative but it has everything to do with whether one is a member of a Parliament which is worth having. If hon. Members share the cynicism of the Government—this motion was put down with the blackest of cynicism—and if they do not respect themselves and just want to be members of the junta, they will vote with the Government. But, if they think that it is important for the British people to have a representative assembly with real power, they should join us in the No Lobby.

I want to associate myself briefly with these protests. We have heard all these arguments before and now we are back to square one without having moved at all in the right direction.

I was almost induced to change my mind after listening to the speech of the hon. Member for Paddington (Mr. Latham). Much as he dislikes the extension of defence expenditure—as I do—he should accept the military wisdom of not fighting on two fronts. If he and his hon. Friends can get support of Conservatives, Liberals and nationalists this is not the time to divide the ranks. I shall vote against this procedure today.

We seem to be in the habit lately of making fools of ourselves. A few days ago we discussed the procedures of the House and a large number of hon. Members expressed dissatisfaction with the effectiveness of Parliament. That dissatisfaction related to our opportunities to debate matters, and extended to our sources of information and research backup. It extended to our knowledge in advance of Bills being processed in the House and the processing of Bills themselves. As much attention was paid to the actual Bill processing as to anything else. It also extended to the question of scrutiny and monitoring of financial expenditure. Only a few days after a debate in which a lot of dissatisfaction was expressed, we are now proposing to allow millions of pounds of public money to go through on the nod. This is not the proper way to deal with these matters.

At times this House seems intent on shedding its authority. It sloughed off a lot of that authority to Brussels under the European Communities Act. It has tried to get rid of other powers by devolution. Now, not content with humiliating ourselves in this way, we are denying ourselves something that is within our competence—the right to scrutinise and debate at length expenditure which the Government try to get through as an afterthought.

Those hon. Members with more experience of local government than I have pointed out the irony of local authority expenditure being subjected to a far greater degree of control than Government expenditure. Local authorities which "bust" their vote are liable to be in difficulties with their auditors. There is no such comparable sanction on the affairs of Government. The Government legitimise it afterwards. Local authorities cannot do that. They cannot legitimise excessive expenditure ex post facto. This is an odd way to conduct our affairs.

I am sorry that the Leader of the House is not here. I see my right hon. Friend the Chief Whip lurking as a spectral

Division No. 85]	AYES	[5.31 p.m.
Adley, Robert	Drayson, Burnaby	Johnson Smith, G. (E Grinstead)
Anderson, Donald	Duffy, A. E. P.	Jones, Alec (Rhondda)
Archer, Rt Hon Peter	Dunlop, John	Jones, Dan (Burnley)
Armstrong, Ernest	Dunn, James A.	Judd, Frank
Bagier, Gordon A. T.	Durant, Tony	Kaufman, Rt Hon Gerald
Banks, Robert	Dykes, Hugh	Kitson, Sir Timothy
Barnett, Guy (Greenwich)	Eadie, Alex	Langford-Holt, Sir John
Bates, Alt	Edwards, Nicholas (Pembroke)	Le Marchant, Spencer
Benn, Rt Hon Anthony Wedgwood	Elliott, Sir William	Lester, Jim (Beeston)
Berry, Hon Anthony	Ennals, Rt Hon David	Lewis, Ron (Carlisle)
Boardman, H.	Ewing, Harry (Stirling)	Lofthouse, Geoffrey
Booth, Rt Hon Albert	Fairbairn, Nicholas	Loveridge, John
Boothroyd, Miss Betty	Fairgrieve, Russell	Lyons, Edward (Bradford W)
Boscawen, Hon Robert	Faulds, Andrew	McCartney, Hugh
Boyden, James (Bish Auck)	Finsberg, Geoffrey	McElhone, Frank
Bradley, Tom	Fookes, Miss Janet	Macfarlane, Neil
Brown, Sir Edward (Bath)	Foot, Rt Hon Michael	MacFarquhar, Roderick
Brown, Hugh D. (Provan)	Forman, Nigel	McKay, Allen (Penistone)
Brown, Robert C. (Newcastle W)	Forrester, John	MacKay, Andrew (Stechford)
Buchanan, Richard	Fox, Marcus	Mackenzie, Rt Hon Gregor
Buchanan-Smith, Alick	Fry, Peter	Maclennan, Robert
Bulmer, Esmond	George, Bruce	McMillan, Tom (Glasgow C)
Burden, F. A.	Gilbert, Rt Hon Dr John	Madel, David
Callaghan, Jim (Middleton & P)	Gilmour, Rt Hon Sir Ian (Chesham)	Marks, Kenneth
Campbell, Ian	Glyn, Dr Alan	Marshall, Dr Edmund (Goole)
Cartwright, John	Golding, John	Marshall, Jim (Leicester S)
Channon, Paul	Goodlad, Alastair	Mason, Rt Hon Roy
Clark, Alan (Plymouth, Sutton)	Gourlay, Harry	Mates, Michael
Clarke, Kenneth (Rushcliffe)	Gow, Ian (Eastbourne)	Mawby, Ray
Cockcroft, John	Grant, George (Morpeth)	Maxwell-Hyslop, Robin
Cocks, Rt Hon Michael (Bristol S)	Grant, John (Islington C)	Meacher, Michael
Coleman, Donald	Grieve, Percy	Mellish, Rt Hon Robert
Concannon, Rt Hon John	Hamilton, James (Bothwell)	Miller, Hal (Bromsgrove)
Conlan, Bernard	Hampson, Dr Keith	Mills, Peter
Cope, John	Harrison, Rt Hon Walter	Moate, Roger
Cox, Thomas (Tooting)	Haselhurst, Alan	Molyneaux, James
Craigen, Jim(Maryhill)	Holland, Philip	Monro, Hector
Crawshaw, Richard	Horam, John	Montgomery, Fergus
Crowder, F. P.	Howell, Rt Hon Denis (B'ham, Sm H)	Morris, Alfred (Wythenshawe)
Crowther, Stan (Rotherham)	Huckfield, Les	Morris, Rt Hon Charles R.
Davies, Bryan (Enfield N)	Hughes, Rt Hon C. (Anglesey)	Morris, Rt Hon J. (Aberavon)
Davies, Ifor (Gower)	Hunt, David (Wirral)	Morris, Michael (Northampton S)
Davis, Clinton (Hackney C)	Hunt, John (Ravensbourne)	Morrison, Hon Peter (Chester)
Deakins, Eric	Hunter, Adam	Mudd, David
Dean, Joseph (Leeds West)	Jackson, Miss Margaret (Lincoln)	Mulley, Rt Hon Frederick
Dempsey, James	James, David	Murray, Rt Hon Ronald King
Dodsworth, Geoffrey	Jay, Rt Hon Douglas	Neave, Airey
Doig, Peter	Jenkin, Rt Hon P. (Wanst'd&W'df'd)	Nelson, Anthony
Dormand, J. D.	Jessel, Toby	Neubert, Michael
Douglas-Hamilton, Lord James	John, Brynmor	Newton, Tony
Douglas-Mann, Bruce	Johnson, James (Hull West)	Oakes, Gordon

presence in the background exuding his usual good humour. It is a wrong-headed way of setting about the matter. I should like to be able to tell my constituents why we are spending £109 million on air systems defence procurement, but I do not know how to begin to answer their questions. Many of them feel strongly about the matter. It is an unsatisfactory situation.

We are all fond of the Leader of the House. We love him dearly. Over the past 30 years he has gained a reputation as a champion of Back Bench rights. However, I am afraid that of late he has been an example of a poacher turned gamekeeper in these matters.

Question put:—

The House divided: Ayes 228, Noes 68.

O'Halloran, Michael	Silkin, Rt Hon S. C. (Dulwich)	Wakeham, John
Onslow, Cranley	Silvester, Fred	Walker, Harold (Doncaster)
Orbach, Maurice	Smith, Dudley (Warwick)	Walker, Terry (Kingswood)
Page, Rt Hon R. Graham (Crosby)	Smith, Rt Hon John (N Lanarkshire)	Ward, Michael
Page, Richard (Workington)	Snape, Peter	Warren, Kenneth
Palmer, Arthur	Speed, Keith	Watkins, David
Park, George	Spence, John	Weatherill, Bernard
Parker, John	Spriggs, Leslie	Weetch, Ken
Perry, Ernest	Stainton, Keith	Wellbeloved, James
Price, William (Rugby)	Steen, Anthony (Wavertree)	Wells, John
Pym, Rt Hon Francis	Stewart, Ian (Hitchin)	White, Frank R. (Bury)
Radice, Giles	Stewart, Rt Hon M. (Fulham)	Whitehead, Phillip
Rathbone, Tim	Stott, Roger	Whitelaw, Rt Hon William
Rees, Rt Hon Merlyn (Leeds S)	Strang, Gavin	Whitlock, William
Rees-Davies, W. R.	Summerskill, Hon Dr Shirley	Williams, Rt Hon Alan (Swansea W)
Rhodes James, R.	Taylor, Mrs Ann (Bolton W)	Williams, Rt Hon Shirley (Hertford)
Roberts, Albert (Normanton)	Temple-Morris, Peter	Winterton, Nicholas
Roberts, Michael (Cardiff NW)	Thomas, Mike (Newcastle E)	Woodall, Alec
Roderick, Caerwyn	Tinn, James	Wool Robert
Rowlands, Ted	Tomlinson, John	Wrigglesworth, Ian
Sandelson, Neville	Tomney, Frank	Young, David (Bolton E)
Scott, Nicholas	Trotter, Neville	Young, Sir G. (Ealing, cton)
Sever, John	Varley, Rt Hon Eric G.
Sheldon, Rt Hon Robert	Vaughan, Dr Gerard	TELLERS FOR THE AYES:
Shepherd, Colin	Waddington, David	Mr. John Evans and
Shore, Rt Hon Peter	Wainwright, Edwin (Dearne V)	Mr. Ted Graham.
Silkin, Rt Hon John (Deptford)

NOES
Abse, Leo	Fowler, Gerald (The Wrekin)	Morton, George
Ashton, Joe	Grimond, Rt Hon J.	Newens, Stanley
Atkins, Ronald (Preston N)	Hamilton, W. W. (Central Fife)	Ovenden, John
Atkinson, Norman (H'gey, Tott'ham)	Heffer, Eric S.	Parry, Robert
Bain, Mrs Margaret	Hooley, Frank	Penhaligon, David
Beith, A. J.	Hooson, Emlyn	Price, C. (Lewisham W)
Bennett, Andrew (Stockport N)	Hoyle, Doug (Nelson)	Richardson, Miss Jo
Bidwell, Sydney	Hughes, Roy (Newport)	Rodgers, George (Chorley)
Blenkinsop, Arthur	Jeger, Mrs Lena	Rooker, J. W.
Canavan, Dennis	Jenkins, Hugh (Putney)	Skinner, Dennis
Carmichael, Neil	Kelley, Richard	Smith, Cyril (Rochdale)
Clemitson, Ivor	Kerr, Russell	Spearing, Nigel
Cook, Robin F. (Edin C)	Kilfedder, James	Stewart, Rt Hon Donald
Corbett, Robin	Kinnock, Neil	Stoddart, David
Cryer, Bob	Lambie, David	Thomas, Ron (Bristol NW)
Edge, Geoff	Lamond, James	Tierney, Sydney
Ellis, John (Brig & Scun)	Latham, Arthur (Paddington)	Wainwright, Richard (Colne V)
English, Michael	Lee. John	Welsh, Andrew
Evans, Fred (Caerphilly)	Loyden, Eddie	Wilson, Gordon (Dundee E)
Evans, Gwynfor (Carmarthen)	MacCormick, Iain	Wise, Mrs Audrey
Evans, loan (Aberdare)	McNamara, Kevin
Fernyhough, Rt Hon E.	Madden, Max	TELLERS FOR THE NOES:
Flannery, Martin	Maynard, Miss Joan	Mr. Tom Litterick and
Fletcher, Ted (Darlington)	Mikardo, Ian	Mr. Stan Thorne.

Question accordingly agreed to.

Ordered,

Orders Of The Day

SUPPLY

[10th ALLOTTED DAY]— considered.

Mr. SPEAKER proceeded, pursuant to Order this day, to put forthwith the Questions which he was directed to put at Ten o'clock by paragraph( 11) of Standing Order No. 18 ( Business of Supply).

Defence Estimates, 1979–80 (Navy), Vote A

Question,

That during the year ending on 31 March 1980 a number not exceeding 78,000 Officers, Ratings and Royal Marines be maintained for Naval Service.

put and agreed to.

Defence Estimates 1979–80 (Army), Vote A

Question,

That during the year ending on 31 March 1980 a number not exceeding 182,100 all ranks be maintained for Army Service, a number not

Division No. 86]	AYES	[5.45 p.m.
Abse, Leo	Clarke, Kenneth (Rushcliffe)	Ennals, Rt Hon David
Adley. Robert	Clegg, Walter	Evans, John (Newton)
Anderson, Donald	Cockcroft, John	Ewing, Harry (Stirling)
Archer, Rt Hon Peter	Cocks, Rt Hon Michael (Bristol S)	Fairbairn, Nicholas
Armstrong, Ernest	Coleman, Donald	Fairgrieve, Russell
Bagier, Gordon A. T.	Concannon, Rt Hon John	Finsberg, Geoffrey
Baker, Kenneth	Conlan, Bernard	Fisher, Sir Nigel
Banks, Robert	Cope, John	Fletcher-Cooke, Charles
Barnett, Guy (Greenwich)	Costain, A. P.	Fookes, Miss Janet
Beith, A. J.	Cowans, Harry	Foot, Rt Hon Michael
Benn, Rt Hon Anthony Wedgwood	Cox, Thomas (Tooting)	Ford, Ben
Bennett, Sir Frederic (Torbay)	Craig, Rt Hon W. (Belfast E)	Forman, Nigel
Berry, Hon Anthony	Craigen, Jim (Maryhill)	Forrester, John
Biggs-Davison, John	Crawshaw, Richard	Fox, Marcus
Boardman, H.	Crowder, F. P.	George, Bruce
Booth, Rt Hon Albert	Crowther, Stan (Rotherham)	Gilbert, Rt Hon Dr John
Boothroyd, Miss Betty	Davies, Bryan (Enfield N)	Gilmour, Rt Hon Sir Ian (Chesham)
Boscawen, Hon Robert	Davies, Rt Hon Denzil	Glyn, Dr Alan
Bottomley, Peter	Davies, Ifor (Gower)	Golding, John
Boyden, James (Bish Auck)	Davis, Clinton (Hackney C)	Goodhart, Philip
Bradley, Tom	Deakins, Eric	Goodhew, Victor
Braine, Sir Bernard	Dean, Joseph (Leeds West)	Goodlad, Alastair
Brittan, Leon	Dempsey, James	Gourlay, Harry
Brooke, Hon Peter	Dodsworth, Geoffrey	Gow, Ian (Eastbourne)
Brown, Sir Edward (Bath)	Dormand, J. D.	Graham, Ted
Brown, Hugh D. (Provan)	Douglas-Hamilton, Lord James	Grant, George (Morpeth)
Brown, Robert C. (Newcastle W)	Douglas-Mann, Bruce	Grant, John (Islington C)
Bryan, Sir Paul	Drayson, Burnaby	Grieve, Percy
Buchanan, Richard	du Cann, Rt Hon Edward	Grimond, Rt Hon J.
Buchanan-Smith, Alick	Duffy, A. E. P.	Hamilton, James (Bothwell)
Buck, Antony	Dunlop, John	Hampson, Dr Keith
Bulmer, Esmond	Dunn, James A.	Harrison, Col Sir Harwood (Eye)
Burden, F. A.	Durant, Tony	Harrison, Rt Hon Walter
Callaghan, Jim (Middleton & P)	Eadie, Alex	Haselhurst, Alan
Campbell, Ian	Eden, Rt Hon Sir John	Hattersley, Rt Hon Roy
Cartwright, John	Edwards, Nicholas (Pembroke)	Hawkins, Paul
Channon, Paul	Elliott, Sir William	Hayhoe, Barney
Clark, Alan (Plymouth, Sutton)	English, Michael	Higgins, Terence L.

exceeding 60,000 for the Regular Reserve, a number not exceeding 83,000 for the Territorial and Army Volunteer Reserve and a number not exceeding 10,000 for the Ulster Defence Regiment.

put and agreed to.

Defence Estimates 1979–80 (Air), Vote A

Question,

That during the year ending on 31 March 1980 a number not exceeding 90,300 all ranks be maintained for Air Force Service, a number not exceeding 10,775 for the Royal Air Force Reserve and a number not exceeding 1,000 for the Royal Auxiliary Air Force.

put and agreed to.

Defence Estimates, Supplementary Estimates, 1978–79

Question put,

That a further Supplementary sum not exceeding £141,122,000 be granted to Her Majesty out of the Consolidated Fund, to defray the charge which will come in course of payment during the year ending on 31 March 1979, for expenditure on Defence Services, as set out in House of Commons Paper No. 198.

The House divided: Ayes 276, Noes 50.

Holland, Philip	Miller, Dr M. S. (E Kilbride)	Silvester, Fred
Hooson, Emlyn	Mitchell, David (Basingstoke)	Sims, Roger
Hordern, Peter	Moate, Roger	Sinclair, Sir George
Howell, Rt Hon Denis (B'ham, Sm H)	Molloy, William	Smith, Cyril (Rochdale)
Huckfield, Les	Molyneaux, James	Smith, Dudley (Warwick)
Hughes, Rt Hon C. (Anglesey)	Monro, Hector	Smith, Rt Hon John (N Lanarkshire
Hunt, David (Wirral)	Montgomery, Fergus	Snape, Peter
Hunt, John (Ravensbourne)	Morgan-Giles, Rear-Admiral	Spearing, Nigel
Hunter, Adam	Morris, Alfred (Wythenshawe)	Spence, John
Jackson, Miss Margaret (Lincoln)	Morris, Rt Hon Charles R.	Spriggs, Leslie
James, David	Morris, Rt Hon J. (Aberavon)	Steen, Anthony (Wavertree)
Jay, Rt Hon Douglas	Morris, Michael (Northampton S)	Stewart, Ian (Hitchin)
Jenkin, Rt Hon P. (Wanst'd&W'df'd)	Morrison, Hon Charles (Devizes)	Stewart, Rt Hon M. (Fulham)
Jessel, Toby	Morrison, Hon Peter (Chester)	Stoddart, David
John, Brynmor	Mudd, David	Stott, Roger
Johnson Smith, G. (E Grinstead)	Mulley, Rt Hon Frederick	Strang, Gavin
Jones, Alec (Rhondda)	Murray, Rt Hon Ronald King	Summerskill, Hon Dr Shirley
Jones, Barry (East Flint)	Neave, Airey	Taylor, Mrs Ann (Bolton W)
Jones, Dan (Burnley)	Nelson, Anthony	Thomas, Mike (Newcastle E)
Judd, Frank	Neubert, Michael	Tomlinson, John
Kaberry, Sir Donald	Newton, Tony	Tomney, Frank
Kaufman, Rt Hon Gerald	Oakes, Gordon	Townsend, Cyril D.
Kilfedder, James	O'Halloran, Michael	Trotter, Neville
Kitson, Sir Timothy	Onslow, Cranley	Vaughan, Dr Gerard
Langford-Holt, Sir John	Osborn, John	Waddiraton, David
Le Marchant, Spencer	Page, John (Harrow West)	Wainwright, Edwin (Dearne V)
Lester, Jim (Beeston)	Page, Rt Hon R. Graham (Crosby)	Wainwright, Richard (Colne V)
Lewis, Kenneth (Rutland)	Page, Richard (Workington)	Wakeham, John
Lewis, Ron (Carlisle)	Palmer, Arthur	Walker, Harold (Doncaster)
Lloyd, Ian	Park, George	Walker, Terry (Kingswood)
Lofthouse, Geoffrey	Parker, John	Warren, Kenneth
Loveridge, John	Parkinson, Cecil	Watkins, David
Lyons, Edward (Bradford W)	Pattie, Geoffrey	Weatherill, Bernard
McAdden, Sir Stephen	Penhaligon, David	Weetch, Ken
McCartney, Hugh	Perry, Ernest	Weltzman, David
McElhone, Frank	Price, William (Rugby)	Wellbeloved, James
Macfarlane, Neil	Prior, Rt Hon James	Wells, John
MacFarquhar, Roderick	Pym, Rt Hon Francis	White, Frank R. (Bury)
McGuire, Michael (Ince)	Radice, Giles	Whitlock, William
McKay, Allen (Penistone)	Raison, Timothy	Wiggin, Jerry
MacKay, Andrew (Stechford)	Rathbone, Tim	Willey, Rt Hon Frederick
MacKenzie, Rt Hon Gregor	Rees, Rt Hon Merlyn (Leeds S)	Williams, Rt Hon Alan (Swansea W]
Maclennan, Robert	Rees-Davies, W. R.	Williams, Rt Hon Shirley (Hertford)
Madel, David	Rhodes James, R.	Wilson, Rt Hon Sir Harold (Huyton)
Marks, Kenneth	Roberts, Albert (Normanton)	Winterton, Nicholas
Marshall, Dr Edmund (Goole)	Roberts, Michael (Cardiff NW)	Woodall, Alec
Marshall, Jim (Leicester S)	Roderick, Caerwyn	Woof, Robert
Marten, Nell	Rodgers, Sir John (Sevenoaks)	Wriggiesworth, Ian
Mason, Rt Hon Roy	Sandelson, Neville	Young, David (Bolton E)
Mates, Michael	Scott, Nicholas	Young, Sir G. (Ealing, Acton)
Mather, Carol	Sever, John
Mawby, Ray	Shaw, Arnold (Ilford South)	TELLERS FOR THE AYES:
Maxwell-Hyslop, Robin	Sheldon, Rt Hon Robert
Meacher, Michael	Shepherd, Colin	Mr. James Tinn and Mr. Alf Bates.
Mellish, Rt Hon Robert	Silkin, Rt Hon John (Deptford)
Miller, Hal (Bromsgrove)	Silkin, Rt Hon S. C. (Dulwich)

NOES
Ashton, Joe	Hamilton, W. W. (Central Fife)	Maynard, Miss Joan
Atkins, Ronald (Preston N)	Heffer, Eric S.	Mikardo, Ian
Bennett, Andrew (Stockport N)	Hooley, Frank	Morton, George
Carmichael, Neil	Hoyle, Doug (Nelson)	Newens, Stanley
Clemitson, Ivor	Hughes, Roy (Newport)	Ovenden, John
Colquhoun, Ms Maureen	Jeger, Mrs Lena	Parry, Robert
Cook, Robin F. (Edin C)	Jenkins, Hugh (Putney)	Price, C. (Lewisham W)
Corbett, Robin	Kelley, Richard	Richardson, Miss Jo
Cryer, Bob	Kerr, Russell	Rodgers, George (Chorley)
Edge, Geoff	Lambie, David	Silverman, Julius
Ellis, John (Brigg & Scun)	Lamond, James	Skinner, Dennis
Evans, Fred (Caerphilly)	Latham, Arthur (Paddington)	Thomas, Ron (Bristol NW)
Evans, Gwynfor (Carmarthen)	Lee, John	Tierney, Sydney
Evans, loan (Aberdare)	Lestor, Miss Joan (Eton & Slough)	Wise, Mrs Audrey
Fernyhough, Rt Hon E.	Litterick, Tom
Flannery, Martin	Loyden, Eddie	TELLERS FOR THE NOES:
Fletcher, Ted (Darlington)	McNamara, Kevin	Mr. Sydney Bidwell and Mr. Stan Thorne.
Fowler, Gerald (The Wrekin)	Madden, Max

Question accordingly agreed to.

