Commons Chamber

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House Of Commons

Wednesday 19 July 1995

The House met at Ten o'clock

Prayers

[MADAM SPEAKER in the Chair]

Adjournment (Summer)

Motion made, and Question proposed, That this House at its rising today do adjourn till Monday 16 October.—[ Mr. Streeter.]

10.4 am

Before the forthcoming Adjournment, I think it right to draw the attention of the House to the unsatisfactory and deteriorating situation at the Liskeard junior school.

I am obliged to remind the House that this is not the first occasion that I have felt it necessary to raise the subject on the Floor of the House. Indeed, the first occasion was in March 1971. On that occasion the Under-Secretary of State for Education who replied was one William van Straubenzee. Sadly, the position has altered little since then.

I should add that during the late 1970s and the 1980s there was relief on the numbers and space at Liskeard junior school as a consequence of the construction of a new Church of England primary school serving the town. However, the advantages gained by that development have now been exhausted. In practice, we are back to the situation of the early 1970s except that the problems are now greater through the combination of higher pupil numbers and the fact that the various buildings that comprise the school, to which I shall come in a moment, are also 25 years older.

The school has a classic market town centre situation. The main buildings were constructed in 1880. They comprise four classrooms, the library, the administrative accommodation and the special needs area. From the 1970s onwards, a series of temporary buildings have been constructed, but, as is so often sadly the case, they have assumed an air of permanence and, because they were constructed as temporary buildings, over the years their maintenance has not been to such a high level as one would have wished and they themselves are causing problems.

I am sure that that set of circumstances is mirrored in all our constituencies. Every time one builds more temporary accommodation to house growing pupil numbers, one cuts down on the playground space. In other words, the position at Liskeard is very unsatisfactory.

The school is centred in the town, adjacent to a main road on a cramped and confined site. I should also mention in that context that, in addition to inadequate space, in recent years there have been problems with the boilers at the school, the hall is totally inadequate and the sports field provision is located away from the school site and there have been times when, for the children's safety, the head teacher and his staff have felt it necessary temporarily to suspend sports field activities.

The number of pupils at the school is roughly 300. During the next three years it is projected that that number will rise to 352.

There is projected housing development in Liskeard. Over the past eight years, on average there have been 100 new dwellings constructed each year. The structure plan for the area allows for a greater increase in housing development. Pressures are being exerted on the school from all sides.

I turn now to the financial position. The school had been allocated, over the next three years, the sum of £220,000. That is part of the basic need bid that the Cornwall county education committee made this year. From my description of the school, its site and its inadequate facilities, I think that the House will realise that it would be futile to spend scarce financial resources on those deteriorating buildings.

Earlier this year, a responsible campaign was undertaken by the parents, in conjunction with the headteacher and his staff and the parent-teacher association. Pressure was put on Cornwall county council. A number of visits to Liskeard were undertaken by county councillors and, as a consequence, they agreed to give Liskeard junior school top priority. In the 25 years that I have been dealing with the county council in my capacity as a Member of Parliament, I have never known it to move so quickly. That testifies to the current unsatisfactory position.

Cornwall made an application to the Department for Education for a supplementary credit approval. A site has been allocated for a new junior school. The total cost of that project will be of the order of £1.6 million. We all recognise that, with the existing constraints on public expenditure, there is no chance of our being successful, in one go, for the whole bid.

Therefore, the school governors have drawn up a rolling new-build project. We are looking for £580,000 for the first phase. Last week, the previous Under-Secretary of State for Education, my hon. Friend the Member for Hornchurch (Mr. Squire), announced that there was to be an allocation of £20 million for supplementary credit approval. Liskeard was allocated just £38,000. I shall not bore the House now with the predictable response to that paltry figure, which was clearly inadequate and, in many ways, an insult.

We are now in a genuine dilemma. Over the next three years, a total of £258,000 has been allocated to Liskeard junior school—a sizeable sum that we do not wish to waste. The purpose of my raising the subject here this morning is to ask my right hon. Friend the Leader of the House two specific questions that I am sure he will convey to the Department for Education and Employment.

First, I gather that in the autumn further supplementary credit allocations are made by the Department. Will he ensure that the Liskeard application features in that list even though we were successful to the tune of a very modest £38,000 last week? We must keep the project rolling forward. The momentum has been created and the only satisfactory outcome is an allocation of a meaningful amount so that we can start the first phase.

Secondly, during the past few months I have kept in touch with my hon. Friend the Member for Hornchurch who was the Minister responsible for the financial allocations. We now have a newly appointed Under-Secretary of State for Education and Employment, my hon. Friend the Member for Chesham and Amersham (Mrs. Gillan). I have already extended an invitation to her to visit Liskeard. I hope that I have been able to impress on my right hon. Friend the Leader of the House the urgency of the situation. I hope that he will support me in trying to persuade my hon. Friend the Under-Secretary of State that she should visit Liskeard as early as possible in the forthcoming autumn 1995 term.

10.14 am

I am delighted to have been called to speak this morning as I wish to raise the subject of the Coxhoe medical practice in my constituency and the events that have occurred over the past few days, which are nothing less than an absolute disgrace.

It is important for me to give a brief history of the medical practice. Until two years ago, seven doctors served 12,000 patients in a newly formed budget-holding practice. The practice served the villages of Coxhoe, Cassop, Kelloe, Quarrington Hill, Bowburn, which is in my constituency, and West Cornforth, a village in the constituency of my right hon. Friend the Member for Sedgefield (Mr. Blair).

Within six months, three partners left the practice and the other four doctors separated. One, Dr. Pollard, set up a practice in the village of Bowburn. Another, Dr. Drew, set up a practice in West Cornforth. The other two doctors, Dr. Woods and Dr. Shami, remained in Coxhoe with the bulk of the practice—about 8,000 patients. From a state-of-the-art surgery, with all modern facilities, Dr. Pollard moved to Bowburn, to a room in the local community centre with virtually no facilities. Dr. Drew moved into one room in a house in West Cornforth, again with few facilities.

Dr. Woods and Dr. Shami have apparently struggled to keep the Coxhoe practice going, with nearly 8,000 patients between them. I am told that that is an impossible workload and they have finally had to accept that they are overwhelmed and cannot cope with the number of patients. The maximum that any general practitioner is allowed to have on his or her books is 3,500 patients.

The practice in Coxhoe has survived with a number of locum doctors who have now all left. The Coxhoe doctors have tried in vain to find new partners, or even locums, to keep the surgery and the practice ticking over. It appears that there are just not enough doctors to go around—the Coxhoe surgery is two short. On making investigations, I have found that the rest of the county of Durham is a further 18 doctors short. I am told that, nationally, there is a shortage of literally hundreds of general practitioners.

The two vacant posts have been advertised four times, including once in the "Irish Medical Journal". Four candidates were interviewed when the first advertisement appeared in the papers and one was appointed. She subsequently took another post elsewhere and did not turn up for the job. Six doctors responded to the second interview, but eventually all withdrew. The third and fourth advertisements produced no response.

As a consequence—and the reason why I desperately needed to address the House this morning—the Coxhoe doctors announced that they have asked the family health services authority to remove 2,500 patients from their lists and find new doctors for those people. The practice has identified the 2,500 patients to be removed from the list. The only exceptions that will be made in those areas, which include Kelloe and Cassop, will be terminally ill patients.

Although all the patients removed from the list will be found other doctors, it is a deplorable situation. Many people will have to travel long distances to find a new doctor. Many mothers with children, and pensioners, will have to go by foot or catch a number of buses, and will have to travel much further than was previously necessary. Those people's local surgery, which many of them raised funds to develop, will no longer be theirs. Many have been patients at the surgery for 40 to 70 years or more and it is outrageous that they have been dumped, thrown off the lists.

It should not surprise hon. Members to know that the affluent parts of the practice have been retained and the less affluent parts have been dumped. Some patients removed from the surgery have received letters and others wait in trepidation for their letters to arrive. As hon. Members can imagine, wholesale panic has set in, and old people in particular are worried sick about the situation because they do not know whether they will be able to see a doctor—if they ever can.

Questions must be asked about how this situation arose and who is to blame for it. At the weekend I was never off the telephone. I spoke to the chairman of the family health services association, I met members of the Durham health commission and I spoke to the doctors. I have had about 30 constituents at my surgery. Anyone who listens to the arguments can draw different conclusions. The doctors of Coxhoe, the FHSA and the county Durham health commission say that there is a desperate shortage of doctors. Therefore, according to them the blame lies with the Government. They tell me that cuts that were made some years ago in the Government programme for training doctors have resulted in a desperate shortage of doctors. Also to blame are the Government changes in the funding arrangements for general practices. Those were changed in 1990 to encourage doctors to set up clinics and other services. Disastrously, not enough money was allocated to cover all the new services that were set up.

The doctors and others have told me that the expectations of newly trained doctors "have moved with the times". That is a nice way of putting it. Doctors do not expect to be on duty at all hours of the day and night or for unbearably long periods. I am also told that they are not attracted to country practices such as those at Coxhoe, Kelloe and Cassop but are attracted to the lush suburban practices that are favoured by the latest funding arrangements of the NHS.

Taking a different perspective, because I sit on the fence on this issue as I do not know who is to blame, is it not strange that a large, successful practice, one of the first to accept the bribes to go fundholding—those are not my words but those of one of the partners some years ago—should disintegrate within six months? I am told that some of the partners do not speak to each other and that the office manager was ignored by some of the doctors because they disliked her so much and that they communicated with her only through a third party. I am told that one or two of the doctors left the surgery because of her and that the atmosphere was so bad that other doctors would not work there or wanted to be away. If that is accurate, is it any wonder that the practice cannot get recruits?

Was it the disunity and incompatibility of the doctors that broke up the practice and led to the eventual catastrophe that my constituents have had to suffer? The dreadful consequences are that patients have been dumped from the list and do not know whether they have a doctor. Internal squabbles in the practice should not have been the first issue: the first issue for any doctor or practice should be the patients that they serve.

Out of 12,000 patients in a state-of-the-art practice fewer than half now enjoy the facilities. Some 2,000 do not know who their doctor will be and the others are seen in substandard conditions compared with what they were used to for many years. It is important that the practice remains intact: it must not be allowed to disintegrate. I urgently request the Leader of the House to take the matter up with the Secretary of State for Health and ask him to intervene, perhaps along with the regional health authority, because it is now clear that the FHSA and Durham health commission are not prepared to intervene. That is not a criticism because they have done their best to get doctors. Unfortunately, they have not been able to do that and now the matter must be subject to ministerial pressure and perhaps the help of the regional health authority.

We must ensure that adequate temporary cover is found so that the practice can continue without kicking out 2,500 patients. Temporary cover should continue until new, permanent appointments can be made to the practice to enable it to continue as before.

I ask the Leader of the House to request an investigation to see why the events that I have outlined have occurred. It is in the interests of the Government to do that because their policies are being blamed for the disaster although, as I have explained, as far as I can see there are two sides to the story. I am not making any judgment whatever, but there should be an investigation to find out exactly what happened and why this tragedy has occurred. Some 2,500 people have been disregarded by the doctors whom they trusted. Those people need help and only the Secretary of State for Health and the Government can halt this despicable situation.

10.26 am

I should like to make five brief points that I hope the Government will bear in mind before we adjourn because it would be scandalous if we adjourned without looking at them. The first item, which I hope the Government and all hon. Members will consider seriously, is the simple fact that spending on agriculture is once again out of control and will continue to get worse.

It is rather sad to hear hon. Members speaking with great feeling and passion about the needs of the education authorities for more money for schools when at the same time an appalling amount is poured down the agricultural drain. That situation is getting worse every year, although the House tries to confuse and mislead itself that things are getting better.

I have a copy of the European Community's general budget for 1996. It contains precise, clear figures and it should be available in the House next week. It shows that spending on agriculture by the EC on the common agricultural policy has increased by 25 per cent. in two years. The figures show that the amount spent is £90 million a day, which is £630 million a week or £2.6 billion a month. What worries me is that we are consistently told by the Government that reforms are coming and that changes are about to occur. But everyone knows, clearly and precisely, that there is no possible way in which we could reform this filthy, evil policy which is no more than a protection racket and an invitation to fraud.

I appeal to the Government and to the Liberal Democrats, who have always fought for people and their rights, to say what the blazes we are to do about the policy when the figures show that it is out of control. Sometimes the Government say, "Their spending has gone up and ours has come down." That is again absolute codswallop because every hon. Member who takes an interest in agriculture, as some do, knows that national spending is higher since we joined the EC and that it continues to rise. The situation is getting considerably worse.

Every hon. Member who pleads with the Government to spend money on hospitals, schools, doctors or anything else should realise that we are pouring enormous amounts of money down an open drain, that the drain is becoming larger every year and that there is absolutely no possibility of the policy being reformed. That cannot happen as a result of people sitting around a table and at some stage we will have to face it.

Secondly, I appeal to the Government to stop what I regard as a conspiracy of silence on European Union information. Over the past 48 hours I tabled two questions, one of which asked for information on the amount that we had spent on agriculture over the past 10 years. That seemed a simple question.

I asked another question about the amount that we have paid in net to the European Union in the past 10 years. The Government have rightly said that Members should not be allowed to table questions about information that is freely available in the House of Commons Library. The sad fact is that to get that information I would have to ask the Librarian to look up 10 separate documents. What was meant to be a protection against abuse has now simply become a means by which factual information about the European Union that the Government do not want to be revealed no longer appears in official publications of the House of Commons.

Why on earth should we not tell people what money we have contributed to the EU in the past 10 years? Why should we not tell them about our expenditure on the CAP?

The third issue to which we must face up is border controls. Once again, I believe that the House is deliberately seeking to evade the straight facts. Some hon. Members may say that I am rather obsessed about border controls, but I appeal to them to reread the announcement about our entry into the exchange rate mechanism. Then, every single Member said that that was wonderful news, which would bring stability and create jobs. If anyone had studied the announcement with common sense they would have realised that it was complete economic nonsense.

On border controls we are simply jumping up and down and saying that we will veto any EU measures. We have said that we will make absolutely sure that we retain our border controls. The plain fact is we simply cannot do that. As we know, our border controls are fading away almost every month. Whereas we used to require people to show their passports at the border, because of the problems of legislation, we agreed that we would operate only what is called the Bangemann wave, whereby people wave their passport at the control. We then agreed that we would let people in with identity cards. The unions who control our borders have said that more than 50 per cent. of all illegal immigrants come from the EU.

What about our remaining border controls? The Government are well aware, as is every Member, provided he or she faces up to it, that our only border protection is the declaration attached to the Single European Act. If that has any validity, can the Government tell me why Commissioner Monti published three directives which will effectively remove all British border controls? He could not have done that if the treaty law was clear. There is only one thing we can do: simply ask that the declaration attached to the Single European Act is transferred into a treaty clause at the intergovernmental conference next year.

If we want to keep our border controls we must make it clear that nothing can be discussed until the issue has been clarified. The Government tell us that those wise, delightful and sensible people all signed the declaration and that we must take their word for it. Their word does not count for anything before the European court. The Government are well aware that proceedings have been initiated by the European Parliament against the European Commission, which issued those directives. Although the Government say that they will stand firm and throw those directives out, individual legal actions will involve the payment of massive damages. It will not be possible to keep people out of the United Kingdom unless we have the courage to say we will try to enshrine our border protection in treaty law.

My hon. Friend suggests that there should be a treaty change to make our control over our borders absolutely total and uncontroversial. If there is a treaty change, that treaty must then be ratified by every country in the European Union. Is my hon. Friend optimistic that such a treaty would be ratified?

No, I am certainly not, and that is the problem. My hon. Friend is absolutely right that the other member states will not want to ratify it. All we are asking is that something at the back of a treaty should be put at the front of it. We are not advocating any change in wording, but just to transfer those words from one place to another.

Other member states such as Belgium and Holland will not support such a change. At next year's IGC the Government should ensure that there is no discussion on anything until the issue has been resolved. Hon. Members may say that that is not a helpful way to solve things. They may ask why we cannot sit round a table to discuss it. We hear that request every five years or so, when we are told that we should adopt a positive approach. Quite frankly, unless we demand that change, border controls will be kaput, as we will find out when the matter is discussed before the European Court. We must wake up to that fact.

What on earth are we going to do about fixed exchange rates? Hon. Members will be well aware that we had a bad experience with the ERM. Under the Maastricht treaty, the next time we go into the ERM, there is no way out of it. That decision is irreversible and unchangeable. Even if that led to massive unemployment and the borrowing of lots of money, we would have to stay on in the ERM. I have been trying, deliberately and precisely, in every way I can to get an assurance from the Government that before we opt again for fixed exchange rates, that decision will be subject to a decision in the House of Commons. I even asked the Prime Minister yesterday

"if it is the policy of Her Majesty's Government to advise the House and seek its advice before a decision is made to act as though sterling was in a fixed exchange rate arrangement under the EMU arrangements set out in the Maastricht treaty;"

He referred me to a delightful answer given by the Department of Trade and Industry, which simply said that we might have a referendum on a single currency.

The Leader of the House is a straight guy and he knows what the score is. Basically it does not matter two hoots about a decision on a single currency in comparison with fixed exchange rates. Once we are in such a mechanism all we will have is the equivalent of a Scottish pound note. Before we break for the recess, surely we should decide that before we go back into the ERM, the House of Commons will be asked to decide on that. If we cannot have that assurance, what the blazes is the point of having a democratic Parliament?

Has my hon. Friend forgotten that the Prime Minister has made a commitment not to join the ERM under any circumstances before the next election?

I am well aware of that statement. My hon. Friend should recall a previous Chancellor of the Exchequer, who gave us similar assurances. He joined the ERM unofficially, which one can do. What is wrong about having a clear statement from the Government—I should be grateful for a similar statement from the Labour and Liberal Democrat parties—that before any such move is made, the House will vote on it? The ERM is not fun. Our entry last time created half a million extra unemployed. Decent, honourable people of our country were made unemployed because idiots approved of the ERM.

I should just like to put on the record that some of us on the Conservative Benches have no dispute with the principle of entry into the ERM. It is possible that we joined at the wrong level. We were certainly at the wrong level by 1992, when our membership of it so was mismanaged by the then Chancellor, who has since become a hero to my hon. Friend's wing of the party.

I do not think we can solve the problem by attacking Ministers. It is most unfortunate that when some of us try to deal with a real issue, some of my colleagues simply tried to indulge in party disputes and assault Ministers. We should stop that silly political nonsense of saying, "He's a baddie and she's a baddie." We should look at the issue. My hon. Friend must know that half a million decent people in Britain were put out of work because of the appalling ERM. I am sad to say that the majority of the House voted for our entry into it, although I voted against. All I am saying to the Government is, "Don't do it again without asking us."

I hope that the Leader of the House will accept that we simply must have a chat about the problems of transport to grammar schools. The Government are aware that those schools are controversial—some people think that they are a good idea, others think that they are bad. My right hon. Friend is also aware that some of those schools operate a 6 per cent. entrance policy, which basically makes them minority schools for up-market people. In some places, such as Southend, however, 25 per cent. of our kids go to them.

I am sad to say that Essex county council has today abolished free transport for children who go to grammar schools. Some of the Labour and Liberal Democrat councillors are decent people. The leader of Essex county council, who is a Liberal Democrat, is one of the nicest people I have ever met. The council has been misled on the basis of a couple of cases where children travel miles and miles and cost the council a fortune. The council has asked why it should pay for them.

I live in Southend-on-Sea and my kids have all gone to the council schools and done very well. There is no problem where I live, because pupils can walk to the grammar school, as my daughter does. One part of Southend, Shoeburyness, is miles away from the grammar schools. The council's declared policy will simply mean that children from one part of Southend will have to pay for their transport to school. That will be expensive and those children may be deprived of the opportunity to attend a grammar school, unlike children in other areas of Southend. That seems completely wrong. I hope that the Government will take the view that where there are grammar schools—where the local people decide that they want them—every child should have an equal opportunity to attend them. It is not right that some people, like me and my kids, can walk to the grammar schools, while others are prevented from attending them simply because they live too far away and are too poor to afford the necessary transport.

We should think about poor people. I say to the Labour and Liberal Democrat members of the Essex county council, "Please think about the poor families in our area who are being deprived of a great opportunity. Please remember your duty to them."

10.40 am

I want to spend a few minutes suggesting some thoughts, reflections and priorities that should occupy some of the time of our new Secretary of State for Wales during the recess. No one should underestimate the strength of feeling that has been expressed to me, not about the personality of the new Secretary of State, but about the way that he was appointed. People are fed up of being pawns in some internal Conservative party game. It is the most important political appointment made in Wales, but we do not believe that the Prime Minister sat down and asked himself who would be the best person for the job and, indeed, what jobs he would want him to do in Wales. We do not believe that those factors played any part in the appointment of the new Secretary of State.

Having said that, I must tell the Leader of the House that we have worked with successive Conservative Secretaries of State and, in some respects, harmoniously. I even worked with the previous Secretary of State—my right hon. Friend the Member for Wokingham (Mr. Redwood)—and although we were ideologically poles apart, we still managed to get on with the business of working together to foster the common good of the communities that I represent.

I hope that the new Secretary of State will come to Merthyr Tydfil and Rhymney—his predecessor did so on more than one occasion—where he will find a curious, enigmatic mixture of our experiences under successive Conservative Secretaries of State. He will see a great deal of development, such as important infrastructure changes and the development of the A470. He will hear our hopes for making the A465 a dual carriageway. He will also see one of the most important and expansive land reclamation schemes in Europe to remove the backlog of 150 years of industrial dereliction.

The right hon. Gentleman will find a vigorous partnership between local authorities, his Department and other agencies trying their best to remove the locational obstacles to development, which have been such a problem to and a burden on communities such as mine. He will find many good things happening in my constituency—I have always acknowledged that—as a result of the working partnership between the Welsh Office, the local authority and other agencies. He will find a local authority which, because of the persuasive character of myself and other hon. Members, is to enjoy the restoration of Merthyr's proud county borough status. We managed to persuade the previous Secretary of State to be a listening Secretary of State in that important respect.

Unfortunately, below the appearance and even the actuality of the developments in my community, serious issues are causing problems and they desperately need to be addressed. Quite frankly, the appearance of development conceals the cumulative growing social and economic problems faced by families and by the community as a whole. Far, far too many people are without jobs; far, far too many people—men in particular—are economically inactive. One estimate based on the 1991 census suggests that up to 40 per cent. of men of working age in my constituency are economically inactive. That is not healthy, it is not right and it cannot be ignored.

Despite all the modest improvements in local employment, there is still a massive problem. We have to live with the fact that far too many people are out of work. I was in the House in 1972—I am not sure whether the Leader of the House was—when a Conservative Government rightly panicked because the unemployment total had hit 1 million. They had to introduce an emergency budget because there were 1 million people out of work. Now, we have to live with the fact that more than 3 million people are out of work.

My constituency has an especially high unemployment rate, so the first problem that the new Secretary of State will have to deal with is the sense of resignation, even fatalism, now felt not only by young people but by the middle aged, who believe that they will never get a quality job again. The Secretary of State should talk to people in employment in Wales because I am afraid that there is no feel good factor among them. Many of them feel that they are working harder for less money. Low pay in the community is as demoralising as no pay at all. It is a serious issue.

