I wish to present a petition

To the Honourable the Commons in Great Britain and Northern Ireland in Parliament assembled. The Humble Petition of Chief Inspector Brian Woollard of the Metropolitan Police.

Sheweth

That as a Detective Chief Inspector in the Metropolitan Police Public Sector Corruption Squad of the Company Fraud Department, I was engaged in investigations into, inter alia, corruption in the Permanent Miscellaneous Street Properties (P.M.S.P.) contracts for the renovation and decoration of street properties of the London Borough of Islington. When these inquiries began to indicate a connection between corruption and Freemasonry, I was removed from the inquiry, then from the Company Fraud Department and the Criminal Investigation Department, by officers who were themselves Freemasons. As a result of my transfer to the Uniformed Branch in April, 1982 my career has been effectively shelved. All attempts to complain about this treatment, to secure the renewal of the inquiry by an investigation entirely independent of the Metropolitan Police, or to rectify the injustice to myself and my own career prospects within the Police Service, whether made to the Commissioner of Police, Home Secretary, the Parliamentary Commissioner for Administration and Prime Minister, have merely been referred back to the officers against whom the complaint was made in the first place. There is no provision for any genuinely independent review of complaints from within the Police Service and no independent inquiry free of Freemasonry associations … has been proposed—

Order. I am sorry to interrupt the hon. Gentleman, but he should summarise the petition and the material allegations in it.

I come to the burden of the petition:

All other means of redress have been exhausted since February 1982 to the present date and my only hope for protection and redress, therefore, lies with Parliament itself.

Wherefore your petitioner prays that your Honourable House will institute an independent inquiry into his case, his treatment by the Metropolitan Police and the frustration of his inquiries and career by the influence of Freemasonry and make provision for the introduction of an independent complaints procedure for internal complaints within the Police Services for England and Wales, so that complaints by serving members and those conceived to have been constructively dismissed, shall not be frustrated by the senior officers against whom complaint is made.

The petition is signed by Brian Woollard.

When all else fails, it is the responsibility of Parliament to provide justice. Chief Inspector Brian Woollard has waged a gallant campaign to secure it and I hope that the House will provide it.

I wish to present a petition on behalf of 2,000 or more residents of my constituency and others who live or work in the London borough of Wandsworth. The petition has my full support and that of my hon. Friend the Member for Tooting (Mr. Cox), but, alas, it does not have the support of the hon. Member for Putney (Mr. Mellor). The petition says:

We believe that the measures proposed in the green paper "Reform of Social Security" are an affront to the principle established by Beveridge, of the prevention of poverty by paying benefit as of right without a means test.

We protest that the abolition of payments for special needs; including heating additions for the elderly, disabled, sick and young will force poor families further into poverty.

We deplore the proposed cuts in housing benefit, the abolition of the State Earnings Related Pension Scheme and the withdrawal of maternity grant, death grant and widows allowances.

We call on the Government to withdraw these proposals and introduce new plans to develop the social security system for the benefit of all by redistributing wealth away from the rich.

I am grateful for this opportunity to debate the operation of consumer protection legislation regarding insurance contracts and so to draw the House's attention to the state of the law and to how it is working to remove rights from people who take out insurance just when their need for cover is greatest.

I shall discuss the operation of the law in general and then speak of the case of Mr. Tony O'Shea, the young disabled man from Birmingham whose life has been wrecked by Lloyd's, and who is a constituent of the hon. Member for Cannock and Burntwood (Mr. Howarth). This is not a party political matter but one of humanity, justice and decency. The hon. Member for Cannock and Burntwood and I have worked together on this case. The hon. Gentleman is in the Chamber and I hope that he will catch the eye of the Chair.

The law states that every contract may contain exclusion clauses but, thanks to the Supply of Goods (Implied Terms) Act 1973 and the Unfair Contract Terms Act 1977, exclusions that are unreasonable are generally void. The 1973 Act deals with the sale of goods and the 1977 Act covers the supply of services, not least insurance. Thanks to the strength of the insurance lobby, however, insurance contracts are excluded from the purview of the Act, so exclusion clauses in insurance contracts remain as binding and effective as they ever were, however unreasonable, unjust, unfair and unconscionable they may be.

There is an ancient rule that, in insurance contracts as opposed to all others, the person who wants the insurance has a duty to inform the insurers of any facts that they may find material when deciding whether to grant insurance and, if so, on what terms. Thanks to the so-called "doctrine of material non-disclosure", if a person does not disclose what the insurers regard as a material fact, then when a claim is made the insurers can say, "You did not tell us." It is no answer for the insured to say, "I paid my money. You never asked me. There was no question about it." He can be ruined as a result of not answering a question that he was not asked.

That wicked rule, that evil doctrine, has been denounced by a series of commissions, but it remains in force. Reputable, decent and honourable insurers do not in general rely on their rights in exclusion clauses, and still less on the archaic and wicked doctrine of material nondisclosure. I regret to inform the House that Lloyd's, that famous and once so honoured name, has seen fit to rely on such a clause, as I shall detail.

Exclusion clauses in insurance contracts remain valid and effective. It is the Government's duty, and especially that of the Minister for Consumer Affairs, to warn the public of these dangers. When entering an insurance contract, the public should be aware that every clause in it will be effective, irrespective of whether it is fair, reasonable or just. It is irrelevant that the clause might be totally incomprehensible. The fact that it is not possible to get insurance on any other terms is also irrelevant.

If one of my constituents goes on holiday over Christmas and takes out travel insurance, as like as not the travel agent will take out the policy and the insured will not see the form. If there is a claim and the insured has not revealed previous travel claims, however long ago and even though he has not been asked, the insurers are technically entitled to repudiate liability. Of course, decent insurers would generally not do that, but I regret to tell the House that I have had to take up a series of such cases on behalf of constituents.

People have been literally on the verge of destruction as a result of insurers relying on this doctrine, which should have been repealed long ago—the doctrine that an insurer, but nobody else, can rely on an exclusion clause. The insured person is meant to inform the insurer of any material fact, or any fact which the insurer might regard as relevant. In practice, the doctrine is entirely on the side of the provider of insurance. I am surprised that successive Governments have allowed that doctrine to remain effective.

The need for the Government to warn people is made plain by the tragic case of Mr. Tony O'Shea, aged 34, and a sufferer from spina bifida, who built up a small business as a craftsman making jewellery in Birmingham. He had only one blemish on his character—many years ago he was charged with receiving a stolen camera. He was convicted, having pleaded not guilty, and he maintains to this day that he was innocent. In any event, he was not asked about that when he obtained insurance from Lloyd's.

I have a copy of the proposal form with me. There is no question asking, "Have you any previous convictions?" I believe that Mr. O'Shea did not fill in the form but that it was completed by brokers and signed by him. There is one wrap-up sentence which runs:

"Are there any other circumstances within your knowledge or opinion not already disclosed, affecting or likely to affect the proposed insurance?"

The answer is "No," because Mr. O'Shea thought that the question was irrelevant—a belief with which I agree.

Disaster struck. Mr. O'Shea's workshop was opened and cleared out. Some £40,000 of stock was stolen. Not surprisingly, he asked the insurers to pay. I suspect that the House will be disgusted to learn that, relying on the doctrine of material non-disclosure, Lloyd's of Lime street, London EC3M 7HL—that once so honoured name in the insurance world—saw fit to repudiate liability. That act was brought to the attention of the hon. Member for Cannock and Burntwood. I learned of it through the BBC programme "Watchdog" and its Mr. Allan Sharpe, to who I pay tribute. He published the facts, and Lloyd's have seen fit to report him to some BBC committee for so doing. I applaud and salute the programme for bringing these facts to my attention and to that of the public.

I took the normal step in the circumstances and spoke to the top person in the insurance organisation. Almost always, the chairman or managing director says, when such facts are brought to his attention, "OK, we made a mistake. I am sorry. Let's put it right. Legally we may not have to, but morally we do. We will pay ex gratia." In this case, the insurers offered the derisory sum of £10,000—less than 25 per cent. of the actual loss—and said, "Go away." I spoke to the chairman and to the deputy chairman of Lloyd's—Mr. Coleridge. At first, he did not know much about it, but he looked into the matter and said that it was a matter not for him but for the chairman, who was away.

I then spoke to the chairman, Mr. Peter Miller, whose name is not now unknown to the House. This morning's debate is not concerned with those major scandals that have been raised in the House in recent weeks, but this individual disaster is just as important and far more poignant that the alleged major frauds. As ancient wisdom has it, "When you save one life, you save the world." Certainly, when you wreck one life, you destroy one world. The person doing so should be held up to hatred, ridicule and contempt. That this hateful, ridiculous and contemptible doctrine has been used by Lloyd's to destroy the life of Tony O'Shea is a nastiness that is not the result of mere bureaucratic bungling, but a carefully contrived, designed and deliberate act of destruction of which Lloyd's and all those connected with it should be deeply ashamed. I hope that, as a result of the debate, Lloyd's may yet change its mind and restore life and hope to Mr. O'Shea.

I have a letter from Mr. Peter Miller, the chairman of Lloyd's, saying that he has now discussed the matter with the junior deputy chairman. Mr. Miller said:

"Lloyd's has a jealously guarded reputation for its determination and willingness to pay legitimate claims."

When I spoke to Mr. Miller, I asked whether he was suggesting that dishonesty was involved in Mr. O'Shea's claim. I am pleased to inform the House that the police are quite satisfied that the robbery that deprived Mr. O'Shea of everything was genuine and that there was no dishonesty by Mr. O'Shea. Lloyd's is not alleging that there was any dishonesty on his part. I told Mr. Miller that if it were alleged, he should say so, and give Mr. O'Shea the opportunity to clear his name and to sue Lloyd's. If Lloyd's does not allege dishonesty, it must pay the claim. Lloyd's may be in the right legally, but morally it is wrong.

Lloyd's is saying that, although it is not alleging dishonesty, it is refusing to pay the claim by relying upon the antique, wicked, evil and ancient doctrine of material non-disclosure. Lloyd's deserves the evil publicity that I hope it will receive for the disgraceful way that it has handled Mr. O'Shea's claim.

In his letter, Mr. Miller attempts to justify non-payment on the ground of material non-disclosure. He refers to the "Watchdog" programme and complains that "Watchdog" did not put Lloyd's side of the case. I do not believe that there is another side to the case. It is simply a matter of Lloyd's saying, "This is a jeweller's claim. This man has a criminal conviction from years and years ago, and although it is nothing whatever to do with this claim, which is an honest and proper claim brought by a disabled young man who has built up his business, we will not pay it."

The underwriters, without in any way admitting liability, made an inadequate offer, and Mr. Miller says that it is a matter for them. If it is, I call from this House on all underwriters in Lloyd's to try to wipe out that blot on the good name of their institution by demanding that the chairman should either change his decision or resign, together with the senior deputy, the junior deputy or any other responsible officer who has been party to this terrible decision.

The chairman said in his letter:

"it is apparent from a review of the matter that underwriters have behaved both properly and reasonably."

Properly in law—probably yes; properly in morality—no; reasonably and fairly—certainly not. He said:

"I do not feel it appropriate to intervene in this mailer."

I suggest that it is now for the Government to intervene, that it is for the Minister to intervene, that it is for the underwriters to intervene, that it is for the public to intervene and that this is a scandal of proportions as great as those of the major frauds now being alleged in this House. The fact that it strikes down only one individual in no way reduces the scope of the wickedness involved.

The law stands. I undertake to seek to introduce a Bill to change that law. It may be a long campaign, but I shall introduce that Bill this Session. We cannot call for a change in the law while taking part in an Adjournment debate, but we are entitled to say, "This law is bad, this is what it does, this is how it has destroyed a life, this is how we can ruin the lives and the Christmases of countless honest decent assured people." We call on the Government at least to join in denouncing the way in which Lloyd's has used the law in the case of Mr. Tony O'Shea.

I congratulate the hon. and learned Member for Leicester, West (Mr. Janner) on so ably securing this debate today, and also on his persistence in a matter that I know is close to his heart. I know that he has shown great tenacity when developing his argument over the years.

My constituent, Tony O'Shea, will be grateful not only for the hon. and learned Gentleman having spent sc, much time this morning alerting the public and the House to the circumstances surrounding his case, but also for the way in which the hon. and learned Gentleman has sought to help him.

The key to the case is the 1979 conviction, when Mr. O'Shea was found guilty of handling stolen goods. That sounds a very serious crime, but we should consider what lies behind it. The fact is that a good customer of Mr. O'Shea's came into his shop and said, "Things are a bit hard at the moment and I am trying to raise a bit of dough. I have a camera, which is not very expensive, which you might like to buy." Mr. O'Shea bought the camera for £70 for his own use, and not to sell to anyone else. He was not trying to make a quick profit. He purchased that camera to replace his own Instamatic. He later discovered that he could have purchased the same second-hand camera for £45.

It is upon that conviction that the whole case hangs. It does not hang upon the events surrounding the robbery on the night of 8 March 1984, when £41,000 worth of stock was stolen. Robbers entered Mr. O'Shea's home arid, knowing him to be disabled and therefore unable to defend himself, took his keys from him at knifepoint. Who is to blame him for surrendering the keys? I suspect that many able-bodied Members would have done the same, let alone were they afflicted with Mr. O'Shea's disability.

Yet it is not because of the events surrounding that crime that Lloyd's underwriters are refusing to pay the claim. I emphasise that no charges have been preferred against Mr. O'Shea arising out of the robbery on 8 March. Indeed, the police officer investigating the case has absolved him of any complicity. We therefore return to that conviction in 1979.

When Mr. O'Shea signed the proposal form prepared for him by an apparently competent broker, there was no question on the form asking him whether he had any previous convictions. Instead, Lloyd's underwriters have relied upon the catch-all clause

"Are there any other circumstances within your knowledge or opinion"—

this is important—

"not already discussed affecting or likely to affect the proposed insurance?"

Mr. O'Shea answered the question—in his opinion, the answer was no. He did not appeal against the conviction because of the costs involved. Anyone involved in litigation knows that there comes a time when one has to consider whether it is better to cut one's losses, and Mr. O'Shea decided to cut his losses and not engage in the expensive business of going to appeal. He said that in his opinion he had denied the accusation, as he denies it to this day, and that it had involved a camera for which he paid £70.

Perhaps Mr. O'Shea was naive and should have realised that that was, in the eyes of the insurer, a material fact. Naive or not, that should not absolve Lloyd's from its responsibilities in this matter. This case reflects no credit on the insurance industry generally. I believe that at the base of it lies the doubt of the underwriters of Mr. O'Shea's innocence and that they are falling back on this catch-all clause to wriggle out of their obligations.

My advice to the underwriters is to put up their evidence or pay up to Mr. O'Shea now, and, to avoid this situation recurring, to ensure that proposal forms include the specific question, "Have you any previous convictions? If so, give details." That is the very least that should be done.

I pay tribute to Mr. O'Shea who, throughout this terrible personal ordeal, has shown great fortitude and a sense of reasonableness. He has not been totally consumed by it and has maintained at all times a balanced and reasonable approach. I hope that, as a result of this debate, a remedy will be found for him.

I congratulate the hon. and learned Member for Leicester, West (Mr. Janner) on raising an important general matter and on relating it to the way in which one individual has been affected; and my hon. Friend the Member for Cannock and Burntwood (Mr. Howarth), who has associated himself with the case.

I begin by dealing with the general points to which the subject gives rise, and I shall comment later on the case to which reference has been made. On the generality of the matter in relation to insurance contracts, there is a good deal of common ground between the hon. and learned Gentleman, who has taken a close interest in this subject for a long time, and the Government. We would not dispute that steps need to be taken so that the balance of interest between the insurer and the consumer provided by the common law of insurance contract is altered, although there may be something between us as to the best remedy to be adopted in pursuit of that objective.

In October 1980, the Law Commission published a report on insurance contract law. That report identified two main areas where, in the opinion of the commission, the law discriminated unfairly against the consumer. First, there was the common law duty of disclosure, to which the hon. and learned Gentleman referred. Under the present law, the insured is obliged to disclose all facts which a prudent insurer would regard as material, regardless not only of whether he was asked about a particular fact, but of whether he was acting in perfectly good faith in failing to realise its importance.

The second matter identified by the Law Commission was the question of warranty, to which the hon. and learned Gentleman did not refer and to which I shall not refer today.

The Government considered the recommendations of the Law Commission and accepted them. In 1983, the Government announced their intention to introduce legislation to implement them, with the important qualification that the reform of the law should apply to consumer contracts only. That was because there is not the same need for consumer protection in relation to business contracts, where the proposer can be expected to have a knowledge of the law and of his obligations under it, while extension to business contracts of a less strict duty of disclosure could seriously weaken the industry's international competitiveness.

The difficulty which the Government have encountered in endeavouring to deal with the problem by legislation is that a satisfactory definition of what constitutes a consumer as opposed to a business contract has proved singularly elusive. Indeed, a satisfactory definition of a revised duty of disclosure has given rise to similar difficulties.

Those were both areas in which it was important to have legal certainty if the revised law were not to create as many problems as the existing law, and it became clear as the Government considered the matter that such certainty would be extremely difficult to achieve. For that reason my predecessor announced in December of last year that he was embarking on discussions with the insurance industry to see whether changes to its statements of insurance practice might serve as an acceptable substitute for legislation.

Those discussions are well advanced and the Government are considering, in the light of the views that have been put to us by all the parties concerned, whether it is possible to achieve a satisfactory solution of the problem by revised statements of practice as a satisfactory substitute for legislation. If we were to follow that route, the situation would have to be kept carefully under review and the legislation would need to be reconsidered if that solution was found not to be working properly, and I hope to make a statement on that aspect of the matter shortly.

The other general point raised by the hon. and learned Member for Leicester, West related to exclusion clauses and to the fact that insurance contracts were excepted from some of the legislation dealing with exclusion clauses, including the two statutes to which he referred, the most recent of which was the Unfair Contract Terms Act 1977.

Those statutes pose specific and particular difficulties for insurance contracts, which must, by their nature, contain some exclusion clauses, and certainty of interpretation is essential to efficient insurance underwriting. If insurance contracts had been made subject to those statutes, that certainty would have been fundamentally undermined. The consequence of introducing such fundamental uncertainty into insurance contracts would have been an inevitable increase in premiums to all policy holders, as it would follow that there would have been a substantial increase in the number of potential and unforeseen claims which insurers might have been obliged to meet.

Thus, there are specific difficulties which those statutes would pose for insurance contracts. The Government have carefully considered whether those difficulties could be met and have reached the conclusion that it would not be right in all the circumstances to make insurance contracts subject to those laws.

Those are my observations on the generality of the points raised by the hon. and learned Gentleman. I come now to the case which he and my hon. Friend the Member for Cannock and Burntwood mentioned, that involving Mr. O'Shea. I say at once that, from the facts that have been disclosed to the House by hon. Members, it is difficult not to approach the case with a good deal of sympathy for the personal circumstances of Mr. O'Shea. I appreciate the reasons which have led the hon. and learned Gentleman and my hon. Friend to take up the matter, I understand the difficulties under which Mr. O'Shea labours and I understand and share the natural sympathy which they have expresssed for the predicament in which Mr. O'Shea finds himself.

Having said that, it is necessary to give careful consideration to the circumstances of the case, to the nondisclosure which occurred in that case and to consider to what extent, if at all, the facts of the case would have been affected by the recommendation of the Law Commission.

Before discussing the detailed circumstances of the case, I wish to place on record, lest it be thought that I had any kind of interest in the matter, that, although I was a member of Lloyd's, I ceased all underwriting in all the syndicates in which I had previously participated in Lloyd's when I assumed ministerial office in September of this year, fully in accordance with the Government's guidelines for the conduct of Ministers.

Does the Minister not consider that in the interest of manifest integrity, and to distance himself and presumably the Government from Lloyd's in the present and other unsavoury circumstances, he should relinquish his membership of that body so that it is abundantly clear that he has no interest in it or any part of what is happening to its bad name in these circumstances and in the allegations of fraud and other misconduct which have been referred to in the House recently?

I have made my position clear elsewhere. It is not possible, for good reasons resulting from continuing obligations and the right of Lloyd's to impose discipline on members where necessary, for a member normally to resign membership immediately. It is not possible normally, according to the rules of Lloyd's, for any resignation to take effect for a period of at least 30 months. In those circumstances, I have done what was proper for me to do, which was to terminate my underwriting and resign from all syndicates.

I wish to deal with the facts of the case——

rose——

Order. The hon. and learned Gentleman must not widen the debate.

On a point of order, Mr. Deputy Speaker. Is it in order for a Minister to reveal an interest in Lloyd's without saying whether he has given the 30-months notice to resign his membership from the organisation?

I understand that the Minister explained his position the other night. In any event, it is not a matter for me.

I wish to deal with the facts of the case in the four minutes that remain to me. The Law Commission's report and recommendation can be summarised in this way:

"the duty of disclosure should be retained but it should be modified … A fact should be disclosed to the insurer by an applicant if … it is material in the sense that it would influence a prudent insurer in deciding whether to offer cover against the proposed risk and, if so, at what premium and on what terms; and it is … known to the applicant … and … it is one which a reasonable man in the position of the applicant would disclose to his insurers having regard to the nature and extent of the insurers cover which is sought and the circumstances in which it is sought".

As we have heard, Mr. O'Shea was a jeweller. He was seeking cover not for his house or personal possessions but for his business. I express no personal view, far less a view on behalf of the Government, as it would not be proper to do so in the circumstances. However, it is at least open to argument that the knowledge that Mr. O'Shea had a previous conviction for receiving stolen goods was a material fact likely at least to influence the premium and the terms which an insurer would be prepared to offer, if not an insurer's willingness to provide cover in the first place.

We have listened with great care to what has been said about the circumstances of Mr. O'Shea's conviction, but conviction it was and as a conviction it remains on the record. In the circumstances, the very fact that the Law Commission's recommendation would not necessarily cover the case may cause some to doubt—I express no personal or governmental view on the matter—whether the extreme language used by the hon. and learned Member for Leicester, West was justified. Those are the circumstances, and it is open to argument whether the Law Commission's recommendation would have covered the case. It is open to argument whether it is reasonable for an insurer to take the view that the disclosure was material and might have affected the premium required.

The hon. and learned Member for Leicester, West asked me to intervene, and he asked the Government to intervene. He must know that neither I nor the Government have any statutory locus to intervene in such matters. Although I share the views expressed by the hon. and learned Gentleman on the need to improve this area of our law, and although I share the sympathy expressed by him and my hon. Friend the Member for Cannock and Burntwood for Mr. O'Shea's personal predicament, I cannot provide the intervention or Government assistance for which they ask in resolving the facts of a sad and unhappy case.

As this is the first opportunity I have had to do so in the House, I congratulate my hon. Friend the Under-Secretary of State on his appointment, which is so well deserved and long overdue. I am delighted to see my hon. Friends the Members for Dorset, South (Viscount Cranborne) and for Lewisham, East (Mr. Moynihan) in their places, both of whose interest and experience in Afghanistan are well known. I understand that they may wish to catch your eye, Mr. Deputy Speaker, in the course of the debate.