Civil Estimates, Supplementary Estimates, 1978–79

Question,

That a further Supplementary sum not exceeding £436,605,000 be granted to Her Majesty out of the Consolidated Fund, to defray the charge which will come in course of payment during the year ending on 31 March 1979, for expenditure on Civil Services, as set out in House of Commons Papers Nos. 199 and 221.

put and agreed to.

Defence And Civil Estimates Excesses, 1977–78

Question,

That a sum not exceeding £29,504,14767 be granded to Her Majesty out of the Consolidated Fund to make good excesses on certain grants for Defence and Civil Services for the year ended 31 March 1978, as set out in House of Commons Paper No. 229.

put and agreed to.

Bill ordered to be brought in upon the three foregoing Resolutions by the Chairman of Ways and Means, the Chancellor of the Exchequer, Mr. Joel Barnett, Mr. Robert Sheldon and Mr. Denzil Davies.

CONSOLIDATED FUND (NO. 2)

Mr. Robert Sheldon accordingly presented a Bill to apply certain sums out of the Consolidated Fund to the service of the years ending on 31 March 1978 and 1979: And the same was read the First time; and ordered to be read a Second time tomorrow and to be printed. [Bill 104.]

Employment Protection Acts

Motion made, and Question proposed, That this House do now adjourn.—[ Mr. Thomas Cox.]

On a point of order, Mr. Speaker. As you are well aware, this is a Supply day, when the Opposition have the right to choose the subject for debate. Under the rules of the House and the motion moved by the Prime Minister, this debate has to end at 10 o'clock. I draw your attention to the fact that nearly two hours have been taken from Opposition time. I ask you, in view of these circumstances, to consider whether it might be possible to extend the debate or have the debate on another occasion.

It is not possible for me to extend the debate, although it is true that we are two hours late starting on the Supply day debate, or two and a half hours late if one counts business questions.

6 p.m.

With regard to the point of order raised by my hon. Friend the Member for Cambridge (Mr. Rhodes James), I hope that the Secretary of State for Employment will report to the Leader of the House that we have lost about two hours of valuable Opposition time during which we could have discussed the whole question of employment legislation. I should have thought that that was a matter which was of some interest to those hon Members who took part in the last debate, and that in turn they would wish to support us in having an additional half-day on Supply when we can discuss these and similar matters at perhaps greater length. I therefore hope that the Secretary of State will report the views of the Conservative Opposition to the Leader of the House.

Perhaps I can waste a little more time by telling the Secretary of State that we are pleased to see him in his place. We realise that he has been up nearly all night conducting delicate negotiations in relation to Times Newspapers Ltd. We congratulate him on the part that he has played in those negotiations. We hope that they come to a successful conclusion, and that The Times, and the other newspapers connected with it, reappear on 18 April as is at present envisaged.

This debate takes place against a pretty bad economic background. The economy is not increasing in relative efficiency. The rate of increase in unit labour costs is destroying our manufacturing potential. We are in for another bout of inflation. Unemployment is again starting to rise.

Nearly four years ago we had the Second Reading of the Employment Protection Bill, as it then was. At that time the Conservative Opposition moved a reasoned amendment, which stated:

" That this House, while recognising that parts of the Employment Protection Bill give legislative effect to good industrial practice, declines to give a Second Reading to a Bill which makes no attempt to establish a fair balance between the rights of management and unions, adds a heavy burden of cost without proper consideration of how it should be shared by employer, employee and State, and takes no account of the particular problems of small businesses."

I should have thought that that was a pretty apt description today—four years later—of the effects of the Employment Protection Act on British industry. Of course,

" We must be careful that the Employment Protection Act is not turned into an Employment Destruction Act. If something is to be done for the pool of a million and a half unemployed, then small businesses are one of our best hopes."

Those are not my words but the words of the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster when speaking at a conference at the end of 1977. I think it is indication of the changing mood within the Labour Party that nearly two weeks ago Labour Members were not prepared to attend and vote down the Bill of my hon. Friend the Member for Surrey, North-West (Mr. Grylls). That is an indication that their experience in their constituencies in the last year or so has convinced them that there is a good deal of evidence to suggest that the Employment Protection Act, in some of its aspects, has certainly damaged the opportunities of employment and has also done a great deal of damage to industrial confidence.

We are concerned with the direct effects of parts of that legislation on employment and labour costs.

rose—

Let me just get going for a bit, and then I shall give way. I know that the Daniels report, the PSI report—one tends to read into all these reports what one expects to read into them—has caused certain direct and indirect problems and that it has increased costs. We are concerned with the general effect of the sheer weight of legislation on industrial relations which this Government have passed, and which bears very heavily indeed on management.

Is the right hon Gentleman aware that the main representation that I have had from small business in my constituency has been in relation to EEC regulations, which in a neighbouring constituency have led to the closure of one factory and the possibility of 30 people being laid off in my constituency? I have not had the type of representation about which the right hon. Gentleman was talking.

Perhaps they did not think it worth while to make these points to the hon. Gentleman. All I can tell him is that the evidence from the surveys, and the evidence from any meeting of business men to which one likes to go, is strongly that the weight of industrial legislation-be it the Employment Protection Act, the Trade Union and Labour Relations Act, the Dock Work Regulation Act or the Health and Safety at Work etc. Act—have in the last four years had their impact on the willingness of small and large employers alike to take on additional labour. They have very much sapped the confidence of management.

I am sure my right hon. Friend is aware that the Merseyside chamber of commerce has drawn attention to the effect of the Employment Protection Act on small businesses. Perhaps the hon. Member for Liverpool, Walton (Mr. Heffer) might like to have a word with it.

My hon. Friend is quite correct. For a moment I had forgotten that the Merseyside Chamber of Commerce had undertaken a survey, which proved conclusively that the Employment Protection Act, among other things, was an important factor in the recruitment of additional labour, particularly young people. Therefore, I believe that the general case against the Government is now proved, in that in the aftermath of the rise in oil prices in 1973–74 they proceeded with grandiose schemes which might just have been possible in a thrusting, growth-orientated economic boom but which were totally misplaced in the circumstances of 1973, 1974 and 1975. I do not think that there can now be any doubt that all this legislation has had a debilitating effect on British industry.

Strangely enough, one does not hear this just from small businesses or managers. One also hears it from quite a few trade union leaders.

The right hon. Gentleman referred to the Health and Safety at Work etc. Act. Is he aware that the latest figures show that accidents at work have declined by 30 per cent., thereby saving a lot of misery to those at work and obviously helping the economy as well? Would he describe that as one of the debilitating measures that have been introduced by this Government?

Of course he does.

I am always happy to welcome the fall in the number of accidents at work. But I do not think that that is necesarily a direct result of the legislation that has gone through this House. Thank heavens, there are many reasons why good industrial management is now leading to a decline in the number of accidents. Therefore, the hon. Gentleman should not be too quick to assume that legislation passed in this House always has the result that he expects it to have.

I should like to quote from the Engineering Employers' Federation survey of November 1978, which states:

" One of the most frequent comments on employment legislation was that, in total, it represented a burden on management time to the extent that it diverted their attention from the vital functions of production and planning for expansion. ' Too much legislation for management to absorb ' was a common view. Some respondents suggested that they were unable to keep abreast of current employment law because of its sheer volume."

I am sure that that statement would be endorsed up and down the country. Quite obviously, the Act is due for amendment.

I really cannot understand the priority which the Government at present give to their business.

We heard the Business Statements today and last week. The Government have hardly any business to put in front of the House at the moment. One would have thought that they could have put forward some reasonable, sensible, agreed amendments to the Employment Protection Act, which I shall outline to the Government and which would do a great deal to get further employment and industrial confidence back into our country.

Government supporters who believe that everything is all right in the best of all possible worlds have only to look at the economic performance of Britain in the past five years to feel thoroughly ashamed of themselves.

I turn to a number of individual items where some changes should be considered in the relevant Acts. It is tremendously important that ACAS continues and survives changes in Government. I want to see ACAS built up into a thoroughly independent conciliation and arbitration service. It has an essential rôle in conciliation and arbitration, although so far it has perhaps performed the conciliation rôle better than the arbitration rôle. It must be seen to be impartial and objective.

There is serious concern about the conduct of recognition inquiries which ACAS has carried out. Those parts of section 1 of the Employment Protection Act 1975 which set up ACAS and which went beyond promoting the improvement of industrial relations need to be reconsidered, as they are in some respects contradictory. In the recent case of the UKAPE recognition inquiry the UKAPE application was turned down on the grounds that it would not promote good industrial relations. Yet when it came to the court it was overturned on the basis that it would have encouraged the extension of collective bargaining. There is a need for a change to be made in the terms of reference of ACAS if it is to do the job which the Opposition believe it must do.

The Act poses great difficulties as to recognition. It has come under strong criticism from trade unionists and management. There are now some voices for the repeal of all the recognition procedures. Is it right that the law should opt out of recognition? Can the Minister tell us what review is going on? Certainly at the moment the sections of the Act dealing with recognition are not even-handed. The behaviour of ACAS on recognition issues has also not been seen to be even-handed, as the terms of reference do not allow that. That must be looked at again. Certainly, an incoming Conservative Government would do so.

I turn briefly to a matter that has concerned this House a great deal in recent years. It has to do with recognition. I refer to the attitude of the Society of Lithographic Artists, Designers, Engravers and Process Workers and the National Graphical Association. The disreputable tactics of SLADE over the past three or four years are a blot on the good name of trade unionism. Few people inside or outside the House have defended SLADE, and one would like to have seen the Government taking a far more forthright attitude towards SLADE than they have so far taken.

The Conservative Party has committed itself, on its return to Government, to set up an inquiry into the activities of SLADE. I hope that we shall get this inquiry under way within a short time of taking office.

I share the right hon. Gentleman's disquiet about SLADE and the union relationship. Some of our constituents have made approaches to us. I have been in correspondence with the general secretary of the TUC on the matter. There hovers over the matter the question of whether the trade union movement is being brought into disrepute as a result. No great faith will be placed in a Tory investigation. It seems to me to be more expressly a matter for the print group of the TUC which was set up to investigate it.

I appreciate what the hon. Gentleman said. He has been more forthcoming than any other member on the Government Benches. I am grateful for what he said. However, it is not good enough to say that it is up to the TUC print industry committee. It has had its chance. It is plain that it will not take this opportunity to hold an inquiry. I understand that from both the committee and the TUC point of view it is difficult for them to do so. On the other hand, it is the duty of Government. I see no reason why it should not be a totally independent inquiry. I do not offer to make the hon. Gentleman a member of the inquiry team. However, if he keeps up his present form, perhaps he could go on to it.

An inquiry is necessary. The Government could and should have set it up. There are now two early-day motions on the Order Paper that would have enabled the Government to take some action had they sought to do so. At the moment SLADE and the NGA are engaged in seeking to black, through a series of letters, a firm called T. Bailey Forman Ltd. of Nottingham. It seems that the letters that have been sent round should be challenged in the courts. I suspect that the blacking is far too remote to be sustained under section 13 of the Trade Union and Labour Relations Act. However, the point at issue today is not section 13 of that Act but the fact that blacking is taking place in furtherance of a recognition order.

On a point of order, Mr. Deputy Speaker. The motion on the Order Paper before us, apart from the daily Adjournment motion, deals with the Employment Protection Act. The right hon. Gentleman has so far spent about half his time discussing other legislation. Is that in order? At this moment he is discussing other legislation.

The right hon. Gentleman should be allowed to advance his argument in his own way.

Nothing that I said was in any way irrelevant to the Employment Protection Act.

I was about to say that the blacking, which is supposedly protected by section 13 of the Trade Union and Labour Relations Act, is in furtherance of a recognition issue which is already in front of ACAS. Of course, it is very much bound up with the Employment Protection Act. It is totally unacceptable to the Opposition that a union should use blacking tactics, with the immunities conferred on it, until the recognition has been properly tested. That has not yet happened.

In a letter to my hon. Friend the Member for Horsham and Crawley (Mr. Hordern), the Minister of State, Department of Employment, said:

" It was the awareness of the need to provide more satisfactory ways of resolving recognition disputes which led the Government to introduce the recognition provisions of the Employment Protection Act. I understand from ACAS that one of the unions concerned in the dispute at T. Bailey Forman Ltd., is, in fact, pursuing a formal reference under section 11 of the Employment Protection Act.'

It is absolutely inexcusable for a union to take this kind of action until it has gone through the procedures that are laid down in the Employment Protection Act for it to gain recognition. I make it plain that the Opposition condemn the action of SLADE and the NGA in this respect very strongly indeed.

Would the right hon. Gentleman equally condemn an employer who prevents ACAS from pursuing a section 11 reference so as to deal with the problem?

I do not need any reminder about Grunwick. I stood out the whole way through for employers co-operating in ACAS inquiries. Since we have ACAS and recognition procedures, I believe that each side should co-operate in them. As I have already pointed out, it is the terms of reference to ACAS which have made ACAS lose so much confidence among employers, who are concerned whether they will get a fair hearing. We have to take that point into consideration.

Will the right hon. Gentleman give way?

No. The hon. Gentleman has had one go already this afternoon and I think that that is enough.

I do not believe that this dispute has anything to do with working conditions or pay. It is merely an attempt by SLADE again, as in so many other cases, to get additional membership and to protect its membership. I do not believe that the way in which it is acting can in any way be regarded as legitimate trade union activity.

I believe that schedule 11 to the Employment Protection Act 1975 has been used and is being used for totally different purposes from those for which it was set up. In Committee on the Employment Protection Bill I said:

" It is damaging from the point of view of inflation; it is damaging from the point of view of collective bargaining; it could lead to leapfrogging in industry in an area; it is detrimental to the whole employment prospects of people whom all of us in this Committee would wish to support."—[Official Report, Standing Committee F, 10 July 1975; col. 1308.]

Everything that has happened in regard to the use of schedule 11 from that time onwards has proved that view to be correct.

The Secretary of State for Employment said time and again, in Committee and on the Floor of the House, that this was a provision which was to deal with the low paid. In actual fact, the people who have used schedule 11 have not been the low paid. There have been very few examples of the low paid being able to use schedule 11. It has been used almost entirely by white-collar unions and craft unions, particularly the Associated Society of Technical and Managerial Staff and the Amalgamated Union of Engineering Workers (Technical and Supervisory Staff). It has been used to obtain increases in pay which have upset almost every other aspect of collective bargaining, all other arrangements concerning differentials, and so on.

I was told recently that the cost to British Shipbuilders—which was governed last year by the Government pay policy—of schedule 11 claims alone was over £20 million. In many cases in the last year or so, schedule 11 has been used for collusive purposes, where an employer has wanted to pay his people extra and has been prohibited from doing so by Government pay policy, and has therefore encouraged his employees to take a case to the Central Arbitration Committee in order to make a schedule 11 claim. The reputation of the CAC, and the manner in which schedule 11 has operated, have been brought into disrepute by the way in which the CAC dealt so dramatically with the claims of the BBC employees just before Christmas.

I believe that schedule 11, therefore, needs to be examined. It should be taken off the statute book altogether. The sooner that happens, the better it will be. I offer that advice to the Government.

I turn now to the question of industrial tribunals. Although I think there has been some improvement since we debated industrial tribunals in this House, I must remind Labour Members that, when at that time we said that everything was not right with industrial tribunals, we were accused immediately of wishing to undermine the whole principle of industrial tribunals. But a little later the Government made some of the changes which we had suggested were necessary. I do not want any Labour Members today to try to pin on us the allegation that we are against the whole principal of industrial tribunals, because we are not. We want to see some improvements and we want to avoid much of the unnecessary work and legal costs which at the moment are involved in many industrial tribunal cases.

I believe that the six-months rule relating to unfair dismissal ought to be changed to 52 weeks. That was the view taken by the Government when the matter was debated in Committee. All experience since then has suggested that six months is too short a time and that it ought to be changed to 52 weeks.

There has been a considerable change in the matter of burden of proof as between the Industrial Relations Act 1971 and the Trade Union and Labour Relations Act 1974. This again requires to be examined.

I turn to another side of the unfair dismissal argument. In this respect I want to deal with section 58 of the Employment Protection (Consolidation) Act 1978. My hon. Friend the Member for Brentford and Isleworth (Mr. Hayhoe) will have more to say about this when he replies, but I should like to deal with the unfair dismissal provisions which are at the moment included in the closed shop legislation. There are two definite changes in the law that we believe ought to be made.

The first is where a worker is expelled or excluded from a union and at the moment has no recourse to an independent court of law but has recourse only to the independent review committee of the Trades Union Congress. That is not good enough. We have always said that it is not good enough. If we wanted proof of this, we have had it from the recent lorry drivers' strike. A considerable number of lorry drivers, who were not concerned directly with the strike in any way, were warned that if they went through the picket line the local branch of the Transport and General Workers' Union would make certain that their cards were torn up. They knew that if they lost their cards they would lose their jobs. It is not good enough that this matter should be dealt with by the TUC committee alone. It needs to have the backing of the law, and we should certainly wish to make that change.

We also want to bring to an end the position in which, when a closed shop is introduced, it is fair to dismiss someone for refusing to join a union although that person may have been in the employment of the company for a number of years. The best example of this is the one that is always given by my hon. Friend the Member for Eastbourne (Mr. Gow). Some railwaymen employed by British Rail—many of them had been so employed for a long time—lost their jobs simply because they were not prepared to join the union. That is not a tolerable position and it is one that we shall seek to put right by legislation.

Although it does not go far enough, the concordat goes some way to support this view, for on page 18 it is stated that

" The General Council advise that unions should adopt approaches which place the main emphasis on unions themselves persuading workers on the benefits of trade union membership."

If that is the view of the TUC, there can be very little objection to underwriting what it wishes to see by means of changes in the law on the lines that I have suggested. I believe that those changes will need to be made. If the Government wish to make them now we shall give them our support.

A matter which has received much attention during the recent lorry drivers' strike and the other strikes this winter is that of guaranteed payments. Several of my hon. Friends have had letters from firms which have made these guaranteed payments, although they were under the impression previously that they would not have to pay out as their employees were put out of work as a result of a trade dispute. These cases depend on how closely the trade dispute can be associated or linked with the firm in question. That is what governs whether the payments have to be made. For a number of firms, in particular those in the textile and footware industries, a considerable number of complaints have been made to us about the way in which these guaranteed payments are operating.

Is the right hon. Gentleman saying that his party has decided to repeal schedule 11? If he is, it is most important. There were so many different wage rates throughout the country and so many conflicting arguments about comparability that British Shipbuilders, for example, came to the conclusion that there should be a national agreement covering shipbuilding workers throughout the country. We in the shipbuilding industry have been arguing for that for a long time. The repeal of schedule 11 would not help towards better industrial relations. It would do the opposite and lead to conflict where conflict could be avoided.

The establishment of a universal rate for wage claims—it could be called a parity—among shipyards, as was put into effect at British Shipbuilders, has nothing to do with schedule 11.

The purpose of schedule 11 was perfectly clear. It was to help the low paid to obtain higher wages as a result of being compared to the average for those types of workers in that particular area. The effect of schedule 11 has been totally different. It has been used chiefly by unions such as TASS and ASTMS to obtain increases for those who, by no stretch of the imagination, come into the low-paid category. I could cite cases where those increases have in turn created anomalies in another part of a firm which in turn has become subject to schedule 11. This must be examined.

The hon. Member for Liverpool, Walton (Mr. Heffer) asked whether I am making firm commitments. The answer is "No". I am saying that these are the measures which we believe should be amended by the Government. I do not know whether the Government have had consultations on these matters, but there should be consultations. When we are returned to office we shall consult on these matters, because those changes need to be made.

The Government have never sought the common ground in any of this legislation. Their consultations have almost always been one-sided. They have consulted the TUC but have not always consulted the CBI or other interested groups. If they had done so they could not have gone through with much of this legislation.

Management has been demoralised. Efficiency, productivity and the will to produce has been sapped. The proposals that we put forward—the basis of the Conservative Party's approach over the last five years—seek to create an even-handedness in industrial relations. We believe that the balance in bargaining power is now tilted too much one way. From time to time Governments have had to resort to the imposition of a statutory incomes policy because they have not been able to keep the right balance in any other way. That is why our proposals would do more to enable responsible and real collective bargaining to take place, free from Government interference.

Each day that this Parliament remains is a wasted day for the nation, unless we can tackle some of these issues. It is not good enough for Britain that time and again when the Opposition put forward views on the Employment Protection Act, on trade union legislation or industrial relations legislation—in a spirit of compromise and of even-handedness—they are rejected by the Government.

The Government know only too well that their policies over the last five years have resulted in high unemployment, a stagnant economy, and a far less competitive position in British industry than we have had for many years. Labour costs are going up by leaps and bounds at a time when nearly all our competitors are controlling theirs more effectively.

They are the lowest labour costs in Europe.