I was fascinated and, indeed, impressed by a lecture given by the right hon. Gentleman's previous boss, the Secretary of State for Social Security. He said:

"This widening of earning differentials between the skilled and unskilled does not just affect unemployment. It lies behind, or is intertwined with, many of our social problems. It may play a major part in the break up of families, the growth of lone parenthood, and a growing welfare dependency. It may even play a part in explaining delinquency and crime."

There are certainly wide earning differentials in my community.

The Government have said that they want to roll back the state and remove its power from people's lives. I am sad to tell the new Secretary of State that during my political lifetime the state has never been more intrusive than it is now in the lives of people in my constituency. It is one of the saddest and most ironic consequences of economic developments during the past 15 to 20 years. People are now more dependent on the state. The state is more intrusive in their lives because they are dependent upon it for benefit because of redundancy and unemployment. We do not want that. The image that we actually like such dependency is nonsense. Indeed, the measure introduced by the right hon. Gentleman in his previous job to introduce a new incapacity test and remove people from invalidity benefit will have a dramatic effect on purchasing power in my community. He will be able to see the effects of those changes on the people in Wales.

What should be the new Secretary of State's priority? He must try to break through the resignation and fatalism felt by so many about the chances of getting a decent job. I am glad to say that he succeeds to a Welsh Office that has never really bought Thatcherism. It has done its own thing under successive Secretaries of State. It has the capacity and power to manipulate skilfully. It can use its powers to work with other agencies to create jobs and attract inward investment.

Therefore, the right hon. Gentleman's first priority must be to put the Welsh Development Agency back on track. The Leader of the House will be aware that it has suffered a sad, distracting and debilitating series of problems, which in my opinion arose partly because the agency had taken its eye off the central need, which is to create jobs, especially in the manufacturing sector. Recent figures show that inward investment has fallen. We do not know whether that is directly associated with the WDA's performance, but it certainly cannot have been any help.

When people say to me, "Where will the jobs come from? Jobs can't be created any more", I say to them that they are already in south Wales. All along the M4 corridor, from Sony to National Panasonic, are large and major assembly plants. Components pour into those plants; a series of manufacturing services are required to maintain them. It must be a major new priority to change the source of an increasing proportion of that component work and manufacturing services and channel that into neighbouring communities, such as mine, which are adjacent to the great assembly plants that have been attracted by inward investment. In other words, the jobs are already there; we need simply to ensure that a higher proportion of component and manufacturing needs are served by local companies in south Wales. That should be the Secretary of State's priority.

I have argued with successive Secretaries of State that we should have not only a "Source Wales" but a "Source Valleys" campaign. We need more than words and glossy brochures; we need the Government to use their powers to attract and develop component making and manufacturing services for our great assembly plants. Although there have been many good efforts, the results are rather poor. The new Secretary of State should set himself and us targets for the future development of jobs of that kind which will break through the fatalism and sense of resignation still felt by so many communities.

10.49 am

I thank you, Madam Speaker, for calling me to speak on what I believe to be an important subject, one that the House should debate before the summer recess. I am referring to the imminent sale of 51 per cent. of the shares in Birmingham airport to Lockheed, the American company. During questions on the business statement last week, I asked the Leader of the House for a debate or statement on this topic. I am therefore grateful for this opportunity to raise the matter before the recess.

The airport is currently in public ownership and owned jointly by the metropolitan boroughs in the west midlands. My interest is that of a Member of Parliament for one of those boroughs. You, Madam Speaker, also have a constituency interest in the future of the airport. Dudley is one of the boroughs involved, and it is interesting to note that the Labour leader of the council in Dudley is also the chairman of the company that currently owns the airport. One of my constituents also wishes to be given the opportunity to purchase the airport. He is Roy Richardson, a large business man in the black country.

Following my request last Thursday, I was rather surprised that the chairman of the airport company, Councillor Hunt, should tell me not to interfere in the future of the airport but to look after my constituents. That is exactly what I am doing and what I intend to continue to do. It seems that the Labour council leaders involved enjoy their ownership of it and treat it as a toy that they, like children, refuse to give up.

I raise this issue at a time when it is accepted that the airport's future financing depends on its being able to attract private sector investment. That has been clearly stated and accepted by the councils involved. The former Minister for Aviation and Shipping, Lord Caithness, advised local Labour councillors how to go about raising more money for future development and told them the Government's view some time ago.

My first question is why are we selling only 51 per cent. of the shares? Surely it would be for the benefit of the councils and the taxpayers to sell 100 per cent. of the holding currently in the public sector. Many airports are currently run efficiently and successfully in the private sector. They do not need worthy councillors interfering with commercial decisions; they decide on commercial grounds how to run those airports and do so with great success. Whether the sale is of 51 per cent. or 100 per cent. of the holding, it is essential that it is completely above board and not decided over sandwiches in a smoke-filled room. For the benefit of the public purse, the councillors should get the very best price for the assets that they hold.

I wrote to the Department of Transport asking what the Government's view was. On 11 May, I received a reply from Viscount Goschen who was by then the Minister for Aviation and Shipping. I was advised:

"It is up to the local authority owners to decide how privatisation should take place, though they will of course be mindful of the need to satisfy their auditors that they have obtained the best price."

It is important that the best price is obtained for the public good. I question whether speaking to only two foreign companies, which are presumably offering the councillors an agreement as to how the 49 per cent. holding will be handled, will necessarily obtain the best price.

In the west midlands, there are three potential purchasers, all with local interests—National Express, West Midland Travel and the Richardson brothers. They have not been given the opportunity to be considered or told exactly for what they should be tendering. I do not wish to make political points although Opposition Members suspect that I may be doing so. However, I shall quote briefly from a newspaper article written, not by a Conservative, but by Graham Findlay in The Birmingham Post on 14 April. The article is headed "Politics leaves bids grounded", and a secondary heading reads,

"Graham Findlay blames 'old Labour' for the row over Birmingham Airport's sell-off'.

The article states:

"There is a sinister political sub-text to the reasons given in public for refusing to consider three Midland bidders for Birmingham International Airport.

The three who are being left out in the cold are National Express, West Midlands Travel and the property developers the Richardson twins…

Officially, the councils say they want the 'internationally-recognised and relevant strategic skills' which the Irish and American buyers could provide …

But behind the plausible reasons for wanting foreign partners at the airport lies what appears to be blatant political prejudice on the part of the seven councils.

At the end of last year West Midlands Travel and BZW, advisers to the councils, were involved in some preliminary talks over the deal.

But then it became apparent that the sale of WMT to National Express would make WMT's managers a great deal of money …

And it is said that once news of the payments became known, several Labour councillors insisted they would have nothing more to do with WMT or National Express as potential partners at the airport …

Meanwhile, Don and Roy Richardson have also fallen foul of the Labour cabal."

These are not my words but those of Graham Findlay in The Birmingham Post. The article continues:

"The Richardsons have had faith in the West Midlands through lean years as well as fat, investing in new projects during the recessions of the early 1980s and the early 1990s.

Yet they are not wanted at the airport. As Mr. Roy Richardson says: 'They are happy for us to do the dirty jobs but when the juicy ones come up, we are left out.'

Once again, we see the local Town Halls' avoidance of successful examples of successful local capitalists.

But for many Labour councillors, the Richardsons face another prejudice. They have been known in the past to lend their support to the Conservative Party.

That alone would almost certainly prove too much for some Labour councillors to stomach."

We now know why they are excluded from being considered for future ownership of the airport. The other two potential purchasers are in no way political, but the whole issue needs to be tackled before the recess. It is especially urgent that the matter be discussed now because the local councillors who currently own the airport are likely before the end of the month to accept a bid from Lockheed to become their partner with a 51 per cent. holding.

I should like to ask my right hon. Friend the Leader of the House what can be done, first, to stop the political fiddling; secondly, to ensure that everyone—especially those actively involved in industry in the west midlands—has a fair opportunity to bid for the airport; and thirdly—this is important for all our constituents—to ensure that we obtain the best price for the sale of this public asset.

10.58 am

May I take the Leader of the House away from the tribulations of Birmingham airport to the more tranquil setting of the River Tweed in Roxburghshire? Before I do so, I must say that Scottish Members owe him a great debt for enabling the House to go into recess relatively early this year. Scottish Members who might have had difficulties greatly appreciate the additional scope that we now have for taking family holidays before school begins again in August.

Before we adjourn for the long summer recess, I ask the House to consider the system of allocation of capital borrowing consents which are to be used by the new Scottish unitary authorities after 1 April next year. As the House will know, in April 1996, the number of Scottish authorities—currently nine regional councils plus three islands authorities—will be increased to 32 unitary councils consisting of 29 unitary land-based authorises and three islands councils. One does not have to be an accountant to recognise that, by virtue of that fact, a larger number of authorities with smaller capital budgets will lead to potential difficulties in paying for unusually large capital projects.

It is a matter of concern across parties that a new system for allocating those important capital borrowing consents has not yet been finalised. A rumour is going around that there will be a system of allocating 75 per cent. of the budgets to the local councils with a residual 25 per cent. being top-sliced and kept in a central pool for allocation on a national basis to larger capital projects.

Whether or not that is true, the planning processes of a number of larger capital projects are being stymied because of the uncertainty. If the matter is not soon resolved by proper consultation with the local authorities concerned, that inevitable confusion and uncertainty will serve to delay further the start of the larger Scottish capital projects involved. Certainly, to go through the long summer recess without that matter being resolved will cause great concern.

To illustrate the point, I shall cite the case of my own roads authority—the Borders regional council—which has had a project ready and awaiting capital borrowing consent for more than two years. The local authority in the Borders region sees an urgent need to build a new road bridge across the River Tweed down river of the Rennie-designed road bridge which joins the two halves of the town of Kelso. The Rennie bridge is a grade A listed building. It was built many years ago, it is an exceptional piece of architecture and any sensible system should preserve it on an architectural and heritage basis for the benefit of future generations. It was certainly never designed to cope with the volume of traffic or, indeed, the size of vehicles today, 12,000 of which cross it daily.

The road platform on the bridge is extremely narrow—it is not up to modern standards—and it is far too narrow for safe pedestrian use. Indeed, a recent tragedy occurred when a fire engine travelling across the bridge went through the parapet wall and fell the long drop into the River Tweed killing one of the fire crew which was responding to an emergency call. That underlines the danger of the Rennie bridge being the only one available to the population and the local community.

The intolerable traffic congestion which is building up because of the bottle-neck Caused by the bridge is inconvenient to the point of interfering with the normal economic life of the town. The local roads authority has paid careful attention to that factor in identifying the need for a replacement bridge. In addition, the fabric of the environment of the centre of Kelso is being knocked to bits by the through traffic, which is forced—because there is no other route—to go through the town centre to cross the Tweed over the Rennie bridge. If anything happens to cause the bridge to close, as was the case with the fire engine tragedy, the diversions required to get to other bridges which cross the Tweed are totally unacceptable, involving detours of some 20 miles in total. A new road bridge would provide relief on all those fronts and is now long overdue.

Public initiatives have been sponsored by the people of Kelso to make their anger and frustration known to Ministers. They included a massive petition which I presented to Ministers and a delegation which I led to see the Scottish Office Minister with responsibility for roads. However, the people of Kelso now feel dismay bordering on outrage because Scottish Office Ministers refused to sanction the necessary consents for the project for the second year running in April this year.

The Borders regional roads authority has an annual capital allocation of just over £4 million. The Kelso road bridge replacement will cost around £8 million. One does not have to be an accountant to appreciate how difficult it is to pay for an £8 million project out of a £4 million annual budget. The galling thing is that almost £1 million of capital expenditure had been committed by the Borders regional roads authority to financing public inquiries, initial survey and design work and acquiring the land to enable the new bridge to be built. That money is tied up, serving no useful purpose and it will have no effect until central Government consent is forthcoming to start building the new Kelso bridge.

In addition, and compounding local anger, Scottish Office Ministers have been unfairly leading on the local authority by appearing to agree the consents necessary for the new bridge in principle when the project appeared in the on-going transport forward planning documents required by statute to be lodged by the local authority. The documents have been submitted and approved by Ministers without demur or comment. The implication is that if the plans are in the three-year rolling programme, they will be given capital consent approval when their time comes. Yet now, although the bridge is ready to be built, Ministers are actively withholding the additional £2 million borrowings needed by the local authority in each of two consecutive years to allow the new road bridge to be built.

I give due notice to the Government and Scottish Office Ministers in particular that the people of Kelso will persist in raising this issue on a regular and frequent basis until the Scottish Office recognises the urgency of the need for a new bridge at Kelso. In the meantime, I urge the Leader of the House to draw the matter to the attention of the new Secretary of State for Scotland. The Secretary of State has a new ministerial team and the chance to look afresh at the merits of this case. I make. two pleas. First, urgent steps should be taken to agree a new system of allocating borrowing consents for all the new councils in Scotland after next April, because it is delaying important planning of unusually big projects.

Secondly, and particularly, urgent reconsideration should be given to the approval of borrowing consent for the building of a new road bridge for Kelso. I would be much obliged if the Leader of the House could take whatever opportunity he has to raise those matters urgently with his colleagues in the Scottish Office.

11.7 am

As we enter the long recess, I want to air a few matters on my mind before summer atrophy sets in to political and parliamentary life. The first matter is Bosnia. It is right to hold an emergency debate this evening on that subject. I asked to speak in this debate before I knew that there would be an emergency debate. So, since a bird in the hand is worth two in the bush, and having been called, I shall speak on Bosnia in this debate as I cannot guarantee being called in the later debate. I hope that the emergency debate might even prevent us from being recalled during the recess to react to yet another dangerous escalation of activity in that region.

Whatever happens, however palpable the failure of the central purpose of the United Nations and NATO mission, there seems to be no sticking point at which Her Majesty's Government say, "That is enough, we must change direction." Lately, we appear to be driven by French taunts of appeasement. They are taken more seriously by us because of our relations in the European Union and our efforts at foreign and defence policy co-ordination. Those efforts will be soured if we give the French a dose of realpolitik rather than indulge their spirit of moral crusade, which is frankly indistinguishable from the ravings of Gladstone over a century ago, and as damaging to British interests.

The comparison by President Chirac concerning appeasement in the 1930s is a ludicrous historical analysis. The threat of Hitler's Germany was wholly different, not least in directly and vitally affecting the peace and security of this country as well as of France.

Facing the challenge confronting us in the former Yugoslavia, we desperately need a clear and accurate historical perspective. Every now and again during the past century and a half, the eastern question, which is centred on what to do about power struggles and atrocities in the Balkans and the pot-boiling interventions of interested nations, stirs demands for some definite action. Most people are relieved that they are not asked to understand, let alone to unravel, the intricacies of a geographical and historical tangle that is more complex than the Gordian knot. On occasions—now is one of them—matters become deadly serious for our country.

We are ordering our service men to risk their lives for the present policy of supporting a United Nations operation, ostensibly with the laudable peacekeeping humanitarian objective of saving lives and bloodshed, but increasingly risking the waging of war in furtherance of those aims. The truth is that there is no peace to keep in the war zones of Bosnia and no agreement between the warring factions that is likely to bring it about.

The British interest and the limits of British power need to be clearly understood and defined. It would be madness for us to attempt, whatever the shadow Foreign Secretary urges us to do, with the French and whoever else joins us, to pick sides and to impose peace. There is no overwhelming public support for fighting such a war. The United States has no intention of committing ground troops to Bosnia for anything but aiding a general withdrawal of United Nations troops once it has seen beyond question that the peacekeeping mission has run its course. Withdrawal, even with full air support, is no easy task and will undoubtedly involve the abandonment of military equipment. It will also mean lifting the arms embargo.

Withdrawal and lifting the arms embargo would have the catastrophic consequences to which my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister referred yesterday. But our objectives must be limited to our power to carry them out and that applies to the whole United Nations and NATO effort. There is no ignominy in withdrawing when we have decided that our humanitarian efforts are no longer sufficiently succeeding. Every moment longer we remain, we shall be held responsible by both sides for what happens. We shall be associated with the bloodshed and we shall face impossible demands from both sides to act or to cease from acting.

At present, we have a classic example. The Bosnians say that they will use United Nations personnel as human shields unless NATO air strikes are called against the Serbs. The Serbs say that they will kill United Nations personnel if air strikes are used. It reminds me of the dilemma faced by Elizabeth Bennett in "Pride and Prejudice" over the marriage proposal from Mr. Collins. She was told by her father:

"From this day forward you must be a stranger to one of your parents. Your mother will never see you again if you do not marry Mr. Collins and I will never see you again if you do."

Our policy on Bosnia should now be to recognise that direct negotiations between the warring parties will not happen in the foreseeable future. The United States will not get involved with ground troops and without United States involvement in a world crisis of this kind, we certainly cannot make substantial headway. We should direct our diplomatic and military efforts, with the United Nations, to contain the fighting and to prevent it from spreading into peaceful parts of the former Yugoslavia or over the borders into other countries. That has been our traditional historical role in the Balkans and to that role we should return as soon as possible.

I turn briefly to more domestic politics and I shall look well beyond recent troubles and the unnecessary bloodletting of the recent leadership election. The Government now require a coherent strategy based on clear policy and decisive, competent action. My right hon. Friend the Prime Minister must capitalise—a good Conservative word which I hope is back in fashion—on his victory in the recent leadership election by delivering decisive and competent action. Our constituents must be able to recognise it.

In recent days, the words of Southey about the battle of Blenheim have been running through my mind and I want to share them with you, Madam Deputy Speaker. He wrote:

"Everybody praised the Duke Who this great fight did win. 'But what good came of it at last? Quoth little Peterkin. 'Why that I cannot say' said he 'But 'twas a famous victory.'"

Good must indeed be seen to come at last to my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister and to the fortunes of this Government, and the electorate must be able to identify with it and to feel it.

We have a reshuffled Government in place, the most noteworthy creation being the new post of First Secretary of State and Deputy Prime Minister, with a flexible job description to give ample scope to the energies of my right hon. Friend the Member for Henley (Mr. Heseltine). In speculating on the likely success of such a creation, it is interesting to note the words of Rab Butler in his excellent autobiography, "The Art of the Possible". In referring to the relaunch of the Conservative Government after the night of the long knives in July 1962, he wrote:

"I was named First Secretary of State and invited to act as Deputy Prime Minister, a title which can constitutionally imply no right to the succession and should (I would advise with the benefit of hindsight) be neither conferred nor accepted."

We must wish my right hon. Friend the Member for Henley—and ourselves—every good fortune with that job. My right hon. Friend certainly has work to do in it.

I do not detect in my constituency any hunger for a Labour Government. Frankly, that is so whatever the notoriously unreliable and ephemeral opinion polls and local election reversals might suggest. It is not difficult to identify the policies on which our political recovery will be based. They are not complicated, they are traditional Conservative ones and they have been aired most notably by my right hon. Friend the Member for Wokingham (Mr. Redwood) in recent weeks. Those policies include lower taxation, support for the prudent pensioner, especially those, mainly women, now in their 70s and 80s, support for small businesses through tax and rate changes, a reduction in public expenditure and the bureaucracy that underpins it, strong defence and the maintenance of our traditions.

We should not, for instance, be proposing to cease Royal Navy mast manning and field gun exercises which continue to have real relevance to training, fitness and morale, and which cost peanuts compared with the expenditure on desk jobs in the Ministry of Defence and other Government Departments, which inspire no one in Portsmouth or anywhere else with a sense of the glory of our military traditions. What Conservative Minister with any pretensions to a soul could consider signing such a demolition order and consigning such useful traditions to untimely collapse? Instinct alone should stay his hand. We must stop doing such things if we are to regain the respect and trust of the electorate.

The same goes for agreeing to shut or amalgamate successful and popular small schools or hospitals. To those who believe that it is impossible to cut public expenditure by significant amounts, I refer the excellent speech by my hon. Friend the Member for Bridlington (Mr. Townend) in last Tuesday's economic debate. If I had time, I could add to it and I will certainly do so in due course. I refer those who scoff and who say that it is impossible to cut taxation—certainly not to the extent of £5 billion—to the statements by my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister and by Government sources to the press about the abolition of inheritance and capital gains tax and the possible introduction of transferable tax allowances. Those changes together amount to well in excess of a mere £5 billion.

Is my hon. Friend not encouraged by the fact that the Prime Minister is already making headway in his commitment to do away with capital gains tax with regard to share options? Tax on those has now been transferred to income tax.

I am very encouraged by what the Prime Minister is saying at present about taxes and I hope very much to see action resulting from it in addition to that to which my hon. Friend refers. Of course we can and we should cut taxes and of course it takes the will to do so. The Government must demonstrate that will and restore their credibility with the electorate with low taxation, which is a crucial difference between us and the high-spending, high-taxing Labour party.

I repeat that there is no appetite for Labour, new or old, or for what passes as its policies. Nor is there appetite for the Liberal Democrats, the ultimate beneficiaries of disillusion, protest and abstention. The vacuum is on the Opposition Benches. We do not need further lengthy consultation exercises on every policy under the sun. I hear that the latest is contained in a 10-page document sent by central office to my constituency, with no copy to me. I merely represent my constituents in this place and could certainly let the Government know, to the best of my ability, of some of the ideas that would represent my constituents.

The new Government, even fresher than new Labour, have the initiative at present and right up to the general election. They must keep that initiative. We must all use the time left in this Parliament to secure the best for our constituents and the best for our nation.

11.19 am

I will not be tempted to follow the route taken by the hon. Member for Portsmouth, South (Mr. Martin). I do not wish to intervene on the internal grief of the Conservative party. That grief has been displayed openly in recent weeks, and it is not worthy of any further discussion on this occasion.

I wish to take the opportunity briefly to talk about certain events in my constituency and to raise a more general issue that relates not just to inner cities, but to our political system as a whole. Last week in the Hyde park area of Leeds, there were two nights of what the media referred to as rioting. The Hyde park area is partly in my constituency, and partly in the constituencies of my hon. Friend the Member for Leeds, West (Mr. Battle) and the hon. Member for Leeds, North-West (Dr. Hampson).

The problems in the area are typical of those of an inner city; high unemployment—particularly among young people—housing stress, changes in the traditional family and family breakdown. The problems are more acutely felt in a city such as Leeds which has done extremely well economically in recent years. There is a real social and political problem when pockets of deprivation lie alongside noticeable pockets of affluence, as people feel that they are missing out on what they consider to be their rightful stake in society.

There is a problem in the way in which our political system discusses inner-city issues. There is a great danger in the House that although we talk about the problems and exchange statistics, we are simply failing to relate to the key players. For many of my constituents—this may be a result of my own failures—the political debate is totally alien to the immediate day-to-day problems that they face. If we in this House do not get a grip on those problems, there is a real danger that we will allow an underclass to fall outside our political system. Those people will not be represented, and may become extremely dangerous to our long-term political stability.

Let me give one fact about last week's events that struck me as one of the most frightening statistics that I have come across for some time. When I talked to the various agencies directly involved in the events—the police, the local authorities and others—it was suggested to me that, on the first night, somewhere between 100 and 150 young people were involved in the activities on the street. They were not organised, nor were they bussed in from other cities. It happened spontaneously, and they were in direct and open conflict with the police. They threw stones and razed a pub to the ground. Cars were burned and other activities took place in which some 100 to 150 young people were directly involved.