The House will know that next week marks the sixth anniversary of the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan. Despite the United Nations proximity talks, there appears to be no sign of an early withdrawal of Soviet troops. This is an especially appropriate time for the House to debate Afghanistan because, in my view, there exists a distinct danger that the euphoria following the recent summit between President Reagan and Mr. Gorbachev may tempt some in the west to compromise their original position over Afghanistan in pursuit of a return to detente, and possibly to encourage success at the arms control negotiations at Geneva.

It might be useful to recall the events leading up to 27 December 1979 when the West gave every sign of having been caught by surprise, which, if true, represents a major scandal. Western intelligence would, or should, have been aware of the growing Soviet influence in Afghanistan, with the application of the classic Leninist strategy of infiltration, subterfuge, sabotage and assassination during each of the successive regimes since the overthrow of King Zahir Shah in 1973, and especially since the role of the Soviet special forces, the Spetsnaz, in the murder of President Amin in 1979.

We now know from Soviet defectors since the invasion, and from Vladimir Bukovsky's book, "The Peace Movement and the Soviet Union", that the Kremlin took some sort of decision in September 1979 to invade Afghanistan, and, in anticipation of the end to detente that this would provoke, it decided also to reactivate the world peace movement at the so-called World Parliament of the Peoples for Peace conference in Sofia on 23 to 27 September.

Surely our spy satellites and intelligence sources would have picked up sufficient evidence of the movement of troops and armour during the weeks preceding the invasion itself, which would have alerted Western leaders to warn the Kremlin both in private and in public of the consequences of such unlawful aggression.

It should come as no surprise that the Foreign Office appeared to know nothing until it woke up after Boxing Day because we now know that our information gatherers were on strike at the time. In reply to a question from the hon. Member for Thurrock (Dr. McDonald) on 30 July 1984, my right hon. and learned Friend the Foreign Secretary said that between 20 December 1979 and 13 February 1980 there was industrial action by station radio officers at GCHQ Cheltenham in support of a pay dispute.

There had been previous action in June, July and September 1979. If we were caught napping because of such irresponsible action by those to whom we entrust the security not only of this country but of the Western Alliance, my right hon. Friend the Prime Ministr was wholly justified in seeking to end union influence at GCHQ. It is a pity that we do not remind the public more frequently of these facts.

The invasion was justified by the Soviet Union on the grounds of having been "invited" to send troops to counter foreign interference, just as it had been invited so to do by Czechoslovakia in 1968 and by Hungary in 1956. The reaction of the rest of the world was rightly condemnatory. The United Nations passed a resolution calling for withdrawal. The European Community approved the Carrington plan to negotiate for a neutral and non-aligned Afghanistan. To his credit, President Carter led the world on sanctions against the Soviet Union, including the grain embargo—this has since been lifted on the ground that it was proving ineffective and hurting American farmers more—the ending of technology transfer, soft credits and SALT II and an American boycott of the Moscow Olympics.

All too predictably, within a year, Western sanctions began to disintegrate in favour of self-interest. For example, President Carter himself quietly approved licences enabling American firms to sell billions of dollars' worth of gas pipeline-laying equipment to the Soviet Union, which, as we now know, was to employ gulag labour to construct it.

But there has been no such feebleness in Afghanistan where the people have shown that they are more prepared to be dead than Red in supporting seven different ill-equipped, ill-disciplined groups of freedom fighters, who were all too often prepared to fight one another rather than the common enemy, who then became a far more effective united force—the Mujahidin, equipped with heat-seeking missiles capable of doing impressive damage to the remaining Afghan army and the Soviet forces.

I shall not waste the time of the House speculating on the reasons for the Kremlin's decision to invade. There are many theories. The report by the Select Committee on Foreign Affairs discounted the historic "warm water port" theory; but perhaps the grim Russian joke—that the best way of defending its border is to be both sides of it—comes closest to the truth.

There is no doubt that the decision by the ageing moribund Brezhnev regime to invade Afghanistan has proved to be one of the Soviet Union's costliest blunders in recent years. It immediately isolated the Soviet Union from the free Muslim world at a time when the United States had lost influence through its support for the Shah and was being embarrassed by the hostages crisis in Teheran. It has been seen to be responsible for causing the single largest refugee problem in the world, with more than 4 million refugees in north-west Pakistan, and 5,000 or more coming over every month, and a further million in Iran—although that is no humanitarian gesture by the Ayatollah, who is using many of them at the front in his war with Iraq and is using the opportunity to export his own Islamic fundamentalist revolution to Afghanistan and the Soviet Union. That is why the Soviet Union has hastily replaced its central Asian troops with less impressionable Russians and Slays.

There is no doubt that the war is contributing to some unrest in the Soviet Union as more and more service men return wounded and ever more families suffer bereavement. That has led to increasing television coverage showing Soviet troops in action. The Soviet Union is never backward in making a fuss of its individual heroes who are assuming almost Rambo-like proportions.

Although this can in no way be compared to the way in which public opinion in the United States forced Lyndon Johnson not to seek re-election because of Vietnam, the higher profile of the war is beginning to take a heavy toll and to affect the country domestically. Rostislav Evdokimov, the Russian free trade union campaigner who is now in prison, told me, while I was in Leningrad to interview him for my report on the freedom of trade unions in the Soviet Union for the Council of Europe, about the growing public awareness of the direction that the war was taking as a result of the coffins coming home.

I do not wish to dwell on the detail of the war itself. Reports still appear regularly in the Western press. It appears that the action has escalated this year and, although the Soviet-backed Afghan army has recently scored some successes, the Mujahidin continue to be able to threaten the main avenues of communication out of Kabul, northward to the Soviet border and eastward to the Khyber pass, as well as to infiltrate the capital.

Disgraceful reprisals are taken against the Afghan population. The list of atrocities is horrific. With more than 180,000 dead, it amounts to genocide. Fortunately, this has not gone unnoticed by the United Nations, where a report on the human rights situation in Afghanistan was presented earlier this year which figured prominently in last month's General Assembly debate when the continued Soviet occupation was condemned by a record majority. The General Assembly adopted yet another resolution on human rights and fundamental freedoms in Afghanistan on 13 December.

For some time, efforts have been made by the United Nations Secretary-General to secure a Soviet withdrawal in accordance with the annual resolutions and his proximity talks in Geneva are still going on. While a number of points have been agreed, we have yet to see any breakthrough resulting from the October summit. We must reasonably assume that Mr. Gorbachev wants a settlement. He has said as much, but he has said also that he would, if necessary, put five times as many Soviet troops into Afghanistan.

Although we must, of course, fully support these negotiations, especially Pakistan's determination not to negotiate directly with the Karmal Government, because to do so would represent de facto recognition of another Soviet puppet regime, there are a number of concerns which are being overlooked as well as initiatives which we should be considering which I should like to draw to the attention of the House.

First, I do not believe that the West has fully woken up to the problems of the refugees. For a first-hand account, I recommend the recent booklet "Refugees from Afghanistan" by George Miller, published by the British section of the International Society on Human Rights. The plight of the refugees must be kept in the public eye. We need to draw new world attention to the plight of the Afghan refugees. We have seen the massive response to aid Ethiopia. I am sure that, if we encourage more aid to the Afghan refugees, this will help to generate contributions and aid to those bearing the burden of assistance, not least the hard-pressed Pakistan Government and the United Nations agencies. It would also put international pressure on the Soviet Union.

Last month, the standing committee of the Assembly of the Council of Europe adopted the report by my right hon. Friend the Member for Torbay (Sir F. Bennett) on "The Deteriorating Situation in Afghanistan", including a recommendation urging the Governments of member states to increase the contributions to the International Committee of the Red Cross and Red Crescent to all paces that they wish to visit in Afghanistan. I hope that the Government will vigorously support that recommendation.

We should not ignore the destabilising effect that so many refugees are having on Pakistan, not just on the economy, especially in the Peshawar area, but on the local population which is already strained by the Pashtoon and Baluchistan separatist issues which are being increasingly exploited by the Soviet Union against President Zia.

There is now widespread evidence that the Afghan security forces, the KHAD, are attempting to exploit Pakistani resentment of the refugee presence and have been able to penetrate the resistance movement to the extent of causing the deaths of a number of Mujahidin leaders within the past year.

Secondly, the West has yet to face up to the problem of the 200 or so Soviet soldiers who are now prisoners of the Mujahidin, many of whom wanted to come to the West. For example, Vladimir Naumov has been in rebel hands since November 1983. His health is deteriorating. He wishes to come to this country but I understand that the Home Office has, on three separate occasions, refused to consider his case. I appeal to my hon. Friend to see that we agree a humane policy with our allies towards those Soviet prisoners who wish to come to the West.

Thirdly, the West, including all members of the European Community, must continue to insist on A Soviet withdrawal before it is prepared to return to any new detente which Mr. Gorbachev seeks. Afghanistan must become a free and independent state again—neutral and non-aligned if that is the express wish of its people. There must be no compromise on that, and every opportunity must be used to get that message across to the Kremlin. I hope that President Reagan did just that at Geneva.

There should be no normalisation of relations between the Community and Comecon. Talks on that matter were broken off in 1980 because of the invasion of Afghanistan. Earlier this year, Comecon asked for a resumption of talks, but it took several months for the Commission to decide against such talks being resumed. Why did it take so long? The answer should have been immediate and emphatic. A Soviet withdrawal must come first.

I question whether the West's current attitude will be sufficient to convince the Kremlin seriously to consider withdrawal. If half the pressure that the world is putting on South Africa at present to end apartheid were applied to the Soviet Union to get out of Afghanistan, I believe that it would be only a matter of time before it did so. For France and other European countries to grovel to Third-world, black, corrupt, debt-ridden dictatorships to pile on the agony for South Africa and at the same time actively to pursue increased trade with the Soviet Union whilst it remains in Afghanistan, and to accept Siberian gas, is sheer hypocrisy and double standards.

At this time, when the Mujahidin is showing, with great courage and self sacrifice, that it remains determined to resist Soviet occupation and is committed to producing the same results as the Vietcong did for the United States in Vietnam, we in the West are honour bound to ensure that they want for nothing by way of arms and equipment. I believe that then we might see, for the first time, a Soviet retreat which will in turn contribute greatly to the promotion of peace and prosperity in our world today.

The House owes a debt of immense gratitude to my hon. Friend the Member for Bournemouth, East (Mr. Atkinson) for the initiative that he has taken today. His timing, as so often, has been impeccable. He has raised the matter at a perfect moment in our parliamentary calendar because we are so close to the anniversary of the Soviet forces' invasion of Afghanistan in 1979.

My hon. Friend was exceedingly eloquent, as we have come to expect of him. He has also been generous in allowing me a small slice of the limited time available to him. I should explain that my gratitude is all the greater because I have an interest to declare, not just as chairman of the Afghanistan support committee but as chairman of its associated charitable organisation, Afghanaid, which is dedicated to sending help inside Afghanistan rather than to the refugee camps in Iran and Pakistan. I am sure that my hon. Friends will understand that that task is difficult, complicated and dangerous.

My hon. Friend has covered a large and complex subject thoroughly. I should like to emphasise a couple of the points that he made. The first relates to the scale of the disaster inside Afghanistan. Let there be no mistake, that is where the humanitarian need is. The refugees need help but, by and large, they are adequately looked after. The real need is inside the country where, of course, politically and physically it is most difficult to deliver it. I am grateful to my right hon. and hon. Friends in the Foreign and Commonwealth Office for the help that they have given my organisation. I wish to express appreciation for the way that they have co-operated.

There has been an appalling disaster which is—dare I say it—greater in humanitarian terms than the disaster in Ethiopia. The difficulty is that we do not know about it. It is extraordinary that the report presented to the United Nations General Assembly on 5 November 1985 attracted far less attention than it deserved. My hon. Friend was correct to draw the attention of the House to it today. The problem is that there are siren voices that say that it is a matter of super-power aggression, and wonder how a bunch of rag-headed tribesmen can manage to fight a super-power. They say, "Would it not be better to let them die slowly and not to irritate the Soviet Union when the world is so anxious to pursue the quest for peace?"

I shall set aside the temptation to discuss appeasement. Those people who put forward that argument do not know the type of people that the Afghan Mujahidin are. They will fight whether we help them or not. It would be an excellent thing, would it not, if we were to ensure, in so far as we could, that their sacrifice was not in vain.

In that context, I ask my hon. Friend the Minister to assure us of three things when he replies. First, that he will continue to give inside Afghanistan the humanitarian aid that is so badly needed. Secondly, that he will ensure that as much publicity as possible is given to what is happening inside Afghanistan. The Central Office of Information does a fine job already, but we need to do more. Will he encourage the newspapers and propaganda organisations to act accordingly? Thirdly, will he ensure that political pressure is applied? Is my hon. Friend the Minister prepared to undertake that Her Majesty's Government will press for observer status at the United Nations for the alliance of seven Mujahidin organisations?

I am grateful to my hon. Friend the Member for Bournemouth, East (Mr. Atkinson) for raising this important and timely debate today. As hon. Members will be aware, I leave this evening for the north-west frontier of Pakistan to highlight the problems associated with refugees. I hope, during a two-week visit, to assess in detail some of the critical issues that he mentioned, and upon which I believe the House must concentrate in 1986.

We must consider the critical issue of the degree to which the Government should give humanitarian assistance inside Afghanistan as well as in the refugee camps. I fully appreciate and share the view of my hon. Friends the Members for Bournemouth, East and for Dorset, South (Viscount Cranborne) that this is a difficult issue which needs careful handling.

Bilateral assistance is provided by humanitarian charities. The Save the Children Fund does humanitarian work in the camps and Afghanaid does outstanding work in Afghanistan. They should have the Government's full support.

I place on record the unremitting and outstanding work of one of the world's recognised experts Rome Fullerton. He has done so much important work in the Afghanistan support committee and, although I have no eyes to see or ears to hear, I understand that he is with us today in the House.

I regret that, while I shall be on one side of the border, the hon. Member for Edinburgh, Leith (Mr. Brown), who as a Member of Parliament should support the democratic values of representative Government, should accept a Soviet invitation to visit Afghanistan as a guest of the Soviet-backed regime. If I see him across the border, I cannot say that I shall readily acknowledge him.

I wish to place on record that I believe that the West has not yet accurately assessed the best and most coordinated way of assisting the Mujahadin and ensuring that the Soviet troops get out of Afghanistan as quickly as possible. There are many strands that are yet to be drawn together into a positive and effective method of action by the West. I regret that we do not have that, and I hope that during the two weeks that I shall be in the north-west frontier I shall be able to address those matters in particular. It has been useful to hear the debate before I go, and I look forward to the contribution from the Minister who, I think rightly, has won the respect of the House as a passionate, thoughtful and highly competent Minister.

I am grateful to the hon. Member for Bournemouth, East (Mr. Atkinson) for giving me the opportunity to reply to the debate, and to my hon. Friends for joining in. I express some regret that no Opposition Member felt able to attend and listen to the debate or take part in it.

I said that I was grateful to my hon. Friend for raising the matter. That is because we are nearing the sixth anniversary of the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan. That anniversary falls on 27 December. However, it is also a repugnant task to reply to the debate because what is happening in Afghanistan is truly repugnant, sobering and chastening. My hon. Friend the Member for Bournemouth, East has already spoken of the historical background to the position in Afghanistan, and I do not wish to expand on that because it is well known, except to point out that the war in Afghanistan has now been going on for six years. That is longer than the second world war.

As my hon. Friend the Member for Dorset, South has said, it is an unsung, faraway and neglected war. Access is difficult. It is hard for the media to secure the facts and films which our communication systems crave. However, the truth can never be completely suppressed and I want to draw the attention of the House to the problems of human rights in Afghanistan. I do not want to be emotional, tendentious or propagandist; I simply want to tell the House the facts, because they speak for themselves. I do not want to produce Foreign Office facts. I shall refer to the report of the Special Rapporteur to the United Nations Commission on Human Rights to the General Assembly of the United Nations. That report is in the Library of the House. It if is true that the hon. Member for Edinburgh, Leith (Mr. Brown) will be spending Christmas in Kabul at the invitation of the Soviet puppet regime, I make an offer to him. The Foreign and Commonwealth Office will gladly make available as many as 100 copies of that report of the UN Commission on Human Rights. I look forward to meeting with him when he returns from Kabul so that he can tell me how far he got in his efforts to distribute those copies and the reaction to them of the regime and the people in Kabul. On the off-chance that he will not feel able to take up my offer, I shall tell the House something of what the report says. That document cannot be described as anything more than a sober and realistic analysis of the position in Afghanistan. It refers to the gross and systematic abuse of human rights in that country.

Some 115,000 Soviet troops are helping the regime in Kabul. The report found that "benevolent" administration guilty of torture, conscription of children aged 15, displacement of persons from their homes making them refugees in their own country as well as refugees in neighbouring countries, infringement of the right to self-determination, acts of brutality by the armed forces, bombardment and massacres of villages following reprisals, use of anti-personnel mines and, even more horrifying, the use of booby-trapped toys.

I shall briefly discuss each of the areas that were highlighted by the United Nations' document. There is no doubt that torture is currently commonplace and, to quote the report, torture

"has almost assumed the character of an administrative practice."

I do not need to detain the House on the horror of conscription of children.

The report refers to the creation of refugees——

"some regions are devastated, the population has had to flee and cannot return, the agriculture is completely destroyed."

In the course of operations against the opposition movements it appears that

"all kinds of sophisticated weapons, in particular those that have a heavy destructive and psychological effect, are being used. The target is primarily the civilian population, the villages and the agricultural structure."

The report goes on:

"whole groups of persons and tribes are endangered in their existence and in their lives because their living conditions are fundamentally affected by the kind of warfare being waged."

If that is not enough, the report writes of the merciless character of the warfare in that country. Perhaps we should not be surprised at the report's observation that in the treatment of prisoners the existence of the Geneva convention is simply not heard of.

I agree with my hon. Friend the Member for Bournemouth, East. The Government would like to see the International Committee of the Red Cross allowed freely to visit Soviet prisoners of war, the many Afghans taken in the fighting and the political prisoners—there are many of them—held by the Soviet occupying forces arid the Soviet puppet regime.

However appalling the treatment of the prisoners of war is, it is a lesser tragedy than the calculated acts of brutality by the armed forces against the civilian population. The report says that the objective of the regime seemed to be to destroy the means of survival of the population assisting the resistance movement. I shall spare the House the full horror described in the report and take a typical example—a series of reprisal operations against 12 villages in one week in March of this year when 1,000 civilians were allegedly killed. These are not the Foreign Office's words. The report states:

"In the course of these operations, livestock was decimated, houses plundered and set on fire, women raped and some of them summarily executed, and several children locked up in a house were burnt to death."

What sort of regime is it that will consciously burn children to death? If we add atrocity to atrocity, the simple, chilling arithmetic says that, according to certain estimates, the series of incidents catalogued in the report

"has resulted in the killing of approximately 500,000 Afghans since 1979, most of them civilians."

In only nine months of this year almost 33,000 civilians were reported to have been killed, almost 2,000 houses destroyed together with 74 villages, and well over 3,000 animals. With that goes the devastation and destruction of fields and livestock and, as the report says, the

"destruction of irrigation systems in provinces as a result of aerial bombardments which have prevented any repairs from being made and have completely obliterated agriculture in several regions".

I do not have to tell the House that if the people cannot farm, they starve.

Yet that is not the worst, regrettably. I referred to the use of booby-trapped toys. Let me tell the House what those devices are. Generally they are dropped by helicopter in zones that are presumed to be controlled by the resistance. They resemble pens, harmonicas, radios or matchboxes, or are shaped like little birds, but those so-called toys explode when they are picked up or stepped upon. The majority of the victims are children aged between 8 and 15 whose hands or legs are blown off. Many witnesses have testified that the use of those horrible devices now form, according to the report,

"part of a strategy aimed specifically at the civilian population of villages where a large military operation appeared to be under way."

At this Christmas season we should note the chilling words of the report:

"The situation of children in Afghanistan has been particularly affected, whether they live in Kabul or in the main cities or whether they cross the border as refugees. The majority of children who do not leave the country and who are not in the cities are helpless against the effects of high altitude bombing and shelling, starvation and disease, the disruption of families and the destruction of family life and the collapse of the traditional structure.

There is apparently no health cure for the majority of the population. As a consequence, the infant mortality rate has reached 300 and 400 per 1,000".

That is one of the highest infant mortality rates in the world.

I should like to illustrate by a further quotation that the regime attacks its own citizens not only physically but in their very spiritual beliefs, in a country where perhaps 99 per cent. are Moslems. The report states:

"The Special Rapporteur also wishes to emphasise two new factors which illustrate the range of the actions taken in the country: on the one hand, a policy described as one of humiliation and religious intolerance, and, on the other hand, bombings of civilians during funerals.

Indeed, according to a number of witnesses, mosques have been desecrated, religious books have been destroyed and in some cases even used as toilet paper, while members of the Islamic faith have been obliged to eat pork and to drink alcohol.

A number of witnesses stated that funeral processions accompanying the bodies of victims had also been bombed."

Faced with that litany of systmatic abuses of human rights, we should not be surprised by what the report calls

"one of the biggest movements of refugees history has ever known".

It is estimated to be continuing at some 6,000 to 8,000 people a month. Again, I quote:

"it may be appreciated that the sheer volume of the refugees is per se a human rights problem."

Small wonder that between 1·5 million and 2 million people are now displaced from their homes in Afghanistan, refugees inside their own country, with a further 3 million refugees in Pakistan and another million in Iran.

My hon. Friends have referred to the importance of aid to assist those refugees. Last year we were able to give some £4 million to help refugees in Pakistan. I hope that we shall be able to give similar amounts next year. I paid particular attention to the remarks by my hon. Friend the Member for Dorset, South. We very much appreciate the work that is done by Afghanaid and we hope that next year we shall be able to be of assistance again.

Despite increasingly aggressive and more sophisticated tactics, and much heavier firepower on the part of the Soviet regime's forces, the resistance remains strong and resilient. I assure the House that we take every opportunity to encourage the resistance, to draw attention to its gallant struggles, and to give it what support we can in its efforts to liberate its country from the Soviet occupation and puppet regime of Babrak Karmal.

The tragedy is that none of that should be necessary. The presence of Soviet troops in Afghanistan has been consistently condemned by the international community, most recently on 13 November this year at the United Nations, when a record 122 voted for the motion calling for the withdrawal of Soviet troops, with only 19 countries against. There can be no doubt that both the Kabul regime and the Soviet Union are, in Afghanistan, in breach of the Geneva convention and of the International covenants on Human Rights, of which both are signatories.

This week the Pakistan Government and representatives of the Kabul regime have been in Geneva for proximity talks under the auspices of the United Nations Secretary-General's special representative. Those talks have already reached agreement on the outlines of a solution, which would provide for the withdrawal of all foreign troops, full respect for Afghanistan's independent sovereign non-aligned status, non-intervention and non-interference from outside, leaving the country free to determine its own future, and the right of refugees to return to their homes in safety and honour.

There appear to be some signs of Soviet flexibility, but we need to have more than just the appearance. We need to have evidence of their willingness to come to terms and to withdraw from the country. Whatever the Soviet Union says, it is its willingness to negotiate a firm, fixed timetable for troop withdrawal which is the real test of its commitment to a settlement. Whatever may have been said at Geneva, we need to see concrete progress from the Soviet Union.