Labour costs in Britain are rising at a far higher and sustained rate than they are in Europe, simply because our productivity has been so low. Our approach is not only to make amendments and changes in the Employment Protection Act and the Trade Union and Labour Relations Act but to switch the balance of taxation so that it bears less on those who work, so that people who earn can keep more of their cash in their pockets. The hon. Member for Birmingham, Selly Oak (Mr. Litterick) will find that in his constituency if he ever asks about it.

That is the policy that we shall pursue and it is on that basis, and because we have no confidence that the Government have in any way thought this through over the last few years, that we shall vote against them tonight.

6.36 p.m.

I thank the right hon. Member for Lowestoft (Mr. Prior) for his kind remarks concerning my part in seeking to resolve the dispute at The Times. Having said that, I am sorry that I must take a totally different attitude to almost everything else that he said in opening the debate. If he believes that we are going to solve the problems of economic performance, wage levels and industrial relations by taking away from individual or organised workers the rights that have been established under the Employment Protection Act, I think that he has identified a fundamental difference between the attitude of the Opposition, which he reflects, and the attitude of the Government side of the House.

I make no complaint that the right hon. Member linked to the subject of the debate certain aspects of industrial relations legislation, because there is a relationship. During the last decade we have had a series of debates in which we have moved from an argument that used to be posed on the question whether there is any role for the law in industrial relations to an argument that seeks to establish what is the proper role of the law in this area. That is an important change in attitude, which has developed over a long period. It has been reflected in the attitudes of many hon. Members. That change of attitude was shown by the right hon. Member for Sidcup (Mr. Heath), who spoke on the 1971 Industrial Relations Act from his experience as an ex-Minister of Labour. He said that his attitude had changed at that time.

We should examine the role of employment protection legislation from a number of angles, including the industrial relations angle and the way that that is affected by employment protection questions. I believe that when the industrial Relations Act 1971 was put on the statute book it was put there by people who really did believe that one could, by introducing a carefully, legally regulated system of industrial relations, produce an improvement in industrial relations performance. I disagreed with them fundamentally.

Nobody will be able to prove conclusively to somebody who takes another view that the fact that there were twice as many industrial dispute days lost per month under the Conservative Government than there were under a Labour Government was entirely due to the different attitudes to industrial relations legislation, but at least, as reasonably objective people, we can accept that nobody has proved that that type of legislation drastically reduces the number of disputes. The evidence is against that.

I am not claiming that our level of disputes is entirely due to the Employment Protection Act and the Trade Union and Labour Relations Act; it is affected by a number of other matters, just as the disputes between 1972 and 1974 were affected by matters other than industrial relations legislation.

In the light of that experience we can now debate in an informed way the right balance that must be struck between those aspects that we should seek to regulate, those rights that should be protected by legislation and those rights that should be left to be determined by individuals when seeking contracts, and those rights which should be subject to free collective bargaining—or voluntary collective bargaining, which is a more acceptable phrase at this time.

Does my right hon. Friend agree that one feature of the 1971 Act that clouds the thinking of many trade unionists today about the horror of a future Tory Government is that there is a total absence of give and take? The Tory Government would not accept any amendments, no matter how constructive, and argued hour after hour.

I hope that we can be a little more loving and forgiving than to go down that road. The right hon. Member for Lowestoft made an appeal that when an approach was made suggesting balance and compromise we should examine our legislation to see whether it needed altering. It is proper for us to respond to that. It would be unkind and ungenerous to say that because the Conservative Government would not entertain any amendments to their Industrial Relations Act we are not prepared to entertain an amendment to our legislation. I would not dream of suggesting such a thing to my hon. Friends.

We should acknowledge that we have not produced the perfect instrument. There are difficulties in operating the Employment Protection Act which we should examine. We should acknowledge that it might be capable of improvement. In the legislation that we have introduced since 1974 we have tried to build upon the system of industrial relations, as suggested by Donovan. Our legislation has been more in keeping with the spirit of Donovan than was that of the Conservative Government.

The right hon. Member for Lowestoft criticised ACAS. He said that it found it impossible to act impartially, at least in certain circumstances. The right hon. Member referred to the way in which ACAS has handled the matter of recognition.

I am still convinced, having examined the successes and difficulties of the three institutions—ACAS, the Central Arbitration Committee and the Employment Appeal Tribunal—that they have proved beyond doubt that one can make a contribution towards improving industrial relations by setting up such machinery and by enabling employers and trade unions and individual employees to take their grievances, difficulties and complaints to an appropriate body to be resolved. I take that view, not because I think that the difficulties will be resolved in each case. I do not think that we can set up machinery that will solve all these problems.

However, we have created machinery which is operated in the best traditions of British justice and sensitivity for collective bargaining which have sorted out a whole series of problems which would have cost industry time and which would have had a detrimental impact on our economy at a time when we could ill afford it.

ACAS is now handling 3,000 conciliation cases a year. That is nearly three times as many as were handled by the Department of Employment before ACAS was set up. In the majority of cases ACAS is successful. Cases are referred to ACAS by employers, by trade unions and by trade unions and employers jointly. That proves that trade unions and employers put trust in ACAS for its impartiality and competence. The House should pay a tribute to ACAS in a debate such as this.

The right hon. Member for Lowestoft reserved special and detailed criticism for the subject of recognition. I do not claim that every trade union and employer has abided completely by the spirit of the part of the legislation which deals with recognition. Far from it. The right hon. Member cited trade unions. It would not be difficult for me to cite employers who have not abided by the spirit of the legislation, but that argument does not take us far. It does not tell us whether the recognition provisions should be scrapped, altered or improved.

We must accept that the recognition provisions have enabled recognition to be obtained in hundreds of firms without a day being lost in a dispute. A whole series of references have been successful. I agree with the right hon. Member that the conciliation part of the exercise of recognition has been dealt with effectively by ACAS, but the final stage in the recognition process has caused difficulties.

There have been trade unions and certainly employers who have not abided by the spirit of the legislation and who have refused to co-operate with ACAS. Those refusals have in many cases led to legal appeals against ACAS and the way in which it performs its role. This is holding up part of its recognition work. I regret that.

I do not say that that is because courts are anything other than impartial. It just shows that when they are put before the courts a view is taken of certain matters which does not accord with the view of industrial relations practitioners who are equally sincere, fair and impartial and who man ACAS. It does not help to suggest that ACAS has been anything other than impartial and thorough in handling recognition claims.

Again, this is something that one will never be able to prove. One can only examine the facts and draw certain conclusions. The facts are that recognition resulted in 49 per cent. of the 1,142 references with which ACAS had dealt up to the beginning of 1979; full recognition resulted in 38 per cent. of the cases; and 11 per cent. of the cases resulted in partial recognition. I suggest that those figures are not incompatible with my contention that ACAS has done its job impartially. It certainly has not awarded to 99 per cent. of the applicants the recognition that they sought. It has not awarded full recognition to everyone who has sought full recognition.

I believe that ACAS has done its job impartially and thoroughly. The courts took a different view from that which the ACAS council took of its duty, especially on the question of the way in which it should test the opinion of the workers. In the Grunwick case there was an attempt to use the recognition provision in an area that we had not carefully considered in the House. Here I express personal regret. I admit to my share of the blame. I may not have given sufficient care to the drafting of that section and its purpose when I laid it before the House. I did not envisage its being used where people were on strike and out on a picket line before they advanced their recognition claim. Used in that way, that section of the Act failed to secure a recognition decision that was acceptable to or workable by the parties.

Having admitted all that, I put it to the House: can anyone think of an instrument that would have solved the Grunwick recognition issue, given the attitudes that developed and the pressures that built up? We are asking more than it is reasonable to ask from legislation if we expect to produce a recognition system which will guarantee that every recognition claim advanced can be handled without in some cases bringing about dissatisfaction or without avoiding in every case an industrial dispute.

It is notable—I hope there will be no dissent from this proposition—that there is a series of important collective and individual rights contained in the Employment Protection Act which the right hon. Member for Lowestoft has not mentioned. I suggest that he has not mentioned them because they are working very effectively and making a useful and important contribution to good industrial relations and good employment standards. I mention briefly the redundancy notification and consultation provisions which are working extremely well, establishing a fundamental right for those who organise workers in firms to be consulted before a mass redundancy takes place. I believe that those provisions, together with the temporary employment subsidy and the redundancy payments provisions passed by the House, have probably reduced the social problems that would otherwise have existed and avoided a series of disputes that would otherwise have occurred.

Schedule 11 has been the subject of criticism by the right hon. Gentleman. It has been in operation for less than three years, but it is built upon a proposition that the House has considered not only over the past 10 years but almost over the past century. It is based upon the principle of the fair wages resolution, which was first carried in the House in 1891. It follows and builds upon section 8 of the Terms and Conditions of Employment Act, which was introduced by a Conservative Government.

It is an extension.

I agree that it is an extension. We are talking about an extension, not about whether we should wipe out the principle from our practices. We are here to debate whether, in the way in which it has been adapted, we have eased problems of industrial relations and contributed to the raising of employment standards. I tend to agree with the point made in an intervention that if there had not been a schedule 11 there would not have been as rapid a solution of the wages problems of British Shipbuilders or, alternatively, those problems would have been resolved only in a series of bitter disputes.

When I examined the claim of the Swan Hunter workers I saw how their wages compared with those of other workers practising the same skills and building the same kind of ships in other parts of the country. If schedule 11 had not been there that claim would have had to be dealt with in another way. That schedule enabled it to be dealt with in a way that avoided disputes, and considerable patience and understanding was shown by many who were involved in it.

The criticism that is advanced against schedule 11 in part is that it has not dealt only with low pay problems. I urge those making that criticism to take notice of part II as well as part I of schedule 11, because the criticism is always advanced against part I, and not against part II, that it has been drawn too tightly and has not been able to deal with some of the problems that we envisaged when we brought it before the House.

The fact is that schedule 11, part 1, has helped low-paid people. Of the awards made under part I, 20 per cent. have been to people who have successfully claimed that they were being paid less than the minimum amount they should have received under the appropriate national or district agreement. The main thrust of schedule 11 is towards relative low pay—relative in industrial terms. It allows comparisons to be made with general levels. Its purpose is to deal with the glaring anomalies that arise when people are paid very different rates for doing the same job in the same industry.

There are several important individual rights in the Employment Protection Act. Adverse criticism has been made today of the unfair dismissal legislation. I speak not as an impartial person. I can never be totally impartial about unfair dismissal because I am probably one of the few people in the House to have been reinstated in a job as a result of a strike by fellow trade unionists who believed that I had been dismissed because of trade union activity. That has had a permanent effect upon my thinking about the issue of unfair dismissal and it has caused me to believe that it is far better for unions, instead of using their collective bargaining strength to resolve questions of unfair dismissal, to put those issues before independent tribunals. That is particularly true of small firms.

That is one reason—not my basic reason—why I am opposed to strong distinctions between large and small firms. When the issue arises of whether one employee in a small firm has been treated unfairly by the employer, it is difficult within the context of normal collective bargaining and union representation to ensure that that matter can be resolved in a way that will not lead to a serious industrial dispute. If one has to make up one's mind, as a fellow trade unionist, whether to vote for the withdrawal of labour in the event of a problem not being resolved in direct negotiations with the employer that, too, is a difficult issue.

I believe that our employment protection in respect of unfair dismissal is no greater than that which generally applies in Western European countries. We have even been a bit slow to provide employment protection in this area compared with Scandinavian and Western European countries. In France, Italy, Belgium, Holland and Sweden there is no minimum qualifying period. As soon as a person becomes an employee he has the protection of his country's unfair dismissal legislation.

In Italy and Norway the remedy for unfair dismissal is reinstatement plus compensation. That is a different approach, but the inherent reasonableness, if I may put it that way, of the proposition that one must have an appeal against loss of livelihood, if that should come about because of an unjust or unfair action, is one that is now undeniable. It is a generally accepted right. If the Opposition do not accept that—

We introduced it in the 1971 Act.

In the 1971 Act, the Conservative Government, in proposing unfair dismissal rights to this House, drew a clear distinction between those employed in small firms and those in large firms. In fact, those employees who worked in firms with no more than four employees were not covered by that legislation, irrespective of whether they had worked for that firm for one, two or 20 years. No cover was provided for them by the 1971 Act.

I am talking about principles. I believe that there is an inherent reasonableness in the principle that the question whether somebody is to lose his livelihood as a result of an unfair action should be able to be tested by an impartial body. That is an indivisible principle. It is not something that one can say exists only according to the size of the firm or organisation in which the person works. Therefore, I believe that much of the criticism against this part of the legislation has been seriously misdirected.

I know that some of the criticisms of the legislation do not attack that principle. I accept that. Some of the criticisms are about the length of time that it takes to operate—the time taken at the hearings. On average, about three-quarters of all hearings are completed in one day. It takes that long to deal with a case. However, good industrial management often takes time when dealing with the problems of individuals.

There have been complaints that the cost of going to the tribunal is high. Sometimes the cost is high because lawyers are employed to deal with unfair dismissal cases where they need not be employed. If I might use an argument that is more likely to appeal to Opposition Members than to my right hon. and hon. Friends, I have found that there are a number of insurance companies that are now prepared to insure firms against the cost of an industrial tribunal. Those insurance firms charge £8 per employee.

Those firms are on to a good thing, because when we examine the likelihood or incidence of adverse tribunal awards against small firms we find that there is about a 1,000 to one chance against a small firm facing an adverse award in any one year. However, the chance is there, and I do not doubt that the insurance assessors who advise the companies to offer the premiums are not advising them to go into it as a social service to small firms, or in order to make a loss, but to ensure that their own profits are not gravely diminished.

I do not think that the criticism of bias on the part of tribunals can be sustained—far from it. I do not rejoice in the figures, but the results do not square with the criticism. Two-thirds of tribunal decisions are in favour of employers and only one-third in favour of employees. Therefore, we can hardly say that that squares with the suggestion that the Employment Protection Act is in some way biased against employers. On the contrary, the way that it works demonstrates that it is remarkably fair, even-handed and impartial.

Another myth that is perpetuated about unfair dismissal is that the case load has increased. That is not so. The case load is diminishing, because 1,000 fewer cases have reached industrial tribunals in the past year.

Another criticism concerns the level of awards. It is said that the awards made are far too high. The truth is that two-thirds of industrial tribunal awards are under £400. We can judge for ourselves whether £400 is too high or too low. In some of those cases where the awards are much higher—and there are such cases—we find that the person concerned has had good long service as an employee and has been unfairly dismissed in circumstances where he is most unlikely to be able to get another job. In those circumstances we have to consider whether the higher award is unreasonable, unfair or an indication of bias. I suggest to the House that it is none of those things.

I am sure that the House will agree that my right hon. Friend is making a devastating case for maintaining the present legislation. Does he agree that to extend the probationary period from six months to a year, which the Opposition are advocating, would be a major reduction in what many of us regard as the minimal rights that now exist?

It would be a substantial reduction in the cover provided by the Act. We are living in a period in which, surprisingly, there is tremendous mobility of labour. A tremendous number of job changes are taking place, even during a period of high unemployment. My Department recorded approximately 4 million job changes last year, and I believe that our statistics cover only about half the total number of job changes. If we take into account the increasing number of persons entering employment, an extension of the qualifying period would mean a considerable reduction of the effective cover of that provision.

The right hon. Member for Lowestoft gave a textbook exposition of the fact that by having a higher standard of employment protection one deters employers from employing and therefore that increases unemployment. That is a gross exaggeration when examined against what actually happens. The Conservative Party's small business bureau asked a slanted question and received a slanted answer. That hardly seems to be effective evidence. The two Government surveys carried out by independent bodies showed that only a small proportion of firms find legislation a major difficulty. In the survey that the Government conducted only a small percentage of firms indicated that they were having difficulty.

It is interesting to notice that when the British Institute of Management wrote to the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Lowestoft at the same time as it wrote to me, it did not indicate that it was having difficulty with the great burden of legislation that had been laid upon it. It said that it was coping well and that the majority of managers had come to terms with it and that it did not want to see basic changes made in the unfair dismissal provisions. That is the view of the institute.

The right hon. Gentleman's own survey—the one issued on 17 August—has a number of figures in it, and the one that shows the most substantial effect is contained in the phrase:

" 71 out of the 301—24 per cent.—said that they would have taken on more employees but for the legislation."

I accept straight away that there are other aspects of the survey that indicate that a smaller percentage objected to particular features, but at least one part of the Government's own survey indicated that roughly one quarter of the firms said that they would have employed more people but for this legislation.

It is part of the argument of the hon. Member for Brentford and Isleworth (Mr. Hayhoe) that the legislation is especially a problem for small firms. The results of the Opinion Research Centre survey, which I issued in a press notice from my Department, showed that only 2 per cent. of employers with fewer than 50 employees named employment legislation when they were asked to identify the main difficulties that they were facing in running their business. Only 7 per cent. mentioned it when they were specifically asked whether Government measures had caused difficulties. These are small employers, if one takes 50 as a definition. When asked what I suggest is the loaded or slanted question whether a firm would take on more or fewer employees if it were not brought within the legislation, the answer was more. The Government commissioned a survey. I am not trying to claim or deny authorship of it. It was relevant. It was helpful to have such a survey and to have the figures considered. It is far better that the figures be available that emerged from the Government's survey than those of the Conservative Party survey for the purpose of discussion by the House.

Is the right hon. Gentleman aware of the survey conducted by the EEF, which revealed that the smaller the company the greater the impact of employment protection legislation, especially the unfair dismissal provisions? It revealed that 70 per cent. of companies employing fewer than 50 employees rated the unfair dismissal provisions as the most important factor in their not taking on more employees. The sample was based on 260 companies.

I recognise that if one is running a small firm one is less likely to have access to the expertise and advice on how to deal with current legislation that is available to larger firms. It does not help if Opposition Members encourage the idea that the Labour Government have laid a great and terrible burden upon small businesses that is dis-proprotionate to anything that operates elsewhere. That is not so.

If we consider employment protection legislation in European countries generally, we find that we do not have more of it in the United Kingdom. Certain comparisons show that we have less of it. It is an insult to British management to suggest that it cannot cope with the present volume of employment protection legislation when managements in other European countries are able to cope. In other European countries there are as many small and successful firms as in the United Kingdom, if not more. That is what we find in Western Germany. I encourage small firms. I am glad that my Department is operating the small firms employment subsidy. The subsidy is assisting employers to expand their firms. I am glad that we are undertaking detailed work in issuing guidance that helps small firms to familiarise themselves with the legislation that we have introduced.

The caricature that is drawn by those who are engaged in the political campaign against employment protection legislation is made even more grotesque by the suggestion that an employer may not dismiss an employee. It is suggested that a small employer cannot dismiss a member of his work force. An employer on a small scale in my constituency, a farmer, said that he would be asked more questions if he sacked somebody than if he shot them. That was the attitude that had lodged in his mind about our employment legislation.

It is necessary for me to state what is so obvious to anyone who reads the Act—namely, that it is permissible to dismiss an employee under current legislation. It is permissible to dismiss for misconduct, incompetence or on grounds of redundancy provided that an employer acts in a reasonable manner. That is the aim behind the unfair dismissal provisions.

The debate has been curtailed and I shall not deal with all the rights that have been provided by employment protection legislation, many of which have been highly successful. I think of maternity rights. They have removed worry from some women in pregnancy that they will lose their jobs. That worry caused some of them to stay at work too long and some to return too early, to the detriment of their health and that of their children I have in mind the guarantee provisions and the time-off-work provisions, which have enabled a much wider social strata to sit on magistrates' benches and councils. I shall not go into these rights in detail.

The real choice before us as members of a modern legislature is not between having the rights to which I have referred and establishing more or not having them at all, but whether we establish these rights in law or whether working people fight for them through their collective strength. There are some rights that are better enshrined in law than fought for through collective bargaining strength. I say that as a lifelong trade unionist.

I accept that our employment protection legislation has its faults. We have run into difficulties with some parts of it. The Government as a whole are willing to examine criticism. We are willing to consider whether there are ways in which legislation may be improved and defects removed.

It interest me greatly to hear the right hon. Gentleman repeat that there are imperfections in the employment protection legislation. Why does he not come forward with some proposals to rectify those imperfections? We have debated these matters on a number of occasions. Private Members' Bills have been introduced. Various representations have been made to the right hon. Gentleman. Why does he not come forward with proposals? If he is saying that he is willing to do so, when will he do so?

One of the reasons why I am not bringing forward certain proposals is that I think that I could not get them through the House given the present attitude of the Opposition. On the contrary, any proposals that the Government were to introduce in the form of a Bill might be amended so that they would have an effect contrary to that which was intended originally. That is why some measures have not been brought forward. A useful guide is to take into account what happens to Private Members' Bills that address themselves exactly to the issues that we are discussing.

The Government's employment protection legislation is a major step forward. That applies to establishing good employment standards and to improving industrial relations. I am still not totally clear about the nature of the Opposition's policy. However, more of it has been revealed today. I previously regarded the right hon. Member for Lowestoft as a man who wished to proceed by taking careful account of the real problems of trade unionists and listening to the TUC and the CBI. However, it appears that the Leader of the Opposition wants to make sweeping legal changes. It seems that the right hon. Lady seeks to pile proposal on proposal. An Opposition policy is emerging that resembles more a Heath Robinson cartoon than a blueprint for good industrial relations. It is a policy that at best is irrelevent to our problems and at worst could lead to chaos in industrial relations.

The Government's approach avoids excessive legalism. It recognises that the law can establish some worthwhile basic rights but that it cannot of itself command good industrial relation practice if it is not operated by a broad degree of consent. That approach lay behind the recent Government-TUC statement. No doubt there will be some who will not heed the guidance that the TUC is issuing. The law alone will not provide solutions the problems. The best chance of progress lies in establishing a common concept of good practice resting on a foundation of basic rights, and in that foundation employment protection legislation must play a major part.

7.18 p.m.

The Secretary of State has given us a detailed statement of the benefits of the employment protection legislation and its workings. To a great extent his speech was disappointing. He admitted that there are defects in the working of the legislation, but he produced no suggestions for reforms or improvement.