Hyde park is an area where there has been a good working relationship between the police, the voluntary agencies, the local authority and the local community. If one wants to look for an inner-city area which has achieved many of the things talked about in the House and elsewhere, Hyde park is one. Yet we still have a large number of wholly disaffected young people.

I do not believe that we can simply attribute to those young people some innate evil that makes them behave in that way. I suspect that a relatively small number of those 100 to 150 young people are involved in organised or regular crime. But we cannot simply say that the majority of those young people are evil or naturally criminal, and that they must be written off.

We have a problem, because it is too easy just to write this off as a law and order issue. It is a much more difficult problem than that. I fear that in my constituency—I suspect this can be replicated up and down the country—we have a generation of young people who are lost to and lost in our society. Unless we relate to those young people, we will have deep and long-running sores in our society.

What can we do? First, we as politicians must recognise that there is no magic formula or panacea. While there is no answer that we can give from on high, there are things that we can do. It might sound economically deterministic, but I think that jobs are crucial. If we do not provide jobs for young people, they will have no hope or no expectation of a stake in society. We must think radically about how we provide jobs.

There is a worrying culture developing in our inner cities in which work no longer has a central part. In many parts of my constituency, people simply do not have a disciplined structure to their lives because they have no role in the labour market. Jobs are crucial. I do not know whether you, Madam Deputy Speaker, or other Members have been following an excellent series of articles on the subject in The Guardian. What came through from one of those articles was a sense that our young people— including those in our school system and primary schools—are saying that they have no hope, no ambition and no expectations.

My hon. Friend has touched on a most profound point for this country and for the House. There is no expectation among our young people not only for themselves, but for their friends and for the future of their families and our society. Does my hon. Friend agree that the primary duty for all parties in this House and those outside is to try to get an economic policy—wherever it may come from—which centres on the need to distribute employment in society so that the sense of expectation can be revived and maintained?

I totally agree with my hon. Friend. I shall digress briefly by relating some personal and anecdotal evidence of some problems in the inner cities. I visited one of the secondary schools in my constituency a few years ago. I may have been full of the middle-class work ethic, a sense of achievement and a belief in our educational system. I remember saying to one streetwise 13-year-old that I hoped that he was working hard and doing all that was necessary to get good GCSE results to enable him to go on from there. He looked at me as if I came from a totally different world and said, "If I work hard, I finish up on a scheme. If I do not work hard, I finish up on a scheme." He had worked out that equation, and decided that he might as well enjoy himself at that stage because—whatever happened to him—he would finish up on a training scheme. My fear is that, in a few years, he might not even have the ambition to finish up on a training scheme.

We must seriously relate to these issues across the political parties. Jobs are important, but a change in our style as politicians is also needed. We must listen more. All of the institutions and agencies operate from the top down and are too top-heavy in terms of solutions. The ideas move from us to them, whereas we should be allowing them to come up with their own solutions. I recognise that if we allow young people much greater control of their own lives, we take risks. But if we do not allow young people that responsibility, there is a real danger that they will simply fall outside our structures.

Following the events in Hyde park, people said to me that what was needed was a new youth club in the area. That suggestion was made with all the best intentions in the world, but those who made it have failed to understand where we are. We must find flexible, informal and creative ways of relating to young people. It is not just about jobs. We must also tap into their culture and give young people a sense of hope.

I should also like to raise the issue of drugs, a subject that is difficult for us as politicians to deal with. Hon. Members who represent inner cities—the problem may be more broadly spread now—will share my concern and fear about the explosion of criminal activity and violence surrounding the developing drug culture. It is difficult for my generation to understand and relate to the drugs problem; it is easy enough to be frightened by it, and to feel that it is alien.

Time after time, experienced, level-headed and sensible senior police officers in the Leeds and west Yorkshire area have told me that some 80 per cent. of crime in the area is drug-related. There is the problem of trafficking, which can be serious; much more relevant to us as citizens, however, is the fact that a large amount of crime is committed to pay for the addiction that exists in the inner cities. I could take hon. Members to any part of my constituency tonight, and they could see young people using drugs. It is frightening.

How should we respond to the problem? It is difficult for us, as politicians, to produce a response. We are in danger of scoring cheap political points at a time when important issues surround young people. If we do not respond, however, the criminal spin-off from drugs will change not just the lives of the individuals directly concerned, but all our lives. Any hon. Member representing an inner-city constituency will have tales of crimes committed against innocent constituents simply because people have been under the influence of drugs, or need money to pay for them.

I can offer no easy solutions, although I have no hesitation in saying that the hard core of drug traffickers should be locked up for a long time, and I am sure that all hon. Members agree. The majority of decent young people, however, pose a different problem: for them the gratification side of the drugs equation is known and experienced, but the risks are ignored or unknown. We must talk to those decent, ordinary youngsters who have been pulled into the drugs net.

This may be partly based on hope, but I think that we could do more. We could listen more to young people; we could condemn less, and devote more time and effort to conveying the message that drugs pose too great a risk for people to become involved with them. Let me issue a plea to the Leader of the House: we need to adopt creative, radical methods to put that message across. If we do not tackle the problem, much of what we know as life in the inner city today—with all its problems and brutality—will continue to deteriorate. I am sure that the Leader of the House is sympathetic; I hope that the Government, with the support of all political parties, will provide more education about drugs and so promote greater awareness.

We need more resources to provide drugs education, jobs and housing. That plea is heard in many debates on the inner city; let me add that we, as politicians, should relate more to the problems of the percentage of society who are increasingly disaffected and falling through the net. We must understand the depth of the change that has taken place in our inner cities. We cannot afford not to allow our fellow citizens to be part of our political debate, and to gain from it.

If we do not relate to the problem, there will be political, economic and moral costs for us all. There will be economic costs because we are wasting the talents and resources of many of our fellow citizens, especially members of the next generation. There will be political costs because, if we do not relate to the problem as politicians, our system will be weakened and grounds will be provided for extremism of all kinds, which will be very damaging in the long term. Finally, as an affluent society we cannot morally justify the fact that a percentage of our fellow citizens have no right to a stake in that affluence. All hon. Members enjoy that affluence, and I feel that we have a moral responsibility—whatever we say in politics—to try to ensure that our fellow citizens enjoy the same affluence and personal well-being.

11.34 am

I am sure that my constituents would not want the House to adjourn without my having the opportunity to raise an issue that I have raised numerous times over the years: the state of the water industry in the west country.

The facts are reasonably well known by now. We in the west country are responsible for cleaning up about a third of the beaches that were found to be deficient under a European directive. Local resources have had to be used to clean some 130 out of 455 beaches. It is easy to say, with 20–20 hindsight—a piece of equipment that I, as a politician, will always use when it is to my advantage—that the Government should not have privatised the water industry in the way that they did, given that we now know that the beaches had to be cleaned up. We did not know it then, however. The fact is that 1.5 million people—or, more probably, about 900,000, given the number who actually pay water charges—are responsible for cleaning up a third of the nation's beaches.

The pressure on prices in the west country is stunning. It has been said that the average annual water charge is about £300 per household because of the high rateable values in the area. It is by no means uncommon for an elderly single person in relatively modest accommodation to pay well over £400 a year, and before long what could be described as an affluent household in the suburbs may be paying well over £1,000—in some instances, as much as £1,800 or £1,900.

It is all very well for those who can afford such charges to say, "It is just one of those things; we must cope with it." For many people in the west country, however, the situation is frightening. In the not too distant past, residents have seen their water bills rise by up to 20 per cent. per annum. They are paying for the one staple of life the use of which they cannot possibly control.

I hope that I can say, without sounding unduly and uncharacteristically flippant, that it is not much consolation for an 80-year-old widow with a zimmer frame to know that surfers in the west country are able to enjoy amazingly clean water. Such people have rather more pressing concerns, and they are having to pay massive bills.

What can be done? A great deal has already been done over the years. At long last, as a result of hon. Members' efforts, Ofwat has been prepared to recommend that the huge year-on-year increases in the west country should not continue, and that increases should be pegged to the rate of inflation. Some say that we should consider reductions in charges; that is a nice idea, but it was never going to happen.

It would have been something if charges could have been pegged so that people at least knew what they were having to budget for. That was a definite prospect last year, when Ofwat made its recommendation. South West Water has appealed to the Monopolies and Mergers Commission, saying that it has not enough money to perform its statutory functions; apparently, however, it had nearly £1 million to devote to the effort to overturn Ofwat's judgment. I do not know whether that figure is accurate, but when I put it to South West Water it was not contradicted. I dare say that South West Water has better things to do.

As I have said, people are paying massive charges for a staple that they cannot control, and seeing no end in sight. That is the general background; I have gone into much more detail in the past. An interesting fact that I have discovered during a life in politics is that things can always get worse—and if they can get worse, they probably will.

One weekend recently, people in the higher-lying parts of the west country found that, when they turned on their tap, nothing happened—no water came through. In certain parts of Cornwall, people found that what came through the tap was obviously unfit to drink. Having paid the highest water charges in the country, they suddenly found that the process of turning on a tap did not produce the water that they were paying for.

Not everyone connected with the south-west and the consumption of water on that weekend suffered the glum reality of water not coming through. One person who was able to consider that in a rosier way was none other than the managing director of South West Water, Mr. Fraser. He was revealed in the Sunday Times to be watering his garden—a marvellous occupation, if you have the water to do it. Doubtless, while watering his garden, he was contemplating what he would do with his latest pay rise—a pay rise of £67,000 per year—a remuneration package. Mr. Fraser subsequently wrote to me, saying that that was not a pay rise as such—it was not him but one of his minions; obviously he would not write to a Member of Parliament about that sort of thing—but a total package of about £67,000. He was quizzed about that by a journalist—it is interesting to meet someone who is paid even more than a journalist—and he said:

"My salary has been frozen for some time. This was a modest rise."

Let me make one thing clear. I am not some latter-day Leveller and I have no difficulty with the payment of high salaries. I would have no difficulty in conveying a message to my constituents that, to retain the best people for a difficult job in a competitive world, it is necessary to pay the rate for that job. I understand that, and I understand the language that says that an organisation must pay whatever is necessary to recruit, retain and motivate.

However, the problem is that, often in the water industry, it is not an issue of bringing people in who bring their great expertise to bear because of the salaries available; they are the same old shower who were there in the first place.

To be fair to Mr. Fraser, he was actually brought in from outside, but a great many people would have asked themselves, that weekend when they had no water in their taps and they saw the spectacle of that gentleman in Surrey watering his garden, contemplating what to do with his extra £67,000, why it was necessary to pay that money. I do not know.

Perhaps, for the rest of the year, head hunters were beating their way up the path, past those lovely, well-watered flower gardens, to present themselves at Mr. Fraser's mansion, saying: "You are such a successful person that we shall offer you plenty of money to leave South West Water." That may have happened, but a cynicism born of many years in politics suggests to me that that may not be true. I have asked, but I have not yet been able to discover any head hunters for Mr. Fraser—scalp hunters, yes, about 1.5 million of them, but no head hunters.

I could be wrong. Perhaps it is necessary to pay a massive sum to retain Mr. Fraser's services, but I should be interested to know what the going rate is. What is the going rate for a pay rise for a managing director of a water company that is incapable of delivering water? I may be displaying the naivety of a politician. Perhaps one really does have to pay an extra £67,000 to someone to do a job that he is proving incapable of doing, but I doubt it, and so do a great many of my constituents.

It was an increase of £67,000 and a total remuneration of £200,000. If we were here with Mr. Court, the chairman of South West Water, today, perhaps round at his place enjoying a pleasant glass of 1983 Chassagne-Montrachet, he would probably say, as we sip that wine in his well-watered garden, "It is a drop in the ocean compared with what South West Water is actually paying", and he is right—it is. However, a sense of fairness matters, and it is the last straw for people in the west country when they find that the directors of that rapacious water authority, paying themselves mega-salaries, are not even able to deliver the service that they are paid that money to provide.

What can we do about that? Obviously, something must be done. It is not sufficient to say, if anyone were to say it, "It is all very difficult, but in the end, in free commerce, the market must decide."

It is a monopoly.

I shall give way to my hon. Friend, if he wants, in a moment.

There is no market in water. It is all about the magical ingredient H₂O. One cannot do without it. The same criteria do not apply to Marks and Spencer, to any grocer or to any other firm in a competitive industry. It is completely and utterly different. The language of the marketplace, which, in my opinion, justifies to the hilt salaries of, in some cases, £200,000—or £2 million, for that matter—cannot possibly apply to the monopoly utility.

I shall say in a few moments, when I have given way to my hon. Friend—[Interruption.] I shall not give way.

I made my point.

One aims to please.

What shall we do about it? It is always easy, yet it is always difficult, to draft legislation on one's feet. The shape of what must be done is obvious.

When the chief executive or managing director or senior board members of a company such as South West Water are recruited externally, the company should be required to file with Ofwat a statement of what salary it intends to offer and its grounds for saying that that salary is necessary to attract people of a sufficient calibre. As far as internal reward is concerned, documents should be filed with Ofwat, showing why it is necessary—let us take the case in hand—to pay Mr. Fraser £67,000 a year more than previously. The documents should say who has tried to poach him, who has beaten a path to his door—why it is necessary to pay that sum of money. Then the public can be satisfied.

If it turns out that it is necessary to pay that sum of money to ensure that water does not come through people's taps in the west country, I am sure that the British people, who are fair, will consider the evidence and say that that must be entirely right. Until that is done, however, they will be extremely upset.

Is it a trivial matter? I do not believe so. Every now and again, one comes across a defining issue—an issue that drives people round the bend, an issue that infuriates people almost beyond reason. In the west country, the salaries that the senior personnel of South West Water pay themselves are that defining issue. It goes against every single canon of fairness.

When someone as naturally right-wing and acquisitive as me is compelled to say that figures such as that are an outrage, the matter needs to be tackled. I hope that, if my right hon. Friend the Leader of the House has the opportunity to say a few words about my contribution today, even if he cannot offer any direct solution, he will at least acknowledge that, yet again, a west country Member is bringing on to the Floor of the House of Commons the pre-eminent issue in the west country today. I should also like to think, because I have a great deal of confidence in him, that he might be able to say something that will give people some cheer that that sort of outrage will one day cease.

11.46 am

I shall briefly comment on the speech that we have just heard. I am sure that all of us, whatever part of the country we represent, will fully agree with what the hon. Member for Teignbridge (Mr. Nicholls) said. He spoke about the west country, and obviously the problems that he and people who live in that part of the country experience, but the problem exists throughout the country. It is not only water charges, which, as the hon. Gentleman said, cause people to drive themselves round the bend with hopelessness, but the size of salaries. I and, I am sure, many other hon. Members of the House might tell similar stories to the one that the hon. Gentleman related.

This is a matter for the Government, because I do not believe that it should be a political issue, as the hon. Gentleman rightly said. Water is one of the essential commodities that everyone needs, and the Government must urgently consider the matter.

The subject that I would like to speak on for a few moments concerns the Latham committee report on the construction industry. That was published a year ago and the report was commissioned by the Secretary of State for the Environment and prepared by Sir Michael Latham, the former distinguished Member of the House whom I am sure that many of us recall.

The report was well received by all with interests in the construction industry. It was welcomed by companies working in the industry. There are thousands of them, large and small; indeed, about 10 per cent. of the country's gross national product comes from the construction industry. The report was also warmly welcomed by trade unions who have members employed in the industry. I must declare an interest, as the trade union that sponsors me, the Amalgamated Engineering and Electrical Union—which has thousands of members working in the industry—also fully supports the Latham committee report.

The construction industry is vital to this country, but it has faced many problems over the years. They included the late payment of money, the abuse of payment after work had been completed, and arguments about cost and the kind of work that companies had done. Those problems often led to drawn-out and expensive disputes and, in the end, the companies and their workers invariably lost out.

The Latham committee report considered all those issues. It recommended measures to improve relations between clients, contractors and subcontractors which would lead to improved efficiency within the industry. As I have said, the report was received very warmly. Early-day motion 557, which appears on the Order Paper, deals with the need for a construction contracts Bill. It has been signed by more than 200 Members from all political parties, including some very senior Members and those who do not often sign early-day motions in this place. I think that that illustrates the support that the proposal for contracts legislation has within the House.

In all constituencies there are construction companies that employ local people, so I believe that the entire country would benefit from such legislation. I impress upon the Leader of the House that it is not a political issue. Sir Michael Latham's proposals are warmly supported by all political parties throughout the country. Members of Parliament and the representatives of the construction industry and companies in our constituencies want to see such legislation introduced in the next parliamentary Session.

The House goes into recess this week and those of us who have been in this place for some time and those who have held positions in Government know that in the next few weeks Ministers and their Departments will be finalising the legislation that they would like included in the forthcoming Queen's Speech. Sir Michael Latham and those involved in the industry—be it the contractors or the trade unions—hope that such legislation will be included in the Queen's Speech.

Tomorrow a major conference will be held at the Queen Elizabeth conference centre. The topic of discussion at that conference will be "Latham: One Year On". We know the nature of the discussions that will take place as there have been many such meetings in the past year. I have with me this morning publications from the Department of the Environment reporting on Latham and his proposals and I have also received similar correspondence and publications from the Construction Industry Training Board.

The early-day motion to which I have referred will obviously be discussed at tomorrow's conference, as will the parliamentary questions that have been asked in the past year. Hon. Members on both sides of the House have asked about the Government's intentions in that regard and I am sure that those questions will figure in tomorrow's discussions. I am sure that the overriding concern, to which speaker after speaker will refer, is when a construction contracts Bill will be presented to Parliament.

One year has passed since the publication of the Latham committee report and, to the Government's credit, it has not been pigeon-holed and forgotten. I pay tribute to the Secretary of State for the Environment for the active role that he has played in the discussions that have taken place about the report. We have a right to look to the Government to make an early announcement about legislation.

When the report was published a year ago, I spoke in a debate similar to this one. Even in those early days, I supported the report, and it was clear from the response of hon. Members on both sides of the House that the Latham proposals enjoyed widespread support and that they believed that legislation should follow. In the past few days, the construction industry has also agreed to the Latham proposals. I understand that the Secretary of State was waiting for that expression of support from the industry. His attitude was: "I am not unsympathetic; but does the industry agree to the proposals?" I have been informed that that is certainly the case.

In conclusion, I hope that the Leader of the House will convey to his right hon. Friend the urgency of the matter. A statement must be made as soon as possible. Many hon. Members—the hon. Member for Teignbridge, who has just spoken, is one of the sponsors of the early-day motion to which I referred—seek the introduction of very clear legislation based upon the Latham proposals.

The industry and its trade unions do not want to see those proposals incorporated in other legislation. The Government of the day often say that, although they are not unsympathetic to a particular case, they cannot introduce a separate Bill to deal with the matter. Therefore, they incorporate the proposals in another piece of legislation from the relevant Department. We want the Government to reach an early decision about introducing a Bill to deal specifically with the construction industry. The proposal has the support of many hon. Members as well as the construction industry and the trade union movement. Therefore, I earnestly request the Leader of the House to convey my comments to his right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for the Environment so that we may know as soon as possible whether contracts legislation will be included in the forthcoming Queen's Speech.

11.58 am

I shall follow the example of my hon. Friend the Member for Portsmouth, South (Mr. Martin) and refer briefly to Bosnia before I return to issues of domestic politics.

This year we commemorate, among other things, the discovery of the full extent of the Nazi holocaust. This generation will censure those who carried out those atrocities and those who collaborated with them. The President of France recently recognised the tragic and awful contribution of French people to the holocaust and we are aware that other things could have been done to avert it. We must resolve to do what we can to prevent any repetition of that tragedy, wherever it may occur in the world. One thinks of what happened some 15 years ago in Cambodia, only recently in Rwanda and particularly of events in Bosnia, which is on our continent and only a few hundred miles from the borders of the European Union, with some many consequences for general peace in the area. We heard the difficulties described by my hon. Friend the Member for Portsmouth, South and later we shall hear further of the considerable practical difficulties that lie ahead in Bosnia. If the United Nations—which I fear is rather like the Holy Roman empire in the 18th century—scuttles from Bosnia and leaves people there to an awful and tragic fate, history will say harsh things about us.

As my hon. Friend the Member for Portsmouth, South pointed out, my right hon. Friend the Member for Wokingham (Mr. Redwood) and others have made useful points in recent weeks. That internal debate has helped in certain respects, and the Government can pursue various proposals. As to the way in which the national press handled that matter, I intervened in a moving speech by my hon. Friend the Member for Stratford-on-Avon (Mr. Howarth) last week, when he spoke about the concerns of inner cities and difficulties in our society—similar to the speech made this morning by the hon. Member for Leeds, Central (Mr. Fatchett). In my intervention, I said none of my hon. Friend's points—any more than the points raised by my hon. Friend the Member for Teignbridge (Mr. Nicholls)—were debated in the national press during the important political contest of a couple of weeks ago. Instead, many newspapers subjected us to a catalogue of lies, half-truths, distortion and crude propaganda. It is not sufficient for most hon. Members to ignore such stuff or that many of our constituents appear to have become immune to it. Indeed, some of my constituents have changed their newspaper orders as a result, although I am sorry that the remaining choice is hardly immense. Damage is done to our political system, the Government and the Conservative party's standing if such half-truths and propaganda are believed.

Some years ago, my hon. Friend the Member for Stratford-on-Avon was director of the Conservative party research department. Both my right hon. Friend the Leader of the House and I have worked in that distinguished and honourable department at various times in our careers. I refer to an article by Dr. Robin Harris that appeared in The Sunday Times on 9 July, so it is hardly ancient history. That article was not written by an 18-year old scribbler or someone who has just returned from Patagonia. Dr. Harris is also a former director of the Conservative research department and made a considerable contribution to winning the 1987 general election—although Lord Tebbit or Michael Dobbs may contest that claim—and was a member of the Downing street policy unit. His remarks in The Sunday Times will have been read by hundreds of thousands of people throughout the country, so I make no apology for quoting them now—and they were outrageous. The headline, which was probably the contribution of The Sunday Times, stated:

"The sooner defeat comes, the sooner the right will inherit the Tory party, says Robin Harris".

I am sorry not to hear cheering by Opposition Members because if that comes about, they can extend their mortgages and take their managers to champagne lunches. If those two events occurred, Labour would enjoy the fruits of office for years to come. Dr. Harris then wrote:

"Kenneth Clarke is safe to promote the European single currency. Malcolm Rifkind is free to place Britain's foreign and security policies further under European Community control."

That assertion is absolute rubbish. It ignores our Cabinet and parliamentary procedures.

It is true.

I am sorry that my hon. Friend disagrees, but I hope that he will allow me to proceed because he might actually agree with something that I will say later.

Dr. Harris continues:

"And the Prime Minister, able at last to express his guilt-ridden loathing of his predecessor and all her works, has the pleasurable prospect of showing his true colours as a big-spending social democrat."

What extraordinary rubbish, and I take the opportunity to repudiate it. As to Dr. Harris's remark about public expenditure, the speech of my hon. Friend the Member for Bridlington (Mr. Townend) contained useful proposals about illegal immigrants and areas of public expenditure that might be curbed. But most of the specific proposals made in recent weeks, if they stand up to examination, would probably not save large sums of money.