I confess that I find it difficult to understand why the Soviet Union has not learnt from the history of the region, from the proud tradition of the peoples of Afghanistan. There can be no victory against them, no militarily imposed solution. As my hon. Friend the Member for Bournemouth, East said, the key to peace remains the withdrawal of Soviet troops as part of a negotiated package. Nothing else can end the tragedy of Afghanistan and the suffering of its people, of whom, as we have heard today, fully one third are refugees either outside their country, in Pakistan or Iran, or within it. The Government are determined to do everything that they can do to assist those refugees and to ensure that the brave fight of the people of Afghanistan can continue to an ultimately successful conclusion.

I am sure that the whole House joins me and my hon. Friend in condemning unreservedly the activities of the Karmal regime and the Soviet Union. Over Christmas everyone in the House and the country will think of the brave Afghan people entering the seventh year of a war against a foreign aggressor. In particular, as our children and grandchildren open their toys, we may spare a thought for the children of Afghanistan who, when they pick up the toys that they see lying in the countryside, find, instead, a booby trap or a bomb, and lose limbs as a result of playing with those particularly fiendish devices left by the Soviet Union.

With permission, Mr. Speaker, I will make a statement about matters relating to the steel industry in Scotland, and, particularly, about the Gartcosh cold-rolling mill and the Ravenscraig works.

On 7 August the Government announced the results of the strategy review which they had conducted with the British Steel Corporation. The most important outcome of the review was that steel making would continue at all five of the corporation's major sites, one of which is Ravenscraig, for at least the duration of the present planning period, that is until 1988, unless there should be a major and unforeseen downturn in demand. At the same time, the corporation announced as a managerial decision, and not subject to specific Government approval, that it intended to close from 31 March 1986 the Gartcosh cold-rolling mill. Gartcosh is about 10 miles from Ravenscraig, and draws its supplies of hot-rolled steel from Ravenscraig.

The corporation's decision on Gartcosh was the subject of controversy in Scotland. The Government were urged to intervene to prevent the closure, mainly on the ground that Gartcosh is an integral part of the Ravenscraig works, and that its closure would lead inevitably to the closure of Ravenscraig. It was argued that that would put in doubt the joint conclusion of the Government and the corporation that Ravenscraig should remain in operation. I have received a considerable number of written representations about the closure of Gartcosh, to which I have replied, and I have also met a number of deputations.

The most significant of the representations which I received were those from the Ravenscraig trade unions committee. On 9 October the committee asked me to meet it so that it could put to me its views on the matters I have just described. I agreed to do so as soon as conveniently possible, and we met in Edinburgh on 21 October. When the House resumed after the summer recess the Select Committee on Scottish Affairs began an investigation into the British Steel Corporation's decision to close Gartcosh. The two matters, the case put to me by the Ravenscraig trade unions committee, and the Select Committee's investigation, were and are quite separate, although obviously they relate to the same issue. Having considered the matter against the background of the Select Committee's intention to restrict its taking of evidence, and to report as quickly as possible, I decided to await the Committee's report before replying to the Ravenscraig trade unions committee. That remained the position until the beginning of this week.

There was then no certainty whether or when the Select Committee would report, and the already lengthy delay in replying to the trade unions committee began to appear discourteous, especially as the Christmas recess was imminent. I came to the conclusion that I could wait no longer, and my Private Secretary, therefore, wrote on my behalf to the Ravenscraig trade unions committee's convener on 18 December, conveying my views on the matters put to me by his committee. On 19 December, in reply to a question by my hon. Friend the Member for Edinburgh, Central (Mr. Fletcher), a copy of the correspondence was placed in the Library of the House.

My conclusion was that the Government would not be justified in changing their view that the decision to close Gartcosh was a matter for the commercial judgment of the corporation, that the issues raised by the proposed closure are commercial, managerial and technical, rather than strategic, and that those issues are properly a matter for decision by BSC, not the Government. The corporation has satisfied me and my colleagues that the closure proposal is consistent with the strategy agreed for the corporation for the next three years, particularly in relation to continuation of steel making on the five major sites, including Ravenscraig.

On 18 December the Select Committee agreed on a report, and I understand that that report is expected to be available later today. As is the usual practice, the Government will in due course give their views on the Select Committee's report and receommendations.

The Secretary of State will be aware of the widespread disappointment and anger at his insistence that Gartcosh can be killed off without damaging the rest of the Scottish steel industry. The Secretary of State, in his letter to Mr. Brennan, the shop steward convener at Ravenscraig, set great store on the BSC assurances. How can he do that with confidence, when bad news is pressing in on every side? Today the press has reported a story of a further 430 men being made redundant at the nearby Clydesdale tube works.

Does the Secretary of State genuinely believe that he can accept a policy which BSC openly says is based on an assumption that there will be no economic recovery or increase in demand for steel products during the next few years? Is it not naive to rely on such assurances about Ravenscraig when the top management of the BSC repeatedly call for closure of one of the major strip mills? Is it not extraordinary that the letter of 18 December was sent? It refers to the Select Committee's report and carefully states that the Government's response will come in due course from the Department of Trade and Industry. Why does the Secretary of State pre-empt that consideration by his right hon. Friend, and announce his damaging views on a central issue in the report?

It is the Select Committee's conviction that Gartcosh and Ravenscraig cannot be treated as separate entities, and that any guarantee extended to Ravenscraig should also cover Gartcosh. The Secretary of State must be uncomfortably aware that the report was endorsed by eight votes to two, and carried every Tory Member except two irreconcilable diehards. Does not the Secretary of State's letter to the convener kick his colleagues in the teeth, and suggest a lack of courtesy and a cavalier disregard for the Committee system? Has the Secretary of State seen the evidence offered to the Select Committee? If he has not, his repudiation of the link with Ravenscraig is even more indefensible.

I understand from what the Secretary of State said that to some extent he accepts that he jumped the gun with his letter to Mr. Brennen, although he offers some explanation. The statement contains an implied apology. Surely he accepts that to talk of discourtesy because of the delay in sending a reply is no alibi for the way in which he acted. I can promise him that the stewards would have been much happier with an explanation of the delay, and to be informed that the Secretary of State was prepared courteously to wait for the important Select Committee evidence, rather than be faced with this dismaying and damaging document, which is so ill-timed.

Is it not grossly unfair on the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry who has still to reply on behalf of the Government to the Select Committee report? Will the Secretary of State assure the House today—this will be an important assurance—that, despite what he said in his letter, the Government's mind is not yet closed, and that there will be a genuine in-depth consideration of the Select Committee's evidence and findings?

This cannot be the final word on the matter. The fight will certainly continue in Scotland. Will the Secretary of State promise that the weighty considerations raised by the Select Committee's investigation are not being shelved or sabotaged by his letter to Mr. Brennan, and that they are still very much on the ministerial agenda? Neither the Government nor the BSC management must take irrevocable action to close Gartcosh during the recess. The Secretary of State owes that assurance to the House, certainly to the Select Committee on Scottish Affairs, to the whole of Scotland, and to the courageous and responsible work force who have put a compelling case for their plant with force and dignity.

I appreciate what the hon. Gentleman has said, and entirely agree that the work force has worked hard and devotedly at Gartcosh. I am sure that he appreciates that the news about the large number of redundancies at Clydesdale tube works, which are extremely regrettable, has absolutely nothing to do with either Ravenscraig or Gartcosh. I am assured by the BSC management that they are due solely to a reduction in the demand for products which are made there. It is important that that should not be confused in any way with the controversy over Gartcosh and/or Ravenscraig.

I ask the hon. Gentleman to consider carefully the detailed responses given by the British Steel Corporation. They make extremely useful and interesting reading, and the hon. Gentleman will have to make his own judgment on the evidence submitted. Before then, he should not jump to conclusions about what his view might be.

We have been waiting for weeks to see whether the Select Committee would produce a report and, if so, what it would say. I have done some waiting, too. As I saw the shop stewards on 21 October, and as I have been pressed almost daily during the past month to say when my response would come, I thought that if I delayed my response until the recess it would be considered discourteous. I have no doubt that the hon. Member for Glasgow, Garscadden (Mr. Dewar) would have been jumping about in fury had I done so——

Oh, no.

Yes; I have had this in the past. The hon. Gentleman would have said that I had delayed my response until the recess to avoid giving Parliament the opportunity to comment on it. The hon. Gentleman must be honest and recognise that that is exactly what he would have said. That is why I decided at the beginning of this week, as there was every likelihood that the Select Committee would not come to a conclusion, that I had to play fair with the House and ensure that I responded before the recess.

However, I give the hon. Gentleman the assurance that he seeks on the Select Committee report. I have not yet received the report or all the evidence given to the Select Committee, but we hope to receive it later today. If so, I assure the hon. Gentleman that we shall consider carefully everything that is said in the report and all the details of the written and oral evidence that was given to the Select Committee. We shall weigh everything carefully before the Government respond in the usual way in the new year.

Is my right hon. Friend aware that Conservative Members regret the prospect of further job losses in the Scottish steel industry? However, is it not a fact that the problems at Gartcosh and the problems reported this morning at the tube works are not due to a lack of Government investment, financial support or political support to keep the main steel works in Scotland going? Indeed, my right hon. Friend showed unusual commitment in obtaining a guarantee of three years' further production at Ravenscraig. Does he agree that there is a contradiction in accepting that the steel industry needs orders and that it must be competitive to achieve those orders, and yet fighting to retain loss-making plants?

My hon. Friend is right to say that the British steel industry, and the Scottish end of it, must be competitive in every way possible. Our consideration of such matters must be dominated by the crucial importance of Ravenscraig to the Scottish economy. We must consider every part of the evidence against the background of whether proposals would be to the advantage of Ravenscraig, which is so large and so important to Scotland. I have considered the matter with that in mind, and I suggest that hon. Members should do the same. By far the greatest danger to Scotland would be a threat to Ravenscraig's future.

I agree with my hon. Friend that job losses are extremely unwelcome at any time, but especially now. But they cannot be due to lack of Government support for the industry, because we have given hundreds of millions of pounds to keep the industry going through its difficulties. Indeed, the Government have made a firm commitment to keep Ravenscraig open during the present planning period.

The Secretary of State cannot seriously expect us to accept his explanation of threatened discourtesy to the trade unions for sending this ridiculous letter, when the trade unions were pinning great faith and hope on the Select Committee report and did not expect ministerial intervention before its publication. Moreover, is he aware that, on Scottish radio this morning, the Minister of State, Department of Trade and Industry, has been properly holding the line about no further Government statement on the matter until the Select Committee report is published in January? The Scottish Office should have adhered religiously to that line.

The Secretary of State must have recognised by now that it is generally believed in Scotland that the closure of Gartcosh in 1986 is bound to have a direct effect on the viability of Ravenscraig after 1988. There is no denying that.

The right hon. Gentleman completely ignores the fact that the Select Committee's deliberations have taken so long, and the fact that my response was to specific recommendations from the shop stewards joint committee. It is not a response to the evidence given to the Select Committee or to the Select Committee's views. Nor could it be, since I have not yet received them. With that in mind, I believe that the right hon. Gentleman is being disingenuous. He, too, would have been angry had I made the announcement during the recess. Therefore, his remarks are unfair to me.

I am a member of the Select Committee to which much reference has been made. Is my right hon. Friend aware that those who wished to use the Select Committee to produce a political report have been found out? Anyone who examines carefully the evidence presented to the Select Committee — I have done a tremendous amount of work on this report—will be bitterly disappointed that the Opposition do not recognise that, on the basis of the evidence, the corporation's decision was clearly commercial, managerial and technical. The British Iron and Steel Consumers' Council said that its members — the customers — had a vested interest in an efficient and financially viable BSC. Were it not so, prices to the consumer would be affected.

The cause of the problems at the tube works is uncertainty in the North sea oil market, brought about by the fluctuating price of oil. The fact that the price is sinking has thrown doubt on further orders from the North sea sector. Does my right hon. Friend agree that, although all of those matters are disappointing for Scotland, the most disappointing aspect is how the trade unions have been led along by those who believed that they could engineer a political report, but were unable to do so?

I appreciate what my hon. Friend says. I shall make no comment on the Select Committee's work until I have read the report in detail. I should tell the hon. Member for Garscadden that we should respect the right of all members of the Select Committee to express their views and to be respected for them. I hope that we will not give the impression that we attach more weight to some than to others——

It was the majority.

I think it is important to accord respect to the views of all members of the Select Committee.

As my hon. Friend said, it is perfectly correct for the BSC to decide the future of Gartcosh. What this controversy has outlined most clearly is that it is exceedingly difficult for people outside the industry to become mixed up in the complicated detail of running it, as I have discovered. Although it must be done, I believe that it is better to allow industry to make its decisions wherever possible. My hon. Friend was right to mention one group who have not been mentioned so far this morning—the customers. They are the most important people. They require products made in the best possible works at the lowest possible cost.

Did the Secretary of State make any approach to the shop stewards asking whether they would accept a delay in his response until he had a chance to consider the Select Committee report? I believe that they received no such approach.

Is the Secretary of State aware that the finishing mills in the British Steel Corporation, with Gartcosh, are already at the bottleneck? Is he aware that the closure of Gartcosh would tighten the bottleneck to such an extent that, whatever the demand, in three years' time the BSC can close Ravenscraig without reducing the amount of finished steel that it can produce?

Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that the BSC and Ministers have wriggled and squirmed in every direction to avoid giving their direct estimates or independent estimates of the effects of closing Gartcosh on the capacities of different stages of steel production, and thus on the viability of Ravenscraig after the closure of Gartcosh? Is he aware that it is totally inadequate for the British Steel Corporation to quibble about irrelevant details of other people's estimates while concealing its underlying strategy?

If, in three years' time, the Secretary of State, from whatever Benches, wishes to fight the closure of Ravenscraig, what arguments will he use? Does he acknowledge that the future of Gartcosh and Ravenscraig can be seen only in the context of the strip products group strategy as a whole, as other plants produce the same products and sell in the same markets? Does he condone the refusal by the chairman of the British Steel Corporation to give evidence on the strip products group strategy when, at other times, he says that that is the essential background to any decision on the future of Gartcosh and Ravenscraig?

Will the Secretary of State confirm that he has received from me a copy of a letter sent by me and other hon. Members to the Prime Minister seeking a meeting with her and other Ministers so that we can fully go into what I agree is a technical matter but one on which Ministers and the BSC have so far sought to conceal the underlying arguments?

I have seen a copy of the hon. Gentleman's letter to my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister. I am grateful to him for letting me see that. I assure him that it will be given careful consideration and that an answer will be sent to him as soon as possible.

I did not approach the shop stewards to ask their permission to delay further, because I thought that further delay would be undesirable and would certainly have been greatly disapproved of in Parliament.

I suggest that the hon. Gentleman, of all people, ought to be extremely careful about continuing to talk about the closure of Ravenscraig. It is not the case that, even if Gartcosh closes, Ravenscraig has to close also. It is terribly important that we should not go around giving the impression that it is. That is not so. Ravenscraig is far more important to Scotland than is any aspect of Gartcosh.

rose——

Order. I shall endeavour to call all the right hon. and hon. Members who wish to ask questions, but I draw their attention to the fact that this is a private Members' day.

Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that he has throughout given the impression of a pussy-footing approach on this important issue? Why did he feel confident yesterday, a few hours after the Select Committee report was published, to pronounce firmly that there was no link between Gartcosh and Ravenscraig, when the Select Committee, including the more respectable part of its Conservative membership, after weeks of taking evidence, was firmly convinced to the contrary?

I am not sure whether the Secretary of State's reply to the hon. Member for Glasgow, Garscadden (Mr. Dewar) meant that, with the Select Committee report, he is now willing to consider the matter afresh and, if necessary, reach a different decision about Gartcosh from that conveyed to the shop stewards yesterday. Is the right hon. Gentleman merely playing with words by saying that he is willing to look at the evidence? If his mind is not open, that is meaningless. Unless his mind is open, how can anyone have any trust in the future of Ravenscraig in his hands—if it be in his hands in three years' time?

The right hon. Gentleman will have to make his own judgment on that, on the basis of the record. The response that I gave yesterday had no relevance to the Select Committee report, because I have not yet received it. It was a response to the detailed recommendations and suggestions by the trade union shop stewards committee put to me on 21 October——

Is the Gartcosh decision open?

—to which I gave a very full reply yesterday. I ask the right hon. Gentleman to look at that very carefully indeed, because he will find that the arguments are extremely strong.

I assure the right hon. Gentleman that I and my colleagues in the Government will give the most careful consideration to everything said in the Select Committee report and all the evidence presented to it and we will look at that with an open nind.

Will the Secretary of State give us an assurance that, whatever else, Gartcosh will not have to close because of his well-known courtesy? Now that the Select Committee has reported, will the right hon. Gentleman take that report as an expression of Scottish opinion across the political spectrum, save one or two Conservative eccentrics? Will he assure the House that, as Scotland's representative in the Cabinet, he will have a change of heart, take on the Department of Trade and Industry and try to save Gartcosh?

As I have said already today, my overriding priority is the future of Ravenscraig. It is the largest part, the most important part and the central part of the Scottish steel industry. If I were convinced that the closure of Gartcosh would put Ravenscraig in greater danger, I should oppose that closure root and branch. But as, on the evidence presented to me by the shop stewards committee, I am not so convinced, I have to think of the future of Ravenscraig. It is clearly the opinion of the BSC management, and in the light of the shop stewards' evidence it is my opinion, that Ravenscraig is certainly no worse off, and is probably slightly better off, if Gartcosh does, regrettably, have to close. [HON. MEMBERS: "Oh!"] That must be our top priority and I hope that the hon. Gentleman will not join his hon. Friends and go around giving the impression that Ravenscraig cannot be run if Gartcosh closes. That is very damaging for the Scottish steel industry.

If Ravenscraig is so safe, why is the National Coal Board closing one third of its coke production for steel making by closing the coke plant at Derwent Haugh in my constituency, which serves Ravenscraig?

That has no relevance to future decisions on Ravenscraig. The BSC has made it clear that it has adequate coking capacity at Ravenscraig for the future, with the silicon welding, and it is putting more investment into Ravenscraig for direct coal injection. Of all the problems that we have to tackle, that is not one.

When the right hon. Gentleman reads the report of these exchanges, he will surely acknowledge the unbelievably tortuous logic that he is trying to use. He told my right hon. Friend the Member for Glasgow, Hillhead (Mr. Jenkins) that he has an open mind on the issue and will be looking at the Select Committee report in that frame of mind, but in response to another question he said that he had a hunch—presumably he has had that hunch for some time—that Ravenscraig might be better off if Gartcosh were closed. What sort of open, objective analysis is that?

Given all the publicity about the deliberations of the Select Committee, surely the right hon. Gentleman does not have to wait for the report to arrive to know, as every hon. Member knows, that the Committee has said that it does not see the case for the distinction between Gartcosh and Ravenscraig that the management of the BSC is trying to make. Surely the right hon. Gentleman can respond to that today, instead of dodging the issue yet again.

I do not think that, on reflection, the hon. Gentleman will believe that that is a sensible proposition. He would not be pleased with me if I gave my response to any Select Committee report after merely looking at its conclusions and without studying the evidence. I have not had access to all the evidence. I have seen only the evidence that has been published. I do not think that, on reflection, the hon. Gentleman will feel that he has made a sensible suggestion.

The hon. Gentleman will not be doing anybody in Scotland any good if he backs a solution that is worse for Ravenscraig. He ought to think carefully, as I have, about what is best for Ravenscraig.

Is not the truly outrageous aspect of the Secretary of State's behaviour the fact that he deliberately sought to pre-empt the conclusions of a Select Committee? He rushed out his response not because of any suddenly realised need for courtesy, but because he was horrified at the conclusions that he thought that the Select Committee had reached. Has not he undermined the whole system of Select Committees?

I suspect that the hon. Lady has not studied the history of the Select Committee on Scottish Affairs. I note that the hon. Lady thinks that, when a proposition has been put to a Minister on 21 October, a response on 18 December has been "rushed out". I do not think that that would carry much conviction among Scottish Members.

Are the two arguments that the Secretary of State has put to the House—the importance of competitive pricing and the need to pay attention to the preference of customers—identical to the arguments that he is deploying in his discussions with the Secretary of State for Defence over the placing of the next batch of SSK submarines?

There is no conflict between those two views. I have been concentrating this morning on trying to get the best deal for the British steel industry. All hon. Members should carefully study with open minds the evidence that I have published and put in the Library.

Against all that evidence, they should ask which course is the best for the Scottish steel industry and will give the best prospects for Ravenscraig. If hon. Members look at the evidence with that question in mind, I think that they will come to a different conclusion from the one that they hold at present.

We now return to the Adjournment debate. I say to the hon. Member for Newham, North-West (Mr. Banks) that the best thing would be for him to continue his Adjournment debate until just before noon, which will enable the hon. Member for Chipping Barnet (Mr. Chapman) to have one minute extra.

I hear what you say, Mr. Speaker. The exchanges that we have just heard are very important. However, it is regrettable that the Government did not choose to find a somewhat more convenient time to make that statement, more convenient for Back-Bench Members who have matters to raise and for Scottish Members, many of whom will already have returned to their constituencies.

At least the Minister whom the Government have chosen to make their apologies for the homelessness in London is in the form of the Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for the Environment, rather than the chairman of the Conservative party, the Chingford boot boy who unfortunately reduced to the level of the gutter what should have been a good debate last Wednesday on the problems of the inner cities.

In a supposedly civilised society, it should be unacceptable that anyone who so desires should be without a roof over his or her head, but within a few yards of the House may be found hundreds of people—men and women, young and old—who are sleeping rough on the streets. The Greater London council has just received an interim report by Professor John Greve of Leeds university on homelessness in London. He previously reported in 1970 and he now finds that the level of reported homelessness in London is up by 700 per cent. since then. Professor Greve's report, with others that came from the Duke of Edinburgh and the Archbishop of Canterbury's commission, show that there is incontrovertible proof of the social crisis that is facing inner cities.

Instead of approaching this problem with the same urgency that sent a task force steaming towards the Falklands, the Government have sought to rubbish all the evidence. If we believe the Government, the Duke of Edinburgh has become a Marxist, the Church of England has become the Kremlin at prayer and recent inner city riots are just isolated incidents of hooliganism. Perhaps the Government think that they can contain the growing problem by recruiting more policemen and giving them plastic bullets, clubs and water cannon. Such a response would simply add blind stupidity to the criminal negligence of which the Government are already guilty in their policies towards inner cities.

London this year has reached the depressing record of more than 27,000 households accepted by the boroughs as being homeless. That is only part of the problem. There are also over 20,000 single homeless in unsatisfactory accommodation or sleeping rough.

Hon. Members will shortly be departing for Christmas, no doubt a merry one. However, I hope that they will spend some time during the season of good will and festivity thinking of the poverty and degradation facing so many of our citizens in London and elsewhere. The lucky ones will go to bed and breakfast or temporary accommodation, where two thirds of the homeless accepted by councils end up. However, I doubt whether any Member of Parliament would consider himself or herself to be lucky in such accommodation. Conditions in bed and breakfast accommodation for the most part are squalid and overcrowded. Fire regulations are often flouted and many mothers and children suffer from ill health and severe social stress brought on by living in such appalling circumstances. The stable in Bethlehem would have offered more pleasant accommodation than many mothers and children will enjoy this Christmas.