I begin by making a rather general remark. Is it not vital to the United Kingdom that businesses outside the public sector should be brave in development, should have enterprise for taking risks and should be prepared to go into risk business even if there is an element of speculation in it? If the United Kingdom is to keep afloat economically, is not that what we should be encouraging? When I employ that high-level and even moral argument in talking to my constituents and I ask them why they do not take more risks and branch out into new business, they ask rhetorically what will happen if they do so. They say "What will happen if I take on a new contract for exports? What will happen if I lake on a contract for a building and I employ 200 or 300 more employees than I normally employ?"

If they do so, the Government will give them a grant.

Not all firms can rely on that. Many of them do not want to take Government grants. When the contract comes to an end they may not be lucky enough to obtain a similar contract. If they have to retain the extra 200 or 300 employees, they may go bust. [Interruption.] Perhaps the hon. Member for Birmingham, Selly Oak (Mr. Litterick) will allow me to make my speech without sedentary interruptions. We listened very patiently to the Secretary of State's speech. The hon. Gentleman has sat there making interruptions from a sedentary position almost all the afternoon except during the speech of his right hon. Friend.

rose—

I will not give way to the hon. Gentleman.

Order. I think there has been enough talk about irrelevant matters.

I was speaking from the employer's point of view, where he takes a risk, goes into new contracts and takes on many more employees. On the employees' side there is some reluctance to take employment with what one may call the go-ahead business men in commerce and industry because they may go ahead too fast and be put in reverse and may then have to disemploy many of their employees. The workings of the Employment Protection Act and the redundancy system do not solve this problem at all. That legislation does not solve the position for the man who really wishes to develop. The employer's fear of the commitments that he may be taking, both under the Employment Protection Act and under the redundancy system, really works against employment, in that the employer then in order to escape those commitments employs his men for periods less than the qualification period. The employees, even if they may be fully employed in that particular industry, may be spread over a number of employers and thereby fail to qualify for the benefits of redundancy or the unfair dismissal procedure. The system results in a certain casualisation of labour.

I fully appreciate that the law relating to dismissal required reform, and I accept the substance of the Employment Protection Act where it reformed the law relating to the termination of employment; but I would like to see the need for it applied only in a small area; and for the rest we should be trying to remedy the casualisation of labour. It seems to me that the present system promotes rather than cures casualisation, short-term employment. I was first introduced to decasualisation some 20 or 25 years ago on the docks. Early in the morning I used to go down to the pens on the docks. I dare say hon. and right hon. Members know what they were like. The place was rather like a church hall with place was rather like a church hall with.

The stevedores stood at one end, and in the cages were men belonging to the different trades on the docks—above deck, below deck, and so on. When the name of a ship was called out, the stevedores would walk down the middle of the church hall and if that ship happened to have some extra money about it, dirt money or danger money, the men in the pens would be holding up their cards. If it had no such fringe benefits those in the pens would be back against the wall with their cards behind their backs and the stevedore would go into the pen and touch the number he wanted on the shoulders. I was horrified when I first went into those buildings. It is a long time ago now since I was first introduced to this system. When I talk about de-casualisation of labour I do not mean that kind of system. Of course, it has been improved and humanised since then.

I believe that the real solution to our present problems is decasualisation. If we take any one industry, whether building, light engineering or something of that kind, is it not possible to recognise the principle that the men in that industry are employed by the industry and not by the individual employers? There should be a register of the employees within any one industry, providing that one can separate and isolate it as an industry, whether it be construction or some other industry of that kind. There should be a permanent employment of those men in that industry by means of a manpower register which could be operated by the Department of Employment, so that there was always fall-back pay and men in that industry should not be out of employment. I am applying, one might say, the decasualisation of dock labour system right throughout other industries. I really see no reason why we should not be concentrating on that rather than on this difficult position of the Employment Protection Act dealing with individuals.

Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that the proposal he is making is precisely the proposal which the Labour Party put forward in its document on construction? It is absolutely marvellous to hear that the right hon. Gentleman accepts our point of view on this. I do not want to embarrass him, but it really is the same proposal.

The hon. Gentleman does not embarrass me. I am perfectly well aware that it has been put forward, particularly by the TUC and it may have been taken up in his party; but we ought to be progressing towards this, rather than on this rather fiddling business of the Employment Protection Act, protecting one individual who has been sacked, and so on, with all the problems that arise out of the Act. In a debate like this I cannot develop the matter in detail, but the fall-back pay would be based on unemployment benefit plus a contribution from employers. The system is not unknown. It is applied already in the management of holiday pay. All this that I propose could be developed from that.

That cannot, of course, apply throughout the whole of employment, and the Employment Protection Act and redundancy payments would still have to apply to many parts of industry and commerce. But it has always puzzled me why we had to set up tribunals to administer a system of this kind. In civil disputes between two parties the judicial or quasi-judicial court or tribunal is set up to administer justice between the parties. It has taken us many years, centuries indeed, to devise in our courts a procedure for administering justice and I suppose it is about the best procedure in the world, because it really produces a fair decision and justice in the end. Why we have to discard that entirely and set up separate tribunals beats me. The procedure of our courts really is not set up to keep lawyers and the judiciary employed. It is set up to see that parties who are at issue really receive justice.

Someone has believed that by setting up a tribunal of this kind under the Employment Protection Act and by discarding all that we have learnt from the progress of our courts over centuries, we shall set up an informal body and that informality will automatically produce justice. Neither is true. It does not produce an informal body. Because of the informality of the preliminaries before the hearing of a case, one party or another goes into court prepared for any eventuality, and therefore takes an array of legal talent into court with it.

These tribunals therefore build up a special formality of their own, more formal than any court of law. If anyone wants to see informality and justice according to legal procedure, he can go into any county court and listen to the judge when he has before him a possession case where the parties are appearing for themselves. Justice with informality is there administered. It is false to think that by making a tribunal informal it will administer justice or achieve that more speedily. If we must have a tribunal, we should apply the legal procedures that have been well tried over the years.

These legal procedures are based on three principles. The first is that before coming to court the parties must know the case that they have to answer or make known that which they are putting before the court. Secondly, in court their facts should be proved by primary evidence and not by hearsay. Those two principles are the bases of our procedure. Thirdly, the person making the claim should have the burden of proving it. Those have all been discarded in setting up the tribunal under the Employment Protection Act, with no benefit at all.

I challenge any hon. Member with constituents coming into his surgeries at weekends to say whether he has had more complaints about county court procedure than about tribunals. There are far more complaints about the administration and conduct of cases before tribunals than before the ordinary courts.

I am puzzled by the statement of the right hon. Member for Crosby (Mr. Page). I have taken cases to tribunals for employers and trade unions. There has never been any complaint, rather to the contrary. Tribunals work fairly. I accept that employers are more able to use the legal profession, but the tribunals recognise that and help the applicant who is there in person.

The hon. Member for Penistone (Mr. McKay) has been luckier than I. I have far more complaints about tribunals than about ordinary courts of law. If the ordinary procedure that has been built up for administering justice were applied to tribunals, they would be far more fair.

In summary, we must think harder about decasualisation of labour. We should recognise that employees are employed by an industry and not individuals. Where we must retain the system under the Employment Protection Act, we should do so within proper legal procedure, even if we call the relevant court a tribunal. Let us maintain the tried legal procedure which we know and which in the end will produce justice.

7.34 p.m.

The speech of the right hon. Member for Crosby (Mr. Page) was most interesting, particularly so in relation to his comments on decasulisation. His reminiscences on the disgraceful working practices some years ago in dockland were of as much interest as those of the Secretary of State for Employment when he was, in his view, unfairly dismissed for trade union activities. The central question is whether British workers should enjoy fewer employment rights and less protection than those in other developed industrial nations. After the Secretary of State's speech the answer, which must be shared by the majority of the public, is that there is no conceivable reason why British workers should have fewer employment protection rights than other workers.

Unfortunately, there is much misunderstanding about the provisions of the Employment Protection Act, certainly concerning unfair dismissal. In many cases there has been total ignorance of other important provisions to which the Secretary of State drew attention. Labour Members feel that much of that has been a direct result of the concerted, confused and malicious campaign waged against the main provisions of the Act by the Tory Party and Tory-front organisations.

Among employers in small and medium-size firms, there is a total ignorance of the main provisions of the legislation. After careful discussion and explanation, there is often agreement amongst employers that such provisions are necessary for a comprehensive and sensible industrial relations framework.

The concept of unfair dismissal was enshrined in Tory legislation. We should not pretend that there are no difficulties in that legislation. It is also unfair to leave the impression that, given the opportunity after the next general election, the Conservatives would introduce sweeping changes.

Workers and employers should be reminded that an application for unfair dismissal cannot be made in the first 26 weeks of employment. That is often unknown. After 26 weeks, if proper warnings and procedures are observed, there is little prospect of recourse to the industrial tribunal and still less of a tribunal finding that unfair dismissal has taken place. We have heard today of certain surveys. Without going into details, there is no evidence that the provisions have been a deterrent to employment. After discussions and explanation, most reasonable employers and members of the public believe that we should have such protection. There is no case for removing it from the statute book.

There are many reasons why people do not employ other people and there are many other reasons for our lack of success in the industrial area. I do not think that there is any case at all for saying that unemployment is at its present level because of the provisions of the Employment Protection Act and particularly the provision against unfair dismissal.

We must look at all the other reasons—our ability to compete against other manufacturing nations, our competence in marketing, the level of investment, import penetration, quality design and the delivery of our goods. It is in those areas that we shall find the real reason for our lack of success.

I believe also that weakening the Employment Protection Act would inevitably worsen industrial relations in this country and the whole industrial relations climate. There is a delicate and sensitive relationship between those who buy labour and those who sell it. We have only to recall the recent comments of a member of the Royal Family to know that even after a very short experience of British industry one can find many serious faults with the relationships in it. There is primarily a difficulty of communication, and there are problems of status among employees.

One example of the sort of difficulties that we see in industrial relations is the plight of Times Newspapers in recent months. I join with other hon. Members in congratulating the Secretary of State on the role that he played in knocking some sense into the management of Times Newspapers. I am interested to hear that the management has agreed to a decision that a number of us had been urging upon it even before the closure took place last November. It is interesting to note that The Times management and the unions representing the workers have agreed to the application of the new technology in accordance with a timetable to be agreed, and arrangements for future joint reviews. There is an agreement to phase in a new technology according to timetable, and that is the sort of approach which will gain and has gained a response among trade union representatives.

In this debate we have heard of the so-called great shift of power in industry over the past few years and particularly since the Act came into being. We have also heard a great deal about asking our constituents for their experiences. The experiences of many of my constituents do not lead them to think that there has been any marked shift in favour of working people and trade unions over the last few years. I take three examples to illustrate my point.

One case which comes to mind is that of a firm that was taken over one day. The next day the new management spoke to the workers and said that the firm had a rosy future and bright prospects. The day after, 90-day notices for redundancy were issued to 350 workers who subsequently became redundant. Today that firm stands empty and idle. I thank the Secretary of State for his intervention in that affair, but unfortunately in this case he was unsuccessful.

The second example occurred two weeks ago in a textile firm when the workers heard over the Tannoy a request for them to attend a meeting in the canteen. At this meeting they were told that the firm had been taken over by another firm but that there was no need to worry because their jobs were secure. What a way to conduct an industry! What a way to avoid anxiety, insecurity and bloodymindedness. No one knew anything about the change of ownership until the message came over the Tannoy system.

The third example also occurred in the last fortnight. A firm in my constituency, which is in the hands of the Official Receiver, is paying its workers by the week and there is great uncertainty about the future. The workers wonder who will acquire the firm and whether they will have any jobs after the end of next week. That is the climate in my constituency and I bet that it applies to many others as well. So do not let us have a lot of talk about the shift in power away from employers to trade unionists and working people.

I argue that the power in British industry today rests where it has always rested—with employers and management and those with the ability to buy labour. Those who have only their labour to sell should enjoy modest employment protection and rights in their interests and in those of their families. The rights and protection that we have by virtue of this Act are much weaker than those which exist in many other countries with which we are in competition. We do not hear squeals from the Germans, the French or the Scandinavians that their employment protection rights, which are far superior to ours, are any impediment to producing, and exporting to this country. We must look in other directions to find the reasons for the difficulties that we face in industry.

Any attempt to sweep away the minimal rights of British workers would not only result in enormous reaction against any Government who sought to do that, it would do nothing at all to increase our industrial performance by one percentage point. In fact, it would do a great deal to worsen it.

We heard a very low-key speech from the right hon. Member for Lowestoft (Mr. Prior), who is increasingly becoming the lone voice of relative sanity in the Conservative Party. All the hard-nosed backwoodsmen of the Conservative Party and those to whom they seek to appeal in the country will be very disappointed that the right hon. Gentleman did not say more about repealing this and attacking that. His speech was very carefully designed and very low key.

I warn a lot of people that if the Tories are returned to power there are grave doubts whether the right hon. Member for Lowestoft would be the spokesman on employment matters. I very much doubt whether his relative sanity would reside in St. James's Square, presiding over the industrial relations framework. There are more dangerous individuals looking with glee at that office and at the sort of damage they could wreak on this country's industry. These people would do untold damage. Many Conservatives should be extremely careful about what they promise to do to appease the wilder groups in the community who in recent weeks have been gleefully looking to the Tories to smash the trade union movement and weaken the position of British workers.

I hope that at the end of this debate the general conclusion drawn by those who look at these matters with more careful perception and understanding will be that the Employment Protection Act is a very modest measure, which gives British workers minimum employment rights and protection, far less stringent and tough than those enjoyed by many foreign workers. To remove these rights would do more harm and damage.

I congratulate the Secretary of State on his speech. He has given a clear indication that if a Labour Government come to power after the general election, far from the Act being emasculated, modest advances will be made to ensure that the rights and interests of British workers are protected and advanced.

7.50 p.m.

I ask the forbearance of the House if, in my brief speech, I depart from the legal aspects of the Act and deal with a subsidiary matter of vital concern to my constituency, where unemployment is running at almost 20 per cent. I refer to job creation and the subsequent schemes.

The burden of today's high unemployment is falling disproportionately upon the young. Employers who are forced to cut back tend to retain skilled and experienced people and to let go those whom they might be obliged to train. Unemployment at any time of life is an affront to human dignity and self-respect, but when one is young, keen and full of hope, it is nothing less than a tragedy. The success of Government-sponsored schemes to alleviate unemployment among young people is particularly important.

When it became obvious that the problem of youth unemployment was unlikely to disappear in the near future, the Manpower Services Commission wisely decided to draw together various temporary schemes introduced between 1975 and 1977. There is now a coherent programme for the young and unemployed, with special temporary employment programmes similar to the old job creation programme. One should pay particular attention to the needs of the long-term unemployed. However, there are administration difficulties and I should like the Minister to clear up the matter when he replies to the debate.

In my constituency the job creation schemes have proved particularly successful. When the time comes to modify such programmes, lessons can be learned from the experience of those schemes. In October 1977, a total of 125 young people were on the careers register in my constituency. Under the provisions of the original job creation programme, 83 of those were placed—15 in work experience projects and 68 in other job creation schemes. That represents 66 per cent. of the total and is by far the highest take-up of any of the regional or island authorities in Scotland. The pattern was consistent in every year in which the job creation schemes operated and I have paid tribute in the House to the success of the schemes.

Between November 1975 and December 1977, a total of 472 of the 488 applications for adult job creation schemes submitted to the Manpower Services Commission were approved. At the peak of the scheme's operation in May 1978, a total of 808 adults were employed on various schemes.

In January 1976, unemployment in the Western Isles stood at 21·6 per cent. The fall to 6·7 per cent. by May 1978 was directly attributable to the success of the initial job creation scheme programme. However, the termination of the original projects has led to a steady increase in unemployment and this month it is at 18·8 per cent.

The Western Isles council and those who administer the job creation schemes are confident about the value of the schemes. The work carried out has been relevant to the needs of the area. A large number of projects for which local communities have pressed over many years have been tackled successfuly. Local people have been employed in building piers, various crofting projects, such as drainage, fencing, tree planting and the construction of sheep fanks and in leisure and recreation projects, such as the building of community centres and the laying of playing fields.

The council is optimistic about the future of the new schemes. It hopes that the new programme will prove as successful as its predecessor. However, the sponsors of the schemes are having difficulties with the Manpower Services Commission because of the condition that preference should be given to those who have been unemployed for at least six months. In my constituency, the job creation scheme was taken up at such a high level that there is hardly anyone who has been unemployed for six months. The Department has assured me in answer to my parliamentary questions that there is no bar to such constituents, provided that anyone who has been unemployed for six months is given preference. If such people are not available, the schemes should go ahead. However, schemes have been held up and I should be grateful if the Minister could clear up that point.

7.55 p.m.

The right hon. Member for Lowestoft (Mr. Prior) made a remarkably moderate speech, as did the right hon. Member for Crosby (Mr. Page). I assume that they are projecting the new image of the Conservatives following the wild speeches and statements made by the Opposition during the disputes that took place after Christmas. Undoubtedly, as the general election gets nearer, the wild image and the wild men will be put on the shelf and the more moderate image will be brought out. I do not see many of those wild men in the Conservative Party on the Benches tonight. Conservative Members know that there are plenty of wild men among them. I was here when we discussed the Employment Opportunities (Small Businesses) Bill which was introduced by a Conservative Member and I remember the wild speeches made by some Conservative Members on that occasion. As we get nearer to the general election, the wild image is put aside and no doubt the Conservative whips will tell their Members "Keep it cool, lads. Do not tell them what we really believe. Let them get the idea that we are more moderate in our approach to the unions than we really are."

I should like to take up the point about the Merseyside chamber of commerce survey. The impression was given that small businesses were being battered, as far as employment possibilities are concerned, because of the Employment Protection Act. I do not deny that there may be some employers—though very few—who have been deterred from employing more workers because they are under a misapprehension about the Act.

When Merseyside was developed, small businesses were practically destroyed. Whole areas of small businesses were bulldozed and that is one reason why they no longer exist in vast areas of Liverpool and other parts of Merseyside.

The other factor is that the port of Liverpool is no longer the port that it was. It is no longer a passenger port, with all the small businesses that were part of the passenger trade. They have gone and that is the basic reason why small businesses in Liverpool have disappeared. Of course, we have to be concerned about bringing small businesses back to Merseyside. Some of us are anxious to do that and have argued for a long time that there must be greater efforts in that direction. The Merseyside chamber of commerce may have a case up to a point, but the real reasons for the problem are those that I have given.

It is unfortunate that some small employers may have been deterred—because of the propaganda emanating from Conservative Members—from taking on workers whom they would have employed but for that political propaganda.

None of my hon. Friends suggests, as the right hon. Member for Lowestoft implied, that everything is all right and that we are living in the best of all possible worlds. We have never said that. There is no doubt that the Act gives workers greater protection than they have had in the past, and I am not ashamed that my party brought in such legislation. It was long overdue and it still goes only a modest distance in the direction that is required. We can feel proud of the Act, but we should push for it to go still further.

Let us look at some of the provisions of the Act. It set up ACAS and I believe that it is a good thing that we have a system of conciliation and arbitration. That was also long overdue. It makes provision for the protection of women from dismissal on the grounds of pregnancy. It provides for maternity pay and that working-class people should be given time off for trade union activities or for serving on a public authority. However, there is still no real guarantee. If a company decides that it is not in its interests for a worker to serve on a public authority, there can be arguments about time off.

Anyone listening to Conservative Members would imagine that the Act gives workers all the rights in the world. It does not—even in relation to unfair dismissal. A case was raised with me recently by a worker from a country area represented by a Conservative Member who refused to take up the man's case. I took up his case because he was working on an estate and was unfairly dismissed. His case was upheld by a tribunal and he was granted a sum of money as compensation. But then the lawyers got to work and that money was whittled down to next to nothing. Yet we are told by Conservative Members that the Act protects workers in such a way that they have too many rights and that the balance has moved too far in their direction. That is a travesty of the truth.

The Act provides greater rights than workers have had before. And why not? The right hon. Member for Crosby gave examples of what he saw on the docks. My hon. Friend the Member for Liverpool, Garston (Mr. Loyden) was part of the docks set-up and was closer to dockers than I have ever been. He knows the sort of things that used to go on.

I was a ship repair worker and, when I started work on Merseyside after the war, we had to queue outside Cunard and many other ship repair companies at 7.30 a.m. with our tool bags. The foreman would come out and decide which workers he wanted. The rest had to go home.

The foreman used to feel a worker's muscles.

They did not quite get round to that, but a young vigorous fellow stood a chance of getting a job while a man getting on in years stood no chance. I had to suffer that sort of humiliation. If a worker was a well-known trade unionist or even if he had argued on one job and the foreman remembered him, he did not get taken on. Workers need better rights than they had in those days.

I found it strange that the right hon. Member for Lowestoft should say that he wishes to amend schedule 11. My hon. Friends and I misunderstood him at first because we thought that he had said that he intended to repeal the schedule, but he claimed that he wishes only to amend it. Schedule 11 says that a claim may be reported to ACAS that an employer is:

" in respect of any matter, observing terms and conditions of employment less favourable than the recognised terms and conditions or, where, or so far as, there are no recognised terms and conditions, the general level of terms and conditions."

What is wrong with that? The schedule provides only that recognised terms and conditions of workers should be accepted as the norm and that if they are not observed, a claim may be reported to ACAS. Even then, there are exclusions. Any worker covered by the Agricultural Wages Act 1948, the Agricultural Wages (Scotland) Act 1949, the Wages Councils Act 1959 and a number of other measures is excluded from the provisions of schedule 11. The idea that the Act is a marvellous instrument which cannot be bettered and, indeed, goes too far is an absurdity. Conservative Members are making propaganda out of it.

The same applies to trade union recognition. I thought that we had brought in legislation that gave workers the right to trade union recognition if they wished it. It just shows how wrong one can be. If we are to amend the Act, we had better amend it in that direction—and the sooner the better. There should be legislation to enable workers to have trade union recognition if they wish it.

The right hon. Member for Crosby spoke about the construction industry. There is an important case being made for a system of decasualisation in that industry. Those of us who have worked in the construction industry—and shipyard workers in my trade worked in the industry when there were no jobs in shipping—know that construction workers were repeatedly on the dole. I am not talking about a time of world recession and high unemployment, such as the present, but about what were referred to as normal times. When the job that a worker was doing had finished, he was out of work. That still applies and it may be a week, a month or longer before a worker gets his next job. It is time that workers in the construction industry did not have to suffer in that way.