The past year has seen considerable debate on education spending. If it had not been for careful management, a degree of patience and various commitments for the future, that debate might have created difficulties for the Government on the Floor of the House. I do not think that there is any possibility of a similar education spending settlement passing through the House next year, so there will almost inevitably be an increase in education spending. We know of concerns about the battle for law and order. My hon. and learned Friend the Member for Burton (Sir I. Lawrence) celebrated the Government's success in that struggle in Prime Minister's Question Time yesterday. If that success is to continue, there must be further spending on the police and associated areas. Difficulties will arise in cutting spending in other areas, such as health, community care and defence.

And agriculture.

I promised my hon. Friend the Member for Southend, East (Sir T. Taylor) that I would make a point about Europe. Of importance in the Conservative party debate about the European Union is that nothing is predictable. There are no hard lines between right and left or between Eurosceptics and positive Europeans. Despite my earlier intervention, I believe that my party's Eurosceptic wing has made and can continue to make an important contribution. A number of my hon. Friend's points deserve replies, because it is a basic right of hon. Members to receive accurate and effective responses to requests for information. Sometimes, the Eurosceptics aim at the wrong target, because the single currency—which may or may not come about—could bring particular benefits. But I support the Eurosceptics in concentrating their fire on some of the legal and constitutional invasions of our country's affairs. It is not satisfactory that the European Court is able to overturn specific decisions of the British Parliament.

I received in this morning's post a letter from a constituent, Mr. Keith Ross, proprietor of The Tantivy in my nearest town of Dulverton, expressing concern about a report in Asian Trader headlined:

"Brussels sets scene for newspaper VAT".

The leader in the same issue comments:

"European Commission President Jacques Santer has made it clear that at next year's Maastricht conference"—

although I am not sure that the intergovernmental conference will be held again in Maastricht—

"the EU will push hard for Britain to give up its right to set its own indirect taxation in order to harmonise levels across Europe."

That will mean VAT on newspapers, perhaps on water services and even on food. I am sure that my right hon. Friend the Leader of the House is aware that there is not a shadow of doubt that such a proposal would not get through the House. It would be resisted by Conservative Members whether they are positive Europeans, Eurosceptics or anything else. I hope that my right hon. Friend will be able to make that clear. I hope also that my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister and my right hon. and learned Friend the Foreign Secretary will make the matter clear in succeeding weeks. Further, I hope that I have the support of my hon. Friend the Member for Southend, East in making that point.

I shall bring my remarks to a close. I am sure that that will please my hon. Friend the Member for Stroud (Mr. Knapman). No recent appointment to the Government gave me more pleasure than his elevation to the Whips' Office. He is enough of a countryman to know the saying about setting a poacher to operate as a gamekeeper. I am sure that he will be successful in the Whips' Office. I am sure also that if he and other members of the Government take note of my concerns—I try to be positive in the struggle about Europe—we shall be a more unified, effective and successful party in the next 18 months.

12.10 pm

This three-hour debate is a substitute for a form of procedure that produced a formal motion for the adjournment of the House. Under that motion, many of us could argue that the House should not adjourn before certain matters had been debated.

The Jopling proposals, comments on which were received at 11 o'clock from the Select Committee on Procedure, confuse sitting hours, which we all wish to be reasonable, with sitting powers. For example, we cannot extend today's sitting because a decision was taken forthwith yesterday. Reductions in the powers of Back-Bench Members are being recommended—in my view wrongly—by the Procedure Committee. They include the elimination of an amendable motion on the sitting of the House. The House should control how long it sits after receiving Government proposals that are amendable and on which we can vote. It is proposed also to eliminate second Adjournment debates and speeches on Ways and Means resolutions, which relate to the fundamental powers of expenditure and taxation. As I understand it, it is proposed also to eliminate private Member's motions. There would be a major reduction in Member's powers and of those of the public who send us here.

I challenge any member of the Procedure Committee, including its Chairman, to debate the recommendation that the entire Jopling package, as adopted, continue to be considered in the next Session.

If a motion had been before us, I would have tabled an amendment to the effect that we should not adjourn unless and until two topics had been debated. The Government have put these topics high on the list of publicity over the past few days. They will be debated and reported upon in the press accurately or inaccurately, as the hon. Member for Taunton (Mr. Nicholson) said, for the next two-and-a-half months. These topics are the Government's plans for sport and for nursery education and/or education of the pre-school type.

Until yesterday's announcement, we were due to have a debate on the Prime Minister's proposals for sport, which do not necessarily involve public expenditure. It is a bit rich because, since 1979, the Government, through their powers and legislation, have closed 5,000 playing fields. Physical education colleges have been closed. Extra-curricular sport has plummeted as teachers struggle with the administrative burdens of the national curriculum. The Government have done more to reduce opportunities for healthy sport and recreation at schools and elsewhere than any previous Government. Having been involved with sport for 14 years before coming to this place, I looked forward to participating in the debate about the Prime Minister's proposals, but we have been denied that debate.

I am sorry that the Lord President gave a rather misleading reply to my question yesterday. It would have been possible to suspend the sitting rule tonight to have a two or three-hour debate on sport, perhaps concluding it at 1 am. There would have been no vote because it would have been on the Adjournment. As things stand, we are not able to have that debate. That is in tune with the Government's approach of having publicity outside the House on issue after issue and restricting debate in the Chamber. No wonder the public do not think very much of us if there is media comment on the Radio 4 programme "Today" and on television shows and a lack of debate in this place. The decline in the reputation of Parliament may be something to do with that. The Deputy Prime Minister, the right hon. Member for Henley (Mr. Heseltine), who will obviously play an important part in Government information and propaganda services over the next four months, will have to be watched in that context.

I commend my hon. Friend the Member for Leeds, Central (Mr. Fatchett) on his remarks about drugs and recreation. On Sunday, I was on the Victoria dock in my constituency. I note that my hon. Friend the Member for Newham, North-West (Mr. Banks) is in his place. There were young people on the dock. Twelve or 13-year-old boys were pushing out a boat, asking permission to row it. They were not able to do so. They may be able to row in future, but thanks to the lottery, not the Government. What satisfaction can those boys get from life? I am talking of a life that produces a sense of well-being within society and a sense of achievement. Many young people who look naturally for well-being and achievement will get them only from the artificial stimulation that is produced by drugs. My hon. Friend was right to draw attention to that.

On 6 July, when the Prime Minister replied to my right hon. Friend the Leader of the Opposition, he said:

"I confirm that, on a phased basis, I look for the introduction of nursery education for all four-year-olds and my right hon. Friend"—

the Secretary of State for Education and Employment—

"will announce this afternoon our plans and the phasing."

The Secretary of State made a statement a few moments later. She opened her statement by saying:

"With permission, Madam Speaker, I will make a statement about pre-school education."—[Official Report, 6 July 1995; Vol. 263, c. 512–17]

We have not had a debate on that subject, although there has been comment in the press and throughout the country. It seems that there is confusion about, and non-recognition of, the major difference between nursery education as we know it and pre-school education. Apparently, the Prime Minister does not understand the distinction between the two. He talked about nursery education for all four-year-olds. The Secretary of State's statement was not about that. The plans are not about that. There are plans for vouchers for pre-school education, of which nursery education is a part.

Did the Prime Minister say what he did knowingly? I use "knowingly" with point because we shall later debate the Nolan report and the responsibility of Ministers. Did the Prime Minister knowingly say what he did when it is not true or was he misled by officials? I cannot believe that he was misled. I cannot believe either that the Prime Minister did not know the difference between nursery education, as defined in current statute, and pre-school education, which includes play groups. I acknowledge that some play groups are extremely good, but the range of pre-school education is different from nursery education. Relatively few people throughout the country understand the difference.

I shall put on record one or two questions and answers, which I have tabled and obtained. They show that the Government are on a collision course with the public and themselves. I do not believe that they have thought out their plans. It is clear that the Secretary of State for Education and Employment is not keen. Some time ago, the Prime Minister poured cold water on the proposal for nursery education for all three and four-year-olds because of expense. I presented a petition on the issue on 19 November on behalf of 106,000 petitioners. They asked for nursery education to meet demand. I introduced a Bill on the subject on 18 September 1994. It was talked out by the hon. Member for Sutton and Cheam (Lady Olga Maitland), who later claimed that she did not know that she was destroying the Bill. All that it would have done was place a duty on local authorities to ascertain need.

Administration will be extremely difficult. Questions have been tabled to try to ascertain exactly what will happen. I received some answers yesterday. They are not yet in Hansard so I cannot provide a reference. I asked in what manner the Secretary of State for Education and Employment expects to advertise the terms of the contract for the firm that will run the vouchers. The answer was:

"I will reply as soon as possible".

It is clear that the Department does not know, or if it does know, it is not saying, despite having announced the scheme.

I also asked what steps the Secretary of State for Education and Employment

"expects to take to ensure that levels of staffing in existing local authority nursery schools will not be prejudiced by the establishment of new nursery schools by a provider offering improved remuneration".—[Official Report, 17 July 1995; Vol. 263, c. 978.]

Clearly, there will be none.

Areas such as Newham, where 60 per cent. of young children go to nursery schools, will be prejudiced by the free market in qualified nursery teachers. Nursery schools in suburban areas will probably be able to offer more by virtue of the £1,000 which some people will be able to expect. A free or semi-free market in nursery education is being opened up which may prejudice areas of greatest need, such as the London borough of Newham.

I asked what number of the 74 bodies listed in a written answer some time ago had been consulted on the Government's plan. I was told:

"The … task force on under-fives wrote to the majority of the bodies listed on the day of the announcement requesting their views."

So, there is to be consultation, but it will not be very good because the proposals have been only half announced.

I asked what was to be the cost of administration of the voucher scheme in the next two years. The answer was:

"I will reply to the hon. Member as soon as possible".

I asked

"if there will be changes in the statutory instruments defining the qualifications of teachers in nursery schools and those relating to their premises."

One of the problems is how the Government will carry out their plans with the limited number of qualified teachers and premises which are statutorily defined as being capable of supporting genuine nursery education. I shall not read the whole answer but it is a classic for, "Yes, Minister". The reply stated:

"My right hon. Friend has no plans at this stage to impose any new qualification requirements for staff in any institutions which register to exchange vouchers for pre-school education."

A casual reading of that might suggest that there will be no change, but I emphasise the words

"has no plans at this stage to impose".

That does not mean to say that the requirements will not be relaxed, and I suspect that that is what will have to be done in order to achieve their objectives.

My last point on the matter, which will cause a great deal of trouble, relates to a series of three questions that were answered yesterday, after a fashion, about the logistics of premises. I have particular views about the regulations of the Department for Education and Employment relating to school premises. They are wholly inadequate, although I do not have time now to give examples to show why that is the case. It appears that there will be a review of all regulations relating to premises and equipment of schools registered to exchange vouchers for pre-school education. The reply says:

"In addition, my right hon. Friends the Secretary of State for Education and Employment and the Secretary of State for Wales announced on 14 July their intention to consult on a new set of school premises regulations. These regulations apply to all maintained schools, including maintained nursery schools. They will continue to do so."—[Official Report, 17 July 1995; Vol. 263, c. 977.]

It did not have the honesty to point out that a written answer of 14 July sets out a change in all school regulations relating to premises. It is too long to read it all, but it says that it has been concluded that

"the regulatory burden placed on schools by the Education (School Premises) Regulations should be significantly reduced."—[Official Report, 14 July 1995; Vol. 263, c. 829.]

So there will be a change not just in the regulations relating to nursery schools, which it is important should be maintained in order to provide the necessary environment in this prized and highly regarded area, but in the already inadequate regulations for schools. That was not made clear by the Secretary of State for Education and Employment. She referred in her statement last week to a change in the regulations, but she did not make it clear that that was what she had in mind.

At the moment, the Government are using the House of Commons less as a means of announcing their proposals and using the Order Paper and the procedure of the House and more as a means of ensuring that matters are not debated. My hon. Friend the Member for Leeds, Central (Mr. Fatchett) mentioned the future generations—children in nursery schools and youngsters wanting sporting facilities. Why is it that we are now to adjourn for two and a half months before both those crucial matters can be debated? It has been impossible to do so, an omission for which the Government are responsible.

12.25 pm

We have had a great deal of debate and discussion on European policy within the Conservative party, but it would be wrong for the House to go into recess without the Government, and my right hon. Friend the Leader of the House in particular, pointing out the appalling implications for the United Kingdom of the Labour party's European policy.

After all, as we know, the matter has been resolved in the Conservative party. We now have a policy with which we in the party and the country can be totally at ease. We are winning the arguments in Europe. We will be able to maintain, because the Prime Minister said so, our immigration controls. We will not agree to any further increase in qualified majority voting as the intergovernmental conference progresses. The United Kingdom will not agree to any deepening in Europe. As we are winning the arguments, we will be gaining more control over our affairs through subsidiarity. Things are moving our way.

My hon. Friend the Member for Southend, East (Sir T. Taylor) looks a little concerned, but I can promise him that in an election within the Conservative party a fortnight ago, 89 of our colleagues, including, no doubt, my hon. Friend and I, voted for a programme and a platform which said that Britain will not have a single currency and for the fact that we will not bring before the House any measures to give more powers to any European institutions.

You lost.

The hon. Gentleman says that we lost the vote, but 89 people voted for that platform. It is inconceivable that this Conservative Government, let alone the next Conservative Government, when many of the positive Europeans will have retired and the people coming in will have come in on a Thatcherite bandwagon, will bring any of these measure before the House. That is fact. That is given. We are secure. No Conservative Government will deepen Europe or introduce any measures to bring about a single currency. They would not do it. It would not work. It would not succeed. They would not have a majority.

The first thing that the Labour party would do would be to embrace the social chapter. What does that mean? Any good employer will want to ensure that his people are well looked after, but to do that he needs a succesful and thriving business. He must be competitive. Anyone who embraces the social chapter will have to embrace the on-costs, the paraphernalia of all the other European countries who will want to stuff it down the throats of our industries to make our industries as uncompetitive as theirs are becoming. Not only will we have bad employment practices and bad employers, but we will lose a great many jobs.

Like the Germans.

The hon. Gentleman cannot resist his asides. Germany is yesterday's story. It is the United Kingdom that will be today's and tomorrow's story.

The next point that the Opposition want to embrace is the single currency—a single currency in Europe with all those diverse economies, with the same interest rates, with the same inevitable levels of taxation, socialist bureaucratic levels of taxation, high levels of taxation. The people who motivate European policy are motivated by schemes and plans and by building up their own empire. We cannot afford that. Let the rest of Europe crucify itself with a single currency and with high levels of public expenditure. Let us be clean and distinct and apart. Let us have the strong currency of Europe while others have the weak one. Let us have the Japanese—Nikko Europe and others—investing in Britain rather than in the rest of Europe because they feel that Britain will be more competitive outside the single currency.

I should like to make one further point about the desperate implications of the Labour party's European policy. Agriculture is controlled by Europe; trade is controlled by Europe; little things, like the quality of our water, are controlled by Europe; our weights and measures are controlled by Europe. The Labour party wants our money to be controlled by Europe. Everything will be controlled by Europe.

The Opposition want a policy for devolution, with more powers going to Scotland and Wales. They have power, if they are given more power, they will seek more power and the remainder of the power will lie with Europe. What is the point of Westminster? Do the Opposition want to break up the United Kingdom? That is what they will do.

I should be grateful if, before the recess, my right hon. Friend the Leader of the House explained loud and clear the devastating implications of the Labour party's policy on Europe for the United Kingdom.

12.30 pm

There are two subjects that the House should consider before the recess. I understand hon. Members' concerns about Bosnia, but one of my constituents, a student called Paul Wells, is currently one of the hostages in Kashmir. I should have thought that it was inappropriate for the House to depart for the summer recess without even a statement about the current state of negotiations on the release of those hostages.

The main issue that I want to raise today, however, is Motability. It is a remarkable organisation, for which I have nothing but praise. It is a registered charity that brings mobility to disabled people. The Queen was recently able to hand over the 500,000th vehicle to a disabled person, due to funding for this scheme through the Department of Social Security. Motability is a truly wonderful charity.

I cannot say the same about the system of financing that exists behind the scenes at Motability. There is an important distinction to be drawn between Motability the charity and Motability Finance Ltd. I am greatly concerned about a series of reports that have been percolating out to the public and press of late about serious wrongdoings in the structure of financing through which Motability Finance Ltd. delivers vehicles to disabled people.

I shall put the matter in context. The charity Motability has a turnover of about £3 million a year. But the supplier of finance, Motability Finance Ltd., has a turnover of £375 million a year. Motability Finance Ltd. is not a charity; it is a private company. It is set up as a partnership of six main banks. It is a profit-making business, which now has assets in excess of £1 billion. It also has access to £1.5 billion-worth of credit each year from the six banks which are the partners in MFL.

On 15 June this year, in the other place, Lord Carter raised a number of his concerns about what was happening in Motability Finance Ltd. He said:

"the Government pay Motability Finance Ltd … £360 million of disabled people's social security benefits. Motability Finance Ltd. is the only lender in the world to have no bad debts. The money is guaranteed by the Government because it is a social security benefit which is paid over. Yet the rates of interest it charges disabled people and its car leasing arrangements are not that advantageous."

That is my first concern.

Lord Carter illustrated some of the concerns that had been raised with him. He said:

"I understand that over the years a number of officials"—[Official Report, House of Lords, 15 June 1995; Vol. 564, c. 1931.]

Order. I am sorry to interrupt the hon. Gentleman, but there is a rule in this place against quoting from a Member speaking in the other place, unless he or she is a Minister in the current Session.

Thank you, Madam Deputy Speaker.

Lord Carter referred to a number of acts of minor fraud that worried him, and should also worry the House. The essence of the matter is the returns required by the major banks that are participants and partners in the Motability Finance scheme.

The simplest thing is for me to quote from a report drawn up by accountants KPMG on the financing of MFL. The concluding paragraph states:

"We have carried out a comparison with the Return on Capital … which would be earned in a typical lease to that which is earned in practice by the partners and other leasing companies … The typical lease scenario envisages a ROC of 14.6 per cent. The average ROC of a number of leasing companies for 1992 was 13.1 per cent. However a Motability lease gives a ROC of 30.9 per cent., substantially higher than that generated by a typical lease or that earned by other companies."

We are talking, then, about a private cartel of six major banks, headed by someone who is also involved as the chairman of Motability. The cartel is mackerel fishing for money from public funds that properly belongs to disabled people. The rate of return required for no-risk access to that finance is almost twice that in the private market.

A report was also commissioned by the DSS about the goings-on inside Motability Finance Ltd. The catalogue of events that have taken place have seen a large number of Motability staff leave in recent years. Last October, the assistant director, Mr. Robin Taylor, left. The following January, the then director, Mr. Simon Willis, who had been seconded from the DSS, had his services withdrawn at two weeks' notice. The following March, the finance director, Mr. Graham Moss, left, and now the fund-raising director has decided to leave.

Many of the departures revolved around conflicts with the chairman of Motability, Lord Sterling of Plaistow, who is perhaps better known, not only as the chairman of P and O, but as a generous benefactor to the party in government.

The most damning matter that the House needs to address urgently concerns a report commissioned by, I think, the DSS, called the Bircham report. It details the serious improprieties that exist within MFL. I shall give two quotations from the report, which should form the basis on which the House should take urgent action.

Paragraphs 9 and 10 of the report state:

"KPMG, of which Mr. Acher is the senior audit partner, are auditors to the National Westminster Bank Group, including Lombard Finance, which participates in the Motability scheme, the Midland Group, including Forward Trust, which similarly participates in the scheme and P and O, of which the Chairman of Motability, Lord Sterling, is also Chairman. At the same time the Chairman of MFL (Mr. Brian Carte) is … both a governor of Motability and a director of Lombard Finance.

Save for out-of-pocket expenses, Motability's Royal Charter of Incorporation prohibits the payment of salary, fees or other remuneration to any governor under clause 4. Mr. Gerald Acher is both governor and Vice-Chairman of Motability on the one hand and a senior equity partner in KPMG on the other. Since he became a governor, KPMG have been paid substantial fees by Motability for professional services rendered, a share of which must pass to or otherwise benefit Mr. Acher in some form. In these circumstances Mr. Acher must account to Motability as a constructive trustee of the gross fees paid to KPMG under the self dealing rule."

The Bircham report details conflicts of interest, improprieties of action and a serious overcharging of the disabled by a banking cartel that is simply fishing money at no risk out of the pockets of disabled people, out of the purse specifically provided by the House to allow disabled people to be mobile around the country.

The House must demand a public examination of the financial structure of Motability Finance Ltd. We need to have a debate on the Bircham report in its entirety. I shall place a full copy of the Bircham report in the Library after the debate. We must demand that the DSS conducts its own root-and-branch overhaul of MFL to ensure that disabled people receive the fairest deal for their, or our, money that goes into the scheme. We must not allow a sleazy bunch of bankers and benefactors to make themselves a fast buck through a no-risk, monopolistic scam, perpetrated on the backs of the public and the disabled—and we need to do that overhaul urgently.

12.39 pm

It is useful to have debates of this kind. The changes to which my hon. Friend the Member for Newham, South (Mr. Spearing) referred have not been unanimously welcomed in the House. However, they have been helpful overall, especially for Back Benchers, as this morning's debate demonstrates.

I am always reluctant to disagree with my hon. Friend on matters of procedure, but I must say that some of the procedures which were changed by Jopling and about which he complained have fallen into disuse and become difficult to defend. They fell into disuse not least because newer Members had not been as assiduous in mastering the procedures as my hon. Friend. The Jopling changes of which he complained have been helpful to the majority of hon. Members.

It is not always possible for every hon. Member to attend on Wednesday mornings. Rather unusually, I should like to mention to the Leader of the House one colleague who could not be here—my hon. Friend the Member for Feltham and Heston (Mr. Keen). He lost an Adjournment debate on Monday through no fault of his own, but he had told the Minister exactly what issues he wanted to raise. I think that he gave the Minister a copy of his speech, which was on European co-operation. I hope that the Leader of the House will accept my hon. Friend's apology for not being here this morning, and will be able to arrange for the Minister to give my hon. Friend the reply that he would have had if he had been here.

Obviously, we cannot deal in detail with all the issues that have been raised, some of which will be the subjects for the debate later today on Bosnia. This morning's debates were unusual because so many Conservative Members spoke about internal Conservative party matters.

Perhaps, in view of what has happened in recent months, that should not surprise us. The hon. Member for Taunton (Mr. Nicholson) invited us to sympathise with his comments about how the press has treated his party in recent weeks. At last he now knows how it feels, because we have been subjected to that kind of treatment for many years. It was interesting to see the tables turned.

These debates are always useful for hon. Members who wish to raise constituency matters, as did the hon. Member for Cornwall, South-East (Mr. Hicks), and not for the first time, as he pointed out. My hon. Friend the Member for City of Durham (Mr. Steinberg) raised some serious matters about his constituents, who must feel very insecure because the basic services provided by general practitioners are threatened in the way that my hon. Friend described. I hope that Ministers have taken his concerns on board, and that the Leader of the House will make sure that they are followed up.

The hon. Member for Teignmouth (Mr. Nicholls) spoke about the concerns of his constituents following water privatisation. I am sorry that the hon. Gentleman is not in his place. When the Bill for water privatisation was going through the House, many of us suggested that prices would go through the roof and that the salaries of directors would be increased to ridiculous levels. The hon. Gentleman complained that a monopoly utility was allowing one of its executives to have a salary increase of £67,000, but such suggestions were described as scaremongering when we complained about water privatisation.