The cost to the state of bed and breakfast accommodation is formidable. In his interim report, Professor Greve concluded that, far from representing an economical way to deal with the problem, the use of bed and breakfast hotels for homeless families is financial and economic madness. In London, the GLC figures show that the financial cost to local authorities alone of subsidising this type of accommodation for the homeless exceeded £12–5 million in 1984–85. It is estimated that this could rise to £16 million in the present financial year. However, this expenditure represents only a fraction of the financial cost to the state imposed by the use of this type of accommodation. In addition to local authority spending, huge costs are borne by central Government. Through DHSS board and lodging allowances the Government are acting on that not by building more council houses or providing more accommodation but by harassing the homeless in bed and breakfast accommodation.

In his report, Professor Greve compares the cost of housing families in bed and breakfast hotels with that of building new homes and flats for the families concerned. Taking into account only the estimated DHSS board and lodging costs, he shows that the average annual cost of keeping a couple with two children in bed and breakfast accommodation is over £13,000 compared with only £7,600 for building the family concerned a suitably sized council flat or house. That is how ludicrous the situation is becoming. If one takes into account the other costs, to the local authority and to the families themselves, Professor Greve concludes that these

"reinforce the financial case for giving priority to housing as against bed and breakfast accommodation … the social case for doing so is overwhelming."

It might be overwhelming to all sensible people, but that excludes the Government. Their economic and social policies are taking the country towards the status of a banana republic, or, as Prince Charles pointed out, a fourth-rate country. Perhaps the Government think that he too has been recruited into the Militant Tendency.

Yesterday, in a written parliamentary answer, the Secretary of State for the Environment announced the housing capital allocation for 1986–87. I have not had a chance to study it in great depth, but as far as I can see, far from increasing the allocation to reduce homelessness, the national housing improvement figure is cut by 13 per cent. in real terms over 1985–86. The London HIP allocation for 1986–87 is £430 million, a heavy cut from the £483 million allocated in 1985–86. When the Conservative Government came into office in 1979, the HIP allocation for London was £1,563 million, but next year it will be only £430 million. That is a reduction of 72 per cent. I know that the Government's philosophy is that problems are not solved by throwing money at them, but I should like the Minister to explain how one solves London's housing crisis by a 72 per cent. reduction in HIP allowances since the Government were elected.

The Minister may say that local authorities have lots of vacant property that they could use to house the homeless. However, in London most vacancies come about because the dwelling is not fit to live in and is undergoing repair or improvement. One of the boroughs with the most empty property is the borough that the Government like to praise as a fine example. In Wandsworth, 2,000 council houses are being kept empty because the authority is trying to sell them off. The Minister may say that authorities have capital receipts, but in inner London the capital receipts are simply not there. They are accumulating in outer London areas where the problem of homelessness is not so desperate. The Government should recognise this in the HIP allocation.

The Minister cannot deny that homelessness has increased dramatically throughout the Government's period of office. I am happy to give way if the Minister wishes to deny that, but he cannot and he remains in his place. On this occasion, I do not blame him. Throughout their term of office, the Government have enforced repeated and vicious cuts on local authority housebuilding and repairing programmes. Since 1979, the amount that councils are allowed to spend on housing has been cut by over 60 per cent. Largely as a result of this policy, the Government have also presided over an increase in recorded homelessness of 70 per cent. in London and nearly 50 per cent. nationally.

The social cuts should be obvious to even the nastiest of Tory Members—I accept that the Parliamentary Under-Secretary does not fall into that category. Perhaps the economic argument is not so apparent. The Government say that it costs £6,500 to keep each unemployed person on the dole, in terms of benefits paid and revenue lost. There are 400,000 unemployed construction workers on the dole, which shows that a major housebuilding programme to tackle the housing crisis would save £2,600 million. That money is at present going down the drain to keep 400,000 construction workers on the dole. What is it, apart from an ideological hatred of the public sector, which prevents the Government from ending what is essentially a man-made scandal—homelessness?

The Minister knows my borough of Newham fairly well. He has visited it several times. We are obliged to him for that. I even offered him accommodation in one of our 110 tower blocks, but he has not taken up the offer yet. I would like to think that, when he replies, he will give the Christmas message that I would like to take back to Newham, which is that we can look forward to partnership status in 1986.

In Newham, the number of priority need clients seen by the homeless persons unit increased from 972 in 1982 to an estimated 1,680 in 1985, and Newham is by no means the worst of the London boroughs for homelessness. Those figures exlude all of the non-priority groups, most of whom are people over pensionable age, single people and childless couples. I can give a dramatic demonstration of how bad things have become in Newham. In 1981, the average nightly placement in bed and breakfast was just 1·6 people but it is estimated to have increased to 71·4 a night in 1985. The cost of bed and breakfast to the borough of Newham during the same period has risen from £9,000 in 1981–82 to an estimated £550,000 in 1985–86.

The Minster knows the borough, but how does he think that we can manage with such problems, which are also mirrored in the adjoining boroughs of Tower Hamlets and Hackney? Those three represent the first, second and third most deprived local authority areas in England on the basis of the Department of the Environment's statistics. That is a terrible treble which the East End can well do without.

I can imagine Tory Members asking why people do not go into the private sector and buy a home. I must tell them that 75 per cent. of Newham's priority applicants for housing are on supplementary benefit. This year, we have for the first time exceeded 40,000 people in the borough on supplementary benefit. I find it peculiarly obscene that the same Prime Minister whose economic and social policies keep so many of my constituents homeless or on the dole can afford to spend £400,000 on a neo-Georgian bunker in Dulwich.

The scandal of London's homeless is getting worse and is directly attributable to Government cuts in housing investment. As the right hon. Member for Leeds, North-East (Sir K. Joseph) said in a flash of inspiration, the poor are poor because they lack money. It can equally be said that the homeless have nowhere to live because there are not enough decent homes to go around at prices which the people who need them can afford. The homeless cannot rely on the private sector because their incomes are too low.

What will the Government do to stem the rising tide of homelessness? Why have they decided not to amend the Housing (Homeless Persons) Act 1977 to give all homeless people the right to a home? How will the Government change their methods of distributing housing capital allocations to take more account of the plight of the homeless in the inner city? Who will take on the role of co-ordinating provision for the single homeless in London when the GLC has gone, given that the boroughs' grant scheme at Richmond will deal essentially with the financial business of distributing grants? Do the Government contest the assertion of many that it is cheaper to build a new council house than to keep a homeless family in unsatisfactory bed and breakfast hotels? If not, why do they not act with more financial prudence and protect the ratepayer by allowing councils to spend more on housing investment?

The Government have failed in many areas of social policy, but nowhere has the failure been more profound than in the provision of housing for the homeless. Why has homelessness in London and elsewhere increased so dramatically during the Government's two terms of office? Does the Minister know? More important for the homeless, does he care?

In view of the plight of the homeless in London and the poverty and degradation that we see around us in the inner cities, no member of the Government deserves to have a happy Christmas this year. You do, Mr. Deputy Speaker, but I cannot wish the Minister the same.

The House is grateful to the hon. Member for Newham, North-West (Mr. Banks) for giving us this opportunity to debate the increase in homelessness. He started by saying that last week's debate on the inner cities ended in chaos because of my right hon. Friend the Member for Chingford (Mr. Tebbit), the Chairman of the Conservative party. If he had been allowed to make his speech, the House would have been a lot wiser than it was.

The hon. Gentleman is right in saying that the numbers of homeless people are increasing. I think that he will find that they went up under Labour as well. From July 1984 to June 1985, the London boroughs accepted 25,900 households as homeless as compared with 24,280 during the previous year. However, nearly two thirds of them were accommodated in permanent lettings, and others were accommodated in hostels and short-life accommodation. At any one time, there were 2,500 households in bed and breakfast accommodation.

Of course we are worried by the numbers being put in such accommodation as it is unsatisfactory and expensive, especially for families. We have made it quite clear that it should be used only as a last resort. I was pleased to see that my own borough of Ealing has managed to reduce the number of people that it has placed in bed and breakfast accommodation. I do not find the economic argument anything like as powerful as the argument that such accommodation is unacceptable for families. We have made it quite clear to local authorities in our code of practice that such accommodation should be used only as a last resort.

The hon. Gentleman was a little carried away when he said that the increase was "directly attributable' to the Government. If we are honest, we will admit that the rise in homelessness has something to do with some significant social changes, such as the greater incidence of marital breakdown. The figures show that 20 per cent. of those who are accepted as homeless in England became homeless simply because of problems arising from marital breakdown. I do not know whether the hon. Gentleman will blame the Government for that, but I think that he would be pushing his case a little too far to try. There are other social reasons. For example, young people are leaving home far earlier and in far greater numbers than they used to. That is social change independent of Government and one of the factors responsible for the increase.

It is also legitimate to consider the other side of the equation—the role of local authorities in coping. Between 1980 and 1985, local authorities in London let homes to about 50,000 homeless families. The number of lettings to homeless families has increased under this Government from 12,700 in 1980 to just over 16,000 in 1985. The Government already allocate a substantial borrowing power to local authorities to enable them to make the necessary adjustments to their housing stock, and we allow them to supplement that with capital receipts.. The figures of allocations that the hon. Gentleman quoted conveniently excluded the capital receipts available to local authorities.

rose——

I shall not give way, partly because I know what the hon. Gentleman will say and partly because time will not permit me.

Local authorities can compliment their allocations by 20 per cent. of the capital receipts that have accumulated during the past few years. Next year, the London boroughs will be permitted to borrow £430 million for capital expenditure on housing.

The hon. Gentleman asked what we were doing about homelessness when allocating resources. Of course, homelessness is one factor and we have recently given it increased weight. For next year we have changed the basis of the homeless indicator from lettings to the homeless to households accepted as homeless. That widening of the indicator means that the number of people placed in bed and breakfast accommodation will have a greater influence on authorities' allocations.

Between 1979 and 1984, local authorities and housing associations in London produced nearly 72,000 new homes, and the private sector nearly 29,000—giving a total of 101,000 new homes. At the same time, the population of London declined by about 100,000, so the overall supply and demand equation is, on the face of it, improving.

The hon. Gentleman dismissed rather peremptorily the fact that in London there are some 30,000 empty public sector dwellings, of which 10,000 have been empty for more than a year. Quite frankly, that is an affront to the homeless. In times of necessary financial constraint, we must try very hard to make the best possible use of existing resources, and returning those vacant dwellings to use must be a top priority.

If the Minister gave the comparable figures for empty property in the private sector in London, including property that has been empty for more than a year, he would realise that the figure was considerably greater than for public sector property.

The figures are available, although I think that they go back some time because there has not been a recent survey. It is public knowledge, but I do not have the figure in my folder. The public sector, both central and local government, have a responsibility because the assets are provided by the taxpayer. We do not have a comparable responsibility for assets in private ownership.

On July 10 we issued a circular to all authorities setting out ways in which better management could reduce the number of empty dwellings and recommending a greater use of short-life schemes and temporary lettings. We have also relaxed the housing association grant regime and have established an urban housing renewal unit that is already active in promoting a number of measures to use empty properties and to revitalise some of the run-down estates.

The problem of rent arrears has a role. At the end of the financial year 1984–85, the GLC and the London boroughs between them were owed rent arrears approaching £92 million. That is deplorable and means the loss of valuable resources that could otherwise be devoted to easing the problems of homelessness.

On the question of mobility, some local authorities have difficulties because they have insufficient accommodation in their own boroughs. We attach great importance to mobility schemes to iron out those imbalances. Those schemes enable the local authorities to respond more flexibly to the accommodation needs of the homeless. However, some boroughs do not take up all the lettings afforded to them. We have established the Greater London mobility scheme, but it is not fully subscribed despite a reduction in quotas this year.

The Government have also put £3 million to one side for the London borough of Camden for the purpose of funding housing association developments in the north-west boroughs to help those boroughs in that part of London which do not have housing stock of their own. All the nomination rights for that go to the inter-borough nomination scheme.

The hon. Gentleman mentioned the single homeless. We must have a sense of priority here, and that must mean that families rather than single people should come at the top of the list. That said, we have been trying to help the single homeless in special need. We are funding the provision of small modern hostels and other forms of shared housing. Most of those are for the single homeless, including the elderly, but other groups with special needs merit that also, including ex-offenders, former psychiatric patients, the mentally handicapped, ex-alcoholics, battered wives and the disabled.

Since May 1979, the Housing Corporation has approved schemes nationally for more than 13,000 people in that type of accommodation. We want to help the voluntary sector, and in 1986–87 we shall increase to £500,000 grants to voluntary bodies concerned with homelessness. That is intended to assist the provision of advice that helps to make better use of existing accommodation, to reduce evictions for rent arrears and to ensure that homeless people receive their rights under the Act. Under those provisions, I have today approved a grant to the Bayswater Hotel Homelessness Project, which is doing valuable work advising homeless families in that part of London on their housing problems and, in many cases, helping them to find a solution. I hope to meet members of the organising group in the spring to hear more about their work.

My Department produces a wide range of leaflets giving guidance to the public on various aspects of housing. It is generally accepted that spreading knowledge of people's rights in that way is useful. In August, we issued an expanded version of our booklet aimed at helping one-parent families with their housing problems, including homelessness. I am now looking sympathetically at the possibility of producing a general leaflet on homelessness.

At the beginning of my speech, I expressed concern about the increase in the numbers of homeless people placed in bed and breakfast accommodation by local authorities. The hon. Gentleman rightly said that standards in some of that accommodation were most unsatisfactory. My right hon. Friend the Secretary of State is consulting local authorities and other interested bodies about a draft circular memorandum that will draw the attention of local authorities to the already wide-ranging powers that they have for securing improved conditions in bed and breakfast hotels and other houses in multiple occupation. —[Interruption.] The hon Member for Holborn and St. Pancras is muttering continuously throughout my remarks.

rose——

In the spirit of Christmas I give way to the hon. Gentleman, in the hope that that will keep him quiet for the remaining few minutes in which I have to speak.

Why have the Government consistently resisted all measures to strengthen the law to improve safety conditions for people living in houses in multiple occupation?

If the hon. Gentleman examines the record, he will find that that is not the case. We have taken a number of measures to improve safety standards for those living in HMOs—houses in multiple occupation—and I shall write to the hon. Gentleman what will have to be a long letter outlining the steps that we have taken. He might prefer to confine his interventions to the field for which he has shadow ministerial responsibility.

rose——

I am hoping to answer some of the questions that the hon. Member for Newham, North-West put to me towards the end of his remarks. I promise to give way to him later if there is time.

He asked what the reasons were for homelessness and why the numbers were increasing. That was a relevant question because the underlying reasons are complicated. We are pressing ahead with a substantial programme of research into various aspects of homelessness costing about £600,000. That will shed light on factors influencing homelessness, on the standards in houses in multiple occupation and on the way in which local authorities operate the Housing (Homeless Persons) Act 1977, including their use of bed and breakfast accommodation.

The hon. Member for Newham, North-West also asked if we were contemplating any other measures. We have had discussions with SHACK, CHAR and other interested bodies and we are considering a number of measures which might help to relieve the problem of homelessness. They cover, among other things, further ways of improving the utilisation of the existing public and private sector stock; possible improvements in the ways in which homelessness is reflected in the arrangements for allocating housing resources; and further steps to encourage local authorities to concentrate their provision on those who are in greatest need. Those results will emerge in due course.

I am interested to learn that there is to be another study of the problem. Does the Minister accept that the report by Professor Greve, which is due out early next year, will provide an excellent basis for the Department's investigations? The hon. Gentleman will be aware that the report is being paid for by the GLC.

As the hon. Member for Southwark and Bermondsey (Mr. Hughes) pointed out, there is a great deal of vacant accommodation in the private sector. Why will his Department not allow local authorities to move in with compulsory purchase orders to take up some of that accommodation? In my borough of Newham we are desperately short of four-bedroom accommodation, although a large amount of it is available in empty private sector stock. We should like to be able to take that up by way of compulsory purchase Can the hon. Gentlman offer any help?

There is scope for the private sector to do more. We have tried to encourage private householders to let their properties by the introduction in the Housing Act 1980 of shorthold provisions which guarantee them repossession at the end of a fixed term; we have given local authority tenants the right to sublet; and, as I explained, the initiatives that we are considering include a further look at the private sector. My Department welcomes any research that sheds light on this problem and indicates the way ahead, and we shall consider the final conclusions of the Greve report when it is available.

The hon. Member for Newham, North-West asked why in yesterday's announcement there was an apparent reduction in resources available to London. The reason is simple. In setting the allocation total, we had to take account, first, of the need to bring expenditure into line with provision. The headroom built in in previous years had not been enough, with the result that there had been a substantial overspend. Secondly, and more importantly, local authorities can use their capital receipts, which have gone up in the last year. Simply holding the percentage constant to 20 per cent. gives them access to increased spending power from those receipts. Local authorities are getting access to other opportunities for capital expenditure.

The hon. Gentleman poured scorn on what Wandsworth is doing, when it is making faster progress in tackling its housing problems by being prepared to have a partnership with the private sector. It is turning round difficult-to-let estates that many council tenants would not accept. It is converting the aptly named Livingstone estate in Wandsworth in partnership with the private sector. In the main, the purchasers of the flats are Wandsworth tenants or those on the waiting lists. It is making real progress in tackling its problems by this partnership. Far from deploring it, Labour Members should be welcoming it with open arms and persuading their local authorities to do even more in this direction.

I am grateful to have this opportunity of raising the wider issue of urban regeneration, which in a sense, but only partly, is a continuation of the previous Adjournment debate. I like to think that it is an extension of the more fruitful part of the debate that took place nine days ago, on 11 December.

I am pleased that the Under-Secretary of State for the Environment, my hon. Friend the Member for Ealing, Acton (Sir G. Young), will reply to this short debate. His long ministerial experience covers six years and he was at one time a councillor in an inner London borough and a chairman of a housing association. Both those qualifications will be helpful to him in this debate.

There is no doubt that there is a need for massive additional investment in urban regeneration, and it is important to mention that we are talking not only about our inner cities. The need for urban regeneration extends to most parts of our urban areas. I am told that 77 per cent. of us live in urban areas. Incidentally, over one third of us live in the large conurbations which occupy only 6 per cent. of the land area that we call the United Kingdom. In other words, we are a closely knit community.

We all have our own views about the state of the fabric of the nation and the nation's housing stock, but I suspect that most politicians are uneasy about the low level of investment in our infrastructure. As my hon. Friend knows, there has been a spate of reports recently, including one from his Department's urban housing renewal unit, which estimated that £18·8 billion needs to be spent to maintain the public sector side of housing alone. I am told that if the private sector is included, there is a need for a global £45,000 million to be spent. There has been the Duke of Edinburgh's inquiry into housing and the Archbishop of Canterbury's Church of England report entitled "Faith in the City".

It is self-evident that there is not the remotest chance of adequate public funds becoming available to tackle such a mammoth task on the scale that is necessary for urban regeneration. I happen to think that that is so under the present Government or another one, or even if there is a change of Government direction. If anyone doubts that, I commend to him the excellent article written by my hon. Friend the Member for Horsham (Sir P. Hordern) that appeared in the Daily Telegraph of 10 December.

We must encourage more private investment; that is the key to meeting more but not all of our housing needs. Eighteen months ago the Select Committee on the Environment reported on green belts and land for housing. I think that I can summarise it in shorthand without distorting what the Committee said. In effect, it stated that green belts have a broad and positive role, that of open spaces whose presumption against development can better shape urban areas; green belts were conceived originally as a way of containing growth and have become essential in dealing with the problems of urban decline; green belts should now assist urban regeneration. Basically, that is the guts of one part of the Select Committee's report. I agree with it, if only, but not only, because I was a member of the Committee and I am the president of the London Green Belt Council.

It will be prudent for me to declare interests at this stage. I am a non-practising architect, a non-practising town and country planner and a non-executive director of a development company and construction company.

We need a partnership if we are to realise the goal of urban regeneration. The public sector has the authority and, I think, the public acceptance. It has the contact with communities and can identify the social needs of a particular area. It often owns the land that needs to be redeveloped. The private sector has the access to finance, the development experience and the skills and expertise needed to assemble parcels of land and undertake construction. There is a need for a comprehensive new approach. We must encourage a massive financial input by the building societies, the banks which are now in the mortgage market, and, not least, the pension funds, which have considerable assets.

We have seen what can be done. That may have been an exceptional experience, but I draw the attention of the House again to the success of the London Docklands development corporation, which has already attracted £1 billion of private investment. I am told that every £1 of public money invested has attracted more than £5 of private investment. About 2,700 houses have been completed; 5,000 houses are under construction; and 4,700 jobs have been created. About 1,500 people at any one time are employed on the construction works.

Another good example of what can be done is the Baltimore inner harbour scheme, across the Atlantic, which occurred before the LDDC's projects. That was the greatest single programme of urban regeneration ever undertaken.

The trick is to turn derelict or under-Used sites with negative market values into positive developments that will show a reasonable rate of return and attract money. The problem is that, although successful schemes can attract four times or more as much private investment as the amount committed by the public, the initial ratio of funding required is 3:1 the other way around. The Government must therefore encourage this necessary partnership.

I acknowledge that the Government have taken and are taking certain initiatives. A legislative framework is being built up. The Building Societies Bill, which will make it possible to use the assets of building societies for urban regeneration on a much larger scale; the concept of urban development corporations; enterprise zones and the impending housing and planning legislation, which will bring about simplified planning zones, are part of the legislative jigsaw. The urban programme, which has been substantially increased and is running at about £338 million, the urban development grants of £77 million—a more modest figure—which have attracted £340 million of private money and the derelict land grants are playing their part. I agree with my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State that the grant schemes seem to achieve the most effective results.

I should like to offer some suggestions to my hon. Friend the Under-Secretary of State. First, because of the success of the LDDC and the Merseyside development corporation, the Government should seriously consider creating more urban development corporations. I understand the difficulties, but I believe that parcels of land could be assembled in some of the other major conurbations where relatively few people live and where comprehensive development of this new type could be better managed by a special agency. The phrase "urban development corporation" is not particularly attractive. I prefer the acronym SPA, or special priority area.

Secondly, there is a need for a new form of national agency to tackle the massive cost of urban regeneration. I do not know whether it should be called a national urban task force or a national urban renewal agency, but we need to draw together people from industry, Government and local authorities who have an expert knowledge of industry and administrative ability. They are the type of people who served on the new town corporations.

That national agency could set up a programme of work and monitor it, and be a catalyst for ideas and experience. There is a case for setting up urban development trusts in selected areas to attract the private finance needed. They could put the money to work to create viable schemes.

There is a need for a rearrangement of finances. There is not so much a need for significantly more public funding for urban regeneration as a need to redirect the money. Urban development grants should not go to the local authorities which in any case have to provide 25 per cent. of the finance needed, but should be redirected to the developers.