Other benefits have been gained by the type of legislation that is being introduced. When I was first an apprentice, one was given one hour's notice. That situation existed even after the war. One hour's notice was given on a Friday afternoon. If the boss did not come round at 4 o'clock and give one the sack, one knew that with a bit of luck one had another week's work. That situation has been improved, but it is still not ended, in that workers too often are thrown out of work in that industry. It is remarkable that the campaign against building nationalisation does not look at the positive proposals. That campaign is totally incorrect about the Labour Party's suggestions. That campaign does not even examine the positive proposals we are putting forward on decasualisation. I am delighted that the right hon. Member for Crosby should support us.

The hon. Gentleman cannot quote me as supporting nationalisation of the construction industry. I picked out that one item of a manpower register as a proposal that should be seriously considered.

I must tell the right hon. Gentleman that we have never proposed nationalisation of the construction industry. I wish Opposition Members would actually read what we say and not read what CABIN said we say. It is important that they should read the document. I am pleased that the right hon. Gentleman is supporting our campaign for decasualisation in the construction industry. When the Labour Government are returned, that matter must be a priority.

I regard this legislation only as a step in the right direction. It is an improvement. It gives us, as workers, more rights than ever before. But the anomalies have been shown up over the years. The Grunwick affair is an example of the anomalies. There are many others. They have to be eliminated. There have to be amendments to the Act. These must be in a totally and fundamentally different direction from those proposed by Conservative Members. Let us support this Act and this legislation. Let us reject the type of wild statements and even the so-called moderate statements that come from the other side of the House.

Conservative Members want to weaken the rights of workers. Those rights have been gained over years of hard struggle. Every time that progressive legislation has been introduced giving workers increased rights, there has been a howl from hon. Members on the other side and from employers. When children were taken out of the mines, there was a howl from the other side of the House. One has only to examine the arguments that went on at that time. It has always been like that. It is like it now. Tory Members always argue against positive legislation that gives workers more rights and more protection. So be it. They cannot turn the wheel of history backwards. It will go on and improve. The workers, who create the wealth, will finally come into their own and will control democratically the means of production in this country. I hope I live to see that day.

8.14 p.m.

I trust that the hon. Member for Liverpool, Walton (Mr. Heffer) will not mind if I do not follow his arguments, in the interests of others who want to speak in this debate, which has already been truncated by two and a half hours. For over three years, unemployment has been at an unacceptably high level. A figure of 1½ million unemployed is far too high in its own right, and higher than that of all our main industrial competitors. Unfortunately, there is no sign that it is going to go down substantially in the foreseeable future. If this Government or an incoming Tory Government really mean to do something positive in this respect, radical changes will have to be made.

The cure for unemployment cannot come from Government services, the nationalised industries or large public companies. Many people would argue that there is already overmanning in many areas of these sectors, which will have to be remedied if they are to become really competitive. Let us not worry too much about that in the present state of unemployment.

The only remaining area that can cure unemployment is that of the small business, which accounts for just under one-third of our GNP. If every small business in the country took on one more person each we would have no serious unemployment. Why do they not do so? A survey was recently carried out among 800 small businesses to find out why they will not expand. The answer was, as suspected, Government legislation. They were asked which Government Acts discouraged them most from taking on more people. Top of the tree, as can be guessed, were 80 per cent. who named the Employment Protection Act. How often does it not happen that governments of all political parties pass legislation that is the opposite of what was desired. We should perhaps remember Newton's third law of motion which states that for every action there is an equal and opposite reaction.

The survey asked what parts of the Acts were causing most trouble. Top of the tree here came sections 70 to 80, which cover dismissal procedures, industrial tribunals and compensation payments. Here comes the rub. If this genuinely caringly motivated Act is causing unemployment, what are we to do? I say to hon. Members in all parts of the House that if this point is now proved beyond all reasonable doubt we must do something. Leaving the Act as it stands on the statute book, we should start making exemptions from parts of it for small businesses that take on more people.

To which survey is the hon. Gentleman referring? Who are the publishers?

The employers' federation.

The survey was carried out by the Small Businesses Bureau.

Would the hon. Gentleman say by whom it is published? Is it not No. 32 Smith Square? Is that not the office of the Conservative Party Central Office?

So what? The survey bore out the figures that every hon. Member gets from his own constituency. I know that it is not entirely satisfactory to exempt some firms rather than all firms, but it would be an initial way of highlighting the harm that this Act is doing. After proof, overall repeals could follow.

Before any hon. Member on the Government Benches starts talking about going back to the bad old days, with people being summarily dismissed and chucked on to the unemployment heap in an inhuman way, let me ask this: would a person prefer to be 100 per cent. unemployed, with no hope of a job, or would he prefer to be taken on by a firm which says that it wants to expand and will take that person on? The firm might say that it expects to take on more people, but there is a risk, for reasons beyond its control, that it might not be able to give a complete guarantee of permanent employment. Again, before Labour Members start objecting, I would like to say that exemptions from sections of the Act would apply only to the extra people taken on by that firm from the exemption date, and such exemptions would be applied only to firms employing fewer than a certain number of people, or with a turnover below a certain level.

When a firm broke through either of those barriers, the Act would apply totally. If the Government are genuine in their desire to cure the curse of unemployment, this is a constructive suggestion, which is worth serious consideration and speedy action. I hope that the Minister will agree to examine this idea on behalf of those who go to bed tonight unemployed, knowing that they will wake up tomorrow morning still unemployed.

8.20 p.m.

I should like to take up the point about small businesses. If any hon. Member suggests that the non-expansion of small businesses is due to the Employment Protection Act I suggest that he looks again at its provisions. There must be other factors besides that. I remind hon. Members that in the Act there is a provision for contractual employment, where an employer can contract for a certain amount of time. In addition, if an employer goes bust—Conservative Members have suggested that this is what people are afraid of—he would have to pay out compensation. That is taken care of in the Act. People seem to be afraid of the Act, but they should try to understand it.

When the Act came on to the scene, management looked upon it in an appalling way. I was part of management at the time. What management did was to take the Act to pieces, look at it, discuss it with middle management, and consider how it worked in relation to individual companies.

I do not know why we should be discussing the Employment Protection Act during the current period of unrest. I believe that we would do better to discuss it impartially at a time when there is no industrial unrest, because we could then look at it in a different frame of mind. That is why, as a new Member, I am disturbed to hear many hon. Members talk about the Act in the way that they do.

I am also disturbed about the way in which the Act has been reported in the media. I have talked to some American students on the subject of industrial relations. They were puzzled, because although America has twice as many strikes as the United Kingdom, that fact is not reported in America in the same way as it is reported in our media. The British media talk about "the British disease", but although the situation is twice as bad in America it is not called "the American disease". Therefore, we should look at other aspects of the problem besides the Employment Protection Act.

I turn to some of the workings of the Act. It is essential to retain notification of redundancies. Today I led a delegation to the Department of Industry in respect of a factory that is closing in my constituency and causing about 190 people to be put out of work. Had it not been for the Employment Protection Act, and the 90 days' notice that had to be given, those people would have known nothing until the employer gave them notice according to the statutory requirements.

Incidentally, that same employer had problems with another of his companies. He refused to bring in ACAS. It was only when we gave publicity to the problem that ACAS was brought in and settled the dispute. Therefore, ACAS works. I did not like the way in which the dispute was settled, because two people were thrown out on a limb and eventually dismissed, but at least the provisions of the Employment Protection Act were gone through. Their case went to a tribunal and subsequently to appeal. Therefore, the Act worked for them, not in the way that some hon. Members have suggested but in favour of the employer in this case. The fact remains that had it not been for ACAS much production would have been lost, and with it many more jobs.

Some people have suggested that the six-month probationary period should be extended. In so doing, I believe, they are doing a great disservice to British management. If within six months a personnel manager cannot determine whether or not a person is suitable, he should look at himself or the staff that does the interviewing for him.

There is no problem about unfair dismissal. All it does is to ensure that an employer looks at his methods and the ways in which he treats his employees. Now he must give notice of dismissal and tell a person why he is being dismissed. No longer does the employer put in the boot and say "Through the door". I have never yet had any trouble with a tribunal in relation to unfair dismissal, providing the code of practice that is understood by every employer is adhered to. During my time in management, I did not lose one case of unfair dismissal. Therefore, in that respect, I believe that the Act strengthens management, while at the same time giving fair protection to the employee. In fact, management's duty is not only to look after the interests of its shareholders—it has an equal responsibility to its employees.

The position of small employers has already been dealt with. During my by-election campaign, I met many small employers. They had no concern about the Employment Protection Act, simply because they run their firms well. As many hon. Members said, there is room for improvement. What is unnecessary is a large-scale demolition of the Act. We should use it and build upon it in order to take industrial relations into the year 2000. Whether or not Conservative Members are successful in their bid to form the next Government, they should think carefully before demolishing this Act, because it is a piece of legislation that will help industrial relations get over its present problems.

8.27 p.m.

Since the length of the debate has been curtailed, I want to devote my attention to only one aspect of the Act—its effect on small employers. There is a distinction between small and large employers. As I listened to the debate, and reflected over the years that I have been in this House, I could not help thinking that if, in the last decade, we had spent as much time talking about employment creation as we have about employment protection, the whole country would be very much better off.

The hon. Member for Liverpool, Walton (Mr. Heffer) said that we do not want to turn back the wheels of history and that we want them to go forward. The great danger for this country is the wheels staying exactly as they are. We spend an enormous amount of time considering industry in the context of one type of industry—established, petrified industry. We spend too much time considering the views of the CBI and TUC with regard to large industry. One need only look at the economic record of this country, not only for the past decade but for the past two decades, to realise that there has been virtually no growth in large industry, except through amalgamation.

I well understand the views expressed by Labour Members about the unfair way in which employees used to be treated when amalgamations of that type took place, when their whole future was thrown into jeopardy.

I accept that a great deal in the Employment Protection Act was needed and was long overdue. However, we are deluding ourselves if we think that that Act does not affect employment, especially in small employers' establishments. Of course it does. I do not need a survey to tell me so. I have spoken to a number of small but well-informed, genuine, humane employers in my constituency who tell me that that is so. That is not the major reason why their firms do not expand and why they do not employ more people, but the matter is always raised. People say that they are disturbed and worried about this matter, and that it is just not worth the candle.

The hon. Member for Walton referred to the decline in his area of Liverpool. I know that city. It used to be regarded as the capital of North Wales. I remember when there were many small employers and small industries in Liverpool. I know that there has been a decline there. That decline is affecting the whole country.

Only one-quarter of British industry is now in the hands of employers who employ fewer than 200 people. That sector of industry is much larger in the United States, France and Germany. However, when we look at the record of this country, the truth is, as an American economist pointed out to me lately, that only 30 per cent. of employed people in this country are now engaged in productive or creative industry. There is a 70 per cent. superstructure which the 30 per cent. support. It is like the ship which started off with a large hull and a small superstructure. We now see a large superstructure on a small hull.

The Employment Protection Act needs amendment in favour of small employers. It frightens them off. It is an important factor, although perhaps not the most important. If employers continually say so, there must be something in it. Why is that so? Small employers, especially those who are in new industry, often operate on slim financial limits. They are concerned about adding to their responsibilities.

Recently, in a debate on a Private Member's Bill, I cited my experience in my constituency with a firm that is one of the great success stories of British industry. It now has branches all over the world. It employs hundreds of people in my constituency. Seventeen years ago, when I first became a Member of Parliament, it employed only about six. It was virtually operating on a shoestring. I doubt whether that firm could have survived in today's industrial atmosphere, yet its wage rates are now 25 per cent. above the union rates and some of the people who started with it are now in management, and even directors. It has a first-class record, yet it would not have grown if it had been jeopardised in its first couple of years. We do not pay sufficient attention to the entrepreneurial risks.

I told the Minister about the experience, in my constituency, of the very happy cooperation between public investment, which is organised by the Government, with a rural development board providing factories, and young entrepreneurs who start in them. This is creative new industry. It is a happy arrangement between public investment and private enterprise. Many of those people tell me that the first two or three years are the most difficult and the Act adds to the difficulties.

The probation period of 26 weeks under the terms of the Employment Protection Act is too short, at least for small industries. I cannot speak about large industry. I have no real experience of that, except in a professional capacity, to advise or discuss legal matters arising from a large industry. I do not have proper first-hand experience of large industries. But I do know that the Act is a real inhibition to small employers. It must be amended to help them. I do not dispute that we needed most of this legislation. However, we must revise and amend it in the light of experience. I thought that the approach of the right hon. Member for Lowestoft (Mr. Prior) was constructive. It was refreshing after some of the remarks that we have heard recently. Nevertheless the Minister and the Secretary of State are deluding themselves if they think that this Act is not an inhibiting factor for smaller employers.

Is not that precisely the same argument that can be used for small businesses not having safety regulations for their machines and not installing extractor fans to carry out chemical fumes and smoke? It is precisely the same argument.

With the greatest respect to the hon. Gentleman, it is not the same at all. If the hon. Gentleman were setting up his own business he would probably have to borrow money from the bank as most small business men do. They cannot calculate as far ahead as can a big established business. The entrepreneurial side of this country must be encouraged. We have only to look at the industrial performance of this country.

I put this to the hon. Member for Walton. Even with North Sea oil we have made a terrible mess of the economic situation. Imagine what it would have been like without North Sea oil. That is the real test of performance in this country. We have reduced the small employer's side of industry. Private enterprise has been thwarted. We have moved into a petrified established kind of industry with no growth. The only growth sector that we can reasonably foresee in this country is that of the small businesses, and we should be encouraging them to expand.

Within the next decade we need to create 5 million new productive, creative jobs in this country not only to mop up unemployment but because there will be a need for a great shake-up in cases of overmanning. That can be done humanely only if we have created new jobs. This aspect of the Employment Protection Act needs amendment, and the sooner it is amended the better it will be for this country.

rose—

Order. I remind hon. Members that we have roughly 40 minutes left before the winding-up speeches. As far as I can judge, there appear to be about six hon. Members still wishing to take part in the debate. This means that they will have about seven minutes each in which to make their speeches. I hope that hon. Members will try to keep within that limit.

8.36 p.m.

The question tonight surely, is whether the operation of the dismissal procedures in the Employment Protection Act is an obstacle to employment. It is as simple as that. Nobody pretends that it is a great obstacle. Some people believe it to be a greater obstacle than others believe it to be. There are far greater obstacles to employment. I should have thought that the taxation system was a far greater obstacle to employment.

In the search for more employment, particularly among small businesses, as the hon. and learned Member for Montgomery (Mr. Hooson) pointed out, any fair-minded person must realise that the operation of these provisions has proved to be inhibiting. It may well be that a business man is unnecessarily afraid of the provisions, but the state of a man's mind is as much a fact as anything else. If he thinks, even wrongly, that he will not be able to manage his business so long as these provisions apply to him. they will prove to be inhibiting.

It may be said that he is not as robust as German or French business men, who have been, rather unusually, exemplified as paragons by Labour Members below the Gangway. We have been told how they can manage, in spite of having to face much more difficult obstacles than are put before the British entrepreneur. We have to deal with our entrepreneurs as we find them, just as we have to deal with our work force as we find it. Perhaps they are not as good as their counterparts in those other countries, but people are frightened, and I believe that they are frightened partly through ignorance. The small business man does not have the advantages of a personnel department. As one of the Labour Members explained, a personnel department can go through the Act and provide expert advice, telling a business man what to do to avoid the worst pitfalls of the Act. The larger firms, which have these facilities, no doubt manage to live with the Act fairly successfully, but the small business man does not have those facilities. Something must be done, therefore, to cure his fear that if he takes on a man and finds him unsatisfactory, he will be taken to court under a jurisdiction that is peculiarly and deliberately vague.

As my right hon. Friend the Member for Crosby (Mr. Page) complained, the provisions have been made vague because it is fashionable to think that, if they are vague and informal, they will work more quickly and in a fairer way, whereas exactly the opposite is the case. The vaguer a provision is, the more unfair it is, the slower it is in operation, and the more bad blood is created.

I should like to give an example of where I think that bad blood has been created. The position has recently improved a little, but it is in danger of becoming bad again. Here is an example of vagueness. I refer to the doctrine of constructive dismissal—that, even though the employee has resigned, he is held to have been dismissed because he had good reason for resigning. There has been a dispute about what is a good reason for resigning when an employee pleads constructive dismissal.

For a long time this question exercised tribunals, the appeal tribunals and the Court of Appeal. It frightened the employer and very often excited the employee over-much. Eventually the Court of Appeal ruled that conduct by an employer which was said to have justified the employee in resigning must amount to a breach of contract. The employee could not use bad behaviour as a hook upon which to hang a claim for constructive dismissal. The reason claimed for such dismissal must amount to a breach of the contract of employment. That was the case of Western Excavating Ltd. v. Sharpe in 1977 and it seemed a pretty firm ruling and something to cling on to, a raft in a uncharted sea.

Now vagueness has come back and clever, astute, people—I do not blame them—representing employees, have said that the breach need not be of explicit terms of the contract. It could be a breach of implied terms. In all contracts of employment, they say, "mutual respect" is one of the implied terms and therefore if an employer does something which damages that mutual respect that constitutes a breach of contract and the employee can then resign and plead constructive dismissal.

So we are back where we started. This is the kind of vagueness which terrifies the small employer and was vividly pointed out by the hon. and learned Member for Montgomery. An employer no longer knows where he stands and I believe that what is required is that the clauses dealing with such matters as constructive dismissal or what amounts to misconduct by an employer must be clearly spelt out either by amending the legislation or in some other way.

It must be remembered that in these cases no costs are awarded and therefore to the small business man the thought of taking himself, and perhaps another witness, from productive work even for the day, which is the average length of these cases, means that he will lose an immense amount of money he will never recover whatever the result.

What about the lawyers?

The small business man does not employ lawyers. I wish that he did. The case would go much faster if he did. He cannot get his costs back even if he wins and so he is at a grave bargaining disadvantage. He settles in nine cases out of 10, even though he may have a good case. He settles because it is cheaper for him to do so. Even if he wins he knows that he has to pay his own expenses and perhaps costs.

For those reasons, it is essential to have certainty in both the base and the operation of the law. There is no certainty at present. That is why an employer is reluctant to take on new labour. I believe that there must also be some sort of filter through which cases that are often frivolous and vexatious and which abuse the process can be passed, either after some ex parte application to ACAS or some other body, to the court itself, or to a tribunal before leave to bring a case is given. That would mean that the cases were serious, that they were not merely gold-digging cases, and that there would not be what amounts to blackmail.

If that can be achieved, unjust dismissal, which is an important and desirable legal concept which we do not wish to see abolished since we invented it, can be removed from the sphere of industrial disputes and dealt with by tribunals and courts of law.

I was pleased to hear the Secretary of State's praise of that structure of the law. If that structure is to continue, there must be more certainty and the Act must not operate, as it does now, as a serious, but not the most serious, obstacle to increased employment.

8.46 p.m.

I intend to be brief. We are treading some well-trodden ground. Most of the debate has centred round the effects of unfair dismissal procedures, particularly in relation to small firms. The Secretary of State stated the facts and it would be tedious for me to repeat them.

As the hon. and learned Member for Darwen (Mr. Fletcher-Cooke) said, small business men take certain attitudes. Surely, the way in which to react to that reality is not to change the law but to change the attitudes, and to desist from propagating the myths instead of the facts. Many Opposition Members are guilty of propagating the myths rather than the facts.

It has been suggested that the qualifying period, at least for small firms, should be increased. I was interested to hear the observations of the right hon. Member for Crosby (Mr. Page). He said that, because the qualifying period had been reduced to six months, there was an increased movement towards casual employment. The logic of that argument is that the qualifying period should be abolished altogether. This is another conflict of view with the Opposition.

There is a basic principle, which my right hon. Friend repeated today—that protection from unfair dismissal is an indivisible right. Whether one is an employee in a small or a large firm is irrelevant: the right must be the same.

We have heard the usual comments about small firms and their effect upon employment. I wish that we would think seriously about employment. Constantly we seek simple panaceas for unemployment. One of the favourite arguments is that, if only every small firm would take on one more worker, the unemployment problem would disappear. That argument puts the problem in a trivial and superficial light.

Unemployment is a serious and complex issue. Many factors are involved. The increase in the size of the work force is an important factor. Another important factor is the effect of technology, which will increase in the future. There are many other factors.

Incidentally, it is not true to say that small firms are the only growth sector. We have only to look at the record of the chemical industry over the past 10 or 15 years. That is an industry which has doubled its output and it consists mostly of large firms. I am not arguing for or against large firms. I am only saying that the hon. and learned Member for Montgomery (Mr. Hooson) should get his facts right.

That sector by and large has not grown. I was referring to individual firms.

I am merely pointing out one example of a large industry which has been highly successful. We cannot generalise and say that it is only in the small firm sector or the large firm sector that growth will take place. Such statements would be wild generalisations, superficialities. No doubt in discussing every Bill which has sought to protect people at work from the early days of the nineteenth century exactly the same arguments have been voiced about the adverse effects such Bills would have on employment.

We have heard a great deal, especially from the Opposition, about making information about the Acts available to small employers. I am concerned about making information available to employees. One of my constituents came to me recently with a case of what in my view was constructive dismissal. His unemployment benefit was suspended. He appealed against that suspension and went to the insurance tribunal. He confused the insurance tribunal with the industrial tribunal and thought that the one tribunal was dealing with both issues. By the time the penny dropped, more than three months had gone by and effectively he had lost his rights under the Act. I merely cite that as an example. Let us not be one-sided in this. Let us realise that information needs to be given both to small employers and to employees. They need to be made aware of their rights.

Over the past five years, despite what has happened in the past few weeks, there has been a considerable improvement in industrial relations. This is not just a question of the figures for industrial disputes and strikes. In a more fundamental sense there has been an improvement in the climate of industrial relations, and the employment protection legislation has had a great deal to do with that in terms of the rights of individuals and of the setting up of ACAS which in many un-publicised, unsung cases has helped to settle disputes If we have had trouble in the past few weeks, that only serves to underline the argument that has been advanced many times by my colleagues, that what we need is co-operation and consent not confrontation. That is the way forward.

8.55 p.m.