In such debates, some matters are raised which could be described as regular. Not for the first time hon. Members such as the hon. Member for Southend, East (Sir T. Taylor) raised the issue of European Union policy, and especially the common agricultural policy. I agree with many of the concerns expressed by the hon. Member for Southend, East about the CAP. The slowness in moving to reform must concern hon. Members in all parts of the House. The speech by the hon. Member for Northampton, North (Mr. Marlow) was somewhat unusual, in that the hon. Gentleman attacked Labour party policy on the EU rather than that of his own party. Perhaps we should put that aside this morning.

My hon. Friend the Member for Tooting (Mr. Cox) again spoke about the Latham report. Perhaps the Leader of the House will be able to respond to my hon. Friend's information about the construction industry's agreement to the proposals.

The hon. Member for Roxburgh and Berwickshire (Mr. Kirkwood) spoke about local government settlements, a topic that has been mentioned on other occasions. He was right to acknowledge the need to take account of such vital issues as family holidays when the Procedure Committee considers when the House should sit. Perhaps I will not be popular with all my colleagues when I say that I told the Procedure Committee a few days ago that there was scope for considering whether the House should sit for some weeks in September as a means of keeping us in touch with what is happening and avoiding such long gaps between our activities.

My hon. Friend the Member for Newham, South raised some topical issues about the need for a debate on sport. I raised that with the Leader of the House during business questions yesterday, and I hope that the right hon. Gentleman will be able to tell us when it might be possible to have such a debate. I entirely agree with my hon. Friend's every word about nursery education. When he was speaking about that, I thought of the earlier speech by my hon. Friend the Member for Merthyr Tydfil and Rhymney (Mr. Rowlands), whose constituency I have visited.

I agree with my hon. Friend the Member for Merthyr Tydfil and Rhymney about jobs and development. People in his area are working hard to attract development, and perhaps some of them feel that they are running hard just to stand still, because of all the factors that are stacked against them. My hon. Friend's remarks coincided with what my hon. Friend the Member for Leeds, Central (Mr. Fatchett) said. He highlighted one of the main concerns of all of us about the future of young people and what is happening in our constituencies. It was in my hon. Friend's constituency that riots took place, but we are all aware that they could have taken place in many other areas.

The comments of my hon. Friend the Member for Leeds, Central about the problems of young people and those of unemployment, deprivation generally and deprivation being side by side with affluence, and many young people feeling that they have no stake in society, must be extremely worrying to us all. If young people have no hope, no expectations and no aspirations, the future is bleak, not just for them and their families, but for society as a whole. That is because we are all threatened by such lack of hope, and by youngsters who can turn to crime. As my hon. Friend said, unfortunately they often turn to drugs. In political terms, if they turned to anything, they would probably turn to some form of extremism. My hon. Friend was right to remind the House and the Government of those dangers.

I was reminded of the comments of my hon. Friend the Member for Leeds, Central during the speech of my hon. Friend the Member for Newham, South, because there is clearly a link between nursery education and aspirations and achievements later in life. There is overwhelming evidence that the best action we can take for our young people is to give them the best possible start by investing in nursery education.

The evidence shows that, if we spend more on nursery education, we shall get a return for the money, because there will be less crime, young people will grow up with more opportunities, and there will be fewer teenage pregnancies. Those are all direct benefits.

I wish I could say that the recent Government initiative on nursery education will provide, as the Prime Minister has promised, nursery education for all four-year-olds. In itself, that is not good enough, because our three-year-olds should also be entitled to it. I fear that the voucher scheme will be a third-rate imitation of a proper comprehensive policy for nursery education for all three and four-year-olds whose parents want them to have it.

I hope that the Leader of the House will be able to respond in detail to some of the important points that have been raised. It is useful to have such debates, and I hope that we will continue to provide opportunities for hon. Members to raise issues in this way, because that is valuable to our constituents and to the House.

12.50 pm

I note that the hon. Member for Dewsbury (Mrs. Taylor) expressed the hope that I would be able to respond in detail, in 10 minutes, to 14 speeches—15, including her own—on a wide range of matters. I must tell her that that would be a triumph of hope over experience, and over practicality. I shall do my best. I shall, of course, consider what the hon. Lady said about her hon. Friend the Member for Feltham and Heston (Mr. Keen). Given the circumstances that she described, I shall see whether I can get him a written reply from a Minister.

Although I cannot speak for the hon. Lady, I suspect that she would agree with me that this debate is one of the pleasures of the job of Leader of the House. I learn an enormous amount in a short time. I am provided with endless briefing notes, which I digest, I hope, at least to some degree, in the relatively short time available. I am offered a guided tour around the United Kingdom.

As the hon. Member for Merthyr Tydfil and Rhymney (Mr. Rowlands) said to me informally outside the Chamber—I hope that he will not mind me repeating it—today we travelled from Liskeard, to Kelso, by way of Merthyr Tydfil. That is surely a testament to the flexibility and efficiency of the Government's transport policies.

We have heard wide-ranging and entertaining speeches from everyone, but some speeches have been wider ranging than others, in particular those of my hon. Friends the Members for Portsmouth, South (Mr. Martin), for Southend, East (Sir T. Taylor) and for Taunton (Mr. Nicholson). I am sure that they would not expect me to range as widely as they did over the policies of the Government towards the world in general and Europe in particular.

I particularly agreed with my hon. Friend the Member for Portsmouth, South about the current policy vacuum in the Labour party, which certainly was not filled this morning. My hon. Friend the Member for Northampton, North (Mr. Marlow) made an impressive speech about one definite part of the Opposition's current policy. I think that I would be right to say that it was probably his most helpful speech in many years. He drew attention to the dangers of the Labour party policies towards the European Union, and I wholeheartedly agreed with his every word.

Give him a job.

My powers do not extend that far, but they extend to giving him the encouragement to make frequent speeches along those lines.

I shall make necessarily brief comments on some of the specific points raised. My hon. Friend the Member for Cornwall, South-East (Mr. Hicks) raised important points about Liskeard junior school in his constituency. I shall certainly draw his remarks to the attention of my right hon. and hon. Friends.

My hon. Friend also asked me to encourage one of my hon. Friends, who has been most recently appointed to the Front Bench, my hon. Friend the Member for Chesham and Amersham (Mrs. Gillan), to visit that school at some stage this year. I have received a characteristically cautious briefing note from the Department of Education, which states:

"Ministers of course do receive a very large number of invitations to visit schools and simply cannot accept them all. I am sure, however, that my hon. Friend would be willing to consider a visit if that could be fitted into a wider programme."

I hope that that gives at least some modest encouragement to my hon. Friend. I shall also have a more informal word with the Under-Secretary of State for Education and Employment to draw her attention to what he said.

The hon. Member for City of Durham (Mr. Steinberg) raised a important and difficult problem, which he would not expect me to answer in detail, about family practitioner services in part of his constituency. He acknowledged, as I have been told, that County Durham health commission is taking urgent steps to help residents in the Coxhoe area to identify alternative doctors, and has set up two help-lines for patients to ring. The hon. Gentleman also made it clear, however, that the problem required further examination. I shall bring it to the attention of my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Health.

My hon. Friend the Member for Southend, East made a wide-ranging speech, but he also referred to a matter of considerable importance to my constituency and subject to many protests from my constituents—the policies of Essex county council, under Labour-Liberal control, towards transport to selective schools that still exist in Essex. My hon. Friend said that his children went to those schools, so perhaps I should declare a past interest in that both my daughters went to Chelmsford county high school for girls, which will subject to the same problem.

I share the concern that my hon. Friend has expressed about the effect on less well-off able children in the county. I hope that the people of Shoeburyness, to whom he referred, will make their views clear in the by-election that will take place, tomorrow, 20 July, for a county council seat.

The hon. Members for Leeds, Central (Mr. Fatchett) and for Merthyr Tydfil and Rhymney made impressive speeches about their areas. The speech of the hon. Member for Leeds, Central was one of the best that I have heard in Adjournment debates for a long time. He will know that I, too, am concerned about drugs. I have worked with the chief constable of West Yorkshire, Keith Hellawell, on producing a new Government strategy on drugs, "Tackling Drugs Together". That places greater emphasis than in the past on prevention and education. I certainly hope that it reflects some of the thoughts that the hon. Gentleman expressed.

My hon. Friend the Member for Halesowen and Stourbridge (Mr. Hawksley) gave me notice that he intended to raise a complex problem. He made some important points. I understand that, alongside the correspondence he has had with previous Transport Ministers, my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Transport has written to him this week on that very subject. I understand that my hon. Friend has not yet received that letter, but I assure him that it is on its way, and I hope that it will be helpful to him.

The hon. Member for Roxburgh and Berwickshire (Mr. Kirkwood) spoke about a problem in a pleasing town in his constituency, Kelso, where I had the pleasure to holiday a few years ago. On that occasion, I ran into the former leader of the Liberal Democrats. I note the points that the hon. Gentleman has made, but I am sure that he would not expect an off-the-cuff answer from me. I shall make sure that his remarks are drawn to the attention of Scottish Office Ministers.

I assure my hon. Friend the Member for Teignbridge (Mr. Nicholls) that I shall draw to the attention of my right hon. and hon. Friends the fact that a west country Member has yet again raised the water industry, which is significant and important to his constituents. I hope that my hon. Friend was encouraged by the Government's response to the Greenbury report.

My hon. Friend will be aware that the Director General of Water Services has set new and tighter price limits for South West Water, which have been referred to the Monopolies and Mergers Commission at the company's request. We have to await the outcome of the commission's determination of price limits for South West Water. The problems to which my hon. Friend referred are being considered.

I may have inadvertently encouraged the hon. Member for Tooting (Mr. Cox) to take part in the debate, because I reminded him of it when I bumped into him in the Corridor yesterday. He duly took up that invitation, and spoke about the Latham report. He will be aware that, in the past few weeks, I have regularly made what I have described as sympathetic noises from the Dispatch Box about relevant legislation. I cannot anticipate the Queen's Speech, but, as I said to someone last Thursday, the hon. Gentleman can take my comments as a sympathetic noise.

I think that I have come close to running out of time, so I dare not embark on commenting on any other speech. I have noted the points made by the hon. Member for Newham, South (Mr. Spearing). If any other speech remains unmentioned, or if any hon. Member is dissatisfied, I shall make efforts to remedy that in some way.

Meanwhile, I hope that I have given universal pleasure and have caused universal enthusiasm by creating a position in which, later today or early tomorrow, all being well, hon. Members on both sides of the House will be able to enjoy a short break from the duties that they have so assiduously pursued on behalf of their constituents this morning.

French Nuclear Testing

1 pm

A week last Monday, Madam Speaker was in the Chair when a few hon. Members raised points of order about the French nuclear testing proposed for September and about the seizure of the Greenpeace ship, which had happened the previous day. Madam Speaker was kind enough to say that, if Lady Luck smiled on me or perhaps another of those hon. Members, we might have an Adjournment debate. Had it not been this particular Wednesday, when three hours have been devoted to discussing the summer Adjournment, we might have had an hour-and-a-half debate, and many of my colleagues would have been able to speak.

I hesitated before applying for this debate, because I was not that sure that it was the sort of subject with which I could deal. I used to be a big mate of Bob Cryer, and I realised that if he had been here, he would have got to the Chair faster than me. It was his subject—he knew about nuclear weapons and nuclear testing better than anyone else in the House. He had spent 20 or 30 years of his life travelling around Britain speaking to thousands of people. I hope that my comments will accord with his beliefs, although I shall not be able to give them quite the same treatment.

On the day that I asked for this debate, I and some of my hon. Friends had been to a hastily arranged wreath-laying ceremony at the French embassy. Apart from the fact that all Labour Members are hostile to French nuclear testing and the seizure of the Greenpeace ship, I detected among the demonstrators the feeling that the vast majority of British people abhor the idea of the French going to the south Pacific, doing as they like and attacking a Greenpeace ship—which, in many ways, was standing up not just for the people of New Zealand, Australia and other parts of the south Pacific, but for the people of Britain.

I am staggered by the fact that this House has not debated the French decision to resume nuclear testing. A mere half hour is hardly adequate to deal with the issue. I can only assume that, when the Prime Minister met Mr. Chirac at Cannes—a summit meeting that he reported on to the House—he gave Chirac the nod and the wink to do as he liked. Indeed, he confirmed that in an answer to a parliamentary question last week, when he was asked, deliberately and directly, why he would not join those protesting against French nuclear testing. He said that under no circumstances would he do that.

That does not excuse the fact that we have not had a debate—

Perhaps the hon. Gentleman should ask his Front Bench why not.

I accept that. There should have been a debate.

There was a debate on a similar occasion—although not as dramatic as this—on 2 July 1973. My hon. Friend the Member for Linlithgow (Mr. Dalyell)—who might get two minutes in this debate if I hurry—spoke from the Front Bench.

Can anybody believe the change that has taken place since then? My hon. Friend was actually on the Labour Front Bench when 266 Labour Members of Parliament went into the Lobby on a three-line whip. My hon. Friend forced Jeffrey Archer, as he then was, to say that, if there was a vote on the Labour motion, he would join us. In fact, he did not, but that is another story. I read his speech, which was very clever and typical Jeffrey—now Lord—Archer.

The important point was that we had a debate, and we protested to the French. We cannot have a proper debate before the recess, so I call upon my right hon. Friend the Leader of the Opposition, together with other members of the shadow Cabinet, to send a letter of protest to Chirac, making it plain where we stand. I would have said that at the parliamentary Labour party meeting if I had had the chance.

I know that many of my hon. Friends want to speak, and I shall try to accommodate them, but it will not be easy.

The problem is the colonialist mentality. When I went to school, Britain used to have lots of pink pieces on the map. The French had some, but not as many as us. There was an idea that the south Pacific could be picked out, as it was by Britain and then by France, and that we could do our bit among the Polynesians. It is all about old-fashioned imperialism and the colonialist mentality. The French cannot do it in their own backyard.

During that debate in July 1973, some of my colleagues—who are still Members—said, "Why can't they drop it in the bay of Biscay?" Charles Loughlin said, "What about the English channel?" I thought that that was getting a bit too close. What I am trying to show is that, 22 years ago, people were determined—

Is my hon. Friend aware that it is only 10 years since French Government agents murdered members of the Rainbow Warrior crew? It is a disgrace that, when they returned to France, those agents were given orders of merit by the French Government. Will my hon. Friend join me in calling for the maximum protest possible outside every French embassy between now and September, and for a boycott of all French products, to force the French to stop these monstrous tests?

I am absolutely in favour of doing so; indeed, it is what I was doing last Monday. I said then that, had it not been for what the mining industry calls a basket Monday, just before a holiday, some other Members of Parliament would have been at the demonstration. Had it been a Tuesday, another 20 or 30 of them would have been there. Many hon. Members travel to the House on a Monday.

When we debated the issue of the common market in 1971, we were told, "Don't worry, we'll look after the Commonwealth. New Zealand, Canada and Australia will be looked after. The common market will not affect that." It has.

When the Prime Minister gave the nod and the wink to Chirac and turned his back on New Zealand, Australia and the other areas in the south Pacific, he was showing that despite the protests from the Tory Government, he has more in common with Chirac, the right-wing President of France, and with the Common Market than he has with the old-fashioned Commonwealth. I have reason to believe that Jim Bolger—not a friend of mine, but the Prime Minister of New Zealand—has written to our Prime Minister in protest. The Minister has a duty to tell us the Prime Minister's answer.

Nuclear proliferation is a problem. For a long time, certainly since the- collapse of the Berlin wall, many people have said that we can all live happily ever after. I have never accepted that naive, innocent view of life. The net result is that countries such as Iraq, Iran, Pakistan, North Korea, Israel and China are developing nuclear weapons.

We in the Labour party, and many others across the world, have been telling them not to develop nuclear weapons because we are moving into a new era and trying to stop nuclear proliferation. As part of that, we said, Britain and America were not going to carry out tests. That was our argument, but it will break down.

Iraq and the other countries will be emboldened by the fact that nobody cares tuppence what the French are doing down in the south Pacific, and will say, "Anything goes; we can have some, too." The world will become a lot more dangerous. Someone said to me—I had better be careful how I choose my words—that there could be an Islamic fundamentalist nuclear bomb. It certainly makes one wonder.

The French argue that they are not doing much, anyway. They say that they are merely engaged in a bit of extra testing, but nothing new. The information that some of us have received—it might be revealed a little later by one or two colleagues—is that the French are up to something else. It is said that they are going to develop a new type of nuclear warhead, and that at least one of the proposed tests is dedicated to that. I was going to read out some comments about that, but I do not have the time.

We were all very worried about Chernobyl and the radiation that spread for several hundred miles across many countries. How do we know that the ocean currents are not roughly the same as the air currents? Will the results of the nuclear tests be as dramatic as the effects of Chernobyl? I do not know, but it crosses my mind that it is quite feasible that the radiation in the south Pacific will in some way affect the food chain and contaminate some species. It is a major problem for all of us.

Many years ago, when Mrs. Thatcher came back from an environmental conference in Rio, I explained to her that the environment was a socialist issue. Not all green issues can be dealt with by market forces, and no individual can resolve the problem. The solution must be collective action, not only in the common market but throughout the world. It is a world problem, which means people banding together to solve it. When she went on about the hole in the ozone layer, I told her that she would not patch it up with a man, a bike, a ladder and an enterprise allowance, but that the solution had to involve the will of literally millions of people banding together.

It is therefore a matter for us; it will be a matter for new Labour, with all the added ingredients. It will have to deal with the problem, so it might as well get used to it. I hope that, at the conference on Hayman Island, my right hon. Friend the Leader of the Opposition listened to the people of Australia and New Zealand, and took note of what they said. I hope that many people bent his ear as they said, "G'day, Blue." What should we do now? I have suggested what the Labour party and the Labour leader should do, and I do so in all friendliness.

Millions of people in Britain who are not necessarily Labour supporters agree with us. All the people in the animal lobby are not protesting only on behalf little furry creatures. The fact is that there is now a new level of understanding about the food chain, the environment and animal life in general; people's interest goes beyond simply saving a few creatures. They can see what is happening. I call on the Government, even at this late stage, to protest before 1 September, and to have the guts to tell Chirac what the British people really feel.

There should be an independent health inquiry into the population in the south Pacific. The least we can do is ensure that such an inquiry is held to monitor the effects of the proposed tests and those that have taken place, because the people we met in a Committee Room upstairs feel that they are on their own.

I support Greenpeace and what it did in trying to sail its ship into the area. The members of Greenpeace were brave. We saw some similarly brave people last Friday—disabled people in wheelchairs, who parked themselves in front of moving buses. Greenpeace did the same sort of thing.

There are some things that we remember for ever. I can still hear the voice of Stephanie Mills, the lass from New Zealand, on the Greenpeace ship a week last Sunday, squealing in passion, hoping that someone could hear her as the French moved in with tear gas and commandeered the Rainbow Warrior. That powerful voice should have registered with everyone in the Labour party. It is high time the Government understood what is needed. Let us stop the tests now, and take steps to save the planet, not destroy it.

1.15 pm

I am grateful to my hon. Friend the Member for Bolsover (Mr. Skinner) for allowing me to ask three technical questions of which I have given notice to the Foreign Office.

The first concerns coral reefs. The French spokesman said that not one fish would be harmed by the tests. That is not true—one coral reef at least will be destroyed. Has the Foreign Office been in touch with Ghillean Prance of Kew, who has substantial evidence that it is the nature of coral reefs to fertilise one another at a distance of 200 miles or more? Are we not creating mayhem in a specific part of the south Pacific? The effect of the destruction of coral reefs on fish stocks is important and must be borne in mind. Has the Foreign Office a technical opinion on what could happen?

Secondly, may I repeat a question that I asked on 2 July 1973 on behalf of the official Opposition. I said:

"Does the right hon. Gentleman"—

I was speaking to Julian Amery—

"deny the presence of strontium 90, and does he further deny the connection between strontium 90 and bone cancer and leukaemia? Does the right hon. Gentleman deny the presence of caesium 137, which has a longish half-life of 30 years, and does he further deny the connection between caesium 137 and many forms of cancer, a connection which has been proved by work which has been undertaken by scientists in Hiroshima and Nagasaki? Does he deny the presence of iodine 131 and its attendant dangers to the thyroid gland? "—[Official Report, 2 July 1973; Vol. 859, c. 48.]

My final question relates to an assertion made in The Guardian on 11 July under the byline of Tim Radford and David Fairhall. They said:

"In one notorious episode, a nuclear device jammed halfway down the shaft, and had to be detonated prematurely. This is believed to have opened up fissures in the basalt, and caused submarine landslides. In another episode, a typhoon tore across the atoll and ripped away a bituminous seal that had been covering irradiated spoil. A large area was contaminated with plutonium and other radionuclides."

Is that true? If so, things could go tragically wrong again, with disastrous ecological effects.

1.19 pm

I compliment my hon. Friend the Member for Bolsover (Mr. Skinner) not only on securing the debate but on the manner in which he opened it.

I want to report to the House that, when he was requesting the debate, I was representing the House in Ottawa at the plenary session of the parliamentary assembly of the Organisation for Security and Co-operation in Europe. At the end of the week, the plenary session considered its declaration. It goes through it paragraph by paragraph to ensure that it has got it right. When it got to the paragraph that had been hard fought in the security committee and which condemned the French decision to resume nuclear testing and the French reaction to the Rainbow Warrior, the French naturally opposed it.

The OSCE parliamentary assembly is made up of 52 nations, plus the Holy See. There were almost 1,000 delegates there. The only delegates who supported the French in the objection were some of the UK delegation. Yet when the full declaration was put to the full assembly, the UK declaration voted to a man along with it to condemn the action, and it was carried nem. con.

If the Government need some backbone, all they need to do is look to their colleagues in the OSCE, including America, Canada—indeed, every nation there—which condemned the French decision and action in relation to the Rainbow Warrior. I hope that the Government, and our Opposition in response to the plea of my hon. Friend the Member for Bolsover, show the same backbone.

The French in the past have been very dismissive of health effects. Their memorable line is:

"You do not consult the frogs when you are draining the swamp."

If anybody were as dismissive as that and agreed with such dismissiveness, I would point them in the direction of the work done by Dr. Sister Rosalie Bertell, who conducted a major health survey, very much in line with that called for by my hon. Friend, which proved beyond all doubt that a serious genetic impairment resulted not only from the previous tests of the French, but from our previous tests and America's previous tests. Such impairment goes on for generation after generation, it affects the seed stock of the whole of humankind, and it can never be put right.

If we believe anything at all, we should do our utmost to bear properly the responsibility that God has given us. The world has been entrusted to us. In their decision, the French are betraying that trust.

1.21 pm

I congratulate the hon. Member for Bolsover (Mr. Skinner) on obtaining this debate. His new-found interest in defence matters is welcome. He is no doubt responding to Bob Cryer's interest in it in the past. I welcome, too, the apparent broadening of his horizons to such distant climes as the south Pacific. Unfortunately, I do not welcome the thrust of his speech. It was remarkable, if unsurprising, for three reasons. Where we needed logic, we got populism; where we needed analysis, we got invective; and where we needed facts, we got hyperbole.