I refer my hon. Friend to paragraph 79 of the Select Committee report:

"Short-term public service public sector savings are hindering the creation of the sustained thrust for redevelopment that characterises the success of the LDDC. The Secretary of State accepted that the money that would have gone on those schemes is used inevitably in ways that pressurise vacant land and Green Belt land. The absurdity is that to save the public sector £90 million of expenditure over the whole country, over half a billion pounds of private money is pushed away from urban areas, to intensify pressure on agricultural land. Of course there is a considerable prospect that if Derelict Land Grant were demand-led huge spending might result. However, these grants do not meet the whole cost of schemes, only local authorities' shares of about one seventh. Their operation should be determined by the willingness of the private sector to put up money, and not by cash limits. A major opportunity to promote urban infrastructure and regeneration is being squandered."

I refer my hon. Friend also to paragraphs 64 and 66 of the report. The vexing but real problems should not be used as an excuse for inaction. Difficulties, for example, in producing title due to previous inefficient conveyancing should be and could be dealt with

"by statutorily guaranteed absolute title if necessary."

The Secretary of State should use his reserve powers more regularly to order the disposal of unused land held by local authorities, statutory undertakers and nationalised industries. I know that some progress has been made since the report was published.

This is an opportune time for a major urban regeneration initative. It is clear that the construction and development industries are ready, able and willing to take part. To realise that, one has only to read the recent speeches of the president of the Chartered Institute of Building, Mr. Norman Wakefield, who was last year's chairman of the national contractors group of the Building Employers Confederation. The Chartered Institute of Building and the Building Employers Confederation have taken significant initiatives. The Phoenix Partnership has been set up by the building material producers and there is also the Urban Investment Review Group which is chaired by Mr. Tim Melvill Ross. To show that initiatives are being taken by other parts of the construction industry I should like to quote part of the leader in the current issue of the Chartered Surveyor Weekly written by the editor, Mr. Michael Hanson. It is the journal of the Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors. It states:

"The British Property Federation's working party on urban renewal under the chairmanship of Gerald Powell"

is one other initiative.

"This is on the point of identifying an actual inner-city site of about 20 acres (not in Liverpool or London) where a hypothetical redevelopment, mixing residential and commercial, can be shown to bring real benefits to the local community.

The Housebuilders Federation is going further, by embarking on an eight-month tour of Britain's worst inner-city areas, after which it will produce its own White Paper of proposals.

These will differ from the recent report of the Archbishop of Canterbury's working party on inner-city deprivation by producing hard evidence and practical solutions, duly costed.

Clearly, not all Britain's housing needs can be solved by building in the inner cities, bur it might be a step in the right direction if the inner cities are regenerated before too much more countryside is laid waste".

We need to harness and channel all those initiatives. It is a matter of the attitude and will of the Government at national and local level. Of course there are difficulties and problems, but I believe that they can be sorted out. I remind my hon. Friend the Under-Secretary that some of our inner-city areas are a disgrace to a nation that calls itself civilised. There is a tremendous challenge. We have a last opportunity to save our inner cities from going into terminal decline. I am told that the Cabinet discussed the need for new initiatives in urban regeneration at its meeting yesterday. I know that my hon. Friend was not present at that meeting, because he is not yet a member of the Cabinet. However, I hope that he will be able to reply to the debate in the positive spirit that is his hallmark.

My hon. Friend the Member for Chipping Barnet (Mr. Chapman) is better informed about what happened in the Cabinet than I am. I can shed no light on what was discussed yesterday.

My hon. Friend is right to say that there is a real challenge to the Government. A growing number of professional bodies, trade associations and construction companies are interested in the inner cities. They are producing new ways of tackling the problem. They have made it clear that they are prepared to invest their own resources and manpower in partnership with the Government. Over the past few months we have read many reports and had many approaches, some of which my hon. Friend mentioned. It is now up to the Department of the Environment and the Government to respond and harness that enthusiasm and build a fresh approach to the inner cities in a spirit of partnership.

It is common ground, certainly between my hon. Friend the Member for Chipping Barnet and myself, that the traditional public sector approach is unlikely to work and, in any case, would be fiendishly expensive. Te some extent, we are currently suffering from the public sector oriented approach in our inner cities. We must make the resources available to tackle those problems. Central and local government must have a much closer relationship, be prepared to understand the issues as they are seen by the private sector and recognise that the private sector is not a loss-making social agency. It has a responsibility to shareholders and we must reconcile its interests with our interests as administrators and parliamentarians.

Only yesterday the House approved, without a Division, the Building Societies Bill that was mentioned by my hon. Friend. That will unlock the substantial resources of the building societies, in a way that is not possible at the moment, to tackle some of the problems of dereliction and decay. My hon. Friend is well placed to address himself to the subject. He is a member of the Select Committee. He has exhibited great interest and he represents a London constituency with the green belt on its northern boundary, but not too far to the south he is exposed to some of the pressures of the inner cities.

My hon. Friend mentioned the London Docklands development corporation and made a powerful case for extending such corporations and setting up similar bodies in other parts of the country. The legislative framework exists and I shall draw his suggestions to the attention of my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State. He also made a more radical suggestion for a national renewal agency, which I suspect will involve primary legislation. That is something that we will have to look at carefully.

My hon. Friend's theme was partnership. He mentioned the gearing that we have secured in the LDDC. Last week it broke the £1 billion landmark for private investment attracted to its area. As he said, every £1 of public money spent in the docklands has drawn in nearly £6 of private investment.

The level of owner-occupation in docklands has risen from 5·3 per cent. in 1981 to 15·7 per cent., but, encouragingly, nearly half of all occupiers of the new homes were previously residents of the three docklands boroughs of Tower Hamlets, Newham and Southwark. Many new jobs have been created in the LDDC area. We shall look closely at ways in which we can apply the lessons learnt from the urban development corporations elsewhere.

Another element in my hon. Friend's theme of partnership was the derelict land grant. One of our priorities, as he rightly said, is to bring disused or under-used tracts of urban land into better use. That is a key priority of the derelict land programme. We have increased its budget from £23 million in 1979 to £82 million this year. We have concentrated it on recycling land and on schemes that lead to development and private sector investment. Derelict land grant can be paid direct to the private sector to enable it to reclaim sites for its own use. Earlier this year we approved the largest ever private sector reclamation scheme costing £1·4 million and covering no less than 90 acres of the Normanby park steelworks in Scunthorpe. The site will be developed by Pipe and Rail Limited for several manufacturing activities.

My hon. Friend referred to land registers. It is common ground between us that far too much public sector land is lying idle in the inner cities. There are often exciting opportunities for new investment or housing development, but we cannot achieve that unless the land is made available. My right hon. Friend the Secretary of State is making increased use of his power under the land registry system to require public sector owners to dispose of unused land. Twenty-one directions were issued on 19 November requiring the disposal of 139 acres. Speaking from memory, I think that one of those directions was in my hon. Friend's borough, although I think that it was in the Prime Minister's constituency rather than his own. We are looking actively at more directions and are determined to get a big momentum behind the scheme. In all, over 10,000 acres have been taken off the register by being sold or brought into use since October 1984.

My hon. Friend mentioned urban development grant and suggested that, instead of having to go through the local authorities, we should introduce a new power enabling us to give grant direct. We shall want to look at that. Urban development grant has made a substantial impact. In England as a whole, by the end of last month, we had approved over 165 UDG schemes. They involve grant offers of £74 million, bringing in their wake private sector investment of £325 million. About £60 million of the approved grants will enable industrial and commercial projects creating 16,000 jobs to go ahead. The remainder is being concentrated on housing development, leading to the provision of nearly 4,000 homes.

Let me give a London example of the success of the UDG. I refer my hon. Friend to last Thursday's edition of The London Standard, which contained a profile of the Royal Agricultural Hall. The report reflected on the astonishing variety of uses to which the hall had been put in the past,

"the entertainment ranging from the Grand Ball of 1869, when 5,000 guests waltzed beneath the chandeliers and 4,000 gas jets, to Ubini's Original Exhibition of Performing Fleas—the wonders of minute creation."

We are restoring the hall with £2·8 million of urban development grant, although not necessarily for that historical use. The scheme involves the refurbishment and conversion of the hall into an international business design and exhibition centre. That transformation of a building that has been run down over decades will contribute significantly to the regneration of that part of London.

My hon. Friend referred to enterprise zones. Some areas have suffered from particularly serious decline over a prolonged period. It was to help those areas that we designated the first enterprise zones in 1981. Since then, further zones have been designated and there are now 25 in the United Kingdom. They are a success. The number of jobs in the zones has increased dramatically and the areas concerned, which have been in decline for so long, have been given a new lease of life.

My hon. Friend touched on housing. The Government are committed to strengthening housing choice and promoting opportunities for low-cost home ownership in our cities.

Earlier this year we set up the urban housing renewal unit, which encourages local authorities to improve the management of their stock, to involve tenants in plans for the future of their estates, and to develop management systems, which are more responsive to their needs. It is also exploring private sector solutions to some of the more problematic housing estates, and improving the standard of housing education by funding 15 part-time graduate studentships at the London School of Economics housing management centre.

Among the initiatives that the unit hopes to develop is an extension of the community refurbishment schemes, which were successfully piloted on Merseyside. They involve local people who have been out of work for more than a year refurbishing their estates, and, in some cases, rebuilding their homes. The unit has an urgent programme of visits and meetings with the authorities with the most severe housing problems. It will be an important part of its job to transfer such successful experiments to areas which have not previously considered them.

My hon. Friend mentioned the urban programme, and was kind enough to say that we have increased substantially the resources available to it. They have increased from £93 million in 1978–79 to £338 million, which is a reflection of our commitment to the regeneration of our inner cities. It is an example of how central Government and local government can work effectively together. Much is made of the friction in the relationship between the two. Indeed, the report of the Archbishop's commission on urban priority areas claimed that there

"is a regrettable lack of will on the part of Central Government to support local government and to devote adequate resources to Urban Priority Areas."

We have put fresh impetus behind the urban programme. Under it, some 12,000 projects are being supported, all of which have been submitted for ministerial approval by local authorities. Since 1978–79, more than £1·9 million has been allocated in support of local authorities' programmes of urban renewal. We have sought to concentrate resources on the worst areas, and have worked with local authorities, with some of whom we have political differences, to ensure that maximum value for money is obtained.

It is sometimes suggested that the increases have been more than offset by cuts in the rate support grant. We make no secret of the fact that there has been a change in the relative contributions of central and local government towards the financing of local authority expenditure. The Government's share has been reduced for every local authority to strengthen local accountability and the financial responsibility of those who manage local authority expenditure programmes. There has been no shift in the share of rate support grant to the inner cities, and the share of the rate support grant for urban partnership and programme authorities is much the same in percentage terms now as it was in 1979. The expenditure assessments on which rate support grant is based recognise that inner city authorities have higher spending needs than other areas. To use the terms of the grant calculation, their grant-related expenditure assessments are often much higher in relation to given functions than the national average.

I could say a great deal more about the Government's commitment to inner-city areas. The Government remain firmly committed to the notion of the green belt, which is one of my hon. Friend's particular interests. However, it is important to emphasise its positive role, as my hon. Friend did. There is something in the green belt for the inner cities, as resources must be redirected to the inner cities, and developers no longer have the option simply to take the easier solution of greenfield redevelopments. The green belt is a positive aspect to our inner-city approach, and has a role to play in tackling problems.

One small example of our determination to restore hope—and, dare I say, faith—in the inner city is apparent in Brixton during the festive season. I ask hon. Members who travel through Brixton to bear in mind that the excellent illuminations have been provided with support from the urban programme. As I would not wish to spoil our reputation for thrift, I must point out that they were obtained second-hand from Blackpool. On that festive note, may I say that we have had a more constructive 30 minutes on inner cities today than last week when Labour Members howled down my right hon. Friend, the chairman of the Conservative party.

I am grateful to hon. Members, and especially to the Minister, for bringing us back to the timetable.

I congratulate the Church of England on its report "Faith in the City". It makes many telling points and draws attention to the growing crisis in our inner cities, caused and much exacerbated by the Government's policies. The report states:

"The combination of unsatisfied needs and unused human abilities seems to us as uneconomic as it is illogical and immoral."

Such sound moral and economic argument, which is relevant to our housing needs and capabilities, as well as to other aspects of life, was met by a bully-boy response from the Government.

The part of the report that especially caught my eye was its identification of urban priority areas, not just in the inner cities but on the fringes of the cities in housing estates. The report says that they present a pressing problem for the mid-1980s. Its recognition of the fringes of cities clearly applies to Leyton, which is classified as outer London, but its housing and many other services mirror the deprivation of the inner city. The main reason why it is not officially recognised as an inner-city area is that it lies in the borough of Waltham Forest which contains in the north the relatively prosperous area of Chingford, although it, too, has pockets of housing problems. The rest of the borough, especially Leyton and Walthamstow, has inner-city problems, and the Government should recognise that in financial terms.

There is a growing housing crisis in Waltham Forest and a severe problem of homelessness. At present, the homeless are almost the only category who can be guaranteed offers of council accommodation. That is done at the expense of those on the waiting list and requiring transfers. But the policy has been adopted because the alternative is the expensive, wasteful, unsatisfactory and unsuitable bed-and-breakfast arrangements. I am informed that even in Waltham Forest the council cannot find accommodation for about 150 homeless families. Although Waltham Forest has avoided using bed-and-breakfast establishments until now, it could be forced to do so in the near future. Even then, there will be no relief for those on the waiting list and awaiting transfers.

With council houses being sold and no replacements being built, there is almost no hope of the overwhelming majority of people on the waiting lists being rehoused,. Many people live in desperate conditions, and have 70, 80 or 90 points, but are getting nowhere in their quest for housing. The young, the newly married and couples with no children have no chance.

The problem is the shortage of decent accommodation. Recently, I received a letter from the council's rehousing supervisor about the case of a Mrs Smith. He wrote:

"In June this year the Housing Panel awarded a very high degree of social need priority to this case and recommended the offer of a three bedroom house … The problem of course is the very limited supply of such properties especially now no new properties are being built … I am sorry to write in such pessimistic tones when writing about a high priority case but the limited supply of properties is having a drastic effect on the prospects of any transfer case."

The lack of new properties is causing great difficulties for tenants who want transfers. The housing manager was interviewed in the local press earlier this year. He said:

"Because the supply of council homes has dried up … there is less opportunity to move within the Council sector, from the tower block estates to more popular properties."

Some tenants who want transfers face a Catch-22 situation. I took up the case of my constituent Mr. Szersynski. He and his girl friend were in the "couples sharing" queue and had 61 points. The housing department wrote to me:

"The present rehousing level within the 'couples sharing' queue is 77 points".

However, the couple are expecting twins, which gives them another 20 points, taking them past 77 points. That seemed to be excellent news, but the letter from the housing department added that when the twins come they will need two bedroomed accommodation and the minimum of points required for that is 110 points. That is a real Catch-22, or perhaps a Catch-110.

Problems have also been caused for my constituents Mrs. Warsap and her 82-year-old parents in Chingford. Their case is reported in today's edition of the Walthamstow Guardian under the headline "Christmas Day Ruined." Mrs. Warsap and her parents want a three or four-bedroom house so that the family can live together. They have offered to swap the two houses that they currently occupy, both of which are in tip-top condition, but that proposal has had to be turned down. Mrs. Warsap told the Walthamstow Guardian:

"When I walk in in the morning mum is often lying helpless and sobbing on the bed … For now, Christmas is a very sad time indeed."

That is the sort of difficulty facing people who want transfers.

Not only is there not enough money for building, but there is not enough to repair existing properties. In the interview with the local press earlier this year, the housing manager said:

"We haven't got enough resources to do the basic repairs and improvements to our existing stock. Take our list of repairs so far. We've got a 10 year programme, but some of the things we'll be doing in year 10, we should be doing this year—no doubt about it … there is no money to spend on environmental upgrading of estates."

That upgrading includes not only the appearance of estates, which is vital, but the facilities for mothers and children on those estates. Play groups and creches on the Hollydown way and Oliver close estates were started and run by the mothers, but have been denied support because of the lack of resources. If facilities are not provided and the environment of estates is not upgraded, it leads to problems such as those experienced on the Broadwater Farm estate as alienation sets in among the inhabitants.

Improvements in the private sector in my borough have also been curtailed because there has been a block on improvement grants since August 1984. There is growing disrepair in that sector, too.

The problem is one of resources. As the housing manager said in that interview:

"It sounds simplistic to say it's a money-linked problem, but to a large extent it is. Obviously you've got to strive to get the maximum out of what you've got, but all these things just can't be done with the amount of money we're working to."

An additional dimension will exacerbate the housing misery of a large number of my constituents for many years to come unless additional resources are provided by the Government. The M11 link road is to be carved through my constituency. The Government gave an inadequate allocation for rehousing the displaced families. In an act of terrible mismanagement, the local Tory-Liberal council sold off the site which was to be used for building new homes and used the money elsewhere. As a consequence, many more people will be in a housing crisis unless additional money is provided.

In the face of these grim facts and those of 9,300 homes unfit for people to live in, 6,800 without bathrooms or inside toilets, 10,700 in need of urgent renovation, 1,300 overcrowded with more than two people per room, the Government dismiss any need for more to he done and abrogate their responsibility. They have cut Waltham Forest's housing investment allocation—the council received less than one third of what it deemed to be necessary.

It is ironic that the debate is taking place on the day when Tory Members are packing up to go to their comfortable homes in the shires. They should think for a moment how they would feel if they were in my surgery, in which I see family after family in housing discomfort and desperation, and bitterly dissatisfied. My housing caseload is a catalogue of human misery, worry and desperation. How many Tory Members go back to the awful circumstances experienced by my constituents?

How many parents of Tory Members experience conditions like those of Mrs. Harvey and her pensioner friends in my constituency, a case described in the local paper? She lives in a Leyton tower block and hates it. Not only do the lifts not work, but they are filthy and never get cleaned over the weekend because the council does not pay the caretaker overtime. When the lifts do not work there is a long haul up to her 11th floor flat. Mrs. Harvey and her friends dream of having their own front doors and gardens with a bit of green—nothing too fancy—but they realise that they are no longer spring chickens. Mrs. Harvey knows that in a few years she will not be able to climb stairs any more.

How many Tory Members have wives and children trapped on the tops of tower blocks unsuitable for their means, like Mrs. Palfreman and her two children and many others in my constituency? Another example is that of Mrs. Dibley and her large family who live in overcrowded conditions in property too small, dilapidated and inadequate for their living requirements. I have had cases in which teenage daughters and sons have had to share bedrooms or even where mothers are forced to share rooms with teenage sons because of their poor housing circumstances. I bet not many Conservative Members have experience of such housing problems. How can they say that monetarist cuts apply in these circumstances?

Let us compare this housing starkness under the Tories with Labour's alternative. We plan for a big boost in resources, extensive building of new homes and repairs and improvements to existing ones. Priority will be given to providing new homes for rent, a sector in which the need is overwhelming. There will be an enhanced role for local authorities, lifting the present Government restrictions on them, and for housing co-operatives. We shall provide new help for low-income households. That is a proper programme for decent homes, providing many jobs in the process. We need this programme of action for the people of Leyton and Leytonstone. My borough also needs a big boost in its housing investment allocation.

The Tory party should be ashamed when it sees Labour's effective housing alternative. It should be ashamed at its rough-neck reaction to the Church of England report, of its application of monetarist policies to housing and of what that has meant in personal misery to many of my constituents and thousands of others in the country. It should be ashamed of backing the Chancellor. He has applied monetarist policies even to his own father-in-law, who has had to live in impoverished circumstances on state benefit—Victorian values, indeed.

The hon. Member for Leyton (Mr. Cohen) threw away what I thought was a good speech with some rather personal attacks at the end, which did not add much strength to his argument. If we are talking about shame, he might care to consider what happened to the housing investment programme under the previous Labour Government. He will find that the major reductions occurred then. There were reductions of some 49 per cent. as compared with 20 per cent. under this Administration. If the hon. Gentleman wants to dish out accusations and invite shame, he might address himself as much to the Opposition Benches as to these.

The hon. Gentleman made a tactical mistake when he implied that there was lack of concern among Conservative Members who represent London constituencies. When I finish the fourth Adjournment debate today, I shall go to my advice bureau in Acton—the second this week—where I shall deal with housing problems, just like the hon. Gentleman. I know that Conservative colleagues who represent London seats are as committed to tackling their constituents' problems as is the hon. Gentleman.

The hon. Gentleman mentioned the M11. The Government have taken on board the implications for local residents of major road improvement schemes. I have had discussions with local councillors about the implications for the council's housing programme of having to accommodate some of the households that will be displaced by the Department of Transport's road scheme. My hon. Friend the Minister of State for Transport has been in touch with the hon. Gentleman about road scheme issues.

Waltham Forest's housing investment programme allocation of £8·270 million for the current year took account of the council's plans to fund a newbuild scheme to assist with the decanting programme. The allocation represented 92·5 per cent. of the council's 1984–85 allocation, when it had been advised to plan on the basis of receiving at least 80 per cent. The hon. Gentleman can be assured that previous HIP allocations had also taken account of the council's plans.

For 1986–87 the council's recently announced allocation of £7·716 million will allow the council to continue with the decanting programme. I understand that development of the Sinnot road site has been delayed, but another site already started at Netley road includes 67 general purpose dwellings to assist in the decant programme. Decisions on the timing to undertake housing schemes are entirely for local authorities, in the light of available resources and local housing needs.

I am satisfied that, within the resources available to London as a whole, housing capital allocations to Waltham Forest borough council have had full regard to local housing needs. I can confirm that special account was taken of the council's plans to develop two newbuild housing schemes to assist with its decanting programme associated with major road schemes in the borough.

The hon. Gentleman said that, to tackle the housing problems in his constituency—I accept that there are housing problems there—there must be increased public expenditure. He set to one side the role of the private sector in helping to tackle such problems. There are now 3 million more owner-occupiers than when we came to office. If it is possible to develop policies that bring owner-occupation within the reach of more people, pressure on local authorities is reduced, and they can concentrate their resources on people for whom owner-occupation is not an option.

The hon. Gentleman should consider the wide range of schemes that we have introduced such as low-cost home ownership and homesteading. He will find that we have taken pressure off local authorities by encouraging people who have traditionally looked to the local authority for a solution of their housing problems to look elsewhere and to adopt a form of tenure which most of them want.

There has been no mortgage famine. Indeed, there has been ready availability, and land has been available for builders. We have been able to bring owner-occupation within the reach of more people. We have encouraged local authorities to have partnership schemes with private developers. Some local authorities are just sitting on land hoping that, one day, a Government will give them enough money to develop it so that they can build council houses for rent.

Some of the more enlightened authorities have said that they should make that land available to the private sector for low-cost home ownership, but insist that, in the first instance, the homes are offered either to sitting council tenants or to people on their waiting lists. If they adopt that approach, that will not increase public expenditure. Indeed, it will reduce it because they will receive capital for the land. Such an attitude will help them to make real progress with their housing problems. If a tenant buys a new house, the authority has the advantage of a re-let; if it is sold to someone on the waiting list, the pressure on the list is reduced. I did not detect any understanding of the role of the private sector in what the hon. Gentleman said.

Some 62 per cent. of tenants in the private sector are owner-occupiers. If we concentrate on public sector stock and public expenditure only, we are not adopting a total approach to housing. It is right to harness the energy of the private sector to try to tackle the problems outlined by the hon. Gentleman.