This debate gives us a brief opportunity to raise some of the anxieties we feel about the 1975 Act. I remind hon. Members who have spoken from the Government Benches that there was no root and branch opposition to that Act from the Opposition Benches. A large number of constructive amendments were tabled in Committee by my hon. Friends, many of which were accepted by the Government. The idea that we set out in 1975 wholly to overturn the Bill and wreck it is not proved by a careful study of the Committee proceedings.

Much has been said about the anxiety that the Act has caused to firms in taking on additional people. I wish to mention only one anxiety, to which I hope the Government will reply. The Thirteenth Report of the Social Services and Unemployment Sub-Committee of the Expenditure Committee, on which I served, refers on page 49 in paragraph 193 to the Employment Protection Act. One piece of evidence which came from representatives of the Institute of Careers Officers was that—

" The young person I think is at a disadvantage because of this legislation."

We heard many other anxieties expressed and our recommendation at the end of that section of the report was, as we have said on page 50, that:

" Continuing efforts should be made to ascertain whether or to what extent the Employment Protection Act is deterring small business men from taking on additional personnel."

We then urge the Government to make greater efforts to explain the working of the Act to small business men. Because of the procedures of this House, we have not yet had a reply from the Government in debate on that report, but I should be interested to hear what they have to say about the evidence that we took, especially that of the careers officers.

The difficulty that ACAS has had from the beginning is contained in section 1(2) of the Act, where an attempt is made to square the circle by promoting good industrial relations and collective bargaining. That section refers to the improvement of collective bargaining machinery and to the need to improve industrial relations. I believe that the extension of collective bargaining is happening of its own volition. One of the troubles that ACAS has had is in trying to marry those three concepts contained in section 1 of the Act.

On conciliation, I was interested in what the Secretary of State said about 3,000 cases per year. He said that it was either at the instigation of management or unions that such cases were taken up by ACAS. I think that there are occasions when ACAS could, off its own bat, offer conciliation and intervene. It might have been able to do so in the Ford dispute. In that section ACAS is given the authority to do that.

On arbitration, one of the difficulties of ACAS is that with a rigid incomes policy there is a limit to what it can do. However, there is an important part in the section on arbitration on page 3 of the Act which says that the Service can alter its normal procedures if it feels that there is a special reason that justifies arbitration as an alternative to the normal procedures. It does have an opportunity to do that if it wishes. As I say, the difficulty for ACAS is the incomes policy. I should like to see many more difficult cases going to arbitration.

I think that much more attention will have to be paid to the advice that ACAS can give in connection with section 4, and it will have to do more in advising on manpower planning and job evaluation. I particularly wish to draw the House's attention to the end of section 4(2) of the Act, where it is stated that ACAS can give advice on any general matter on industrial relations where it thinks such advice would be helpful.

The concordat, or the agreement between the TUC and the Government, says on page 9:

" Some unofficial action may arise because of faulty communications within the union, and unions need to periodically review their internal machinery."

I do not think that "periodically" is enough. It should be done annually. The difficulties that we have been through over the past three months indicate that there should be a very regular review by unions of their internal machinery. Under the Act ACAS can certainly help and I should like to see both ACAS and the TUC getting together to improve that situation.

We argued in Committee during the passage of the Bill that if a person had a genuine conscientious objection to joining a union there should be provision for that person to appeal to a court or industrial tribunal. The concordat says on page 4:

" In particular, unions are advised to bear firmly in mind that the closed shop may not be a rigid arrangement, agreements should provide for conscientious objectors and can provide for certain categories of workers to be excluded from the closed shop provisions."

That is as close as we could get, almost, to what we have been arguing for over the past four years. Here, on page 4 of the concordat, recognition is made of the fact that there can be conscientious objection to joining a union. I hope that the Government will take one small step forward from that and actually make an alteration in the Act. They can easily find the amendments because we tried so hard to put them on the statute book. Before this Act came into effect a small percentage of non-union people worked peacefully alongside those who were members of unions and the conscientious objection clause was perfectly understood and accepted.

There is a problem about disclosure of information. If the Secretary of State reads the December issue of the Industrial Relations Review and Report, he will note that difficulties are emerging when disclosure of information cases go to the Central Arbitration Committee. The issue is what constitutes information for the purposes of collective bargaining. In three cases—namely, ASTMS v. GKN Sankey, ASTMS v. Clydesdale Bank, TASS v. Dunlop Company—the CAC appears to have given contradictory advice. That is an issue that the Government will have to consider carefully.

I refer to the health and safety at work provisions in section 116. We are now having organisations of employees queueing up for recognition as unions. The Government will have to consider carefully the appointment of safety representatives and whether appointments should be confined only to those in recognised trade unions. In my view others should have the right to be appointed.

The Government should publish the research that they have undertaken on industrial tribunals. The Minister of State gave me a somewhat oblique answer on 20 February 1979. We are entitled to more information about their workings. If the Government will loosen one or two parts of the 1975 Act, that will create a better atmosphere and more employment.

rose—

Order. I call the hon Member for Birmingham, Selly Oak (Mr. Litterick). I remind the hon. Gentleman of the implied contractual obligation to speak for a maximum of seven minutes.

9.2 p.m.

I am almost inclined, Mr. Deputy Speaker, to take your remark personally. First, I comment on the speech of the hon. Member for Bedfordshire, South (Mr. Madel). The hon. Gentleman seemed to imply that the existence of the Employment Protection Act 1975—perhaps he meant the whole corpus of labour and labour relations legislation—has brought about unemployment among young people that would not otherwise have happened. He seemed to say that. I see that he is shaking his head so I shall not make the remark that I was about to make.

It has been a disappointing debate. I regret to say that it has been disappointing mainly because of the tone set by the right hon. Member for Lowestoft (Mr. Prior), whose interest, enthusiasm and, at times, knowledge of the subject causes me to have some respect for him and to listen to him with great interest. His speech was characterised by great vagueness and an over-anxiety to make propaganda points for a specific sector of the electorate. His speech did great unfairness to the legislation that the Government have introduced and to himself.

It is a bad policy to try to gauge legislation to meet the needs of—perhaps it is appropriate to use the term as we are talking about industry—the least efficient people in the economy. Opposition Members constantly reiterate the attitudes of small business men. That implies that there is a case for special treatment for those who are especially incompetent. That does not do small business men a a great service. That does not do a service to the needs of the economy.

The British people would not thank us or the Conservative Party if we were to enact legislation that made life cushy for small business men. Most of us agree in principle that anyone employing labour should be obliged to accept certain common basic responsibilities as an employer of labour. That seems to be a simple principle. I should find it difficult to avoid if I were an employer. I am sure that most Opposition Members agree that it is a basic moral obligation.

We have chosen to impose on all employers the duty to accept the same basic ground rules. It does not prevent more efficient, more competent employers offering better conditions than are laid down by the Employment Protection Act. It seems to me that responsibilities to employees which the Employment Protection Act lays down really are minimal and certainly if we compare these to what is done elsewhere in Western Europe we see we have not been outstandingly radical at all in this respect.

Again, it was noticeable in the speech of the right hon. Member for Lowestoft that there were not many facts. He talked of the insupportable burden on management time arising from all the legislation and alluded, in a rather evasive way, to cost at the same time. We all know that European managements, European enterprises, bear a much heavier burden in these respects and bear it, apparently, with equanimity and are much more successful, by and large, than are most British enterprises, at least in international competition. It seems to me, therefore, that the right hon. Member for Lowestoft again did himself a disservice. He ought to have brought forward comparative facts showing that there are employers elsewhere who are bearing these burdens and being crushed by them, or are not. He did not try to do so, and that is enough to make any serious Member of this House a bit sceptical about the rather vague arguments that he brought forward about a lot of little employers feeling very bad about this kind of legislation.

I am not at all surprised that many little employers—the lumpen element in the middle class—are feeling very bad about having obligations imposed upon them by Parliament. They always did. I am sure they were very vociferous when Parliament said children should not be sent up chimneys or women should not be sent down coalmines. ' Twas always thus, and it seems to me that a great party like the Conservative Party should be careful about the interest it espouses so explicitly and with such enthusiasm. It seems to me that these are not a reputable part of society in the sense that it seems, no doubt unwittingly, that the Conservative Party is prepared to expose a significant part of the working class of this country to a degree of risk which, says that party, is insupportable if working people are working for larger firms. Do they really mean that? I doubt it very much. They should beware of that kind of special pleading.

Through the debates on the Employment Protection Act it was remarkable that the Conservative Party kept on insisting that this would make the employment of labour more costly and therefore, as a number of Conservative Members have said tonight, it would make employers a lot more cautious about recruiting labour. It seems to me that any sensible human being ought to welcome that.

I have been employed as a personnel manager involved in the functions of recruiting and training people, managing industrial relations, and so on and I have seen the devastating consequences of the irresponsible hiring of labour; because the irresponsible hiring of labour inevitably leads to the casual firing of labour. It has been in the past and is still, to some extent, a very general feature of the conduct of British industry that management has taken a casual view of the hiring of labour, and, more importantly, the disposal of labour. That is why we have enacted legislation of this kind. Opposition Members have been sensible enough to remark that there is a good deal of consensus between the two sides of the House that in those circumstances some protection was necessary.

If people are to be recruited irresponsibly, there is trouble. It is also inhuman and cruel, because those people are not being offered any kind of future. Some people may ask "Why should they expect security?"—but they do. People expect some degree, at least, of assurance that they will have a job next month or next year. That is not a plea—and I would not make such a plea—for job security for life; but again I suggest to Conservative Members that they should not confuse the rewards and penalties of entrepreneurship with the obligations of workers. Workers are not paid to take risks. They are simply paid to do an assigned job in our economic system.

We are told that entrepreneurs take risks and reap unusual rewards if they succeed. But workers are not paid to do that. They are merely paid to work. Even in occupations where there is a high risk, workers' wages do not reflect that. I do not mean the risk of bankruptcy but the risk of life and limb, which is why we passed the Health and Safety at Work, etc. Act. Workers are rewarded not according to the insecurity of the firm or the dangers of the work place but according to the going rate in their labour market.

It is therefore totally indefensible for the Tories to suggest that the modest protections of the Employment Protection Act should be subverted, undermined, watered down or diminshed, so that a significant section of the working class should receive less protection at work, security of employment and so forth than the remainder.

9.11 p.m.

We have established a little common ground between the two sides in the debate. The speech of my right hon. Friend the Member for Lowestoft (Mr. Prior) was most restrained, but anything from this side of the House is treated as an attack on the whole edifice of legislation. We are, however, seeking to examine particular points in the legislation to see whether employment prospects in the country are being enhanced or retarded. That is not an attack on the working man. The present prospects of employment are daunting. Unemployment is getting worse. The principal forecasts, not least those locked in the Department of Employment, suggest that it may get worse in the next few years.

In those circumstances we must consider restraints on employment, and today we are concentrating on the Employment Protection Act. There is restraint on employers, and we should take it seriously. We do not say that the rights of working people should be abolished to enhance employment prospects, but we should examine whether what we are trying to do is right in the context of other serious problems, such as mounting unemployment.

There has been comparison with the practice in other European countries. I do not say that everything that is happening in overseas countries must be right in this country. Even if in concept it is right, it cannot necessarily be implanted here without considering the background, conditions and other circumstances of their industrial relations that may be different. We may want to achieve a better standard of workers' rights, but we should consider the pace at which we proceed. We must consider that when determining new obligations on employers. We may have tried to do too much too quickly.

We have had much discussion on the effect of the legislation on small businesses. Many small employers in my constituency have mentioned the effect of the legislation. The survey that was mentioned by the Minister of State and reported in the Official Report, on 16 February, volume 962, column 1510, indicates that 24 per cent. of companies thought that this was a factor. That evidence should be taken seriously. We should consider slightly amending the provisions of the Act without attacking its overall principles.

We should pay particular attention to the time that is allowed to elapse before the unfair dismissal provisions apply in particular circumstances. I believe that it is fair to extend the period from 26 weeks to 52, and I reject the argument that it is a bad employer who cannot decide in the shorter period. The fact is that employers have to take risks. Many employers, with all their burdens, are not prepared to take the additional risk of making a mistake that will involve them in redundancy payments and unfair dismissal proceedings. That is very inhibiting. Many employees will be dismissed prematurely because during the fifth month an employer who is not sure of an employee is inclined to get rid of him rather than risk running into the period of the legislation. There is a case for the modest proposals put forward by my right hon. Friend the Member for Lowestoft.

Against the awful background of worsening unemployment, I wish Labour Members would realise that we on the Conservative Benches are not mounting an attack against the fundamentals of this legislation. All that we are saying is that in certain cases it is defective and even injurious to employment prospects in this country.

9.16 p.m.

As my hon. Friend the Member for Saffron Walden (Mr. Haselhurst) just said, we are not mounting an all-out attack on the Employment Protection Act any more than we did during that measure's Committee and Report stages some years ago.

Some aspects of the legislation have been praised and some have been rightly criticised. Overall, the debate has confirmed again that this Government's so-called employment protection legislation has had exactly the opposite effect. Jobs and job opportunities have been destroyed as a result of it, and the case has not been made out for any job having been protected by it. Consequently the country's dole queues are longer and people, particularly young people, stay in the queues longer.

The debate has demonstrated conclusively the trade union bias in the Government's legislation on industrial relations. The Employment Protection Act and the Trade Union and Labour Relations (Amendment) Acts of 1974 and 1976 were part of the Government's payment for the transient and largely illusory trade union contribution to the social contract. In the social contract's first phase we saw inflation and unemployment soar to record levels, and in total we have seen an economy in which industrial production—the wealth of our nation—is only as much as it was five years ago. In the same period, earnings have risen by 120 per cent and prices by more than 100 per cent. Any transient benefit from the trade union side as part of that contract has long since gone, but the damaging effects of the legislation remain.

The Secretary of State has accepted the role of law in industrial relations, and in doing so he has advanced a different argument from those we heard from him and his right hon. and hon. Friends in years gone by. He admitted his change of view on this matter, and rightly so, because he has been responsible for sponsoring and fathering more industrial relations legislation in this House than any of his predecessors, whether they were at the Department of Employment or the old Ministry of Labour. He also made general comparisons between the Industrial Relations Act 1971 and the current legislation and he referred to strike statistics. Figures can be chosen from the past to suit oneself. In fact there was one full year only when the 1971 Act was in operation—1973.

That was a disaster.

The hon. Gentleman is jumping in before he knows the facts, which is not unusual. In 1973, the number of days lost through strikes was about 7 million—fewer than in 1977 or 1978 and less than three times the days lost in January of this year. Therefore, the attack launched on the Industrial Relations Act and the claim that it poisoned industrial relations and caused increase in strike activity is not proven. Labour Members often quote figures for 1972 when 24 million days were lost as a result of strikes, but 10 million of those days were lost because of the coalmining dispute. I have read the Wilberforce committee report, as, no doubt, other hon. Members have. It contained no reference to the Industrial Relations Act. A myth has grown up that the Industrial Relations Act was the cause of industrial unrest. That is not true.

In opening the debate, my right hon. Friend the Member for Lowestoft (Mr. Prior) referred to the terms of reference of ACAS and the conflict that exists in them. We pointed out while the legislation was going through that there was a conflict between the duty imposed upon ACAS of improving industrial relations and extending collective bargaining. We argued at the time that those factors could, in certain circumstances, be incompatible. We have been proved to be right. It would have been wiser if the Government had accepted the amendments that we then moved.

We also argued that the recognition procedures were loaded in favour of the trade unions. Again, experience has shown that to be right. Unions had access to the procedures, whereas employers did not. That created from the start a feeling of unevenness about the recognition section of the Act. It has led to this aspect of ACAS's work attracting greater criticism than the constructive and helpful role that ACAS has generally played when acting as conciliator or arbitrator.

Questions of guaranteed payments and unfair dismissal have been raised. I shall not repeat the points about unfair dismissal and industrial tribunals—except that I hope that Ministers will be concerned, as I am, about a particular aspect of the matter. A study of the judgments made in unfair dismissal cases leads one to feel that too many are decided on the basis of procedural points rather than on the merits of the case. The judgments seem not to be concerned with the justification for the dismissal of the person concerned but more with the fact that proper procedures have not been gone through—perhaps in a pettifogging way.

We should re-examine what has been happening to try to achieve a more even-handed way of dealing with these important questions. The right to go before a tribunal and claim unfair dismissal is important.

Does the hon. Gentleman agree that justice has to be seen to be done within the firm? To that end, it is necessary that the firm, in its own interest, should establish—however rigid or bureaucratic it may seem—a recognised procedure by which people get the sack.

I agree. I believe that the post-1971 legislation has led to a considerable improvement in such procedures in most industries. But the hon. Gentleman will accept that the perception of the fairness of the legislation by outsiders can be affected if they think that the issue is being decided on a small procedural point when there are real issues of merit involved.

The point about pro-union bias in the legislation is so clear and is so well understood by Labour Members, as well as by my hon. Friends, that it does not need to be argued. We saw an indication of pro-union activity by the Government in the news about recent Inland Revenue action and the points put so well by my hon. Friend the Member for Worthing (Mr. Higgins) in his Standing Order No. 9 application today.

However, perhaps we see the unfairness at its sharpest in the closed shop. What an irony and what a grotesque absurdity it is that the Employment Protection (Consolidation) Act 1978 should contain the legislative backing for the sacking of individuals who refuse to become, or remain, trade union members in a closed shop.

Section 58 of the Act provides that:

" Dismissal of an employee…shall be regarded as fair "

if the individual concerned falls foul of a closed shop agreement. There is no similar provision anywhere else in the statute. The dismissal of an employee caught with his hand in the till or of a confessed or convicted thief may or may not be fair. The burden of proof will rest on the employer. But the dismissal of an individual, perhaps with long and loyal service to the firm, who is sacked as the result of a union membership agreement being made will be fair. The dismissal of an employee, perhaps one with a record of violence, for severely assaulting a fellow worker may or may not be fair. It will be determined by an industrial tribunal. The dismissal of an individual with genuine, deeply held, personal convictions against trade union membership, who is willing to pay the equivalent of union dues to a charity—so there is no question of free-riding—and who refuses to join or remain a member of a union, will be fair. The statute says that it will be so.

Section 58(3) of the 1978 Act is a pretty disgraceful piece of legislation which should never have been enacted and which should be eliminated from our law as soon as possible.

I have spoken so far in general terms. Let me be much more specific. A constituent of mine, Mr. Arthur Dungate, had been employed by Hounslow borough council as a signwriter for more than six years. He is well liked by his fellow workers and by the management. Recently, he was on jury service for seven weeks and he went to work for two hours every morning before going on to the court in order not to let down his department and to keep the signs coming through. Someone said of him at that time "There are not many who would do that." How right he was.

Mr. Dungate has been dismissed as the result of a closed shop agreement. The Labour majority on the council has confirmed his sacking. A few Labour councillors stayed away from the vote, but not one was prepared to vote against such a monstrous act of injustice. That meeting was on Friday 16 February—just two days after the Prime Minister came to the House waving the so-called concordat, which contained the suggestion that closed shops should be dealt with in a flexible manner and that proper provision should be made for those with conscientious objections.

I have taken up the matter with the Prime Minister and with Mr. Len Murray and have asked them to intervene. Apart from an acknowledgement, I think that is all that has happened. The Minister may tonight or at a later stage give one better news. If any right hon. or hon. Member would weigh in and give support to this individual, that support will be well received. Are those opposite unwilling to intervene on a matter of this kind? Are they all so weak and spineless that they will stand on one side washing their hands about this whole sordid affair? It is not as though Mr. Dungate, my constituent, is just a single isolated case. Mr. Phipps who is employed by the Hounslow borough council and who is not a constituent of mine, is also being sacked.

In my own constituency, at the Brentford works of Booths Distilleries, other people are being victimised by the Transport and General Workers' Union as a result of a closed shop agreement which came into force on 1 January 1979. I have taken up this matter with Moss Evans but have heard nothing from him.

The law as it affects closed shops must be changed to provide proper and reasonable safeguards for individual rights—the right of appeal to a court of law against arbitrary expulsion or exclusion from a trade union. This can mean the loss of a job if a closed shop is involved. Provision for compensation is required and an end to the iniquitous enactment that closed shop sackings are fair. Protection is required for individuals who object to union membership on grounds of deeply held personal conviction but who are not seeking to gain financially as a result of that objection.

Just as the overwhelming majority of residents in Hounslow are firmly opposed to the sacking of Mr. Dungate and Mr. Phipps, so, too, are the overwhelming majority of our fellow citizens opposed to the inhumanities of the closed shop. They are in favour of the essential safeguards, to which I have referred, being enacted and arranged as soon as the Conservative Party comes back to office.

I have referred to the concordat and the Employment Protection Acts. These are very relevant to the matters my right hon Friend raised about SLADE. The blacking and blockading activities of SLADE are thoroughly disgraceful. Whatever the fears of members of that print union about job loss and skill redundancy which flow from technological change, there can be no excuse for the sort of action which has been taken by the leadership of that union—

Referring back to the hon. Gentleman's point about the closed shop, is he really saying that the Conservative Party will repeal legislation in relation to the closed shop so that there is no legislation to deal with that matter at all? Or is he saying that the Conservatives will bring in legislation of a kind that exists in the United States—the right-to-work legislation? It is important for us to know what is in the minds of hon. Members opposite. If they simply mean to repeal the Act, I must tell the hon. Gentleman that there were always closed shops. There were always one or two people in such circumstances who felt that they were wrongly treated. That was without legislation. This legislation, in fact, protects them in a way that did not afford them protection before.

I do not accept what the hon. Gentleman said in the latter part of his remarks. I suggest that he reads in Hansard what I have said, which was very precise and clear. Perhaps, unlike himself, I mean what I say.

I always mean what I say.

In those circumstances, the hon. Gentleman can do me the courtesy of reading what I said rather than getting up and interrupting when he knows that time is short. The House listened to him earlier in the debate.

I welcome the news that SLADE has suspended the fair list system. I gather that this news came out yesterday. However, I am worried about the genuineness of the change, because I understand that earlier this month SLADE's London branch assistant secretary, when speaking at a surgery meeting of the SLADE Art Union about the suspension of the fair list, went on to say:

" We'll come back in a couple of years' time and do it properly. You'll all be glad to pay the £1·35."