I shall deal first with the incident that the hon. Gentleman led on, in which the French forces boarded the Greenpeace ship the Rainbow Warrior II on 9 July. With respect, the hon. Gentleman, not for the first time, missed several points. First and foremost, he referred in his familiarly colourful manner to an incident in which the French Government acted entirely within their rights in French territorial waters. The hon. Gentleman too, of course, is within his rights in raising the matter, but it is another matter to suggest that the British Government are somehow guilty of some outrageous crime just because we have refused to join the Greenpeace-led chorus of disapproval.

I make the point again quite clearly: we support the French Government in their right to defend sites of national security importance in their territorial waters. I think that the House would prefer me to enunciate a policy which is rather more responsible than the arguments that we have just heard, and I shall talk about that in some detail.

I remind the House of the facts of the incident, as we understand them. The boarding took place not only in French territorial waters, but in a 12-mile exclusion zone which the French Government had declared, as is their right under international law. The captain and crew of Rainbow Warrior II had been warned not to enter the exclusion zone, and that the French authorities would if necessary enforce the exclusion zone. Rainbow Warrior II none the less entered the exclusion zone in defiance of that order. The French authorities then took action to enforce the exclusion zone.

We have seen no evidence to suggest that the French actions were illegal. The press and the hon. Gentleman have made much of the alleged French heavy-handedness. He must address any detail questions on that to the French authorities; it is not for me to answer. However, so that the House is not misled and hon. Members do not think that the French authorities committed great atrocities on 9 July, I should make quite clear what happened and what did not happen.

From the information that I have, I understand that no injuries resulted from the boarding of the Rainbow Warrior II, and there were no injuries to the British people present on the ship. The ship and her crew have now left the Mururoa atoll. I, for one, certainly hope that they do not seek to return.

I turn to the difficult and very real issue that we have to face up to: nuclear testing. We have not criticised the French decision, and I do not intend to start now, but I shall explain to the hon. Gentleman, and any others of his persuasion, the position that we have taken and why we believe that it was right to take it. In doing so, I shall deal with some of the points raised by the hon. Member for Linlithgow (Mr. Dalyell).

It might be helpful first to remind hon. Members of some further facts, particularly what President Chirac said when he announced France's decision to resume testing. On 13 June, President Chirac stated that France would undertake a final series of no more than eight nuclear tests at Mururoa, between September 1995 and May 1996 at the latest.

Will the Minister give way?

I am afraid not. I do not have much time to conclude my remarks.

Importantly, President Chirac confirmed France's commitment to the conclusion of a comprehensive nuclear test ban treaty by the autumn of 1996—[Laughter.]—and France's intention to sign such a treaty once concluded. The laughter from the Labour Members sitting below the Gangway shows how seriously they are taking this matter, as against their rhetoric on it.

First and foremost, President Chirac made it clear that he took the decision because he considered that France's national security needs could not be met in any other way. I do not believe that it is for us to seek to second-guess his judgment on this. National security—our own and that of our allies—means something to Conservative Members. I am sorry that the hon. Member for Bolsover seems to dismiss it so lightly.

Hon. Members heard a characteristically detailed speech from the hon. Member for Linlithgow, who has a long and honourable interest in this area and has some expertise in it, so in a second I shall come to the points that he raised. But in first addressing it, I reiterate that President Chirac has offered a clear assurance that a testing programme will not harm the environment. Indeed, we are told by the French Government that, despite the fact that more than 150 tests have been conducted at Mururoa, the level of radiation in the south Pacific is lower than natural levels in some parts of mainland France. The French Government have made it clear that all the tests will take place underground.

The hon. Gentleman raises an interesting and important point about atolls. I assume that he means that the atolls are linked biologically rather than physically. In fact, he talked to me earlier about seeding. Even so, from the scientific evidence at our disposal, I do not believe that there is the kind of problem that the hon. Gentleman suggests.

If I understand his argument correctly, the risk would reflect two things: the product of the differential in radiation at the source point, and the mass transfer between the points that he is discussing. Both those numbers will be very low. However, I will look into it in some detail, since he has raised it rather too late for me to study the matter further.

Will the Minister ask Foreign Office officials to view the television programme "Coral Grief", which gives pictorial evidence of inter-reef fertilisation?

I shall make sure that we write to the hon. Gentleman, because I take his concerns seriously. I think that they are ill founded in this case, but I take them seriously.

The hon. Gentleman also raised the point about caesium 137 and strontium 90 in a debate in July 1973 about atmospheric testing. As the hon. Gentleman is aware, all the French tests will take place underground on this occasion, and there is no reason why such elements should be released from those tests. On that occasion in 1973, he received a response from the Attorney-General, which I think stands.

President Chirac has issued an invitation to experts to visit the area—we have had a call for an independent study—to check his assurance on the effect on the environment.

Will the Minister give way?

I ask the House to consider whether President Chirac would have been prepared to give such an assurance if he was not fully confident that it would be proved justified. I leave it to the House to draw its own conclusions, but the matter seems fairly clear to me.

President Chirac has explained that the limited programme of tests will be designed to enable France to take advantage of computer simulation techniques to ensure the safety and reliability of its nuclear deterrent, once a comprehensive test ban treaty comes into force. If the hon. Member for Bolsover reflects on this, he will see that the latter point is good news.

We wholeheartedly share the desire for the comprehensive test ban treaty to be concluded at the conference on disarmament. The French decision and their reiterated commitment to a CTBT are a constructive contribution towards achieving that goal. The French are saying that they want to work for a comprehensive test ban treaty, that they want to sign one and that they are prepared to work to put themselves in a position to do so in a—

Order.

Mr Stephen Spayne

1.30 pm

I know that it is highly unusual to raise the case of an individual in the House of Commons, but there appears to be little alternative. I have already raised the case with the leader of Cleveland county council and it has become clear that an investigation must come from outside the council. I also raise this matter because people should be told what goes on in their local municipal buildings and how their money is being spent. No one at the county council seems to be interested in tackling the issue properly, although I understand that this morning, an extensive press statement has been issued which attempts to explain the position.

I shall run through the situation. This case relates to my constituent, Stephen Spayne, who works as a shift supervisor in the computer department at Cleveland county council; he has been working there for 21 years. In 1988, Mr. Spayne discovered a rather suspicious document purporting to be an invoice from KN Consultants to a man called Ted Stafford at Rank Xerox. For ease of reference, I have the document here. It is dated 16 May 1988 and it is for £350 for two days' consultancy, travel, subsistence and incidental expenses.

Mr. Spayne noticed that KN Consultants happened to have the same address as his immediate superior, Mr. Kevin Narey, in the computer department. Mr. Spayne recalled the wording of the code of conduct which bans private work except in very exceptional circumstances. He went to see the chief executive of Cleveland county council to report what was prima facie evidence of corruption.

Mr. Spayne also took with him two further letters, which he has given to me. The first is a letter from Mr. Narey to Rank Xerox which says:

"I am returning the cheque which eventually arrived last week in the hope that you can have it amended for me. As you will see, it is made out to KN Consultants. I need to have it in my own name and hope that this can be arranged. If it is any use to you, I enclose a second invoice in my name only. Sorry for the inconvenience."

The second piece of paper is from Mr. Kevin Narey of the same address. It is in respect of

"two days' consultancy, travel and subsistence and other expenses."

Mr. Bruce Stevenson, the chief executive of the county council, who is also my constituent, assured Mr. Spayne that he would deal with the matter thoroughly and that he need not trouble him with it again. Mr. Spayne then received a visit from his union branch secretary. He was clearly told not to mention the matter outside the county council and specifically not to go to see me, his Member of Parliament.

Following this action by Mr. Spayne, his working environment rapidly deteriorated. Mr. Narey came to see him, accused him of shopping him and started to harass him at work. His life became difficult. He was, for instance, booked on to a management training course while Mr. Narey was away and he received a start date. On Mr. Narey's return, the course was cancelled. There were complaints about every aspect of his work, even about the way in which he parked his car and about a range of other matters.

Mr. Narey, meanwhile, was promoted to head of the computer department and Mr. Spayne's life became even more unpleasant. Finally, in September 1993, the situation culminated in Mr. Spayne being issued with a disciplinary notice for dereliction of duty. Understandably, Mr. Spayne appealed and refused to speak to the people who were harassing him without a union representative being present. A report was prepared for the appeal tribunal by an investigating officer who was appointed by Mr. Narey. The report did not, however, uphold the case for suspension and Mr. Narey sent it back for redrafting. Mr. Spayne's colleague at work was approached to give evidence against him and was asked, in effect, to lie about him. On 18 January 1994, Mr. Spayne was suspended from his post.

An independent inquiry was launched by a Mr. Dokes from the education department of the same county council. After a few weeks, my constituent was taken off suspension and put on leave of absence with pay. In May, he returned to work but was given menial tasks in another department, the printing department. From October last year, he went on sick leave as his new job was getting him down.

Meanwhile, Mr. Dokes had rapidly concluded his investigation and had written a 23-page report substantially supporting Mr. Spayne and drawing on the long history of events, going back to the discovery of the invoices in 1988. It was submitted to the chief executive, Mr. Stevenson, who apparently ordered it to be suppressed and another one to be written. Mr. Dokes said to a Mr. Slater of Unison of his first report:

"If anyone requests this report I shall deny even writing it, because I have my own position to think about."

There were witnesses present who wrote those words down. A new report was written; it was heavily jargonised and it did not come out with clear conclusions.

Late last year, Mr. Spayne came to see me. I regard allegations of corrupt practices as extremely serious, especially when the chief executive is alleged to be covering them up. I went to see the leader of the Conservatives on the county council and she directed me to the leader of the council, Councillor Paul Harford. After going through the facts and discussing Mr. Stevenson's role in all this, Mr. Harford agreed with me that there should be an outside investigation. He asked the county secretary, David Ashton, to receive a report from Mr. Spayne and to set up the necessary action. Mr. Spayne saw Mr. Ashton in December. In January, Mr. Spayne was suddenly recalled to work. He had a two-minute meeting with Mr. Wright of Unison and Mr. Stevenson. Mr. Stevenson said that there was no reason why he should not return to work immediately in his old job. However, he refused to discuss why Mr. Spayne had been off work for nearly a year. My constituent then returned to work and wrote to the personnel department asking for written reasons why he had been away from work, but he was given none.

Following the meeting with Mr. Ashton, the county secretary wrote to Mr. Spayne and to me in April this year saying that the matters had been investigated. I am afraid that the explanations offered do not amount to very much. There is to be no outside investigation.

First, Mr. Ashton appears to believe from what has been said by Mr. Wright of Unison that my constituent's grievances were being pursued through the normal channels when that was patently not the case. They have not been pursued by anyone, let alone Unison which seems, incidentally, to act as an arm of the county council.

After all, it was another union representative who informally offered Mr. Spayne £20,000 to leave the county's employment.

Secondly, Mr.Ashton has taken advantage of Mr. Spayne's understandable reluctance to speak to superior officers in his own council about his allegation to discern that Mr. Spayne does not allege misconduct on the part of the chief executive. Yet the reason why I went to see the leader of the council and asked for a proper outside investigation was precisely because such an allegation had been made. I do not believe that it is in the interests of my constituent, Mr. Stevenson or the county council simply to brush the matter aside. If senior officers can accept outside payments from companies dealing directly with the county and can then have the matter hushed up, the council tax payers in my constituency should know about it.

The explanation of the events leading a senior officer of the council to invoice Rank Xerox has no substance at all. The matter was apparently referred to an internal auditor who sent a report to the chief executive who decided to take no action. Mr. Ashton—another servant of the council—has apparently read the report and is happy with it, but he will not say what is in it. However, I understand that in the light of today's debate, a statement has been issued to the press which offers some explanation.

Mr. Ashton has said that the personnel director stated in 1974 that, from time to time, chief and senior officers were requested to give informal or formal talks on particular aspects of the work of council, and that expenses for travel and subsistence and a fee could be paid. So why was Mr. Narey not open and above board about it? What about the company called KN Consultants, which apparently disappeared overnight? Apparently, it was resolved by the council that permission could be given for such talks if the appropriate chief officer was consulted. But no suggestion has been made that anybody was consulted in this case.

Why was Mr. Narey so angry about being shopped? Why was Mr. Spayne hounded, nearly out of his job? Why was the report on Mr. Spayne's employment quashed and sent back for a redraft? If the matter was all in order and above board, why did not Mr. Stevenson just tell Mr. Spayne that? Why is Mr. Narey now telling my constituent that he has no chance of redeployment when the computer department moves over to the new unitary borough of Middlesbrough? Is Mr. Narey, along with other officers, free to accept payments from contractors and then harass his staff if they question his doing so?

I suppose that it is possible that there is a perfectly reasonable explanation for all this, but justice has not yet been done, nor has it been seen to be done. There are, I suspect, only two alternatives. Either something very shady is going on in the county council and there has been a cover-up for some reason, or it is just a very badly managed institution which treats its staff poorly and has terrible internal communications. Either way, I am not confident that Cleveland county council is the efficient organisation it has pretended to be to stave off its own abolition.

I hope that the Minister will use what powers he has to have Mr. Spayne's case properly investigated by an outside authority. I would also like to see an independent report on Mr. Narey's activities with regard to the dummy invoices, and a clear statement from Cleveland as to the circumstances in which officers' private arrangements with outside companies are deemed to be corrupt.

Since these events happened, Cleveland county council has revised its guidance on private work and general conduct for staff. Under the heading "General Conduct" in both the old and new versions, it says clearly:

"The Council must be in a position to rebut with confidence any allegation that the integrity of its administration is being impaired because of the leisure time activities of any of its staff. Implicit in this is the requirement that there must be no question of staff undertaking activities in circumstances which might lead to suspicion of undue or improper favour being granted, or undue or improper influence exercised, in relation to contracts or any kind of consent, permission, licence etc., which members of the public seek from the Council."

That is a clear statement which, in the circumstances, I do not think Cleveland council can live up to today.

Finally, it is beholden upon Cleveland county council to apologise to my constituent for the appalling way in which he has been treated, and to offer some token compensation. Once again, we see evidence of how the internal dealings of Labour-controlled councils leave a lot to be desired, and how difficult it is to bring such circumstances out into the light.

1.43 pm

My hon. Friend the Member for Stockton, South (Mr. Devlin) has classically presented his case with typical clarity. Those of us with an interest in these matters will wish to consider carefully what he has said and consider their response to his analysis of these issues. However, I am sure that he will appreciate that it is not for me to comment on the specific case or the specific allegations. As my hon. Friend is aware, Ministers have no direct role in such cases, nor do they have powers to intervene. Nevertheless, the Government condemn all forms of impropriety and corruption in public life, wherever it occurs. We have done much in the last 16 years to promote good conduct in local government. I can offer my hon. Friend some general comments and some general guidance on how he might take this matter forward.

Historically, local government in this country has been characterised by a tradition of propriety and public service. However, there is always the potential for misconduct or fraud and we must not be complacent. Central Government's role is to ensure that there is a framework in place to provide a safeguard against such misconduct. In 1982, the Government established the Audit Commission to arrange for the audit of local authorities. The Audit Commission oversees the work of councils' external auditors, who have an important role in the fight against fraud.

In 1985, the Government set up the Widdicombe committee of inquiry into the conduct of local authority business. We responded to the committee's report with legislation providing for a number of measures to ensure the good conduct of local authority business. In particular, we introduced a head of paid service, responsible for making reports on—among other things—the proper appointment and management of staff and the introduction of the role of the monitoring officer to make reports on the contravention of the law or maladministration.

Other measures introduced by the Government since then have contributed to the improvement of the conduct of local government by encouraging authorities to root out waste and bureaucracy and to remove obstacles to the provision of efficient and effective services. I am thinking obviously of the disciplines imposed by the extension of compulsory competitive tendering to greater areas of local authority business and most recently the requirement to publish performance indicators.

However, the primary responsibility for the prevention and detection of fraud within their areas of operation rests with the local authorities themselves. As responsible employers, councils should uphold the highest standards of probity among their own employees. In the great majority of cases, they do. Where fraud is found, the authority should root it out. However, my hon. Friend is clearly dissatisfied with the response he has received from the council in this case. I would advise him that he, his constituent and others concerned about this case have two alternate avenues to explore.

In cases where there is a suspicion of criminal activity, the matter should be referred to the police and the Crown Prosecution Service. However, I am not aware that such allegations have been made in this case. Alternatively, matters relating to misconduct, fraud or the loss of public money can be referred to the council's external auditor. I am not in a position to say—nor should I comment—on whether the allegations referred to by my hon. Friend have some substance, but the nature of the allegations suggests to me that they are of the type which would fall within the remit of the district auditor. My hon. Friend may wish to consider this course of action, if indeed it has not already been done.

District auditors are independent of the councils which they audit, and they have significant powers to investigate allegations of wrongdoing and take action. Their powers extend wider than those of a commercial auditor. They not only audit the council's accounts, but advise on matters relating to value for money and good financial management. They guard against fraud, misconduct and the loss of money, and if they find transgressions they can surcharge those responsible for the repayment of money.

District auditors are overseen by the Audit Commission. Its statutory duties include the preparation of a code which prescribes

"what appears to the commission to be the best professional practice with respect to the standards, procedures and techniques to be adopted by auditors".

The code is subject to approval by Parliament and hon. Members with an interest in these matters will know that a Standing Committee of the House considered and approved the latest version of the code only last week.

Auditors have a duty to comply with the code in carrying out their functions, and therefore it plays an important part in the fight against fraud. The code makes it clear that it is the responsibility of auditors to review the adequacy of the measures taken by councils to combat fraud, to test compliance with these measures and to draw attention to significant weaknesses or omissions which they may identify. According to the code, any person may at any time give information to auditors which concerns the accounts of the relevant councils or is otherwise relevant to the auditors' functions, and auditors must—I emphasise that—consider such information. The relevant auditor in the matters referred to by my hon. Friend would be obliged to consider information passed to him.

Mr. Deputy Speaker, I sympathise with my hon. Friend's frustration in this case, and I hope he will not be disappointed that I have to say—in all fairness, I think he already realised this—that I cannot pursue the matter on his behalf. However, I have explained the framework within which local authorities and their external auditors must operate, and I have offered him some guidance on the future action he must take. I can do no more than wish him the best of luck.

rose—

Order. This is an Adjournment debate, and the Minister has spoken.

As both the right hon. Member for Tweeddale, Ettrick and Lauderdale (Sir D. Steel) and the Minister of State, Foreign and Commonwealth Office are present, we shall now move to the next debate.

Burma

1.49 pm

I am grateful for the opportunity to raise the important question of British Government policy on Burma. On Monday, I was able to welcome and congratulate the new Minister; let me do so again now. No doubt this is the first of many foreign affairs Adjournment debates that he will have to answer.

The Minister inherits one excellent policy: what has been described as the "good governance" policy of Her Majesty's Government over the past two or three years. We shall all miss the leadership shown by the right hon. Member for Witney (Mr. Hurd) over the years, and I have always given my full support to Baroness Chalker when she has spoken on the subject. Indeed, I shall begin by quoting from her Chatham house lecture of a year ago. She said:

"The United Nations charter lays a duty on all of us to promote respect for human rights everywhere."

That encapsulates the theme of my speech.

In 1988, the National League for Democracy in Burma won the general election. Its victory was inconvenient for the military, which promptly staged a coup and established in its place the infamous SLORC—the State Law and Order Restoration Council. As with so many military coups around the world, the theory was that this would be a transitional phase prior to an orderly handing over of power to a democracy. That has not happened, however, and many of the Members of Parliament who had been elected were thrown into gaol. Since then, the legitimate Prime Minister of Burma, Dr. Sein Win, has been in exile. He is currently in Washington, and I had a long discussion with him there a few weeks ago.

The daughter of the Independence Prime Minister, Aung San Suu Kyi, has been the most noted figure of opposition to the military, and has been awarded the Nobel peace prize. We all rejoiced when she was released last week after six years of house detention. She became a symbol of resistance to oppression around the world, but life could have been so easy for her: the regime was perfectly willing to release her provided that she left the country to join her British husband and family in Oxford, but she realised that she would never be allowed back and volunteered to remain under house arrest. That is a tribute to her steadfastness and courage.

In her famous essay "Freedom from Fear", Aung San Suu Kyi wrote that courage could be described as grace under pressure—

"grace which is renewed repeatedly in the face of harsh, unremitting pressure."

That definition could very well be applied to Aung San Suu Kyi herself. She has been a symbol of hope to the people of Burma, whether they are in the country or—as many are—in exile around the world. I was glad to hear today that she was able to attend the martyrs' memorial ceremony; we wait to see what other freedoms she will be allowed following her release.

We in the Liberal international movement decided to give Aung San Suu Kyi the 1995 prize for freedom. We award the prize annually to a figure who has made a contribution to world freedom, and I can think of no more appropriate recipient this year. Only a few weeks ago, the SLORC authorities refused me permission to travel to Burma and present the prize. Given the new circumstances, I have asked permission again, and I hope that it will be granted in the near future.

I do not think that Aung San Suu Kyi would have been released but for the pressure exerted by many Governments around the world, including the strong words of our own Prime Minister in an answer to me at Question Time only three weeks ago and the pressure from the visiting Japanese Foreign Minister. All those factors have helped, but there is a danger that, because Aung San Suu Kyi has been such a symbol of the victimisation and oppression of the Government, the fact of her release may lead people to believe that things will be well in Burma from now on. I hope that they will, but the House should be aware that 16 elected Members of Parliament are still in gaol, and that there are an estimated 1,000 political prisoners in Burma—including nine students who were arrested only this year while attending the funeral of one of the Independence leaders.

The regime has been universally condemned for its human rights abuses over the past few years. Successive annual resolutions of the United Nations Commission on Human Rights and the third committee of the United Nations General Assembly have been increasingly critical of SLORC, and the sub-commission on prevention of discrimination and protection of minorities has also been extremely critical of its oppression of minority groups in the country—notably the Karen minority on the border with Thailand. No doubt the Minister is aware of a recent television documentary that produced some evidence that biological warfare had been used by the regime against the Karen people. That in itself deserves international condemnation.

All the UN resolutions have consistently called for an end to summary executions, torture and forced labour. I have just been reading the International Labour Organisation's report on forced labour. It estimates that some 800,000 people have been used for that purpose under legislation that allows Burmese local authorities to requisition citizens for public works. It states that the Government are is using forced labour in a strategic and systematic way to develop holiday resorts for tourists. For example, workers have been conscripted to clean out with bare hands the Mandalay canal, 10 km long and more than 3 m deep. Houses bordering the canal have been demolished and local people forced by the military to work 24-hour shifts, and 2,000 prisoners in chains have been brought in to assist. The report goes on to claim that some 30,000 workers have not been paid for work at the new airport in Basang, and that hordes of men have been seen cleaning streets and historic buildings in Mandalay.

The regime has responded that the allegations of forced labour are false and are being made by people who want to denigrate it. It argues that international critics do not understand the culture of the people; the voluntary contribution of labour to building shrines, temples and so forth is a tradition that goes back thousands of years.