Some difficult council estates are being transferred to the private sector, with sitting tenants who retain all their rights, such as the right to buy. The private sector has transformed those estates and made them satisfactory places in which to live. Both Labour and Conservative authorities have adopted that partnership approach so as to make faster progress in tackling housing problems.

I am aware of the role of the private sector. Indeed, I mentioned that improvement grants should be expanded, not blocked as new improvement grants have been since August 1984. If the Minister is so keen on giving the private sector support, he should provide additional money so that the improvement grants can be reinstated.

Many of the schemes to which the Minister referred, such as improvement for sale, are mostly cosmetic because those who most desperately need housing just cannot afford them, even with the discounts being provided. The result is that many of the homes allocated under those schemes are left empty, and that makees those in need of homes very angry.

When we took office in 1979, the figure spent on improvement grants by local authorities was £90 million. Two years ago, that figure rose to £900 million. It has now settled at between £400 million and £500 million. That is substantially more than was being spent by the previous Administration. The hon. Gentleman is being somewhat selective in his criticism.

On improvement for sale and other initiatives such as homesteading, local authorities must ensure that those to whom homes are allocated will modernise and occupy them quickly. My borough imposes quite tough conditions on when people must begin work if they wish to continue to be eligible for improvement grants and for the delayed start of mortgage repayments.

The hon. Gentleman did not pay sufficient attention to the role of the private sector in tackling housing problems in his constituency. He mentioned the problems of tenants in getting local authorities to effect repairs. He will be pleased to know that, as from 1 January, local authority, new town and housing association tenants will have a right to repair. An item of work that costs between £20 and £200, such as repairing a cracked cistern or a leaking pipe, can now be paid for by the tenant, who will be reimbursed by the authority. That is a worthwhile extension of the many rights that we have given to tenants since we took office.

Leaflets will be available shortly to local authority tenants. We can give the hon. Gentleman a supply of them for his advice bureau if he would like that. The work may be carried out more quickly under the new proposals than if tenants continue to rely solely on local authorities.

The hon. Gentleman mentioned renovation of housing stock. We have a much clearer picture of the position since we undertook a survey, with the help of some authorities, earlier this year. We were especially grateful for the cooperation of Waltham Forest in that exercise. The borough council is an enthusiastic supporter of our policy to improve private sector stock. The housing strategy that it has drafted for next year shows that it proposes to continue with that support. Indeed, almost 30 per cent. of its bid for housing capital resources has been planned for improving the private sector stock.

It is important that improvement grants, which are not as readily available as they were, should be targeted by the local authority at those who can least afford to pay for the repair and improvement of their property. The council newbuild programme continues to give support by providing accommodation for those with special needs, the elderly, disabled and others who are not able to cope easily for themselves.

The hon. Gentleman implied that the allocations announced yeaterday were inadequate. Whatever figure we had announced, the Opposition would have found it inadequate, but we had to bear in mind the Government's overall economic strategy, and the need to keep control of public expenditure and keep down inflation.

London's share of the national allocation of £1·5 billion is 30 per cent. That is recognition of the special housing needs of the capital. In addition, the boroughs can invest a worthwhile proportion of the receipts that they generate through the sale of council houses to tenants and through sales of vacant housing and land. The abolition of the GLC means that the allocation that the GLC would have had has been redistributed to the London boroughs, which will also have the spending power associated with the GLC's capital receipts.

The London borough of Waltham Forest, within which the hon. Gentleman's constituency lies, has received an allocation for next year of £7·716 million. That represents 91·4 per cent. of the council's 1984–85 allocation and fully honours the commitment given to all local authorities in December of last year that they could plan their forward housing programmes on the basis that their allocations for next year would be at least 70 per cent. of their initial allocations for 1984–85. As I say, Waltham Forest has capital receipts which it has built up and it can augment the allocation by using that money.

In total, these resources can be used by the council to meet what it judges to be local housing needs and priorities, including those in the hon. Gentleman's constituency. The council's housing strategy seems to contain the right priorities—eliminating unfit housing, increasing the supply of accommodation for special needs, upgrading unsatisfactory housing, securing additional local authority accommodation to meet general housing needs, such as decanting, and improving the environment of housing areas.

The specific problems include an aging stock with disrepair in the private sector, particularly in the pre-1919 stock. The council also has disrepair in some of its own buildings and a poor external environment to some of its estates. There are 9,300 unfit dwellings in the borough, with 5,700 not having internal WCs or proper bathrooms. It also has the problem of 570 houses affected by the problems of pre-stressed reinforced concrete dwellings. We have made provision to help local authorities with difficulty in meeting their obligations under the Housing Defects Act 1984.

I was involved in an initiative not long ago in the hon. Gentleman's borough. I refer to the Walthamstow neighbourhood home improvement agency, which is in the neighbouring constituency to his. Two years ago I opened, in conjunction with the London borough of Waltham Forest and the Anglia building society, the Walthamstow neighbourhood home improvement agency, the object of which was to provide advice and help to poor, elderly owner-occupiers in an area of the borough covering more than 4,000 homes.

That was run on a non-profit-making basis, giving free advice, and it made a big impact in the area. Indeed, the house from which the scheme is run was itself improved and converted, giving people living in the area an idea of the potential of their own homes. With a commitment by the local authority to improvement grants and the availability of top-up mortgages from the building society, that is the sort of partnership scheme that the Government want to see, and I know that other similar initiatives are being considered.

From my Department's urban housing renewal unit, £50 million of the resources available for housing next year is being made available to assist local authorities to carry out schemes to be identified and agreed in discussion with my Department. We hope that there will be a constructive meeting with Waltham Forest to ascertain whether there is some scope for part of the £50 million to be spent in Waltham Forest to turn round some of the difficult estates.

I do not underestimate the problems facing the hon. Member for Leyton and his constituents. We are doing what we can for Waltham Forest, but we believe that more progress will be made more quickly if we broaden the horizon and harness the resources of the private sector rather than concentrating exclusively on a public sector solution.

Christmas is a time for families, a time for loved ones to be reunited in their own homes, to enjoy themselves and to be together. Most important of all, Christmas is a time for children.

It is with particular sadness, although with particular appropriateness, that on the Friday before Christmas 1985 the House should be debating the tragic story of a young girl who will not be at home and will not be with the family that she loves. Sadly, this will be the third Christmas that she will be spending away from her home in Harlow, where she was brought up since she was three or four months old. She will be in Nigeria. She will be in a strange country, with strange customs, with strange people.

That is the result of the deceit and trickery of her natural mother, the mother who had no contact with her child since her birth until August 1983 and who kidnapped and took the young girl to Nigeria.

In 1971, one of my constituents, Mrs. Jean Dwyer, who lives in Harlow, saw an advertisement in a magazine asking for someone to foster a Nigerian baby girl. She applied because most of her family had grown up and left home and because she had fostered Nigerian girls before. She entered into a private undertaking—a fostering arrangement—between herself and Oluronke's natural mother. It was all proper and above board because Mrs. Dwyer deposited the agreement and had it ratified with the local authority.

All went well. From 1971 to August 1983 the little girl lived happily as part of Mrs. Dwyer's family. She went to a local school and she made many friends. She was a happy little girl who had spent all her formative life in Great Britain, in Harlow.

There was a problem in 1975 when for some reason the natural mother, aided and abetted by the natural father, tried to snatch the girl back. Perhaps that was because in 1974 her natural parents had separated and their marriage was dissolved, but we do not know. As a result of the attempted snatching, Mrs. Dwyer went, properly, to the High Court and Oluronke was made a ward of the High Court, with custody, care and control going to Mrs. Dwyer.

From 1975 until 1983, all was happiness. There were no further disturbances and no further contact with the natural parents. A happy little girl was living in a loving environment in my constituency. Then the High Court did something outrageous, and certainly inexplicable. On the application of the natural mother, it ordered that the little girl should have access to her natural mother, the mother who had had no contact with the little girl since she was born. To make matters worse and to compound the High Court's ludicrous decision, which is still a mystery to me, the mother was allowed to take the child away overnight. This only heralded the obvious tragedy. The natural mother took the child away, despite the protestations of Mrs. Dwyer and the little girl, and Mrs. Dwyer never saw Oluronke again.

The natural mother said to the little girl, "I am taking you on a shopping trip to Amsterdam." Nothing could have been further from the truth. It was nothing more than a wicked deception. The little girl was taken on an aeroplane not to Amsterdam but to Nigeria.

Several months passed before Mrs. Dwyer heard anything about Oluronke. Hon. Members can understand that she was worried out of her mind. The High Court sensibly ordered a full press and television search. The High Court said, "Give the case the maximum coverage. We must find this little girl. The natural mother is clearly in contempt of court because the little girl is a ward of the court and under its jurisdiction."

After several months, letters from Oluronke started to arrive showing that she was desperately unhappy. She was in a strange country with strange customs, strange people and sometimes a strange language, because she had been brought up and educated in Harlow in Britain. She did not know anything about Nigerian customs. She was Nigerian only by birth. It appears that the natural mother does not care for the child in any way, as the little girl does not even live with her. She has been dumped into the custody of a 90-year-old grandfather.

The little girl has been managing to contact Mrs. Dwyer through letters smuggled with the aid of the little girl next door. It may be of interest to the House if I give an example of the type of letter the little girl has been writing to her home. She has said:

"These past few months have been agony. All the memories of England, Harlow and, most of all, home have just been closing in on my mind, although since I started school I don't get so much time alone and so I am now occupied. But in the first months things were really terrible. Even now, sometimes when I'm watching TV and I see a programme from England, it reminds me of us all arguing over what programme to watch. So you can see, I can never never forget you and all you did for me, and I am determined to pay you back even if not in money … I will always love you, even if we are not successful in my returning. I could never resent you for that. So if you don't have the money, please don't worry yourself at all about it.

Bye now, Love,

Ronke."

That is an example of the tragic, pathetic letters that Mrs. Dwyer, the foster mother, receives from the little girl.

The House and the vast majority of the people in Britain are outraged at such cases. We are not prepared to accept the abduction of young children to strange countries. There was a time, before the Child Abduction and Custody Act 1985 and before we were signatories to the Hague convention, which deals with this problem, when the Foreign and Commonwealth Office was dealing with 150 child abduction cases a year. There was a time when about 200 illegally abducted children were brought to this country each year. It is no surprise to my hon. Friend the Under-Secretary of State that there is still a serious problem of child abduction. The Child Abduction and Custody Act 1985 and the Hague convention are utterly meaningless unless all countries are willing to make them work. It will be no surprise to the House and to my hon. Friend to know that Nigeria is not a signatory to the Hague convention.

It is normal in a debate involving the Foreign and Commonwealth Office to lash out and blame it for all kinds of difficulties. After all, my right hon. Friend the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster once said that the Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food was for farmers and the Foreign Office was for foreigners. I do not subscribe to that view. My hon. Friend's Department and his two predecessors have been helpful. They have done all in their power to facilitate the return of this little girl. I commend my hon. Friend and his officials, with whom I have had numerous dealings, for the hard work that they have put into the case.

The difficulty is simple. We are not receiving co-operation from the Nigerian authorities. Money is no object. We have raised enough cash to enable this little girl to be flown back to Great Britain. Passports are not a problem because the Foreign Office and the high commission in Lagos have arranged for an emergency passport to be available for her. What is happening with the Nigerian authorities? Precisely nothing.

The problem is not helped by the natural parents' and the grandfather's attempts to prevent this little girl from returning to this country. I cannot understand why. Shocking threats have been made to this girl. Unfortunately, letters stopped coming from Oluronke to Mrs. Dwyer some time in July this year because the natural family discovered that there had been correspondence between them. They discovered that Sola, the littel girl next door, had been helping with the correspondence. They discovered the plan for Oluronke to return here.

One of the last letters from Oluronke received by Mrs. Dwyer said:

"Dear Auntie Jean,

I am sure now that there will be no way of me returning to England now only for a holiday or after I have finished school here. Every day the people here will be watching my every movement and if I was still to return it would put Sola"—

that is the little girl next door—

"into so much trouble. Although I can honestly say I don't regret my correspondence with you I do regret letting Sola get involved in all this and I swear to God I would have given my life here yesterday just to get her out of all this trouble. Anyway I really wrote to inform you that both my father and mother intend writing to you in the near future. I can't explain what I want to tell you very well but they both swear that when you read their letter you'll die immediately so please if any letter arrives from Nigeria take it straight to your lawyer or barrister but whatever you do don't open it please. This is very important."

What type of people put such terror into the mind of a girl of 14 or 15? What type of people are prepared to go to such lengths to prevent that girl from going back to the family that she loves and to the only home that she has ever known? It is as obscene as it is monstrous. Today is probably a last-ditch attempt to try to get this little girl back. On Monday, I went to the Nigerian high commission and delivered a letter to be sent to the new President of Nigeria asking him whether, for humanitarian if no other reason, he would intervene in the case to try and stop the obfuscation by the authorities and to obtain some co-operation with the family so that this girl can come back.

I ask my hon. Friend the Under-Secretary to do all he can to persuade the Nigerian authorities to be co-operative. They should at least give the little girl a chance to go to the British high commission in Lagos and say that she wants to come home or give her the chance to express her point of view and preferences. I ask him to do all he can to put pressure on the Nigerian Government to become a signatory to the Hague convention, so that, even if we can do nothing in this case, we can prevent such things from happening again.

Most importantly, I am grateful for the work that my hon. Friend and his predecessors have put in, but we must not give up. It is shocking that the little girl should have to endure what she is putting up with at the moment and that she should be so desperately unhappy. The now widowed Mrs. Dwyer spent the years from 1971 to 1983 loving and caring for the child and she will now have to spend another Christmas on her own. The only thing that she has to comfort her are her memories.

I pay a warm tribute to my hon. Friend the Member for Harlow (Mr. Hayes) for the way in which he has fought so steadfastly and determinedly on behalf of his constituent Mrs. Dwyer. It is an extremely sad case and he has described it very movingly to the House. My own personal sympathies go to Mrs. Dwyer and to Oluronke.

Few Members in the House would have done as much as my hon. Friend has on behalf of his constituent. I know that at least twice he visited my predecessors to discuss the case. I am particularly grateful to him for the warm tribute that he paid to the officials of our consular department. The work done by our consular offices throughout the world is under-rated and under-valued. They often work long and unreasonable hours against unreasonable expectations by British citizens. It is nice when hon. Members such as my hon. Friend the Member for Harlow feel able to pay a real tribute to their work. On Christmas day, as on every other day of the year, there will be a consular officer on duty in the consular department in London, standing by to assist in any emergencies that may occur on 25 December.

Before I comment on the sad circumstances of the case I should like to take the opportunity of reminding the House of the background against which all cases of international child abduction have to be considered. It is to be regretted that child abductions are becoming all too common and more frequent. The ones who suffer are not the parents but the children, who often become little more than pawns in bitter marital and legal disputes. However, it is an inescapable fact that when children are removed from Britain, whether they are the subject of a court order of custody or wardship, they become subject to the law of the country where they happen to be and are no longer within the jurisdiction of the British courts.

At present, there is no machinery for the enforcement outside the United Kingdom of British court orders of custody or wardship. In the absence of an amicable agreement between the parties concerned, the only legal course open to the aggrieved party is to take action to be awarded custody in the courts of the country where the children are. It would be for those courts to decide what relevance, if any, to attach to a British court order. Unfortunately, any action overseas would be costly, as British legal aid is not available for legal actions taken in overseas jurisdiction. In the majority of cases, sadly, legal aid will not be available to the British subject in the country where the legal jurisdiction operates. Our diplomatic and consular posts overseas cannot initiate legal action, nor can they represent the plaintiff in court. I stress that we fully accept that we have a general responsibility in such a case to do what we can to help, but the extent to which we can help will vary from country to country, and even from case to case.

Since early in 1983, our consular officers have been under instructions to assist as soon as they are contacted by a parent whose child has been abducted. Their instructions cover the following courses of action: first, to provide lists of local lawyers to enable parents to pursue their case through local channels; secondly, if they are so requested, to try to obtain from the local authorities a report on the child's welfare; and, thirdly, to give any assistance they can in connection with granting access to the children, including if necessary offering facilities where a meeting with the children could take place. Further, after consultation with our consular department in London, officially or unofficially they can draw to the attention of the local authorities information about British court orders affecting the children; they can do what they properly can to help bring about a speedy conclusion of any legal proceedings dealing with the child's custody; and, finally, they can approach the local authorities for help in tracing abducted minors.

However, the situation is made more difficult if the child or children concerned, as well as being British, are citizens of the country where they are being held—in other words, dual nationals. It is a matter of internationally accepted practice that a consular officer cannot afford protection to dual nationals in the country of their second nationality. Any representations on their behalf have to be informal and, sadly, the authorities of the country concerned would be within their rights to say that the British Government had no standing to intervene.

My hon. Friend referred to the Child Abduction and Custody Act 1985, which came into effect in October last year. The purpose of the Act is to try to reduce, and ideally to eliminate, the incidence of child abduction from this country. Under its terms, the abduction of a child, even by one of its parents or guardians, is a criminal offence. Anyone suspecting that a child is at risk of abduction can inform the Home Office. A warning will then be sent immediately to ports and airports.

Furthermore, child abduction is an extraditable offence. If a child has been abducted to a country with which the United Kingdom has an extradition treaty, it is for the police and the Director of Public Prosecutions to decide whether action for the extradition of the offender could and should be initiated. However, even if the offender were extradited to this country, that of itself would not necessarily guarantee the return of the child. Unfortunately, in several cases reported to us during the past year, the abduction has been unexpected, and the offender has left the country before the ports could be warned. That happened in the case with which my hon. Friend is concerned.

The problem of child abduction affects not only this country; it is worldwide. As my hon. Friend knows, two international conventions came into force in the second half of 1983. Their purpose is to achieve some mutual recognition of the court orders of wardship or custody of one country in another and to help right the wrongs of child abduction. Those conventions are the European convention on recognition and enforcement of decisions concerning custody of children and on restoration of custody of children, and the Hague convention on the civil aspects of international child abduction. The United Kingdom is a signatory of both conventions, but we have not yet ratified them. The Child Abduction and Custody Act 1985 will enable us to ratify both conventions when it comes into force. We hope to do that some time next year. The terms of the conventions are incorporated in the Act, which will give them the force of law in the United Kingdom.

The terms of the conventions can be applied only between states which have ratified them. Although the existence of the conventions is a step in the right direction, their wider effectiveness will depend on future ratification by other signatories, and the number of cases for which solutions may be sought will be limited by the number of countries which have ratified the conventions. At present there are no proposals to make bilateral agreements with countries that have not acceded to the conventions.

I turn to the specific case which my hon. Friend raised so ably today. It must be considered against the background that I have just outlined. The case is expremely sad, and has caused considerable anguish and distress to the child's foster mother, Mrs. Dwyer.

Oluronke was born in London in 1970 to Nigerian parents. She is a British citizen by birth, but also a Nigerian citizen. When she was three months old, she was fostered to my hon. Friend's constituents, Mr. and Mrs. Dwyer. In 1976, Oluronke was made a ward of court, and care and control were granted to Mr. and Mrs. Dwyer. Furthermore, when Mr. Dwyer sadly died, the court granted care and control to Mrs. Dwyer alone. However, the court stressed that Oluronke's natural parents were to be allowed reasonable access, and during an access visit her mother abducted her to Nigeria.

I well understand Mrs. Dwyer's anxiety for Oluronke's welfare and her desire that Oluronke should return to the United Kingdom. It must be tragic when someone to whom one has dedicated 13 years of love and care is suddenly snatched away. I fully sympathise with Mrs. Dwyer, and my heart goes out to her. I cannot do other than condemn the act of abduction which was in direct breach of a United Kingdom court order. Oluronke is now at the home of her natural mother and grandfather. She is living in her grandfather's house, which in the context of the Nigerian extended family is not as unusual as it would be in the United Kingdom. As she is still a minor, she may not leave Nigeria without the permission of her natural parents.

As my hon. Friend said, both her mother and grandfather are opposed to her return. Oluronke is now attending school, and we understand that she has made some friends of her own age. That is help, albeit to a small degree. As she is a Nigerian child living with her natural family in Nigeria, she is subject to Nigerian law, and I am sorry to say that our high commission in Lagos has no formal standing to intervene in her case.

When Oluronke is 18 she will be able to apply in her own right for a British passport, to which she would be entitled, and, travelling under that passport, she would be able to return to the United Kingdom without any let or hindrance.

The message that I must give my hon. Friend is especially sad and harsh. He has done everything that he can to assist his constituent and has asked me to give an assurance that we shall not give up. He has not given up, and I gladly assure him that we shall not give up. I wish Oluronke well, and I hope that it will not be too long before she is reunited with Mrs. Dwyer.

The Minister for the Arts has explained to me why he is unable to be present today. He is attending a meeting of Ministers in Brussels. I am sure that the Under-Secretary of State for the Environment—the hon. Member for Mitcham and Morden (Mrs. Rumbold)—will be an admirable substitute. The Minister has offered me a meeting to discuss arts funding in the new year, and I shall take up his offer keenly.

I start from the view that the arts have an enormous value for millions of people. Governments of all political persuasions must encourage the production of the arts to foster creativity, and must at the same time ensure that the general public can enjoy the arts—especially the performing arts—at prices which everyone can reasonably afford. Those twin principles—the fostering of initiative and creativity, and encouraging the public to participate in and enjoy the arts—are the cornerstones of any sensible arts funding policy.

Sadly, the present position is not so happy. Many artistic institutions will have great problems when the GLC and the metropolitan county councils are abolished at the end of March 1986. The funds at present placed at the disposal of artistic institutions by the GLC and the metropolitan counties will not be available after 1 April. The Government have recognised the problem and have said that they will make available additional funds through the Arts Council to enable replacement funding for the institutions that will suffer. However, the amount is insufficient.

I can do no better than quote a letter that I received only two days ago from the chairman of the Arts Council, Sir William Rees-Mogg. On the general problem of replacement funding, he wrote:

"I must make clear to you the very great difficulties the Council faces with regard to post-abolition funding given that the sum of £25 million provided by Government to replace Met. County spending on the Arts, while an improvement on the originally intimated £16 million, still falls far short of the £35 million which the Council has identified as the real need."

That is not the Opposition speaking; that is the chairman of the Arts Council, appointed by the Government, telling them that the amount of replacement funding should be £35 million, not £25 million. That is the root cause of the problem which I shall discuss today. That is the major problem facing many artistic institutions that are vying for too small a part of Arts Council funding.

I hope that the Government will not give the excuse that the Minister for the Arts gave at a recent Question Time when he said that arts funding has risen by 7 per cent. in real terms under this Government. The arts world is baffled by that figure and every calculation demonstrates that it is not correct. I hope that the Government will not start saying that they have been very good to the arts and that we should appreciate that. The simple fact is that £35 million is needed and £25 million is being made available. That is about to have a serious effect on the arts.

I wish to speak principally about two artistic institutions in my constituency—two theatres that receive funds from the Greater London council. They are the Almeida theatre and the Sadler's Wells theatre.

The Almeida was founded about six years ago and has shown a remarkable development, largely through the initiative, enterprise and creativity of the small group who started the theatre and have put in a tremendous amount of work to make it an institution which is respected not only nationally, but internationally. Remarkable progress has been made in those six years.