If there has been a helpful move by SLADE in withdrawing the fair list system, it is worrying that one of its officers should be saying "Yes, but we are doing it only for a short time". I hope that SLADE will stop all the vicious pressure tactics that it is using. I hope that it will pay some attention to the advice given in paragraph 16 of Guide Three of the concordat, which states:

" The General Council advise that unions shall adopt approaches which place the main emphasis on unions themselves persuading workers of the benefits of trade union membership."

That is about as far away as one can get from the sort of activities that we have seen by SLADE, which has gone not to the workers but to the management and said "Unless you force all your people into the union, we will black everything that you do." I hope that the Government will respond to the early-day motions calling for an inquiry into the activities of SLADE. If they will not do so, let me again give the assurance that the next Conservative Government will set up such an inquiry.

I began by talking of the job and job opportunity destruction that has resulted from this legislation. The evidence about this, which to some extent has been disputed today, is nevertheless accepted right across the House, because no Labour Member has suggested that the employment protection legislation has had no effect whatever on jobs and job opportunities.

There is a conflict about how much effect it has had. We have the Daniels report. We have the ORC survey, carried out on behalf of the Government, and the best figure that one can dredge out of it is that mentioned by the Secretary of State, that 2 per cent. of small employers saw employment protection legislation as the main difficulty—worse than taxation, high interest rates, planning permission and everything else. But 24 per cent. of those surveyed said that they would have taken on more staff but for that legislation. Perhaps the truth lies somewhere between those two figures. Even so, it is a very substantial element within our society if 5 per cent. 10 per cent., 15 per cent. or 20 per cent. of small businesses are not taking on extra staff because of this legislation.

We also have the surveys of the Small Business Bureau, the Engineering Employers' Federation and the Merseyside chamber of commerce, all of which have been referred to. One that has not been specifically referred to is the survey carried out by the London Chamber of Commerce and Industry. I should like to quote from one section, which states:

" Virtually all of the 1,048 firms surveyed reported that the legislation is adversely affecting their business. A commonly voiced reason was that the time spent ensuring that the company did not breach the laws is quite out of proportion to the value of the legislation to the firm and wastes valuable management time. Many firms also feel deterred from recruiting new labour because of this legislation—particularly the Employment Protection Act."

By our vote tonight, we reiterate our criticisms of these Employment Protection Acts, and also reinforce our intention to make the necessary and essential changes in the law to remove the bias that now exists.

9.40 p.m.

Until the hon. Member for Brentford and Isle-worth (Mr. Hayhoe) rose to wind up the debate for the Opposition, I thought that we had had a well mannered, good-tempered and low-key debate, conducted in terms of moderation. I contrast that with the abrasive, sustained attack by the hon. Gentleman, who seemed to find it hard to say a kind word about legislation that has been widely praised on both sides of industry since its enactment and which is considered to be one of the most beneficial influences in British industry. The hon. Gentleman must be the last surviving defender—although I suppose that those who applauded him shared his view—of the Industrial Relations Act. Even on the eve of the disastrous—for the Conservative Party—general election of 1974 the director-general of the CBI could do nothing other than describe that Act as disastrous.

rose—

I shall not give way, as I have only just started.

I am sorry that I missed the speech made by the right hon. Member for Lowestoft (Mr. Prior). It was the only speech that I missed. By all accounts it was a sensible, thoughtful and restrained speech. I do not know whether the right hon. Gentleman wishes me to refer to his speech. I am trying hard to do so. If the account that I received of his speech was accurate, it was the kind of speech that we do not hear from the Leader of the Opposition. We cannot fail to get the impression that it is like the interrogative technique that one sees in Hollywood films, of the hard cop, soft cop approach. At one moment one man browbeats the party. He is followed by the avuncular type. Presumably the right hon. Gentleman is the soft cop, who will now wait for the right hon. Lady's tough follow-up.

Some of the right hon. Gentleman's remarks have been replied to by my right hon. Friend. The right hon. Gentleman complained that the volume of labour relations legislation had been heavy on industry. In the past four years it has been a heavy burden. There has been much for industry to absorb and understand. That happened because we had to make up such a backlog. We recognise the difficulties.

Later on I shall refer to SLADE, about which references were made by the right hon. Gentleman and the hon. Member for Brentford and Isleworth.

My hon. Friend the Member for Sowerby (Mr. Madden), in what I thought was a well-informed and robust speech, paid a tribute to my right hon. Friend, in which I should like to join, in acknowledging the efforts that my right hon. Friend made, toiling through last night, which have now resulted in an undertaking about The Times. [Interruption.] I hope that the sneering and disapproving noises made by Members on the Opposition Benches—most of whom have not been in the Chamber the whole day until now, and some of whom have no doubt just come crawling in from the Smoking Room—will be put on the record, so that the workers at The Times will know who are their friends and who are their enemies in the House.

The right hon. Member for Western Isles (Mr. Stewart)—I do not blame him for taking advantage of the opportunity afforded by the debate—raised the question of employment problems in his constituency, especially those of young people, and the difficulties that are being faced in the application of the job creation programme in the Western Isles. I understand that the Manpower Services Commission is considering the position. I shall ensure that the right hon. Gentleman's remarks are drawn to its attention, and he will receive a response from the Under-Secretary of State.

My hon. Friend the Member for Liverpool, Walton (Mr. Heffer) was critical of sections 11 to 16 of the Act. I understand that. He thought—indeed, there was a general belief—that what we provided was a more sensible and peaceful machine, by means of which trade unions could seek recognition from employers, perhaps recalcitrant employers, in ways different from those that had to be resorted to traditionally, and especially to avoid the disastrous confrontation that we have experienced. I am bound to tell my hon. Friend that we thought that as well, but in the light of experience I have my own reservations about whether we have found the right way. We shall have to look very carefully at the provisions to see whether they can be reformed and strengthened to enable us to avoid the kind of difficulty which has arisen, particularly as illustrated by the Grunwick dispute.

One thing that we could not envisage was the degree to which there would be intervention by the courts, and the interpretations that would be placed by the courts on the words of the statute. We shall have to look at these matters. I am sure that the whole House will share with me the view that it is right that we should seek to have some kind of machinery, whether by statute or otherwise, to enable trade unions to seek recognition in a sensible and peaceful way, rather than having to fight their battles on the streets of Willesden or elsewhere.

I warmly welcomed some of the points made by the right hon. Member for Crosby (Mr. Page). I am glad to note that in saying that I have brought a smile to his face. I welcomed particularly his comments on the need to decasualise labour. He mentioned particularly the building industry, but I believe that his remarks were made in a more general sense. I agree with him about the building industry. He will be pleased to know that for about two years the Department of the Environment has sponsored a committee that was set up to look precisely at this issue. Progress has been made, although there has been some difficulty in getting agreement about the register or registers with the employers' organisations. As the right hon. Gentleman will know, there are two employers' organisations in the industry—the Federation of Master Builders and the National Federation of Building Trades Employers.

I look forward to the right hon. Gentleman's support when, as I hope, shortly, I or some other Minister introduces proposals for decasualisation in the fishing industry. If there is a need for decasualisation in the building industry, there is an even more acute need for it in the fishing industry. I have been involved in trying to persuade employers in that industry to agree on decasualisation measures. Likewise, I have been involved in talks which may lead eventually to a degree of decasualisation in the construction industry.

A theme that has dominated the whole debate has been that of unfair dismissal, particularly with reference to small firms. We seem to have this debate increasingly frequently in the House. There was a very full debate on the subject on 16 February. Some hon. Members who spoke today spoke also in that debate. In listening to the debate today, it would be hard for anyone who did not know the facts to believe that it was the Conservative Party that introduced the unfair dismissal provisions that Conservative Members so bitterly attack today.

The hon. Member for Saffron Walden (Mr. Haselhurst) suggested that there ought to be an extension of the qualifying employment period to 52 weeks. Even at the time of the introduction of the provision, it was seriously suggested by the Conservative Party that the period chosen was one that would be diminished in the light of experience of the case load as the application of the provision developed.

The right hon. Member for Crosby appeared to miss the point about the unfair dismissal provisions in seeming to believe that somehow making the industry itself responsible, rather than separate employers, would somehow eliminate the need for redress for workers who might wish to complain of unfair dismissal. Workers would still be liable to be faced with dismissal, unfair or otherwise, in the building industry, irrespective of who was the employer. I am sure that the right hon. Gentleman would not wish to deprive workers of their statutory right, established by Parliament, to complain of unfair dismissal. That point is often overlooked.

The remedy is one for unfair dismissal, not for any kind of dismissal. The employer has to make the case that he has dismissed fairly. That was raised this afternoon when complaints were made that the burden of proof had been unfairly imposed on the employer. I see the hon. and learned Member for Cleveland and Whitby (Mr. Brittan) nodding his head, because he believes that the employers were not the party on whom to impose that burden of proof. I accept that he disagrees with me, but when a worker applies to the tribunal he is appealing against a decision already taken by the employer. He is appealing against an arbitrary and, prima facie, unfair decision taken by the employer.

Only the employer can know the reasons why he has dismissed a worker. For that reason alone it would be sufficient and proper to place the burden of proof on the employer. I cannot help being surprised at the number of Opposition Members who write to me enclosing letters of complaint from their constituents saying that they have been unfairly dismissed and have been denied access to the unfair dismissal procedures. That is because they have not had sufficient qualifying time. Invariably hon. Gentlemen send the letter to me saying they would be grateful for my comments. They hope that they can then return such letters to their constituents with a sympathetic note, regretting that the Minister has not dealt with the matter in a more constructive and sympathetic manner.

There is a word appropriate to that kind of behaviour, Mr. Speaker, although you might rule me out of order were I to use it. [HON. MEMBERS: "What is the word?"] We are getting the full whiff of the Smoke Room right across the Chamber, as we often do on these occasions. I can almost smell the brandy.

The right hon. Member for Crosby, whose views were to some extent echoed by the hon. and learned Member for Darwen (Mr. Fletcher-Cooke), asked why we needed the tribunal when we had an adequate judicial system that he felt could deal with any complaints of unfair dismissal.

I can understand the right hon. Member's saying that, as he is a lawyer. I am not a lawyer. I am an ex-shop steward and I have had precious little experience of the courts. What little experience I have had would have been sufficient to deter me, as a trade unionist, as a shop steward and as a worker, from seeking a remedy in the courts. I am not saying that the courts are unfair, or that they are not impartial.

Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

If the hon. and learned Gentleman will contain himself, I think that he is anticipating me.

rose—

No, I will not give way. The hon. and learned Gentleman must allow me to make my point.

Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

I do not know why the hon. and learned Gentleman is shouting at me before I have made my point, which is that the whole atmosphere of the courts is intimidating to workers. It is legalistic, and dominated by the jargon and recourse to learning that lawyers find comes easily to them.

We, as did the Conservatives when they established the unfair dismissal procedure, have made provision for redress through the tribunals which are less formal than the courts. They are an informal way in which people can seek redress in a more relaxed and less legalistic atmosphere. There has been an increasing tendency on the part of employers to use the law.

rose—

This is a matter that we regret. I hope that instead of an increased use of solicitors and barristers, and legalism in the courts, we shall restore the informality that was originally envisaged when the concept was established.

Will the Minister now give way?

No, I shall not. I have precious little time left. The hon. and learned Member had better get that into his head.

References have been made to surveys. The hon. Member for Aberdeenshire, West (Mr. Fairgrieve) should have been more honest when he referred to the survey that was put out from the Conservative Central Office and which attacked the Employment Protection Act. As Mandy Rice-Davies would have said "They would, wouldn't they?" What other response could one expect from the Conservative Central Office? Hon. Members might have relied more reasonably on the research commissioned by authoritative, highly respected, independent sources by my Department and which was quoted by the Secretary of State.

Will the Minister give way?

No. I give the last word on this matter to Lord Carr. When first introducing these unfair dismissal provisions he was understandably pressed by those who supported the cause of the small business man and wished to see exemptions. When introducing the Conservative Government's code of industrial practice he made it clear that he had received representations from small businesses. He said:

" On the question of small establishments in particular, while I appreciate their difficulties. I feel that the universal applicability of the code is a fundamental feature of it which must be retained. If we were once to depart from that much of the pressure and incentive of the code would be weakened. A too-easy gateway of excuse would be open for people not prepared to enter into it."—[Official Report, 18 October 1971; Vol. 823, c. 391.]

I turn to the SLADE problem. I understand why this matter was raised. In the last few months I have had informal discussions, not only with the general secretary of SLADE, Mr. John Jackson, but also with members of the SLADE art union. Mr. Jackson is aware of what has been said in the House. He is particularly aware of my comments in the full debate some time ago.

Far from being insensitive, he has made clear to me his society's readiness and anxiety to respond to the criticisms. Progress in doing so has been inhibited until recently, because there has been a ballot about a proposed merger with the National Graphical Association. If the merger had taken place it might have removed some of the difficulties in the way of a different approach to recruitment. However, the outcome of the ballot was declared recently and the merger proposal was narrowly defeated.

In the light of that, Mr. Jackson and his colleagues are developing an approach to the union's positive objectives in a manner that should avoid the complaints that have been made. He has made it plain to me that he is anxious to achieve this without returning to the conflict experienced in 1976.

As on so many other occasions when the House has debated industrial relations, the Opposition's contribution has

Division No. 87]	AYES	[10.00 p.m.
Adley, Robert	Clark, William (Croydon S)	Goodhart, Philip
Aitken, Jonathan	Clarke, Kenneth (Rushcliffe)	Goodhew, Victor
Alison, Michael	Clegg, Walter	Goodlad, Alastair
Amery, Rt Hon Julian	Cockcroft, John	Gorst, John
Arnold, Tom	Cooke, Robert (Bristol W)	Gow, Ian (Eastbourne)
Atkins, Rt Hon H. (Spelthorne)	Cope, John	Gower, Sir Raymond (Barry)
Atkinson, David (B'mouth, East)	Cormack, Patrick	Grant, Anthony (Harrow C)
Awdry, Daniel	Costain, A. P.	Gray, Hamish
Baker, Kenneth	Critchley, Julian	Grieve, Percy
Banks, Robert	Crouch, David	Griffiths, Eldon
Beith, A. J.	Crowder, F. P.	Grimond, Rt Hon J.
Bell, Ronald	Dean, Paul (N Somerset)	Grist, Ian
Bendall, Vivian	Dodsworth, Geoffrey	Grylls, Michael
Bennett, Sir Frederic (Torbay)	Douglas-Hamilton, Lord James	Hall-Davis, A. G. F.
Bennett, Dr Reginald (Fareham)	Drayson, Burnaby	Hamilton, Archibald (Epsom & Ewell)
Benyon, W.	du Cann, Rt Hon Edward	Hamilton, Michael (Salisbury)
Berry, Hon Anthony	Durant, Tony	Hampson, Dr Keith
Bitten, John	Dykes, Hugh	Hannam, John
Biggs-Davison, John	Eden, Rt Hon Sir John	Harrison, Col Sir Harwood (Eye)
Blaker, Peter	Edwards, Nicholas (Pembroke)	Harvie Anderson, Rt Hon Miss
Body, Richard	Elliott, Sir William	Haselhurst, Alan
Boscawen, Hon Robert	Emery, Peter	Hastings, Stephen
Bottomley, Peter	Eyre, Reginald	Havers, Rt Hon Sir Michael
Bowden, A. (Brighton, Kemptown)	Fairbairn, Nicholas	Hayhoe, Barney
Boyson, Dr Rhodes (Brent)	Fairgrieve, Russell	Heath, Rt Hon Edward
Braine, Sir Bernard	Farr, John	Heseltine, Michael
Brittan, Leon	Fell. Anthony	Hicks, Robert
Brocklebank-Fowler, c	Finsberg, Geoffrey	Higgins, Terence L.
Brooke, Hon Peter	Fisher, Sir Nigel	Hodgson, Robin
Brotherton, Michael	Fletcher, Alex (Edinburgh N)	Holland, Philip
Brown, Sir Edward (Bath)	Fletcher-Cooke, Charles	Hooson, Emlyn
Bruce-Gardyne, John	Fookes, Miss Janet	Hordern, Peter
Bryan, Sir Paul	Forman, Nigel	Howe, Rt Hon Sir Geoffrey
Buchanan-Smith, Alick	Fowler, Norman (Sutton C'f'd)	Howell, David (Guildford)
Buck, Antony	Fox. Marcus	Howells, Geraint (Cardigan)
Budgen, Nick	Fraser, Rt Hon H. (Stafford & St)	Hunt, David (Wirral)
Bulmer, Esmond	Fry, Peter	Hunt, John (Ravensbourne)
Burden, F. A.	Galbraith, Hon T. G. D.	Hurd, Douglas
Butler, Adam (Bosworth)	Gardiner, George (Relgate)	Hutchison, Michael Clark
Carlisle, Mark	Gardner, Edward (S Fylde)	Irving, Charles (Cheltenham)
Chalker, Mrs Lynda	Gilmour, Rt Hon Sir Ian (Chesham)	James, David
Channon, Paul	Gilmour, Sir John (East Fife)	Jenkin, Rt Hon P. (Wanst'd&W'df'd)
Churchill, W. S.	Glyn, Dr Alan	Jessel, Toby
Clark, Alan (Plymouth, Sutton)	Godber, Rt Hon Joseph	Johnson Smith, G. (E Grinstead)

followed two themes. The first is a strident and abusive criticism of our labour laws, with a marked absence of specific remedies. The second theme echoes the lead of the Leader of the Opposition. It is to denounce trade union power and to imply that most of the ills that afflict our society are attributable to the unions.

In January the right hon. Member for Finchley (Mrs. Thatcher) talked of people fearing the power of the unions and of the unions smashing Government policies. It was bloodcurdling stuff. The great flaw in British industrial relations is not union power so much as weakness. The people who said that were those who wrote "The Conservative Opportunity", to which the hon. and learned Member for Cleveland and Whitby (Mr. Brittan) contributed.

Question put, That this House do now adjourn:—

The House divided: Ayes 268, Noes 282.

Jones, Arthur (Daventry)	Morris, Michael (Northampton S)	Sims, Roger
Jopling, Michael	Morrison, Hon Charles (Devizes)	Sinclair, Sir George
Kaberry, Sir Donald	Morrison, Hon Peter (Chester)	Skeet, T. H. H.
Kilfedder, James	Mudd, David	Smith, Dudley (Warwick)
Kimball, Marcus	Neave, Airey	Smith, Timothy John (Ashfield)
King, Evelyn (South Dorset)	Nelson, Anthony	Speed, Keith
King, Tom (Bridgwater)	Neubert, Michael	Spence, John
Kitson, Sir Timothy	Newton, Tony	Spicer, Michael (S Worcester)
Knight, Mrs Jill	Nott, John	Sproat, Iain
Knox, David	Onslow, Cranley	Stainton, Keith
Lamont, Norman	Oppenheim, Mrs Sally	Stanbrook, Ivor
Langford-Holt, Sir John	Osborn, John	Stanley, John
Latham, Michael (Melton)	Page, John (Harrow West)	Steen, Anthony (Wavertree)
Lawrence, Ivan	Page, Rt Hon R. Graham (Crosby)	Stewart, Ian (Hitchin)
Lester, Jim (Beeston)	Page, Richard (Workington)	Stokes, John
Lewis, Kenneth (Rutland)	Parkinson, Cecil	Stradling Thomas, J.
Lloyd, Ian	Pattie, Geoffrey	Tapsell, Peter
Loveridge, John	Penhaligon, David	Taylor, R. (Croydon NW)
Luce, Richard	Percival, Ian	Taylor, Teddy (Cathcart)
McAdden, Sir Stephen	Pink, R. Bonner	Tebbit, Norman
McCrindle, Robert	Prentice, Rt Hon Reg	Temple-Morris, Peter
Macfarlane, Nell	Price, David (Eastleigh)	Thomas, Rt Hon P. (Hendon S)
MacGregor, John	Prior, Rt Hon James	Thorpe, Rt Hon Jeremy (N Devon)
MacKay, Andrew (Stechford)	Pym, Rt Hon Francis	Townsend, Cyril D.
Macmillan, Rt Hon M. (Famham)	Raison, Timothy	Trotter, Neville
McNair-Wilson, M. (Newbury)	Rathbone, Tim	van Straubenzee, W. R.
McNair-Wilson, P. (New Forest)	Rees, Peter (Dover & Deal)	Vaughan, Dr Gerard
Madel, David	Rees-Davies, W. R.	Viggers, Peter
Marten, Neil	Renton, Rt Hon Sir D. (Hunts)	Waddington, David
Mates, Michael	Renton, Tim (Mid-Sussex)	Wakeham, John
Mather, Carol	Rhodes James, R.	Walker, Rt Hon P. (Worcester)
Maude, Angus	Ridley, Hon Nicholas	Walters, Dennis
Mawby, Ray	Ridsdale, Julian	Warren, Kenneth
Maxwell-Hyslop, Robin	Rifkind, Malcolm	Weatherill, Bernard
Mayhew, Patrick	Roberts, Wyn (Conway)	Wells, John
Meyer, Sir Anthony	Rodgers, Sir John (Sevenoaks)	Whitelaw, Rt Hon William
Miller, Hal (Bromsgrove)	Ross, Stephen (Isle of Wight)	Whitney, Raymond
Mills, Peter	Rossi, Hugh (Hornsey)	Wiggin, Jerry
Miscampbell, Norman	Rost, Peter (SE Derbyshire)	Winterton, Nicholas
Mitchell, David (Basingstoke)	Royle, Sir Anthony	Wood, Rt Hon Richard
Moate, Roger	Sainsbury, Tim	Young, Sir G. (Ealing, Acton)
Monro, Hector	St. John-Stevas, Norman	Younger, Hon George
Montgomery, Fergus	Scott, Nicholas
Moore, John (Croydon C)	Shelton, William (Streatham)	TELLERS FOR THE AYES:
More, Jasper (Ludlow)	Shepherd, Colin	Mr. Spencer Le Marchant and
Morgan, Geraint	Shersby, Michael	Mr. Michael Roberts.
Morgan-Giles, Rear-Admiral	Silvester, Fred