That superficial argument has been rejected by, among others, the United States Government representative to the ILO, Julia Misner. She has pointed out that, while the United States Government respect the tradition of voluntary community service in Burma, there is clear evidence that people have been forcibly conscripted, taken from their villages and farms and made to work—often without pay or food—under threat of heavy fines, and subjected to severe physical abuse. She said:

"Some of these workers had died as a result of mistreatment and some had been murdered. What was unacceptable and alarming was not only had the Government failed to suppress the use of forced labour, but apparently had even promoted the spread of this practice".

When we speak of good governance, we are not talking only about obscure parliamentary traditions; we are talking about the way of life imposed on the people of Burma by the present regime.

What should we, in the outside world, be doing about that? Of course we have no aid programme to Burma because of the human rights record, yet Burma is a very poor country. The per capita gross domestic product is only $235; that is half of India's per capita GDP and less than that of Bangladesh. Only 10 per cent. of homes have electricity. Obviously, therefore, Burma is a country which in normal times would be a very worthy recipient of international aid assistance.

Given that that aid has been denied to them and given their inflation rate and their levels of poverty, the Burmese authorities have been developing what I can only call "economic diplomacy". A Japanese trading company recently signed an agreement on major infrastructure joint ventures and it is widely believed that the Japanese Government are now considering the resumption of an aid programme. Britain held a trade promotion week last year, and the World bank is currently preparing a report on economic reforms.

It is believed that Burma may announce other palliative measures following the release of Aung San Suu Kyi. She herself has answered a direct question on her release. She was asked by Time magazine:

"How should the international community react"

to your release? She replied:

"The authorities should be given credit for releasing me, but I think people should wait a bit to see what follows. There is no use rushing in and thinking everything is going to be hunky-dory from now on."

I think those are wise words.

I suggest to the Minister that our policies should be roughly as follows.

First, we must use our position in the World bank and the International Monetary Fund to ensure that major economic benefit lending is not resumed to Burma without a dramatic improvement in human rights. I believe it is essential that we use our. influence in the international financial institutions in that constructive way.

Secondly, I do not believe that any further trade or investment delegations should be sent to Burma until the UN resolutions have been complied with.

Thirdly, I hope that Her Majesty's Government will support the UN machinery to establish a contact group which could encourage dialogue between SLORC and the National League for Democracy. It is interesting that members of the National League for Democracy—at any rate those that I have met—are not wild-eyed revolutionaries. They are making a reasonable suggestion that in Burma there might be, as an interim measure, a shared administration between the present regime and the NLD, pending the construction of a proper constitutional conference.

I believe that that is a sensible and moderate suggestion, which the UN is ready to encourage and which Her Majesty's Government should support.

We must make it clear to the regime that unilateral constitutional tinkering on its part will not be acceptable. The present so-called "constitutional convention" is already in draft and proposes, for example, a major continuing role in the democratic assemblies for the military. It proposes, for example, to disqualify from standing for presidential office anyone married to a foreigner; a more blatant piece of manipulation intended to exclude Aung San Suu Kyi is difficult to imagine.

Obviously, it is unacceptable that the existing regime should itself revise the constitution. There must be some process of dialogue, of constitution-building on a consensus basis. I suggest that the international pressure, especially the pressure from Her Majesty's Government, which was applied to the Banda regime in Malawi and produced exactly that type of constitutional dialogue leading to democratic elections, is what is required in Burma.

I hope that the Minister will confirm that not only shall we ourselves not resume an aid programme until there are changes of a more fundamental type in Burma, but that we shall talk firmly to our allies in the Japanese Government to try to ensure that they do not do so either.

I freely recognise that one of the problems facing the Government in promoting the good governance policy is that pressure through withdrawal of investment or trade is not effective if it is unilateral. It must be on a multilateral and co-operative basis. I argue that that co-operation should begin in the European Union. It may take us a long time to move to the so-called common foreign policy outlined in the Maastricht treaty, but whatever our opinions may be in the House on that subject there can be no denying that, on the issue of trade and investment pressure, a common policy is exactly what is needed. Otherwise, one country's sanctions become its neighbours' business opportunities. I hope very much that the policy of good governance will be pushed forward, especially in the European Union.

In the past few days, we have had the sad example of Nigeria. Strong statements were made about Nigeria by the Minister and by Lady Chalker, and the Nigerians have reacted against that and called in the heads of the British oil companies to warn them against what they regard as interference in their affairs. We are exposed as an individual country unless we work together with our allies to increase the pressure on those totalitarian regimes and persuade them to return to civilian Government.

I realise that I have not used up all the extra time that you have generously allowed us, Mr. Deputy Speaker, as a result of the shortness of the previous debate, but I have never believed in occupying space for that reason alone. I very much look forward to hearing what the Minister has to say in reply.

2.6 pm

I am most grateful to the right hon. Member for Tweeddale, Ettrick and Lauderdale (Sir D. Steel) for initiating the debate. It is certainly very timely for the House to focus on Burma slightly more than a week after Daw Aung San Suu Kyi was released from the house detention to which the right hon. Gentleman referred. She had indeed endured that house detention for almost six years, and it had long been a policy priority of this Government to secure her unconditional release. I am sure that all hon. and right hon. Members of the House will wish to join the right hon. Gentleman and myself, especially on such a significant day, in welcoming that courageous lady back to freedom.

July 19 is martyrs day in Burma, commemorating not only Daw Suu Kyi's father, but the other Burmese leaders who were assassinated just before Burma achieved its independence. Earlier today, as the right hon. Gentleman rightly said, Daw Suu Kyi joined the State Law and Order Restoration Council—the SLORC—in laying wreaths for her father. The ceremony passed peacefully, and I believe that we should take that as a good omen for a united future for Burma.

I wish to begin by expressing my heartfelt admiration for Daw Suu Kyi. The citation for her Nobel peace prize in 1991 described her contribution as one of the most remarkable examples of civilian courage in Asia in recent decades. I am pleased to hear of the additional honour to which the right hon. Gentleman referred.

Throughout her detention, Daw Suu Kyi remained untainted by bitterness, and was rightly regarded as a fitting symbol of the non-violent struggle against oppression. Since her release, that courage has been complemented by a remarkable magnanimity and self-restraint. She has indeed been an example to all democrats. In a moving statement that she made to the press on her first day of freedom, she spoke, not of triumph, but of forgiveness and reconciliation. Now she is free, and is turning her efforts towards working with the SLORC for the good of the Burmese people. As I say, I cannot praise her enough and I should also pay tribute to the fortitude shown by her family.

We must also welcome the decision of the ruling military regime in Burma, the SLORC, in finally agreeing to remove the restriction that it had placed on Daw Suu Kyi. A long detention without trial was against all the principles of justice. We appreciate the SLORC's acknowledgment of her right to liberty at long last. By agreeing to her unconditional release and expressing its desire to work with her for the peace and stability of Burma, it has acted in its country's best interests. We warmly welcome its action and hope that it represents the first step in an irreversible pursuit of progress towards a prosperous and a democratic Burma.

As no one appreciates more than Daw Suu Kyi, that will be no easy task. But now there is hope for change. Burma is one of south-east Asia's least developed countries, with vast unrealised natural and human resources. The SLORC has asked Daw Suu Kyi to participate in the creation of a peaceful and prosperous country, and has expressed its hope that national reconciliation will be achieved. We encourage the SLORC to recognise the rights of all Burmese people to participate fully in the political process, and to heed the call for dialogue.

Encouraging such dialogue and cooperation has been a key. aim of our policy since the SLORC came to power, and it will continue to be so. As Daw Suu Kyi has already pointed out, the positive resolution of political problems throughout the world in recent years has been achieved primarily through dialogue.

We have been heartened by the SLORC's stated intention to achieve reconciliation, and by its recent release of many political prisoners. But, as the Secretary of State said in his message marking the release of Daw Suu Kyi, there are many more people still detained in Burma. I am grateful to the right hon. Gentleman for his comments in that regard and for confirming the magnitude of the existing problem. We hope that the process of formulating a new constitution will become a truly consultative process involving all ethnic and political groups and that all those still detained for voicing their hopes and aims for a free and democratic Burma will be released to take part in that process.

Of course, civil liberties are not the only important rights. The welfare of the Burmese people continues to concern us. As the right hon. Gentleman has mentioned, the human rights situation in Burma is distressing by any standards. We are aware of reports of forced labour and military porterage, and of the displacement of entire communities. The plight of the Karen people on Burma's border with Thailand must not be overlooked. As the right hon. Gentleman said, there has been graphic evidence of that in recent television programmes.

Freedom of speech and association are still denied in Burma. We have condemned such human rights abuses and will continue to do so, both bilaterally and in international forums. We support the activities of the United Nations in promoting democracy in Burma and we would consider carefully any proposal for a contact group. But there is hope for change. The SLORC has at last realised that the removal of constraints from Daw Suu Kyi can help it to achieve a prosperous and a peaceful Burma. We must work with others to persuade it to realise that the same benefits will come from respecting the human rights of all the Burmese people, including the ethnic minorities.

We are committed to helping Burma develop into a peaceful and prosperous nation with which we can enjoy productive relations. We endorse Daw Suu Kyi's call for the healing of divisions to stabilise Burma and we are encouraged by the SLORC's request that she work with it for the peace and stability of the country. Internal stability is a vital prerequisite of the political and economic development that is essential if Burma is to play a full international role.

We recognise that Burma's neighbours have direct concerns which affect the formulation of their policy. But we urge them to consider carefully the implications of moving too quickly. Daw Suu Kyi and the right hon. Gentleman referred to the advantages of a quiet and careful approach. We should not rush into things, assuming that everything is, as Daw Suu Kyi said, "hunky-dory". We all want Burma to play its full part in international and regional groupings. But before Burma can fulfil wider roles satisfactorily, the SLORC needs to be encouraged to apply principles of good governance. I am grateful for what the right hon. Gentleman said in that regard. The principles of good governance require a Government to be legitimate, competent, accountable and to respect and promote human rights and the rule of law. We can all do much to encourage that.

All those Governments with an interest in the future of Burma are reviewing their policies following Daw Suu Kyi's release. But the watchword is caution. We shall all be watching closely to see if the SLORC takes advantage of the situation that it has created. Burma stands to benefit greatly if it does.

Aid is an important aspect of our policy, as the right hon. Gentleman highlighted. We shall be considering carefully the direction that our aid policy should take over the coming months. Aid is a valuable tool in exercising international influence in Burma, and we must be careful that it is used to support reform rather than undermine it. We shall discuss the way ahead with our European partners. We are already in agreement that we should reward reform in Burma by providing aid.

We consider it vital that the SLORC should cooperate with the UN bodies and other aid and humanitarian agencies working in Burma, whose efforts we strongly support. It is only in that way that the Burmese people will be able to benefit from the help that we all wish to provide.

Burma is in desperate need of economic development, as the SLORC has recognised. We should be doing the Burmese people a grave disservice if we were to ignore that. Daw Suu Kyi has also expressed her support for measured economic development country wide. But we must proceed with caution. As part of our critical dialogue, we should let the SLORC know that progress with economic assistance will be conditional on both economic and political reforms. They must be radical. In particular, Burma needs a stable fiscal framework and a new currency policy. She should address urgently the problem of her foreign debt.

We shall also be reviewing the means by which we assist British companies to prospect the Burmese market. It is a market that could develop quickly should real reform come. We need to ensure that British companies will not be at a disadvantage when competing in those conditions. The competition will be intense. Through trade, we can help to reinforce rather than undermine our policy in other areas. Through increased commercial contacts with democratic nations such as Britain, the Burmese people will gain experience of democratic principles. So I do not share the view of the isolationists who contend that trading with repressive regimes only brings them succour.

I shall refer to the right hon. Gentleman's comments about the trade fair. British week proved extremely successful. It was a small scale affair, but one which aimed to give British firms a chance to assess for themselves market opportunities in Burma. It was not just a trade event; it included cultural and information elements that aimed to correct the distorted image of the United Kingdom in Burma. We do not have any plans for future events, but I believe that the trade fair achieved all of its aims.

Overall, we aim to provide the strong and sympathetic support that Daw Suu Kyi asked for from the international community, working bilaterally with our European partners, Burma's neighbours and other nations. The continued interest shown by the House reflects the genuine wish of people in Britain to help to achieve the aims that she has represented for so long. We must impress upon the SLORC our interest and potential to contribute, but we must emphasise our continued insistence on the removal of the many abuses and restrictions that remain. It is truly critical to maintain our dialogue.

I can summarise our current attitude as cautiously optimistic. We are looking at our policy options but will not rush ahead. We must allow the dust to settle and the dialogue between Daw Suu Kyi, her followers and the SLORC to develop. We must do our best to aid the progress of dialogue and reconciliation by recognising and rewarding moves in the right direction. Daw Suu Kyi has warned the Burmese people

"not to expect too much too quickly",

but her positive attitude gives hope for progress. She pointed out that the differences between the regime and the Opposition in Burma are nothing like so great as the gulf that divided black and white in South Africa. If South Africa can resolve its differences and proceed as a united country, there is hope for Burma. We shall do all that we can to encourage the fulfilment of that hope. Again, I am grateful to the right hon. Member for Tweeddale, Ettrick and Lauderdale for raising the issue in the House today.

2.19 pm

Sitting suspended.

2.30 pm

On resuming—

It being half-past Two o'clock, the motion for the Adjournment of the House lapsed, pursuant to Order [19 December].

Private Business

Accommodation Level Crossings Bill Lords(By Order)

Order for Third Reading read.

To be read the Third time on Thursday 19 October.

City Of Westminster Bill Lords (By Order)

Order read for resuming adjourned debate on Question [26 June].

Debate to be resumed on Thursday 19 October.

Oral Answers To Questions

Environment

National Park Authorities

To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment what representations he has received regarding the new national park authorities. [33371]

Our conclusions in response to the many representations we have received are reflected in part III of the Environment Bill.

The Secretary of State will be painfully aware of the extent to which Britain's conservation bodies feel cheated by his decision to remove "quiet enjoyment" rather than accept the definition tabled by the Opposition on Report. When will his revised guidance be published, as promised? Will he give us his word that that guidance will make it crystal clear that a special quality of all national parks is their peacefulness and tranquillity?

I am sorry that the hon. Lady should not have read with care reports of discussions in Committee, when it was made clear that, although the Government sought to find a way both to retain "quiet enjoyment" and to ensure that people could continue to do in national parks what they have done and want to continue to do, there was no way in which either the Opposition or the Government felt that that could be achieved. We have removed "quiet" and I have stated in the guidance, which I hope to publish as soon as possible, that we shall ensure that the tranquillity that is suitable for national parks is maintained while enabling people to continue to lead their lives in a reasonable manner. I think that that is reasonable, and most bodies agree with me.

Does my right hon. Friend accept that his decision to increase the number of local people on national park authorities, especially parish councillors, has been warmly welcomed, particularly in the context of the Northumberland national park? Will he dissociate himself from the remarks made by an Opposition Front Bench spokesman in Committee to the effect that parish councillors are overly parochial and accountable to no one?

I was surprised to read of the Labour party's assertion that parish councillors are accountable only to themselves. I was surprised also by the dismissive and contemptuous way in which they were treated by the Labour Front Bench. I hope that parish councillors notice that the Labour party does not consider them to be representative of local parties and does not believe that they are elected. I hope also that parish councillors will know what to do in future when the Labour party woos them.

Does the Secretary of State agree that there are many people who enjoy walking in national parks? Will he encourage national parks to negotiate access agreements to increase the areas in which people can walk? Will he urge all national parks to achieve the target set out in the Edwards report by ensuring that, by the end of the year, all rights of way in national parks are free of obstruction and are signposted where they leave the highway?

I am obviously pleased by the way in which we have improved the opportunity of access during the past few years. I know that most national parks are trying to do precisely what the hon. Gentleman has urged. We must recognise, however, that there is a balance to be achieved. Many other functions of the national parks must be carried out properly, such as conservation of habitat, protection of birds and improvement of agriculture. All those factors must come into the balance as well.

Building And Construction Industry

To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment what is his latest assessment of the prospects for the building and construction industry; and if he will make a statement. [33372]

I commend to my hon. Friend the latest state of the construction industry report, produced jointly by my Department and representatives of the industry, which was published on 13 July. Copies have been placed in the Library.

Does my hon. Friend agree that a thriving building and construction industry is usually a great contributor to economic recovery and should be a political imperative for a party that has always championed the idea of a property-owning democracy? Given the present flatness of the housing market, has my hon. Friend any ideas in mind, such as the upgrading of our substandard housing stock, which would revitalise the industry and restore the cachet of home ownership?

I agree with my hon. Friend about the importance of the construction industry. Of course we want to encourage it in every way possible to become more efficient and cost-effective so that it will continue to have an important place not only domestically but in terms of exports, which are going well. My hon. Friend should not forget that, despite gloomy pictures on the part of the construction industry, there are some better prospects and, in particular, exports are going well.

Does the Minister accept that the prospects for the building and construction industry are extremely gloomy because, in the public sector, the Government will do nothing to release local authorities' capital receipts which could lead to jobs and homes being built and, in the private sector, the Government are impotent and can do nothing because the real problem is the British people's lack of confidence in the Government and in Britain's economic prospects while they remain in power?

The hon. Gentleman behaves as though the receipts that accrue to local authorities are sitting under councillors' beds. A proportion is used for housing investment and much is used as a substitute for borrowing or lent on the money market. If that money was spent all at once, it would exert upward pressure on interest rates as well as causing other problems.

Does my hon. Friend agree with the Prime Minister who, when addressing the Manufacturing and Construction Industries Alliance on Monday this week, said that, with interest rates and inflation under control and with falling unemployment, housing has rarely been more affordable, and that the only stumbling block was lack of confidence? What does my hon. Friend believe he should do to get over that stumbling block in order to encourage the first-time buyer, thereby enhancing the prospects for the construction industry?

I read my right hon. Friend's excellent speech and I commend my hon. Friend's husband, the Member for Macclesfield (Mr. Winterton), on his role in that organisation. My hon. Friend refers to the 20-year low in the ratio of prices to incomes and therefore rightly highlights the fact that housing is more affordable. Instead of talking down the housing market, Opposition Members should be emphasising that fact to encourage sales.

Will the Minister now come clean? In the past week we have seen figures from the National House-Building Council that show that starts in the first six months of this year are 15 per cent. down and figures from the Corporate Estate Agents showing sales down by a similar amount. Everyone in the industry knows that the house-building industry is in difficulty and that confidence has been further weakened by the crass decision to cut the income support safety net. When will the Government face up to their responsibilities? There was nothing in the White Paper to restore confidence in the market. When will the Government come to the help of the hard-pressed house-building industry and the millions of home owners who are in difficulty?

No one has any illusions about the fact that the house-building sector is going through a difficult period which will be overcome only as confidence continues to gain strength. That depends on how the economy performs and on how the message—that private sector housing has not been as affordable as it is now for 20 years—is put across.

House-Building Industry

To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment if he will make a statement on the business prospects for the house-building industry. [33373]

The Government remain firmly committed to a policy of sustainable home ownership and we anticipate recovery in the house-building industry as the wider economy continues to grow.

The national interest and the Conservative party's interest depend on a flourishing housing and building industry in the widest possible sense—home ownership and encouraging mobility. Does my hon. Friend agree that the present situation—which has complex causes, notably the over-borrowing of the late 1980s—is not sustainable for long? It is desirable for the reasons that I have given that my hon. Friend's Department should work closely with the Treasury to bring forward specific, urgent and early measures to encourage the house-building industry.

I shall certainly draw my right hon. and learned Friend the Chancellor's attention to my hon. Friend's point, but I return to the fact that the health of the house-building industry depends crucially on the performance of the economy as a whole. As my hon. Friend says, it would serve no one any good if we returned to the days of hyper-inflation in house prices.

In view of the Minister's new responsibility for health and safety, has he yet had time to look at the appalling health and safety record of building workers in the house-building industry? What will he do, particularly about the deregulated sector, commonly known as the lump?

The hon. Lady sounds like a voice from the 1960s. We are, of course, keen to see improving safety standards in the construction industry. As someone who worked in that industry, I am more aware of the matter than most, and we will continue to place emphasis on it.

Does my hon. Friend agree that a key factor in the house-building industry is the level of interest rates? Does he applaud the action taken by my right hon. and learned Friend the Chancellor of the Exchequer on 5 May when he resisted increasing interest rates? Will my hon. Friend try to ensure that, like the Chorley building society, other building societies do not always put up their rates when the larger ones do?

I am pleased to hear about the building society in my hon. Friend's constituency. My right hon. and learned Friend the Chancellor has to balance all the considerations, including the climate for inflation, as well as the performance of the economy as a whole. As I am sure my hon. Friend knows, that is not an easy balancing act.

Houses In Multiple Occupation

To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment if he will make a statement on his reasons for deciding not to introduce a national licensing scheme for houses in multiple occupation. [33374]

The rules that we are proposing will permit effective action to ensure safety where that is necessary without imposing universal rules that may not be necessary everywhere.

Will the Minister admit that three out of every four people who responded to the Government's consultation paper supported the case for a national licensing scheme for houses in multiple occupation? By refusing to introduce such a scheme, are not the Government putting their ideological hostility towards regulation ahead of the proper concern for public safety and the need to save lives?

It is true that a large number of people wanted a licensing scheme, but they wanted different things—there was little agreement on the shape of the scheme that they wanted. We have decided to build on the powers that local authorities have rather than impose duties on them. There are parts of the country where there are relatively few problems, and it is not necessary to introduce a compulsory universal scheme. Where it is necessary to introduce a scheme, local authorities already have the relevant powers, and we shall give them enhanced powers.

Can my hon. Friend assure me that he will advise local authorities that houses in multiple occupation are precisely that and that the term should not be applied to large houses that have been converted into a few flats with relatively few residents?

We shall exempt from the regulation places such as long-term leasehold blocks, houses with self-contained flats and university halls of residence. They will be caught by different regulations that achieve the same purpose.

Air Quality Monitoring

To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment how many monitoring stations capable of recording levels of PM₁₀s or lower provide information for his Department. [33376]

There are currently 16 stations. Another nine will come on stream by the end of 1996. On top of that, local authority sites will be integrated to increase the coverage.

I welcome the Minister to his new post, but I am extremely disappointed with his reply. Professor Seaton's report in The Lancet in January established a direct fink between the number and level of PM1Os in the atmosphere and high levels of death as a result of cardiovascular problems and respiratory disease. I understand that the expert panel on air quality standards will report later this year. Is not the number of monitoring stations wholly inadequate? Does the Minister agree that his plans do not address this serious problem?

The hon. Gentleman should take into account the fact that, in addition to the automatic monitoring stations, there are 250 non-automatic stations around the country. The hon. Gentleman is right to say that particle matter causes concern. That has been recognised by the expert panel, which is taking the matter seriously. No doubt particle matter will be one of the pollutants that we shall aim to reduce as part of our national air quality strategy that will be put in place by the Environment Bill. That strategy will be taken seriously; certainly it will be put into force.

I warmly welcome my hon. Friend's appointment. I am sure that he is aware that pollution causes particular difficulties for those with health problems such as asthma. What further action can his Department take to ensure that existing laws and those that are passed in this Session are used to try to reduce the number of lorries and buses that belch out filthy black smoke?