Not only have those at the theatre produced great achievement in artistic terms, but they have transformed a derelict building into one of the most attractive theatres in the country. The mixture of productions, ranging from the almost popular to the wildly avant garde, has added new dimensions to the artistic enjoyment available within our capital city.

The people at the theatre have adopted an extremely sensible housekeepng approach to funding and the management of resources. They have worked hard, with a skeleton staff, and have put in enormous effort. If the Government are as dedicated to such values as they keep saying that they are, they ought to recognise that the people at the Almeida have put in an enormous amount of work for little reward, being dedicated solely to creating a vibrant and exciting artistic institution.

The theatre has made strenuous efforts to seek private sponsorship for its activities and has been successful to a limited extent, but there are limits to the amounts that private companies are prepared to put into experimental theatre of the type that the Almeida is particularly interested in promoting.

The theatre has used pricing policy to good effect. Seat prices have been raised as high as possible, without losing custom and reducing the size of audiences. In all possible respects, the theatre has adopted a sensible and cost-effective approach to the business of putting on theatrical productions. It is sad that there is no guarantee that the money that the theatre receives from the GLC, both in capital and revenue terms, will be replaced when the council is abolished.

The other artistic institution in my constituency about which I am particularly worried is the Sadler's Walls theatre, which has a long and honourable history, going back far beyond the innovative and recent development of the Almeida theatre.

The recent announcement of the Arts Council that Sadler's Wells and four other so-called receiving theatres would not receive Arts Council funding after abolition has thrown the theatre into a deep and distressing quandary. The decision by the Arts Council not to provide any replacement funds for the receiving theatres runs contrary to the apparent assurances that were given to Sadler's Wells in the past. I quote first from a letter written on 16 April 1984 by Lord Gowrie, who wrote to the right hon. Member for Chelmsford (Mr. St. John-Stevas), who had taken up the question of Sadler's Wells funding:

"When I met representatives from Sadler's Wells last December (1983), I undertook to consider their case for some form of central funding. I am glad to say that it will now be possible for Sadler's Wells to apply to the Arts Council to make up the deficit in their funding caused by the abolition of the GLC. Final decisions as to the distribution of new funds will of course rest with the Arts Council"—

this is the get out—

"but I am sure that they will sympathetically consider any approach made by Sadler's Wells."

If sympathetic consideration is a rejection of any replacement funding, I shudder to think what unsympathetic consideration might be.

Subsequent to that, on 23 September this year, the hon. Member for Shoreham (Mr. Luce), now the Minister for the Arts, wrote to the chairman of Sadler's Wells:

"I appreciate Sadler's Wells' worries and I can assure you that the Arts Council are aware of them too. As you know, the GLC's grant to the theatre was taken into account in calculating the £16 million additional funding which the Government has already announced for the Arts Council."

If the Sadler's Wells grant was taken into account in the original £16 million, why, now that the amount is £25 million rather than £16 million, is Sadler's Wells not to get any funding that has been made available to the Arts Council?

It must also be borne in mind that the £267,000 for which Sadler's Wells has applied represents only slightly above 10 per cent. of its gross turnover. It is not asking for massive funding of large proportions of its operations. It is asking only for that amount that is the shortfall that it needs to remain viable in business. It has made strenuous efforts to attract private sponsorship and commercial support. In 1985–86, that amount will reach over £350,000. However, it cannot, in the 15 weeks left to it between the announcement of the Arts Council decision and the start of the next financial year, find the further £250,000 that it will require to make up the shortfall, because no funds are now available.

The Government's decision, through the Arts Council, not to provide funds to Sadler's Wells will undermine the confidence which private and commercial sponsors will wish to see before they put funds in the theatre when the GLC goes. The point that so far has been consistently made in terms of both the Almeida theatre and Sadler's Wells by Government Ministers when they talk about these matters is that the local borough should pick up some of the tab when the GLC goes.

I endorse everything that my hon. Friend has said about the Almeida theatre and Sadler's Wells, being an admirer of both. Will he consider the problem of many other theatres in London, particularly innovative local community theatres such as the St. George's theatre in Tufnell Park in my constituency, as also being serious? The real problem is that the Government should be providing sufficient money to make up for the shortfall following the appalling decision to abolish the GLC in the first place.

I entirely agree with my hon. Friend. These examples from my constituency are but two among many that will be affected by the decision to abolish the metropolitan county councils and the GLC.

I noticed that the hon. Lady the Under-Secretary was nodding when I said that the successor authorities are expected to pick up the tab. That claim ignores the fact that the borough already provides both theatres with some support. In revenue terms, the amount is small but, in terms of a 25 per cent. contribution to partnership funding for capital works in both theatres, it is substantial. In addition, both theatres receive their mandatory 50 per cent. rate relief and the discretionary 50 per cent. rate relief, which represents a substantial contribution from the borough's ratepayers in forgone rate income.

Does the hon. Gentleman agree that the Government's claim also ignores the promise that the Minister for the Arts made to the Select Committee on Education, Science and Arts that there would be sufficient Government money to continue supporting GLC and metropolitan counties' arts enterprises?

Yes indeed. There is quite clearly insufficient money to continue the full operations of the artistic institutions that are supported by those councils which are about to be abolished.

Two other factors must be borne in mind when the Government say that the borough must pick up the tab. First, the borough of Islington is rate capped. We were told only this week that a reduction of 18 per cent. in rates levied on the people of Islington is demanded by the Government in the coming financial year. How will the additional money that will be required be found from a diminishing pool to support those theatres when the GLC goes? Secondly, the theatres do not relate solely to a small community — they represent borough and regional resources. It can be argued that their attraction goes beyond the capital city. It is up to the Government to recognise, through the Arts Council, that they have a relevance beyond Islington.

I call on the Government to do three things, and I hope that the hon. Lady will be able to give me some assurances. First, they should admit the gross inadequacy of the £25 million that is being made available to the Arts Council as replacement funding. Secondly, they should recognise the special status of these valuable artistic institutions as regional resources rather than merely local ones. Thirdly, they should show some shred of recognition that the arts are essential to our community, and that they are not a luxury to be cut as a result of easy whim.

The arts are an essential part of the civilization that goes with a democracy. If these theatres and others like them suffer as a result of lack of financial commitment from the Government, the quality of life in Britain will be diminished. Heaven knows, life in Islington is hard enough. These two artistic institutions provide a little joy to my constituents. The Government are full set on a course that will remove that joy.

I reiterate the apologies of my hon. Friend the Minister for the Arts, who cannot be present to respond to the debate. As the hon. Member for Islington, South and Finsbury (Mr. Smith) said, my hon. Friend has explained to him that he is in Brussels and has offered to meet him in the new year. If I am unable fully to cover all the points raised by the hon. Gentleman, my hon. Friend will write to him.

The hon. Gentleman felt that it was important that Government, among others, should continue to encourage the arts. I do not think that anyone would disagree with that. Indeed, I believe that the Government have fully demonstrated, by their actions, that they are committed to that.

It may be helpful if I begin by outlining our position on funding the arts after abolition. The Government have always recognised that abolition of the GLC and metropolitan county councils would have important implications for arts funding, bearing in mind the prominent role which the GLC and MCCs have taken in this sphere. As a result, on 11 April 1984 the then Minister for the Arts announced that the Government would make available £34 million in 1986–87 to replace GLC and MCC expenditure on the arts. That comprised £16 million for the Arts Council, £1 million for the British Film Institute and £17 million for museums. Those figures were based on the estimates then available of actual expenditure in 1983–84, adjusted forward for inflation to 1986–87, and after allowing for a take-up of essentially local activities by the successor districts and borough councils, which were, of course, being relieved of the significant GLC and MCC precepts. I should stress that at no time have we committed ourselves to making up the total deficit, because we consider there is a proper role for local funding. Similarly, we have never committed ourselves to funding additional activities and commitments which the GLC and MCCs have entered into after 1983–84, which may be part of the problem.

Nevertheless, during the course of 1985–86 many representations were made to my hon. Friend and his predecessor, Lord Gowrie, by the Arts Council and others, that the original calculations on which the £16 million had been based omitted significant arts expenditure that was either carried by the GLC and MCCs on other budgets or related to bodies that had come into operation after 1983–84. They also argued that the Government's funding should be increased to take account of the general expansion in arts spending by the GLC and MCCs that had taken place since 1983–84. A case was also made by the British Film Institute for additional post-abolition funding for film projects.

On 14 November, my hon. Friend announced the Government's response to those various representations. He announced that the Government were raising the £16 million allocated to the Arts Council to £25 million and the £1 million allocated to the British Film Institute to £1·3 million. Perhaps the hon. Gentleman would recognise that Sir William Rees-Mogg has played a significant part in enabling that increase to take place.

My hon. Friend also announced that the Arts Council's basic grant, excluding post-abolition funding, would be raised to £110·6 million, thus giving it a total grant of £135·6 million for 1986–87.

Together with the £17 million already announced for museums, this brings to over £43 million the Government's provision for post-abolition funding of the arts. It demonstrates our determination to maintain the level of Government support and to give arts bodies in the GLC and metropolitan areas a good foundation on which to build.

Nevertheless, the Arts Council figure of £25 million still leaves districts and boroughs to make a vitally important contribution. The Arts Council's estimate was that to meet all current arts requirements it would need £35 million. This seems to be slightly unreasonable because there is cause to expect districts and boroughs to bridge the gap when they will have been relieved of precepts to a much greater value than this sum—by definition, about £35 million said to be the current GLC-metropolitan county councils' contribution.

We believe strongly that local arts must have a base of local funding. If this is not forthcoming, or if successor authorities are unwilling to contribute adequately, it must call into question whether the arts are seen as sufficiently worthwhile in the area. I am sure that such a question does not arise in the hon. Gentleman's area.

The hon. Gentleman will be grateful to know that, in spite of the rate capping of Islington council, it will have the ability, because of the favourable grant that it has been given—about £11 million in excess of what it received last year—if it is prepared to look carefully at its expenditure, to contribute to the arts within its total budget. I trust that he will look at that with interest, if not with favour.

The Government take the view that there is a strong obligation on districts and boroughs to assess need in their areas and to meet it, often on the basis of matching contributions from central Government via the Arts Council. The hon. Gentleman will recognise that it is not for the Minister to dictate which project should be helped, although my hon. Friend has done his best to ensure that there is enough money to go round.

The hon. Lady refers to an additional £11 million going to the borough. She will appreciate that that must cover everything that the GLC at present provides for the people of Islington. She is suggesting that the total grant requirements of Sadler's Wells and the Almeida theatre, which between them—two artistic institutions alone — amount to £600,000, should come out of that £11 million. That, surely, is impossible.

I was merely suggesting that there should be some constribution, as the local contribution, from that money to help the Sadler's Wells and the Almeida theatre.

I come to the specific point that the hon. Gentleman made about Sadler's Wells and the general case that he put. The Arts Council said recently that it would not assume responsibility for the metropolitan counties' funding of receiving theatres, including Sadler's Wells. This is entirely consistent with the council's normal funding policy, which is to fund performance, not buildings.

The council firmly believes that it is for local authorities to provide and maintain buildings, but it has undertaken that, where it can assist other arts bodies in a particular district, it will do so, taking full account of the fact that the successor authority is shouldering its responsibility for receiving theatres.

My hon. Friend has received strong representations from a number of the arts bodies affected by the Arts Council's decision not to provide receiving theatres with replacement money. On 9 December he met representatives of Sadler's Wells, who told him of their anxieties.

My hon. Friend has much sympathy with these bodies. Equally, he understands the Arts Council's reluctance to break with its longstanding policy of not funding receiving theatres. He therefore welcomed and has commended to the affected bodies the council's clear indication that it was prepared to take into account successor authorities' funding of receiving theatres when considering the funding of other arts organisations in their areas. He believes firmly that funding of arts bodies should be a joint activity, bringing together the Arts Council and/or regional arts associations in partnership with local authorities and other local interests.

The Almeida is a producing house as well as a receiving theatre and the council has told my hon. Friend that it will be considering its case for replacement funding, in line with the claims of all other bodies presently funded by the GLC. The council does not expect to be able to announce its decision on funding for a few weeks.

As I have explained, we see funding of the arts as a plural activity; central Government have an important part to play but so, too, have local government and the private sector. We believe that we have upheld our part of the funding. Although the hon. Gentleman will not like what I am about to say, I shall reiterate that since the Government came to power in 1979 we have increased total central arts expenditure by nearly 10 per cent. in real terms and increased the Arts Council's basic budget by about 7 per cent. These figures take no account of the additional funding that we have provided to replace arts spending by the GLC and MCCs.

We believe that the Government have met their commitment, and through their provision of over £43 million for total post-abolition funding, including £25 million for the Arts Council, have recently given a generous lead to the successor authorities in the abolition areas.

Almost exactly three years ago, on Friday 17 December 1982, I presented a petition which said:

"There is a need for the full range of facilities to be maintained at Beckenham Hospital for the benefit of the local communities. Wherefore your petitioners pray that your Honourable House will urge the Secretary of State for Social Services to instruct the Bromley Health Authority to maintain the present range of facilities at Beckenham Hospital."

As I told the House at the time, the petition had been signed by a wide cross-section of community leaders. It was supported by more than 22,000 signatures, which were gathered in only six weeks. It represented the largest demonstration of support for a local institution that I could remember in the past 25 years.

That unprecedented gesture reflected, in part, the fear that the authorities would soon take far-reaching decisions without being aware of the strength of local sentiment and, in part, gratitude for the splendid skill and dedication of the staff at Beckenham hospital, which has been demonstrated so often for so many years.

The petition was prompted also by the fact that there is an imbalance in the provision of health facilities in the Bromley health authority district. Most of the hospital beds are in the south and most of the people live in the north. Nearly 50 per cent. of my constituents in the northwest third do not have cars and find journeys to hospitals in the southern part of the district exceedingly difficult.

We feared three years ago, and we still fear, that if cuts had to be made in any hospital provision, the convenience of the doctors who live and work in the south of the district would count for more than the convenience of the patients who live in the north. On 24 January 1983, in replying to the petition, the Secretary of State said:

"Bromley Health Authority will produce a Strategic Plan in 1983 setting out plans for developing local health services. While the Strategic Plan cannot be anticipated in detail, the Authority does intend to maintain a wide range of facilities at Beckenham Hospital for the benefit of the local community: this does not mean that the existing range of facilities will necessarily remain unchanged in every respect … but Beckenham Hospital will continue to play an important role in the district."

When the strategic plan was produced, it was eminently sensible. In its draft plan, Bromley health authority said that it had

"as a long-term objective the provision of 60 per cent. of hospital services in the north of the district in line with the distribution of the population."

That sensible declaration was widely welcomed when it was made, for it fitted the social as well as the demographic realities of life in the area.

Since the publication of the draft plan 25 years ago, there have been substantial changes in the provision of health care in Beckenham. Beckenham maternity hospital, which has given such good service to the community for so many years, will soon close. Its facilities will be transferred to Farnborough hospital, which lies about eight miles to the south of the present maternity hospital.

I have accepted the planned closure reluctantly. The move to Farnborough will create some inconvenience for constituents, especially in the north-west of my constituency. There are substantial medical arguments in favour of the transfer, although I would have wished that the Beckenham maternity hospital could continue on its present site until the planned new accommodation in Bromley hospital is available in the early 1990s. Meanwhile, there has been a reduction in the number of acute beds in Beckenham hospital. They were replaced by a geriatric day hospital and two wards of geriatric patients.

Despite some initial misgivings that the switch in emphasis towards geriatric provision was going too far, the present balance between orthopaedic beds, gynaecological beds and geriatric beds and the geriatric day hospital and outpatient services provides a service to the community that is highly valued. That service is provided efficiently and effectively in a way that commands the respect and affection of the community. There is one operating theatre in Beckenham hospital. From the beginning of January until 19 December this year, 2,245 operations were carried out there, showing that the theatre fills a real need and is managed most efficiently.

Despite the fact that Beckenham hospital has avoided a reputation for conveyor-belt medicine, its throughput of patients is substantially better than in the district as a whole and the regional average. In orthopaedic beds, Beckenham's throughput is 27; the average for the district is 20·2; and the average for the south-east Thames region is 27·2. It does not sound wholly appropriate to talk about throughput in reference to gynaecological beds, but the throughput figure for beds in the Beckenham gynaecological ward is 73, compared with a district average of 57·2 and a regional average of 64·7. In geriatric beds, where clearly throughput must be viewed differently, the Beckenham figures are slightly better than elsewhere in the district. The future of Beckenham should be assured on grounds of convenience and efficiency.

The Bromley health authority's meeting on 17 December was faced with a management paper recommending the closure of the operating theatre and the gynaecological and orthopaedic wards in Beckenham hospital. The management paper envisaged total closure of Beckenham hospital in the near future and the closure of all acute beds in Orpington hospital in the south of the district.

The Bromley health authority is spending, in round terms, £50 million a year on hospitals. Looking ahead to 1986–87, the Bromley health authority estimates that it will be faced with a shortfall in income of £2 million. To meet that shortfall, the health authority has been urged by the management to reduce the number of acute beds from 659 to 566 in 1986–87. In other words, to meet a projected revenue shortfall of 4 per cent., the management proposes a cut in acute beds of more than 16 per cent.

Of course a shortfall of £2 million a year is serious, but to meet this by a cut of 93 hospital beds is barmy. According to the management's own figures, it will produce a saving of £1·2 million a year. In other words, the management will have precipitated a major crisis in the Health Service locally and will still have gone barely halfway towards meeting the projected financial shortfall. That would plainly have the most harmful effect on our waiting lists.

At the moment, the Bromley health authority is in the top quarter of the 200 odd districts in England and Wales when it comes to the shortness of waiting lists, but 28 per cent. of the 350 people on our waiting lists have had to wait for more than a year for an operation. If the proposed plans go through, the waiting lists and the time that those on them will have to wait can be expected to escalate sharply.

The effect of the proposed changes on Beckenham hospital will be out of proportion to the savings that can be achieved. If and when the orthopaedic and gynaecological wards at Beckenham are closed, it is suggested that the beds will be filled with geriatric patients who at present go to Farnborough and Orpington hospitals. That would mean that the sole major identifiable saving would be made on the operating theatre at Beckenham hospital. Its closure will save £60,000 a year.

We are then talking about the destruction of Beckenham hospital as we know it for a paper saving of £60,000 a year. It would, of course, be possible not to move in additional geriatric patients, but just close the orthopaedic and gynaecological wards. When I discussed that matter with the management at Beckenham hospital yesterday, it was plain that that alternative made no economic sense when one considers the division of overheads. If the whole of Beckenham hospital were to be closed, it is said that the savings would be £2 million a year. I suspect that the estimated savings are illusory, while the social and medical loss would be enormous.

The most charitable thing that I can say about the proposals by the chairman of the Bromley health authority and the new management team is that they seem to be ill-considered and are likely to produce the maximum disruption for the minimum of saving.

The new chairman and the new management team should not be asked to take most of the blame for this new crisis. They are being strangled by the guidelines of the resource allocation working party. That working party, which produced its guidelines in the mid-1970s, had the laudable objective of seeking to equalise the provision of medical services across the country as a whole. That was a desirable objective, and it was hoped that progress towards achieving equality between one part of the country and another could be made painlessly by a process of differential growth between the regions.

Relatively under-provided regions would merely have a larger annual increment of growth than the relatively over-provided regions. In theory, no one would suffer. As Dick Crossman, the egalitarian and highly political Labour Secretary of State for Social Services, wrote in the 1970s:

"I can only equalise on an expanding budget."

Between 1979 and 1983, that in effect was what happened. There was differential growth on an expanding budget and the operation was comparatively painless.

In the past three years, however, London and the southeast have been faced with a real loss of resources as money has been transferred to other regions and the regions have been encouraged to carry out their own resources reallocation programme. That means that, if the RAWP guidelines continue to be enforced so enthusiastically, we shall be faced locally with a perpetual crisis. As one senior nurse said to me yesterday at Beckenham hospital, "However many economies we make in Bromley, we always seem to be £2 million a year short."

We have done what the Government want. Our administrative costs in Bromley are lower than those in the region as a whole, and we are saving £2 million a year through the introduction of competitive tendering. However, we still face a crisis. What then should be done? In the immediate future, the Bromley health authority management team should go back to the drawing hoard and do its sums again. I am glad to say that that is already happening.

There should be urgent talks between the Bromley health authority and the South-East Thames region about the application of the RAWP guidelines in the financial year 1986–87 and the years immediately following that. That will help during the course of the next month.

The Secretary of State and his admirable team of Ministers must look urgently at the application of the RAWP formula. I am glad to note that on 17 December this year the Secretary of State announced that he had asked the National Health Service management board to review the operation of the formula, particularly the way in which the relative needs in different parts of the country are measured. I hope that the review will act quickly but, inevitably, it will take time. The hospital service in my area, and in London as a whole, cannot wait for a lengthy academic review which may or may not produce some relief for the current crisis. In order to meet our immediate crisis, I hope that in the new year the Secretary of State will meet the chairmen of the four Thames regions and the chairmen of all the health districts in greater London to consider what remedial action may be taken to relieve the immediate problems faced by London.

This is the last but one debate in the House before the new year. I wish you, Mr. Deputy Speaker, and the Under-Secretary a merry Christmas. If the patients and the prospective patients at Beckenham hospital in particular, and Bromley hospitals in general, are to have a happy and healthy new year, they will need more help than they are getting at the moment.

I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Beckenham (Sir P. Goodhart) on the way in which he has raised the issue of the effect of RAWP in Bromley and the vigorous style in which he has defended his constituents. I am grateful for the opportunity to contribute briefly to the debate.

I should like to emphasise that Bromley health authority has reduced its expenditure, as my hon. Friend said. It has done that by efficient economies and by contracting out. It has been congratulated in the House by the Secretary of State on the way in which it has done so. However, it still finds that it is continually having to make reductions in its services because it cannot meet its budget.

I am not going to argue the case for Beckenham or any other hospital. I have no hospitals in my constituency because they are situated in the other three constituencies in the area. However, whatever reductions are made, whether in Beckenham or elsewhere, the ultimate effect will be a reduction in patient care for my constituents and those of my hon. Friend. I accept the principle of RAWP and what it seeks to achieve, but I urge the Under-Secretary to consider a substantial slowing down of the effect of RAWP or an abatement of it.

Like my hon. Friend, I wish the Under-Secretary a peaceful Christmas, but I urge him, when he returns in the new year, to look carefully at the effect that RAWP is having in an area such as Bromley, and to reconsider its effects.

I am happy to have the opportunity to respond to my hon. Friends the Members for Beckenham (Sir P. Goodhart) and for Chislehurst (Mr. Sims). I reciprocate the wishes for a peaceful, happy and prosperous Christmas for all of us and a healthy and well cared for new year for constituents in the Bromley area.

The concern of my hon. Friend the Member for Beckenham for the Beckenham hospital is well known and, as he has reminded the House, he has made sure that Ministers in the Department of Health and Social Security are well aware of his concern. That was particularly manifested by the presentation in December 1982 of a petition to the House signed by around 22,000 people.

I endorse the tribute that my hon. Friend paid to the skill and dedication of the staff at Beckenham hospital, and the loyalty of the local people to the hospital. That is the case in many hospitals. We should be proud of that and take advantage of it.