NOES
Abse, Lao	Cant, R. B.	Dunn, James A.
Allaun, Frank	Carmichael, Nell	Dunnett, Jack
Anderson, Donald	Carter, Ray	Eadie, Alex
Archer, Rt Hon Peter	Carter-Jones, Lewis	Edge, Geoff
Armstrong, Ernest	Cartwright, John	Ellis, John (Brigg & Scun)
Ashley, Jack	Castle, Rt Hon Barbara	English, Michael
Ashton, Joe	Clemitson, Ivor	Ennals, Rt Hon David
Atkins, Ronald (Preston N)	Cocks, Rt Hon Michael (Bristol S)	Evans, Fred (Caerphilly)
Atkinson, Norman (H'gey, Tott'ham)	Cohen, Stanley	Evans, loan (Aberdare)
Bagier, Gordon A. T.	Colquhoun, Ms Maureen	Evans, John (Newton)
Bain, Mrs Margaret	Concannon, Rt Hon John	Ewing, Harry (Stirling)
Barnett, Guy (Greenwich)	Conlan, Bernard	Faulds, Andrew
Barnett, Rt Hon Joel (Heywood)	Cook, Robin F. (Edin C)	Fernyhough, Rt Hon E.
Bates, Alf	Corbett, Robin	Fitt, Gerard (Belfast W)
Bean, R. E.	Cowans, Harry	Flannery, Martin
Benn, Rt Hon Anthony Wedgwood	Cox, Thomas (Tooting)	Fletcher, L. R. (Ilkeston)
Bennett, Andrew (Stockport N)	Craigen, Jim (Maryhill)	Fletcher, Ted (Darlington)
Bidwell, Sydney	Crawshaw, Richard	Foot, Rt Hon Michael
Bishop, Rt Hon Edward	Cronin, John	Ford, Ben
Blenkinsop, Arthur	Crowther, Stan (Rotherham)	Forrester, John
Boardman, H.	Cryer, Bob	Fowler, Gerald (The Wrekin)
Booth, Rt Hon Albert	Cunningham, Dr J. (Whiteh)	Fraser, John (Lambeth, N'w'd)
Boothroyd, Miss Betty	Davidson, Arthur	Freeson, Rt Hon Reginald
Bottomley, Rt Hon Arthur	Davies, Bryan (Enfield N)	Garrett, John (Norwich S)
Boyden, James (Bish Auck)	Davies, Rt Hon Denzil	Garrett, W. E. (Wallsend)
Bradley, Tom	Davies, Ifor (Gower)	George, Bruce
Bray, Dr Jeremy	Davis, Clinton (Hackney C)	Gilbert, Rt Hon Dr John
Brown, Hugh D. (Provan)	Deakins, Eric	Ginsburg, Devid
Brown, Robert C. (Newcastle W)	Dean, Joseph (Leeds West)	Golding, John
Buchanan, Richard	Deil, Rt Hon Edmund	Gould, Bryan
Butler, Mrs Joyce (Wood Green)	Dempsey, James	Gourlay, Harry
Callaghan, Rt Hon J. (Cardiff SE)	Doig, Peter	Graham, Ted
Callaghan, Jim (Middleton & P)	Dormand, J. D.	Grant, George (Morpeth)
Campbell, Ian	Douglas-Mann, Bruce	Grant, John (Islington C)
Canavan, Dennis	Duffy, A. E. P.	Grocott, Bruce

Hamilton, W. W. (Central Fife)	Marks, Kenneth	Silkin, Rt Hon John (Deptford)
Harrison, Rt Hon Walter	Marshall, Dr Edmund (Goole)	Silkin, Rt Hon S. C. (Dulwich)
Hart, Rt Hon Judith	Marshall, Jim (Leicester S)	Sillars, James
Hattersiey, Rt Hon Roy	Mason, Rt Hon Roy	Silvester, Fred
Hayman, Mrs Helena	Maynard, Miss Joan	Skinner, Dennis
Heffer, Eric S.	Meacher, Michael	Smith, Rt Hon John (N Lanarkshire)
Hooley, Frank	Mellish, Rt Hon Robert	Snape, Peter
Horam, John	Mikardo, Ian	Spearing, Nigel
Howell, Rt Hon Denis (B'ham, Sm H)	Miller, Dr M. S. (E Kilbride)	Spriggs, Leslie
Hoyle, Doug (Nelaon)	Mitchell, Austin (Grimsby)	Staltard, A. W.
Huckfield, Les	Molloy, William	Stewart, Rt Hon Donald
Hughes, Rt Hon C. (Anglesey)	Moonman, Eric	Stewart, Rt Hon M. (Fulham)
Hughes, Robert (Aberdeen N)	Morris, Alfred (Wythenshawe)	Stoddart, David
Hughes, Roy (Newport)	Morris, Rt Hon Charles R.	Stott, Roger
Hunter, Adam	Morris, Rt Hon J. (Aberavon)	Strang, Gavin
Irving, Rt Hon S. (Dartford)	Morton, George	Strauss, Rt Hon G. R.
Jackson, Colin (Brighouse)	Moyle, Rt Hon Roland	Summerskill, Hon Dr Shirley
Jackson, Miss Margaret (Lincoln)	Mulley, Rt Hon Frederick	Taylor, Mrs Ann (Bolton W)
Janner, Greville	Murray, Rt Hon Ronald King	Thomas, Jeffrey (Abertillery)
Jay, Rt Hon Douglas	Newens, Stanley	Thomas, Mike (Newcastle E)
Jenkins, Hugh (Putney)	Noble, Mike	Thomas, Ron (Bristol NW)
John, Brynmor	Oakes, Gordon	Thompson, George
Johnson, James (Hull West)	Ogden, Eric	Thorne, Stan (Preston South)
Johnson, Waller (Derby S)	O'Halloran, Michael	Tierney, Sydney
Jones, Alec (Rhondda)	Orbach, Maurice	Tilley, John
Jones, Barry (East Flint)	Orme, Rt Hon Stanley	Tinn, James
Jones, Dan (Burnley)	Ovenden, John	Tomlinson, John
Judd, Frank	Owen, Rt Hon Dr David	Tomney, Frank
Kaufman, Rt Hon Gerald	Padley, Walter	Torney, Tom
Kelley, Richard	Palmer, Arthur	Tuck, Raphael
Kerr, Russell	Park, George	Urwin, T. W.
Kilroy-Sllk, Robert	Parker, John	Varley, Rt Hon Eric G.
Kinnock, Neil	Parry, Robert	Wainwright, Edwin (Dearne V)
Lamble, David	Pavitt, Laurie	Walker, Harold (Doncaster)
Lamborn, Harry	Perry, Ernest	Walker, Terry (Kingswood)
Lamond, James	Phipps, Dr Colin	Ward, Michael
Latham, Arthur (Paddington)	Price, C. (Lewisham W)	Watkins, David
Leadbitter, Ted	Price, William (Rugby)	Watt, Hamish
Lee, John	Radice, Giles	Weetch, Ken
Lestor, Miss Joan (Eton & Slough)	Rees, Rt Hon Merlyn (Leeds S)	Weitzman, David
Lewis, Arthur (Newham N)	Reid, George	Wellbeloved, James
Lewis, Ron (Carlisle)	Richardson, Miss Jo	White, Frank R. (Bury)
Litterick, Tom	Roberts, Albert (Normanton)	White, James (Pollok)
Lofthouse, Geoffrey	Roberts, Gwilym (Cannock)	Whitehead, Phillip
Lomas, Kenneth	Roderick, Caerwyn	Whitlock, William
Loyden, Eddie	Rodgers, George (Chorley)	Willey, Rt Hon Frederick
Lyons, Edward (Bradford W)	Rodgers, Rt Hon William (Stockton)	Williams, Rt Hon Alan (Swansea W)
McCartney, Hugh	Rooker, J. W.	Williams, Rt Hon Shirley (Hertford)
McDonald, Dr Oonagh	Roper, John	Williams, Sir Thomas (Warrington)
McElhone, Frank	Ross, Rt Hon W. (Kilmarnock)	Wilson, Gordon (Dundee E)
MacFarquhar, Roderick	Rowlands, Ted	Wilson, William (Coventry SE)
McGuire, Michael (Ince)	Ryman, John	Wise, Mrs Audrey
McKay, Alan (Penistone)	Sandelson, Neville	Woodall, Alee
MacKenzie, Rt Hon Gregor	Sedgemore, Brian	Woof, Robert
Maclennan, Robert	Selby, Harry	Wrigglesworth, Ian
McMillan, Tom (Glasgow C)	Sever, John	Young, David (Bolton E)
McNamara, Kevin	Shaw, Arnold (Ilford South)
Madden, Max	Sheldon, Rt Hon Robert	TELLERS FOR THE NOES:
Magee, Bryan	Shore, Rt Hon Peter	Mr. James Hamilton and
Mahon, Simon	Short, Mrs Reneé (Woly NE)	Mr. Donald Coleman.
Mallalieu, J. P. W.
Question accordingly negatived.

Gas Supply (Bristol)

Motion made, and Question proposed. That this House do now adjourn.—[ Mr. Jim Marshall.]

10.16 p.m.

I wish to raise this evening, in the short time available on the Adjournment, the question of the refusal, in effect, of the south-western branch of the Gas Corporation to provide a supply of gas to would-be consumers in a road in my constituency called The Chippings, in the Stapleton ward of Bistol. I want to make to my hon. Friend the point that there are about 30 residents in this road anxious to take a supply. They read the advertisements of the Gas Corporation and, in their innocence, suppose that they can obtain supplies, but the Corporation, while admitting that there is an existing supply in adjoining roads, has said that the cost of extending it to The Chippings would mean a contribution of approximately £500 being required from each householder. The Corporation admits that such a fantastically large amount is impossible for the residents to find and I suspect that it is not particularly interested whether or not they find the money.

In any case, the Corporation is right to blush at its own effrontery. Why should a public corporation, able to raise money from the Treasury, or by loan with Teasury guarantee, expect citizens to provide capital free of interest when such citizens could invest that capital at the present high going rates of interest? The more one thinks about it, the more untenable becomes the position of the Corporation, because, after all, it is a public utility. In this respect it is in the same position as that of other utilities, such as electricity, water and telephones.

Because of that, in Victorian times the first Acts of Parliament regulating utilities gave utilities a territorial monopoly, whether publicly or privately owned. As a return, Parliament imposed on them a statutory obligation to give a supply. The present nationalised electricity supply industry retains that obligation. It is compelled to give a supply in principle. Those ancient Acts that have been incorporated in the nationalisation statutes came into force between 1882 and 1936. Ironically, the beginnings of some of the provisions are in the Gasworks Clauses Acts of 1847 and 1871. I say "ironically" because the Corporation has been virtually freed from a statutory obligation to supply even to domestic consumers living in an urban environment. I am not talking, of course, of a supply to some remote part of the countryside. The Chippings is three-quarters of a mile within the Bristol city boundary and less than two miles from the centre of the city.

Under paragraph 3 of schedule 4 to the Gas Act 1972, brought in during the time of a Conservative Government, the Corporation is relieved of an obligation to give a supply if that involves laying a new main or enlarging an existing main. I served on the Standing Committee of the Bill, and was prominent in the debates, with my interest in these matters. It was good sense that the gas industry should not have to give a supply in remote rural areas, but it was never the intention that the provision should be used in the highhanded way that South-Western Gas is using it against my urban constituents. It is telling these good citizens of Bristol that they may own in small part the nationalised undertaking and back it with their taxes funded in the national Treasury, but that does not ensure a supply of gas if the gas authority decides against it.

I started corresponding on this matter with Mr. A. I. D. Frith, the chairman of South-Western Gas, in September 1978. I say nothing against Mr. Frith. He is a most pleasant man, who has behaved with perfect courtesy. Indeed, his letters have grown longer and longer since I began my arguments. I told him that the Gas Corporation could not plead falling revenues. The industry is in a highly prosperous position, due largely to the careless way in which it is depleting the North Sea gas resources at low prices. The system under which Sir Denis Rooke, the chairman of the Gas Corporation, is apparently allowed by the Department of Energy to wreck the British fuel economy with little regard for the future is a negation of the planning to which I thought the Labour Party was dedicated.

I now quote from a long letter of Mr. Frith's, dated 21 November 1978. He says:

" Our general practice therefore is to ensure that the costs associated with providing a gas supply to new housing developments or to an existing community should be recovered from that particular project. The use of any surplus achieved by the Gas Industry for the purpose of subsidising uneconomic supplies would in my view be in conflict with our statutory requirements and would probably lead to considerable criticism from existing consumers."

That is a remarkable statement of policy. Why should the Gas Corporation not take the rough with the smooth? It was on the basis of urban consumers subsidising would-be rural consumers that electrification of the countryside was carried through after the nationalisation of electricity supplies under the 1947 Act. If Mr. Frith is suggesting that every supply has to pay in its own right, this goes back on every good principle of national ownership. When he talks about the conflict with statutory requirements, Mr. Frith is simply saying that the Corporation is taking advantage of the statutory requirements that were intended to meet another risk—that of being compelled to give a supply in a remote rural area. That consideration does not arise within a city boundary.

Will the Minister undertake to discuss with Sir Denis Rooke, chairman of the Gas Corporation—the fact that it is the British Gas Corporation presumably means that British people are entitled to use gas supplies—the position of my constituents in The Chippings who desire a gas supply from a public utility—a supply that has been refused? I am told by the chairman of South-Western Gas that they are not alone in their loss. I can well believe that, but if it is so the scandal of the Corporation's attitude is compounded.

Secondly, is it not anomalous that one utility that is in direct competition with another should have legislative advantage over the other? Under the Electric Lighting Act of 1899, which still governs the position of electricity boards, a board must give a supply, although a reasonable connection charge may be made.

The Minister was once a member of the Select Committee on Science and Technology, under my chairmanship, when we recommended that the Government should establish a small independent expert energy commission, to advise the Secretary of State on energy questions, including pricing policy. This advice has been disregarded. Instead, we have to endure this mass Energy Commission—a loose convention of conflicting interests which will never agree. But apart from my personal objection to the present Energy Commission and my reference to the Select Committee's proposals that any such commission should be genuinely independent, I ask the Minister whether the present Commission has been able, as yet, to propose a pricing policy that would right the present imbalance in secondary fuel prices, which the Gas Corporation exploits in those areas where it can apparently pick and choose its customers.

10.29 pm

It is unusual for me to be replying to my hon. Friend the Member for Bristol, North-East (Mr. Palmer), because, as he has said, I was a member of the Select Committee on Science and Technology under his chairmanship. It feels rather like the apprentice replying to the sorcerer. I appreciate the courtesy of my hon. Friend and I know of his understanding and frankness in dealing with these problems. I have worked with him for a number of years. However, I cannot agree with a number of his remarks, particularly those about the activities of the British Gas Corporation. I shall try to deal with the important points that he raised on behalf of his constituents.

I should also like to correct one or two general misconceptions about the responsibilities of the British Gas Corporation. Section 2 of the Gas Act 1972 states:

" It shall be the duty of the Corporation to develop and maintain an efficient, co-ordinated and economical system of gas supply for Great Britain, and to satisfy, so far as it is economical to do so, all reasonable demands for gas in Great Britain."

The physical extent of this obligation is laid down in schedule 4 to the Act, which provides that the Corporation must, if required, supply gas to any premises situated within 25 yds. of a gas main currently in use, unless that main is either a bulk transmission line or used only for supply to industrial premises. However, schedule 4 further provides that the cost of laying a supply pipe beyond the distance of 30 ft. from the Corporation's main and of any such pipe on the customer's property shall, if the Corporation requires, be defrayed by the person requiring the supply. Whether my hon. Friend likes it or not, that places a statutory obligation upon the Corporation. There is normally no difficulty in these circumstances—nor does the Corporation seek to create difficulties. If what my hon. Friend says about the rapacious attitude of the Corporation towards the energy market is true, it would hardly wish to deny itself customers.

Within a reasonable distance, British Gas lays the connecting pipes free of charge. I should like to clear up a common misconception. It has to be made clear that the cost of internal pipework—pipework in the house from the meter—is borne by the customer, regardless of whether charges are made for external work. Depending on the size of the house and the kind and number of appliances, the cost of internal pipework can be considerable.

I did not suggest that the Corporation did not want to help customers. I suggested that it sought profitable customers only.

I hesitate to apologise for public corporations wishing to be profitable.

My hon. Friend has raised what might be called the abnormal case. It is a situation which does not fall within schedule 4, and the British Gas Corporation has no statutory obligation to provide a supply—it is discretionary. These cases may include isolated individual houses, new estates or existing houses which are more than 25 yds. from a gas main.

In such cases, where request for connection is made, the Corporation, taking account of its obligations under section 2. calculates the capital cost and offsets the revenue likely to be earned before such sales are made. If the estimated revenue does not justify what it regards as the legitimate capital costs, it may seek a contribution from the prospective customer in order to make the connection economic.

In certain circumstances, particularly the ones described by my hon. Friend, it is not surprising that people would like to have gas. If one takes the year 1970 as 100 in comparing costs, by last year the real price of gas had fallen to 76, the real price of electricity had risen to 123 and the real price of oil had risen to 144.

The estate to which my hon. Friend has referred had the option of a gas supply, but it was declined by the developers and the heating systems are based on solid fuel, oil and electricity, all of which have subsequently become much more expensive than gas. I am not surprised that my hon. Friend's constituents would like gas heating.

However, the connection charge in such cases can be considerable since the cost of laying gas mains and the subsequent reinstatement work is much higher than would have been the case if gas had been provided when the development first took place. We cannot blame the British Gas Corporation for that.

That is the background against which we must look at the case raised by my hon. Friend. I agree with him that it is not an isolated problem. I have had several similar instances in my constituency, and my constituents react with disbelief that I, as their Member and the Minister responsible for the gas industry, cannot solve their problems.

My hon. Friend is talking of 31 prospective customers on an estate of between 180 and 190 houses. He said that the Corporation was effectively refusing a gas supply. That is not the case, but the high capital costs involved mean that the Corporation has been obliged to propose a significant contribution from the householders. Those who want a supply are not in one area of the development. They are spread throughout the development. It is not a question of one small installation. There would have to be a series of installations.

My hon. Friend says that the Corporation is not denying residents a gas supply, but in areas that he knows well—Marian Drive and Wardley Park estate in Gates-head—the costs are so prohibitive—as much as £390 per household in some cases—that the Corporation is effectively denying those residents a gas supply.

Perhaps I can return to that later. The contribution can be substantial for several reasons. I have mentioned the costs of excavation and reinstatement, and they would certainly be higher in existing developments than in new developments. In the case to which my hon. Friend the Member for Bristol, North-East has referred, the problems are made worse by the fact that only a small number of residents on the development want a gas supply. The circumstances would clearly change if more people wanted a supply. It is a matter of high costs being spread over relatively few people—with a considerable charge to each one.

I do not know the circumstances of the case which my hon. Friend the Member for Gateshead, East (Mr. Conlan) has raised, but he is right when he says I know the area. I went to school there. I cannot claim to be totally ignorant of the circumstances. If he would like to refer the matter to me, I shall look at it in more detail.

It has been the practice for all regions of the British Gas Corporation to maintain close liaison with local authorities and private developers over these matters for many years. The situation in the South-West, in the Bristol area, which is the region to which my hon. Friend refers, was that significant numbers of developers rejected the opportunity to have a supply in the first place. One cannot blame the British Gas Corporation for that. In succeeding years, largely because of the introduction of natural gas and its virtues, not least its increasingly competitive price, there has been a substantial increase in the number of inquiries. By and large, these have been met.

There has been a 23 per cent. increase in the number of domestic gas consumers in the South-West since 1975. I do not know whether my hon. Friend likes this, because of his association with the electricity industry, but 95 per cent. of houses planned during 1978 will have gas as a fuel. This is clearly because of the competitive situation and the attractions of gas.

Is not some of the difficulty to which my hon. Friend refers on the part of the electricity boards the fact that they are obliged, unlike the Gas Corporation, to give a supply?

Yes. There are some differences between the obligations, but the general position is the same. If costs are significant, the electricity industry can make a charge. It does not have to provide the service free. The practical result is very similar. I cannot give my hon. Friend the definitive reply that he would like tonight, but I would like to deal in order with the questions that he put to me.

He asked whether I would undertake to discuss the position of his constituents with the British Gas Corporation. The answers is, of course, "Yes". I shall do that with pleasure and write to him. I cannot give any guarantee about the outcome, but if anything can be done to improve the prospects of his constituents I am sure that we shall do it. If I had been asked whether I would instruct British Gas to provide the supply regardless of the economics of the situation, the answer would have had to be "No". I do not have the authority to do that, nor do I believe that it would be right to make that kind of decision. We have to realise that there is a statutory obligation on the Gas Corporation. In other circumstances, we might be raising questions if it was not carrying out that obligation.

My hon. Friend said that his constituents were not alone in this. I have dealt with that by saying that I know from my own constituents, from my hon. Friend and from other quarters that this is the case. He also raised the question of pricing policy. British Gas itself is not in total control of this situation. It has a number of take or pay obligations in terms of gas, and there is the problem of associated gas. These matters are discussed in the Energy Commission. I agree that we have not solved the problem.

I gave the figures earlier deliberately to emphasise what has happened in this area. But the Government are seeking to deal with the problem. One of the reasons why we have given British Gas sole licences is to give it more control over the situation. I hope that my hon. Friend will be able to say to his constituents that this matter will be looked into in greater detail and that when I have had discussions with British Gas I shall write to him.

Question put and agreed to.

Adjourned accordingly at sixteen minutes to Eleven o'clock.

Volume 963: debated on Thursday 8 March 1979

House Of Commons

Private Business

Oral Answers To Questions

Northern Ireland

Retention Of Troops

Political Discussions

Maze Prison (H Block)

Public Investment

Republic Of Ireland (Foreign Minister)

Security

Select Committee On Procedure (Recommendation)

Prisoners

Nationalised Industries

Trades Union Congress

Prime Minister (Engagements)

Business Of The House

Consolidated Fund (No 2) Bill

Income Tax

Questions To Ministers

National Health Service (Industrial Dispute)

European Communities (Draft Order)

Business Of The House (Supply)

Orders Of The Day

Defence Estimates, 1979–80 (Navy), Vote A

Defence Estimates 1979–80 (Army), Vote A

Defence Estimates 1979–80 (Air), Vote A

Defence Estimates, Supplementary Estimates, 1978–79

Civil Estimates, Supplementary Estimates, 1978–79

Defence And Civil Estimates Excesses, 1977–78

Employment Protection Acts

Gas Supply (Bristol)