At the same time, we must improve and develop our health care. I leave aside the resource constraints and problems, which are inescapable. Progress in medicine, shifts in population and the need for more technical and clinical services to be grouped together must be taken into account. I hope that we all agree that there must be changes. Inevitably, we run into problems of the conflicts of old and justified local loyalties with the advances of modern technology. The Health Service must be concerned primarily with the delivery of service to our constituents.

The inescapable shadow of the distribution of resources must always hang over us. Neither of my hon. Friends will need reminding that nationally our record is good. Since 1979, we have increased expenditure on the National Health Service by 20 per cent., and, according to the Chancellor's autumn statement, next year there will be a further increase of 2·2 per cent., in real terms. Of course, there are pressures of pay and additional staff, but we always need to remind ourselves that they, too, are services. Some 70 per cent. of the cost of the NHS is staff pay. Staff are a valuable and crucial commodity in the delivery of health care. We have achieved real increases in pay and in the numbers of doctors and nurses. We are happy to have done so. All that is at the national level, and should be recognised.

Both my hon. Friends referred at length to the complicated resource allocation working party formula. I was glad to note that my hon. Friend the Member for Beckenham accepted that the move towards the RAWP objective of equalising services throughout the country was laudable. That proposition was supported by my hon. Friend the Member for Chislehurst. That is the Government's position, as it was of previous Governments.

We are moving towards that objective at a steady and measured pace, not at a helter-skelter pace. Long-term revenue plans assume annual reductions of 0·3 per cent. until 1993–94. That can be regarded in no sense as undue or immoderate haste or pressure. As my hon. Friend the Member for Beckenham was good enough to acknowledge, the pressures on several areas, particularly the four Thames regions, have been recognised in two ways—by the statement following the autumn statement and by the broad RAWP outlines announced by my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State on 17 December.

There was an increase in funding in the Thames regions to take account of the pressures to which both my hon. Friends referred. The management board of the Health Service was invited to review the operation of the RAWP formula. That is being done within the basic principles of RAWP, with which we all agree, but we recognise that an examination of the pressures is required. My hon. Friend rightly suggested that the examination be speedy. That is a fair point, and I take note of it. I hope that he will accept that we recognise those pressures.

I shall now deal with the proposition of Bromley health authority, and the future of Beckenham hospital. I stress that these are still proposals for discussion. As I understand it, a formal consultation process will begin next month. The proposals are revisions of proposals which have been around for some time.

At the meeting on 17 December all the proposals were referred back, so the health authority will have to do its sums again.

My point is that this is still an issue for the health authority. As my hon. Friend recognises, our system must be based on policies being made essentially at district health authority level. The region and the Department only take part at appropriate points in the process.

Given that the health authority is above RAWP and that financial adjustments are still to be made, I am sure that my hon. Friend will agree that better dispositions of resources can be achieved. Therefore, it must be right for the health authority to examine all the available options, taking due account of the sensitivities of local support for particular services and facilities. I hope that my hon. Friend will not seek to cramp the authority's intellectual style in the search both for the most effective use of resources and, more important, for the delivery of the services which his constituents need. I understand that the health authority is adopting that approach. Obviously, we shall maintain close contact with it.

The proposition is that the acute services will be dealt with in two hospitals rather than four, taking account of the fact that the hospital throughput is rather slow and expensive for acute services. Clearly there is a need for improvement. The delivery of the full range of high-quality clinical acute treatment is difficult to achieve. It is not for the Department or Ministers to take a decision on that. However, we must consider whether these days an 80-bed hospital can truly provide the level of acute treatment that our constituents have a right to expect. Whatever may have happened on 17 December, I understand that the authority has judged that the answer to the provision of a better service is to concentrate acute services in two hospitals, and to use the facility at Beckenham hospital for geriatric and mental illness provision.

We have watched the development of the issue carefully, and I have no doubt that the chairman and members of the district health authority of Bromley will take careful note of the points made with sincerity and conviction by my hon. Friends. The community health council has been involved in the discussions from the earliest stages. It appreciates the need to put the proposals into effect. But the measures will be the subject of the usual consultation, and Ministers will not come to a firm view unless and until the proposals are referred to the Department for consideration.

I have the privilege of opening the last debate of the last sitting before Christmas and, indeed, of this year. That gives me the opportunity to extend seasonal greetings to you and your family, Mr. Deputy Speaker, and to the Minister and his. It also enables me to comment on the appropriateness of debating housing at a time when we celebrate a feast with such obvious significance for the homeless and the badly housed.

My interest in housing co-operatives predates my entry into the House and originated when I was chairman of Liverpool council's housing committee. I believe in housing co-operatives because they offer the best way of giving tenants a stake and a say in their communities. I believe in them because, from my experience of representing people in the inner city during the past 13 years—as a local councillor or as a Member of Parliament—I am convinced that the traditional landlord-tenant relationship has failed badly. A passing glimpse at sprawling, faceless, badly-maintained municipal estates confirms my belief.

Planners and politicians have waged war against entire communities, slowly and deliberately running down neighbourhoods and depriving people of their homes, roots and identities. In their place, the "we-know-best" politicians have created nightmare developments which people have rejected utterly. One need look no further than Manchester's Hulme or Liverpool's Netherley to see the dire consequences of Labour and Tory housing policies during the past 20 years. I opposed the construction of Netherley in 1972; 13 years later, it is being demolished with about 47 years of debt charges remaining to be paid. In my constituency, two 20-year-old blocks of flats—Entwistle Heights and Milner House—are being demolished, with 40 years of debt charges remaining.

It is a bitter and costly legacy. But perhaps most damaging of all is that, in destroying the "Coronation Street" communities, family life and support has been wrecked. In the past, many inner-city communities were like large happy families, until the politicians came along and scattered the people to the winds.

The housing co-operative movement has recognised people's desire to take over from the planners and take control of their homes. Nowhere has that desire been so potent as in Liverpool, where thousands of people recognise housing co-operatives as the opportunity to realise their most cherished dreams. In a city where one in five is unemployed and many have low incomes, the right-to-buy legislation is not an option. But that should not preclude people from having the opportunity to realise their cherished dreams.

I have been saddened by the response of the Labour-controlled council to those who wish to have their own homes, but who cannot afford to buy them. The Rochdale Pioneers must be turning in their graves as they see Socialists putting every possible obstacle in the path of people who wish to shake off the municipal, corporatist yoke.

The Minister will be aware of the heroic struggle and the fight waged by the Eldonian housing co-operative in Liverpool. Its leader, Tony McGann, and his brave committee have faced every sort of threat from municipal bully-boys. Their original planning application was opposed on completely trumped-up grounds, with the council subsequently being overruled by the Secretary of State on appeal. Attempts were also made to bribe and intimidate tenants to break ranks and move out into newly-built council properties. Labour used every dirty trick in the book to try to break the spirit of that co-operative. It has happened in other developments, too. Portland gardens was to have been a housing co-operative, but it was municipalised, snatching away from people who saw homes being built opposite them the chance of homes of their own. Those properties were sequestrated by the local council and taken away from those tenants.

Furthermore, the local Merseyside Improved Housing association, which had been backing the Portland gardens development, lost about £40,000 on abortive work on the scheme. That, too, is public money.

Tenants at the Mill street co-operative were told by the local housing department that if they resigned they would immediately be offered houses—if they got out of the co-op, they would be given somewhere decent to live—but if they chose to remain, no repairs would be done to their homes.

The latest attempt by local Labour leaders is to change the allocations policy so that tenants who believed that they would be able to move into housing co-operatives will now be denied that chance. Every possible obstacle has been put in the path of people who want to live in housing co-operatives.

That bitter experience has convinced me that a new Act to guarantee the rights of co-operators is needed urgently. A right-to-co-operate Bill should be introduced at the earliest opportunity in the new year and should guarantee in law the rights of tenants who take on the full might of the council landlords.

The Eldonians were a particularly strong group. They had the support of their local councillors, some of whom were moderates in the Labour group. I admire them immensely for the way in which they stood up to the local Militants. The Eldonians also had the support of the Archbishop of Liverpool and of the Liberal group on the city council. My right hon. Friend the Member for Tweeddale, Ettrick and Lauderdale (Mr. Steel), the leader of the Liberal party, met that group at one of its meetings and gave it his personal support.

The Eldonians' fight has secured for them £6 million of housing investment in Liverpool. The housing will be managed by the tenants. That is jobs; that is services; that is homes. How ironic it is that political leaders, who never stop parroting those phrases, should have been in the vanguard in trying to prevent that investment and those homes from coming to Liverpool.

The Eldonians were fortunate to have the support of the Merseyside Improved Housing association in their fight. The work of that association has been magnificant, and I pay particular tribute to the chief officer, Mr. Barry Natton, to Tom Clay, who has done much of the groundwork, and to the other members of the team. Merseyside Improved Housing backed its commitment to housing associations by putting its money where its mouth was. It put £150,000 into the Eldonians' scheme alone, and £50,000 of that will ultimately be a direct subsidy which is not reclaimable.

Merseyside Improved Housing cannot afford to do that every time, as my hon. Friend the Member for Orkney and Shetland (Mr. Wallace) learned last Friday when we visited St. Andrew's gardens in my constituency and met the fledgling Bronte housing co-operative. The members of that co-operative need resources and help desperately. Representatives of Merseyside Improved Housing came to that meeting and will happily provide the professional advice and skills, but they must be backed up by resources.

The Department of the Environment's funds for housing co-operatives are lamentably small. The Minister for Housing, Urban Affairs and Construction told me last month in answer to my question about grants under section 121 of the Housing Act 1980:

"I consider that the present arrangements are satisfactory: the total provision for such grants in 1985–86 is £342,700 of which £94,700 has been set aside for co-operatives".—[Official Report, 25 November 1985; Vol. 87, c. 381.]

In other words, less than £100,000 has been provided throughout the country for the development of housing co-operatives through grants under the 1980 Act. I have given an example of one co-op which required £50,000 to get only one scheme off the ground.

The Housing Corporation provides a co-operative promotion allowance, but that is only £2,100 per scheme. The Minister told me in another written answer:

"The level of co-operative promotion allowance for 1986–87 is currently being considered as part of the annual review of all housing association grant allowances."

The Minister admitted that the current rates were only £2,135 per scheme for projects in the provinces, and slightly more in London. He went on to say:

"The rates to take effect from 1 April 1986 will be promulgated early in 1986."—[Official Report, 27 November 1985; Vol 87, c. 570.]

That gives the Minister the opportunity to review those small allowances. The Government should take into account as well the size of the scheme and an additional per unit allowance should be made available.

Thirdly, we should be looking at the funding for repair grants, the upper limit of which is about £200. That is not enough money if one lives in a run-down fiat in the middle of a hard-to-let development on a peripheral council estate. The House must pass legislation or bring in orders that will enable more money to be made available to tenants who want to turn around their estates. If special grants, such as repair grants, were given where people formed housing co-operatives, they could act as a catalyst and be responsible for tackling the major problem of hard-to-let and empty property that we see on so many of the big municipal developments.

There is a need for plurality of funding from a number of different pockets both in the Housing Corporation and in the Department of the Environment. The present derisory sums are hopelessly inadequate. None of the existing mechanisms recognises this most difficult and important work and the struggle that so many tenants have to mount without professional advice or expertise.

As an illustration of how low a priority such action is at the moment, I point out that the Housing Corporation nationally allocated only half of one person's time specifically to housing co-operatives, and that is not good enough. I hope that the Minister will say that the Government will look again at funding the need for more professional backing and help. If the housing co-operatives succeed, they will form a springboard for more co-operative ventures. The Mondragon experience in Spain came about when groups of unemployed Basques got together with the help of the local priest to set up a people's bank. They put their savings into the bank and financed the development of workers' co-operatives. That experience could be repeated in areas such as central Liverpool, which can work on the basis of a successful housing co-operative.

Housing co-operatives give people a stake and a say in their own community and homes. Families need greater protection if they are not to see the homes that they have helped to plan snatched away from under them. That is why we need a right-to-co-operate Bill. Co-operatives are about the most important form of home rule. They enable us to decentralise power and ownership in the most radical way possible. They are worthy of full support from the House. In the spirit of Christmas, which is of such special significance to the homeless and the badly housed, I hope that the Minister will be able to give me the assurances that I have sought.

rose ——

Order. Does the hon. Gentleman have the consent of both the Minister and the hon. Member for Liverpool, Mossley Hill (Mr. Alton) to speak? I see that he does.

I am grateful to my hon. Friend for granting me a few minutes to speak in support of his plea to the Government to be more supportive of the housing co-operative movement.

At the moment, our lament is that the housing co-operative movement is seen as incidental rather than integral to the planning of housing provision in Britain. For many—and the Government have still to learn this lesson—they are the only way out of municipal misery. They are the only alternative that offers self-management and self-control rather than that other fallacious alternative, the unmanageable financial prospect of being able to buy, and then keep up payments for, a house. The liability of owner occupation and the right to buy is a useless resource to those who do not have the money to purchase and then sustain a commitment.

The Government should no longer consider the co-operative movement to be the reserve of the trendy middle class. That is not the reality. They are often most appreciated by working people in inner cities, London as well as Liverpool. The working people are backed up with the expertise and resources, both financial and skilled, of people who can advise and assist.

I have three propositions to make to the Government. First, they should establish, as part of the Department of the Environment, a national co-operative development fund—a co-operative corporation to balance the Housing Corporation—which would channel funds to the co-operative movement to build up that part of our housing sector.

Secondly, the Government should ask local authorities to present proposals for co-operative schemes in what is presently the public sector and in newbuild when, each year, they ask for local authorities' housing plans. That would help us to get away from the idea that the only alternative to public sector build is private sector build. Local authorities could get used to the idea that they had to plan co-operative ventures.

Thirdly, the Government should facilitate a network of expertise, administrative skills, financial advice and resources to enable those who would choose co-operative housing if they were given the chance to make that choice and to be supported.

Such steps would give the Government a new reputation for the new year as the improving, enabling, co-operative Government—which even they will find appealing.

May I, on behalf of Opposition Members, offer our good wishes to you, Mr. Deputy Speaker, and to the Clerks and staff of the House who make our work so much easier? May I ask the Government to reflect that the more co-operative they are on matters such as this, the happier people will be and the better our housing will be in 1986?

Nobody is more committed than the Government to breaking up the municipal monopolies that the hon. Members for Liverpool, Mossley Hill (Mr. Alton) and for Southwark and Bermondsey (Mr. Hughes) have mentioned. Similarly, nobody is more committed to moving away from the town hall paternalism which has doomed many local authority tenants to live in rather depressing surroundings.

That is why we are happy to review our support for the co-operative movement and to see how we might usefully build on it to provide greater impetus in this growing movement. I was disturbed but not surprised to hear of the irregularities of Liverpool city council that the hon. Member for Mossley Hill described. It is appropriate at a time of year when thoughts of many of our colleagues turn to other things to consider the role of co-operatives in tackling some of the remaining housing problems.

The debate shows the anxiety of the hon. Member for Mossley Hill about the many recent disturbing developments that affect his constituency and the whole of Liverpool. Some of the incidents that he described show the damage that can be wrought by militant Socialism in a deprived inner-city area.

There is not much between the Government and the hon. Members for Mossley Hill and for Southwark and Bermondsey about the desirability of extending further the housing co-operative movement. Only last week, my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for the Environment said in a debate on the inner cities that co-operatives are working successfully in many inner city areas, not least Liverpool. We are anxious to see how we might help best.

Co-operatives are formed by a group of tenants or prospective tenants who are in housing need. If they are registered with the Housing Corporation, they have access to development funding, as do other housing associations. What distinguishes them is the fact that they are completely self governing, that their rules restrict membership to tenants and would-be tenants, and that all tenants have to be members of the co-operative. Almost by definition, therefore, their experience of the broader requirements of developing a housing scheme is somewhat limited.

The right way in which to approach that lack of experience is to help with the necessary training, advice and support. The Housing Corporation now insists that any new co-operative seeking registration and public finance must have a development agreement with a recognised secondary co-operative or housing association that provides back-up services and training. Secondary co-operatives are bodies which own no properties, but exist solely to provide development and other services to the primary co-operatives which carry out the work. I pay tribute to Co-operative Development Services, one of the major secondary co-operatives in Liverpool, which has done so much to encourage and foster the movement in Liverpool.

I have touched on the difficulties that can arise with housing co-operatives, but a recent review by my Department showed that they are balanced—and, indeed, outweighed—by the benefits and advantages that the movement can bring, not least in inner urban areas. Inherent in the co-operative movement—and both hon. Members touched on that—is the willingness of the residents to take responsibility for managing their own houses and taking a real sense of pride in the area in which they live. That avoids many of the problems and the resentments between landlord and tenant which have been a feature on large local authority estates.

That participative approach extends to the design of the dwellings to be built or renovated by the co-operatives. Apart from the co-operative style of management, a key feature is likely to be the close involvement of the actual members who work closely with building professionals in the physical arrangement of the development so that it fully reflects the wishes of the members of the co-operative. For that reason, they are now in the forefront of the community architectural movement that has attracted considerable publicity and most distinguished endorsement during recent months. Those of us interested in the inner cities simply have to take note of the growing awareness and willingness of those who live there to take responsibility for their future and to transform the soulless inner-city estates into an area in which they are proud to live.

The development of those schemes is funded primarily by loans from the Housing Corporation. I note what the hon. Member for Southwark and Bermondsey said about the need to set up a separate source of funds—he used the initials NCDF—for that movement.

At the moment, every scheme, whether submitted by a co-operative or a conventional housing association, is considered by the corporation on its merits. That ensures that only the best and most suitable projects are approved and that funds are used in the most effective way within the corporation's overall strategy.

In 1984–85, the level of capital expenditure on co-operative schemes was £23 million. It is too early to say what the figure will be for this year, but the indications are that the value of new schemes may be running at a slightly higher level. Yesterday we announced the Housing Corporation's approved development programme for next year. Gross provision has been maintained at the same level but we will concentrate resources on meeting needs in inner-city areas. That should encourage the funding of co-operative schemes.

However, development loans are not the sum total of our commitment to housing co-operatives. On 1 April this year an additional development allowance, the co-operative promotion allowance, was introduced. It is provided exclusively to housing co-operatives and its aim is to meet the extra costs that they face in obtaining back-up and advice from registered associations and secondary co-operatives. It currently stands at £3,522 for each first project in London and £2,135 elsewhere. The hon. Member for Mossley Hill implied that that was a derisory sum. When it is reviewed, we shall take his comments into account. Second and subsequent projects receive a smaller allowance.

We have attempted to recognise the special problems that co-operatives face when considering section 121 grants. Out of the total of nearly £350,000 available, some 30 per cent. has been set aside for secondary co-operatives in the current year.

Can I press the Minister further on allowances? Will he look at the question of their being paid only on successful completion of the scheme? There are occasions when co-operatives fail, through no fault of their own, and the allowances are not paid.

Will the Minister say something about the number of staff employed by the Housing Corporation who deal with housing co-operatives?

The Government are anxious not to spend too much on abortive expenditure. That principle inspires our approach to housing associations and co-operatives. I shall have another look at the matter, but obviously we want the money to go on schemes that are completed rather than on those that are simply contemplated. I shall also take another look at the resources of the housing corporations that are devoted to promoting co-operatives in the light of the fraction of 1 per cent., or one person, as mentioned by the hon. Gentleman.

The housing co-operative movement was pioneered in Liverpool in the late 1970s when people in depressing public housing started to band together into self-help groups to find a way to better housing. That approach, harnessing the energies of local people, was supported initially both by the housing corporation and the city council of the day, and many of those early schemes are now complete.

Notable successes have been, for example, the Weller street and the Grafton crescent housing co-operatives in Liverpool 8. Those achievements have been widely recognised and some have won awards. The Prime Minister visited Grafton crescent co-operative in Liverpool last year and she, like others, was deeply impressed by what she saw.

In the Merseyside context, the co-operative principle provides an opportunity for those with no realistic prospect of home ownership, a point made by both hon. Members. The people there can now take real responsibility for the design, management and maintenance of their homes. It enables them to escape from inefficient local bureaucracy and to play a role in creating and sustaining good sheltered housing.

It was extremely sad, therefore, that the present Labour city council should have adopted a deliberate and dogmatic policy of municipalisation at the expense of co-operative schemes. The city council is not now prepared to enter into arrangements for tenant management co-ops or to found newbuild schemes for co-operative ownership because of its wish to direct all available resources to the council's newbuild for rent programmes, a narrow-minded and counter-productive approach.

That means that Liverpool co-operatives must now look exclusively to the Housing Corporation for funding and compete directly with many other claims on resources. Even though the corporation's resources are fully committed, it has been possible—through the special allocation for Merseyside which the Minister for Housing, Urban Affairs and Construction announced yesterday as £8·6 million for next year—to help some deserving co-operative schemes, in particular the Eldonian community association, which established the Portland gardens housing co-op in 1982 with the objective of developing a scheme of 111 houses and bungalows for families from the Portland gardens tenement block.

That scheme had been caught by the change in Liverpool city council's policy, but a deal was struck by which the council took over the scheme as a municipal development. But as co-operative members were involved in the design work, they will be allocated the new houses and bungalows.

That association has further plans for another scheme of 145 houses, bungalows and flats on the Tate and Lyle site. The scheme will be for families living in tenement blocks due to be demolished in Vauxhall. The proposed scheme is 60 houses for shared ownership for families in employment, 40 houses for rent by unemployed families and 45 bungalows and flats for rent by pensioners. We have been able to agree that resources should be made available from the Housing Corporation's approved development programme to make a special allocation to the co-operative to acquire and develop the site.

The former sugar refinery had been acquired by English Estates, which demolished it, and it is now reclaiming the land, with the aid of a derelict land grant, fox future development. As the hon. Gentleman pointed out, there was a problem with planning permission, which the Secretary of State resolved, and the Eldonians have now started to work out detailed design proposals.

Despite Liverpool city council's rejection of the co-operative movement, that movement still demands attention. The Government have shown their commitment and have made special funds available, through the Housing Corporation, to enable a number of schemes to proceed.

When the city withdrew support, we provided resources for the Dingle residents and the Shorefields co-operatives to proceed on land owned by the Merseyside development corporation near the garden festival. Those are almost complete. Co-operative development services, neighbourhood housing services and major co-operative housing agencies in Liverpool, together with other bodies, have been in the forefront of building up the co-operative movement in Liverpool.

There is much to be said in favour of housing co-operatives. The forthcoming legislation may provide an opportunity for a debate on the lines that the hon. Gentleman outlined about a right to manage. I readily concede that there is energy and resource in our inner cities that the Government must harness, perhaps through the cooperative movement, to enable people to have a greater say in their own destinies, and the Government are ready to give those people an opportunity to achieve their aspirations.

As the final speaker before Christmas, I join in what has been said in wishing you, Mr. Deputy Speaker, and your fellow occupants of the Chair, the officers of the House and the Whips a richly deserved happy Christmas and all the best for 1986. I have no doubt that when the House reassembles early in January we shall have been refreshed and invigorated by our holidays and will be ready to tackle some of the problems that hon. Members have outlined in these Adjournment debates.

I am grateful to hon. Members for their kind expressions of good will. I join them in extending our best wishes to all who serve us here, and I extend my personal best wishes to all right hon. and honourable Members.