I am grateful to my hon. Friend for his kind comments, as I am grateful to the hon. Member for Pembroke (Mr. Ainger) for his. My hon. Friend makes a valuable point. Diesel exhausts, buses and cars are responsible for a large volume of the pollution he describes. He will be aware that tighter standards are coming into force in 1996. They will result in a reduction of that type of pollution in the way that other measures, including the introduction of catalytic converters, have reduced other forms of serious pollution. All those measures will help to achieve the high standards for which we aim.

Homelessness

To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment what additional new measures he proposes to take to combat homelessness. [33377]

There will be a further rough sleepers initiative in London and we are considering how to apply the experience of the rough sleepers initiative outside London.

Is not it the case that, during the past 16 years of Tory government, homeless households have more than doubled and housing for rent has fallen to its lowest level? There are no real programmes offering homeless people what they really want—permanent homes. Why will not the Government let local authorities build affordable social housing?

I am afraid that the hon. Gentleman is trapped in a time warp. That comment is typical of the whole Labour party, which wants only to build council houses and does not seem to take any interest in any other aspect of housing policy. The Government have shifted the emphasis for construction to the housing associations because we think that they do the job better than local authorities. We have also shifted the emphasis towards getting an increasing number of houses for rent available to people by making sure that we have vacancies for them.

We have encouraged people to move into their own property if they can afford it so as to liberate that property, and we have a campaign to deal with the problems of empty property. We have achieved a much better balance in housing than existed before. Those policies offer to homeless people, specifically through the rough sleepers initiative and through the programmes that will be in the housing White Paper, a far better balance in housing policy across Britain as a whole.

Does my hon. Friend agree that one of the ways in which to tackle homelessness is through a thriving housing market? Given the current difficulties in that market, and especially its low margins, does he sympathise with the significant concern of the housing industry about the draft part M building regulations and about the additional cost brought about in particular by the insistence on ramp accesses for every new house? Those measures will inevitably impose costs on the housing sector and that will be completely against the interests of those who want to own their own homes and, ultimately, act against the interests of the homeless.

We are not insisting on that. That is merely one of the options.

Housing

To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment if he will make a statement about the advantages of large-scale voluntary transfer of housing stock. [33378]

As my hon. Friend will know from the recent transfer of Maldon's housing stock to the Plume housing association, large-scale voluntary transfers mean more investment in housing stock and better services for tenants.

My right hon. Friend mentions the transfer of Maldon district council's housing stock. Is he aware that, following that transfer to the Plume housing association, tenants will this year pay a rent increase of 3.9 per cent. rather than the 12 per cent. that was projected by the council and that the council has benefitted by £21.5 million? Is not that an excellent demonstration of the way in which large-scale voluntary transfer can benefit council tenants, the local authority and the council tax payer?

I agree with my hon. Friend. Perhaps he shares my experience. Now that LSVTs have been made in Suffolk Coastal, I receive from council tenants in a year the number of complaints that I used to receive every month. The improvement in the management of housing and the money available for improvements in housing stock have had a remarkable effect. I hope that other local councils will take heart.

While we welcome the moves towards greater mobility in the housing market, is it true that housing association are permitted by law to sell tenants their own homes, or are they forbidden from doing so? I am not speaking about special purpose housing, but normal housing.

The constitutions of some charitable housing associations have arrangements that make it impossible for them to sell, but, for the most part, associations can, if they wish, sell to their tenants. We are encouraging that. In future, housing associations that receive money from central funds will get it on condition that they provide a right to buy. The money that they make from those sales could, of course, be recycled immediately into new housing.

Will my right hon. Friend confirm that, if Labour and the Liberal Democrats had had their way, local councils would have had no capital receipts because no council houses would have been sold?

My hon. Friend is perfectly right. He may also notice that the Labour party has been extremely careful not to say, were it in power and were it to allow local authorities to spend their capital receipts, that it would maintain the same amount of capital allocations as we now provide. What the Labour party is saying is entirely untruthful. It might well allow capital receipts to be spent, but it would ensure that the same amount of money was not handed out by the Government to the councils that really needed it.

Disused Mines (Water)

To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment what access his Department has to studies on the effects of the cessation of pumping at disused mines conducted by British Coal before privatisation. [33379]

British Coal has discussed with the National Rivers Authority the implications for the water environment of potential mine closures, and has made available any studies relevant to the responsibilities of the NRA.

I am grateful to the Minister for that answer, but that conflicts with what I and my hon. Friend the Member for Sheffield, Hillsborough (Mrs. Jackson) were told when we recently met members of the NRA and local business in my constituency. We learnt that the NRA is finding it difficult to gain access to the impact studies that were conducted following the closure of each colliery and that they did not have access to the mine plans. Will the Minister ensure that the NRA and the new Environment Agency, which will take on that duty next April, have access to those mine plans and the impact studies carried out by British Coal?

I am happy to talk to them about that. The hon. Gentleman will of course derive reassurance from the fact that the Coal Authority has confirmed that it will continue pumping operations at abandoned mines where the NRA considers it necessary. It is doing just that at a former pit, Wooley colliery, in the hon. Member's constituency. My hon. and noble Friend Viscount Ullswater gave an assurance that the authority will go beyond that and seek the best environmental outcome in the circumstances.

Is the Minister aware that the Coal Authority has said that it does not consider itself to be responsible for the pollution from abandoned mines? Given the problems of the NRA not having access to certain information and insufficient resources to deal with the problem, the Government should devote more resources to combat pollution, which is causing a great deal of concern in former mineworking areas.

I am disappointed that the hon. Gentleman has put that interpretation on what the Coal Authority has said, because he is completely wrong. As I said, the authority has guaranteed to continue pumping operations. It is clearly important that it should do so. The hon. Gentleman is aware that those operations are continuing at a number of pits, including some close to his constituency.

Home Energy Efficiency Scheme

10.

To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment what plans he has to extend the remit of grants available under the home energy efficiency scheme. [33380]

This year, about 600,000 homes will be insulated under the scheme. Since 1993–94, we have increased the money going into it by 185 per cent., and we are now seeing whether there are any further ways in which to make it more effective.

However welcome the home energy efficiency scheme is, does the Minister agree that, if the Government gave wall insulation grants as well, it would help the environment and help to fight fuel poverty?

I agree that cavity fill is worth considering. There are many cases where it might be more effective than other forms of insulation. It is one of the areas that I want to consider during our review.

I congratulate my hon. Friend on his recent promotion, which was richly deserved in view of his sheer brilliance and because of the time and attention he has given to the City of Chester, which he visited recently in connection with this very scheme.

Will my hon. Friend confirm that the scheme will benefit 600,000 homes in the coming year? Will he further confirm that the people whose homes in Chester I visited are saving several pounds a week in fuel costs since taking advantage of the scheme, as well as enjoying greater comfort?

I am grateful to my hon. Friend for his kind comments. It is sad that we are discussing this subject so soon after the death of his predecessor, who was a leading figure in the home insulation sector and president of the neighbourhood energy action group.

I confirm that we estimate that 600,000 homes will be insulated this year, bringing to well over 1 million the number that have benefited from the scheme.

Social Rent Homes

11.

To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment what is his estimate of the total number of social rent homes which will be started in 1995; and what were the figures for 1979. [33382]

In 1995–96, we estimate that about 46,000 new social rented homes will be started or released by home ownership grant schemes, together with a further 4,000 shared-ownership properties. There were about 77,000 starts in 1979–80.

The Minister is being evasive. Why does not he face the fact that the Government's housing programme has been a shambles? In the first five months of the year, housing association starts were down by 31 per cent. Does he accept that the output of new houses for rent is the lowest since the end of the second world war?

Will the Minister confirm that his Department's estimate of housing need shows a requirement for between 60,000 and 100,000 new houses for rent each year? However, new starts this year will be only half of the bottom end of that range. Does he admit that his housing policy has been a disaster and does not meet the country's needs?

To equate housing need and housing starts is a wholly false comparison. What matters is how many people acquire homes as a result of policies. Housing starts are obviously part of that equation, but so is people's ability to move into empty property, people taking up the incentive schemes and people taking shared ownership. I can think of no Government who would calculate the figures purely on the basis of housing starts. The hon. Gentleman should look at the entire pattern of the housing programmes to see what is being done to help the private rented sector and appreciate how the housing associations have been given a much greater role in the provision of housing. He should also look at the provisions in the White Paper, which are intended to bring greater capital into the programme. I am sure that he will find that, far from being what he described, the Government's housing policy is coherent. We are all waiting for the Opposition's housing policy. We have been told that it is about to be announced, but I suspect that, yet again, they are having a spot of trouble with Gordon.

Is not the most effective way for local authorities to promote the construction of social housing—and, indeed, to release housing capital receipts—to adopt the large-scale voluntary transfer of council housing stock? They could then pay off their debts and invest their housing capital receipts in new construction, in conjunction with housing associations.

My hon. Friend is absolutely right. The large-scale voluntary transfer programme provides one of the avenues through which significant resources can be released for the benefit of the tenant and the local authority. I draw his attention equally to the Government's recent proposals on the creation of housing companies, which will provide another avenue. We are anxious to find as many ways as possible to provide the sort of houses that people want and to get the best value for money in providing them.

Given that housing need and homelessness are greatest in inner-city areas, will the Minister please confirm that Labour-controlled inner-city councils are mismanaging many thousands of empty houses and flats, to the detriment of people in real need? The Opposition want to run the country, but they could not even run a bath.

My hon. Friend is right. Some inner-city authorities forget that the basic management skills involved in filling voids, doing repairs and keeping people moving up the waiting list are essential in the provision of homes. If they do not have those management skills, they are not likely to be able to embark on any of the more ambitious programmes.

Behind all the Minister's waffle, is it not the case that, in the first five months of the year, there were only 11,000 council or housing association starts and that we are therefore heading for the lowest number of such starts in any year since the second world war? Is it not a bit rich for the Minister to announce suddenly that the Government have seen a blinding new way to deal with the demand and need for housing when their predecessors took the simple-minded view that if there were people with nowhere decent to live, it would be a good idea to build them some houses? Is it not a fact that the Government's housing policy is letting down people who have nowhere to live and people who live in overcrowded conditions? Is it not also letting down owner-occupiers by the million through the record level of negative equity and mortgage arrears and, now, record low levels of house building? It is all very well for Ministers to laugh, but the fact is that, whether people are renting, or buying, or have nowhere to live, the Government are letting them down, and the recent housing White Paper offered no solutions to any of the problems.

Before the hon. Gentleman gets too frantic, and before he turns his attention to persuading the shadow Chancellor to allow him to publish his own housing proposals, for which we are all waiting with bated breath, perhaps he might consider what is actually in the White Paper. It is amazing that, even when a document is leaked, the Labour party cannot understand the leaked version.

We have significant proposals for the development of the role of housing associations; we have proposals that will help the development of the private rented sector; we have proposals for the diversification of tenure; and we have proposals to bring new money into the social rented sector and the private rented sector. [HON. MEMBERS: "That is privatisation."] There is a great deal to be said for privatisation. The hon. Gentleman overlooks the fact that in, for example, our proposals for housing companies, we intend to allow local authorities a significant stake. I noticed that one of the Opposition's Treasury team speaking at Harrogate—at the same conference at which the hon. Member for Greenwich (Mr. Raynsford) spoke—said that we should not expect the Labour party to allow local councils to have a majority stake in housing companies because it does not believe that they should. When he reflects on things, the hon. Gentleman will have great difficulty seeing anything in his document apart, of course, from proposals for more council houses built by the same councils on the same old dreary estates.

Rented Accommodation

12.

To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment what steps are being taken to encourage the availability of affordable rented accommodation. [33383]

This year, public funding will produce 70,000 new social lettings. Around 250,000 existing tenancies become available for reletting each year.

Does the Minister not realise that what he has said this afternoon to my hon. Friend the Member for Holborn and St. Pancras (Mr. Dobson) and other colleagues does not alter the fact that tens of thousands of families are being punished—there is no other word for it—because they cannot get a mortgage and are unable to obtain a council house, as a result of Tory dogma? Why should those people be punished and have to live in the most dire circumstances, often in a single room, or even be homeless with their children, while Ministers have perfectly adequate accommodation? Is it not time that we allowed local authorities to build again, thus giving people who cannot afford a mortgage the opportunity to live in the kind of accommodation available to Members of Parliament?

I would be rather more concerned about the hon. Gentleman's indignation if I felt that he was being a little more useful in tackling the situation in Walsall, where the incoming Labour council is seeking to overturn a tenants' ballot in favour of taking the management of the estate under its control, not to speak of management changes that have even the Labour unions protesting against the Labour council. When he has addressed himself to the problems on his doorstep, he might be more qualified to address the problems of the nation.

Does my hon. Friend accept that, in Hackney, the Monklands of the south, some 9 per cent. of the housing stock is empty? Is he aware that many Labour-controlled councils have a large number of empty council houses and that also they have not collected huge amounts of rent and rate arrears? If they collected rents, would they not be able to do something about improving the housing stock? Does he also accept that many people welcome the proposals of my right hon. and learned Friend the Home Secretary to deprive illegal immigrants of the right to social housing?

I am sure that my hon. Friend is right on all counts. It must be the first task of local authorities to ensure that they manage their stock correctly. That means that they get down voids, they manage their repairs, they move people through on the waiting list and they collect the rent. The rent which is not collected is simply a resource being ignored, and that means that somebody suffers. Usually, people who are in the worst circumstances suffer from those inefficiencies.

Is it not difficult to justify paying housing association grants to private sector providers of social housing, as the White Paper proposes? If the Government insist on proceeding with that proposal, will the Minister confirm that such private developers will be subjected to exactly the same requirements as housing associations and local authorities on the selection of tenants and being required to accept nominations from local authorities, and so on? Do the Government have any concrete evidence that the private sector can provide social housing more efficiently than housing associations, bearing in mind that, of course, it will take its cut of profits?

The hon. Gentleman should realise that if private-sector builders enter this process and therefore get Government subsidy, they will have to sign a contract with the Government that will govern the conditions under which they receive grant, get tenants and quit the sector and it will govern what happens to any profit that they might make over the very long-term from that activity. It is our absolute intention to ensure that housing associations and private developers in that sector are put on an exact equal basis and that the standards of the properties that they are required to build will be the same.

Does my hon. Friend accept that there is an unfairness because tenants of social housing and private rented accommodation qualify for housing benefit, and those who are in protected tenancies do not? Does not the landlord of the protected tenant have to subsidise that tenant, whereas taxpayers and council tax payers subsidise tenants in social and private rented housing?

I am sure that my hon. Friend understands that one of the central purposes of the White Paper is to encourage more landlords to come into the housing sector. The evidence is that a large number of landlords—many owning few properties—would like to be able to rent their properties but they are concerned about whether they would get possession of the security. Being given rent guarantees, having an intermediary who can act on their behalf and being given the assurance that if things go wrong they will be able to get their possession, for example, is an essential and important way of ensuring that more properties are made available for people to rent. A vigorous private rented sector is an important aspect of a successful economy because of the sheer mobility that it can introduce into our labour market.

Social Housing (London Docklands)

13.

To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment what policy guidelines he has given to the London Docklands development corporation concerning the provision of social housing within its area of jurisdiction. [33385]

The London Docklands development corporation is not a housing authority. As part of its broad regeneration remit, the corporation works in partnership with the local housing authorities, housing associations and others, to assist the provision of new and improved social housing.

Does the Minister nevertheless agree that it is the Government's remit to regenerate the whole London Docklands development corporation area, which must involve provision of housing and social housing for which it has recognised an arrangement with the London borough of Newham? Why is the new urban village confined to 25 per cent. of social housing, a figure which on the Isle of Dogs caused a good deal of community difficulty and, as he knows, had political consequences?

On this subject, the hon. Gentleman always shows the truth of the old saying that there are none so blind as those who cannot see. The evidence is on his doorstep. The success of regeneration, especially in housing, depends on mixed tenure, and mixed tenure has been the success of this area. Some 19,000 housing units have been completed and one third of them are essentially for rented and shared ownership—social housing. Some 7,700 local authority dwellings have been refurbished. Before 1981, 95 per cent. of housing in the area was local authority owned and was in poor condition in the hands of the Labour local authorities.

Will my hon. Friend confirm that the London Docklands development corporation is a great success story? It has transformed the face of docklands and has brought in £6 billion of private investment for the good of the local community.

I recognise that my hon. Friend knows the area well, especially from the past. She has obviously seen the positive results and she is correct to say that £1.6 billion of public investment has drawn in £6 billion of private investment.

I think that the hon. Member for Sutton and Cheam (Lady Olga Maitland) has flown over the area.

Before the London Docklands development corporation is wound up, will the Minister look urgently at the fact that, as yet, within the area that the corporation controls, in which it is the planning control authority—

That's right.

and where it owns much of the land, it has not nearly met the housing needs of the different local communities?

That's right.

Many of the people who bought their homes from local authorities are trapped with massive bills which they cannot pay. People are in shared ownership from which they cannot escape—

That's right.

I have never had such consensus. Most important of all, after 15 years of the development corporation, we still have among the highest unemployment rates in the country and most of the jobs in building local homes do not go to the local community.

That's right.

If I were the hon. Member for Southwark and Bermondsey (Mr. Hughes), I would be concerned about taking advice from the hon. Members sitting behind. [HON. MEMBERS: "That's right."] I think that there is a bit of mimicking going on. The reality is that the area is dramatically different from what it was in 1981. Many jobs have been brought in and jobs are available for the local people to utilise. In addition—this cannot be assessed—the difference in the economy between now and 1981 is absolutely dramatic, and that has had a knock-on effect. The hon. Gentleman referred to my hon. Friend the Member for Sutton and Cheam (Lady Olga Maitland). She has close knowledge of the area; it is not a case of flying over. She knows the area almost as well as the hon. Gentleman does.

Dredging (Wash)

14.

To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment when he next expects to meet representatives of the National Rivers Authority to discuss dredging activities in the Wash. [33386]

I have regular meetings with the NRA.

The Secretary of State will be aware that, in the near future, he will consider a number of new dredging licence applications for the extraction of sand from the Wash for use in the beach renourishment scheme on the Lincolnshire coast. Is he aware that, when dredging took place last autumn, there was serious damage to the brown shrimp fishery in the Wash? Will he confirm today that if, as a result of the new dredging applications, there is serious damage to the fishery, the dredging will stop? Will he also confirm that if there is any loss to the local fishermen, they will be paid proper compensation?

Last year, it was necessary to take material from the Race bank to ensure that there was no damage by storms on the Lincolnshire coast. I think that my hon. Friend will agree that we need to use the soft protection increasingly effectively. He will know that I am determined that the use of this material should not destroy the environment or the fisheries. Although this is overwhelmingly a matter for my right hon. and learned Friend the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food, I will ensure that the environment is the first part of any decision that is made. I assure my hon. Friend that I shall do my best to protect his constituents' interests.

Waste Recycling

15.

To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment what progress has been made towards the Government's target of recycling 25 per cent. of reusable household waste. [33387]

Measures in the Environment Bill will significantly boost the recycling of household waste.

I congratulate my hon. Friend, and it is good to see him where he belongs—on the Front Bench. Does he agree that the proposed landfill tax will boost significantly the minimisation and recycling of household, industrial and community waste?

I am grateful to my hon. Friend, and he is absolutely right about the impact of the landfill tax. The tax will improve the minimisation of waste, and will also aid the recovery and recycling of waste. What is more, it will do so without imposing regulations or extra costs on business. It is a green measure which justifiably bolsters the green reputation of my right hon. and learned Friend the Chancellor of the Exchequer.

Will the Minister explain how he knows more about the recycling and saving of waste in the packaging industry than the people who operate in that industry? Will he accept that the proposals from V-WRAG—the Val Pak working representative advisory group—which are supported by 50 companies in the packaging industry, are better than the proposals made by his Department? Will he accept those proposals, and let us get on with salvaging waste in the packaging industry?

I am afraid that the hon. Gentleman is not doing justice to the ambition that industry has shown to assist in the process of waste minimisation and the recovery and recycling of waste. The Government will listen to what the industry has said, but it has set ambitious targets and the hon. Gentleman has not done justice to the industry.

Will my hon. Friend take into account what the industry's representative body, V-WRAG, has had to say about the implementation of the European packaging directive? Will he look carefully to see if a multi-point implementation is better than a single-point implementation?

Yes, my hon. Friend is right. It is important to listen to the industry, and we shall do so.

European Nuclear Waste Repository

16.

To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment what representations he has received on the development of a European nuclear waste repository. [33389]

We have received no recent representations on this subject.

My question has nothing to do with Nirex and the Minister need not answer in that context, as the Secretary of State has a quasi-judicial role to perform in the matter. Why cannot there be a European solution to a European problem—there is a problem in every member state in the EU—or an international solution to an international problem?

I am not entirely clear what the hon. Gentleman means by that. If he means that there should be scope for co-operation and for a pooled use of experience, that is a sensible point. If he wants us to turn our backs on our policy of self-sufficiency, I do not agree with him.

Water Supply

17.

To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment if he will arrange to meet the chairmen of the water companies to discuss quality and reliability of water supply. [33390]

Only last week, my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State met leading figures in the water industry who reconfirmed the high reliability and quality of British water supply.

Does the Minister realise that more than 12,000 consumers per year have their water supplies disconnected because they cannot afford to pay their water charges? Is he aware that that number has increased by 86 per cent. since privatisation, while the fat cats on the water boards have laughed all the way to the bank with massive salary increases and other perks? Will the Minister intervene to stop that scandal? Will he consider introducing legislation similar to that in Scotland, where it is illegal to disconnect people's water supply under such circumstances?

The hon. Gentleman should be aware that disconnection takes place only as a last resort, that the numbers involved are very small and that supplies are usually disconnected for a very short period. The hon. Gentleman's question, which included hostility towards the water boards, illustrates the pathological hatred that the Opposition have towards the water industry. They completely disregard the industry's success in improving reliability and quality—both of which are now of a very high standard—and its overall success in winning business abroad and increasing investment at home. The real answer to the hon. Gentleman's question about quality and reliability is that both are good.

May I draw my hon. Friend's attention to a water authority that does not fit that pattern, South West Water Authority? On one particular weekend, the authority gave an increase of £67,000 to its managing director while ensuring that many people in my constituency could not even get water to come through their taps. Do not exceptional cases such as that bring the whole system into complete disrepute?

My hon. Friend echoes comments that have already been made. As he must know, South West Water has special circumstances; the overall picture of the water industry—with which Opposition Members are unable to live—is of success, and improvement in water quality and reliability.

Atmospheric Pollution

18.

To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment what new proposals he has to reduce atmospheric pollution. [33391]

The Government have brought forward provisions in the Environment Bill to implement a new framework for air quality management, and later this year we will publish our proposals for a national strategy for improving air quality.

Is the Secretary of State not ashamed of that answer—the answer that was also given to my hon. Friend the Member for Pembroke (Mr. Ainger)? Some 17 months ago, a Select Committee drew the House's attention to the dangers of PM₁₀s. It was suggested then that they would cause 10,000 additional deaths each year—three times as many deaths as are caused by road accidents. There is also the problem of photo-chemical smog, which has caused three major incidents in this city over the past four years, and all the other problems of vehicle exhaust pollution. Is it not an utter disgrace that, after 16 years of this Government, hundreds—almost certainly thousands—of people in this city are being killed by the air that they breathe?

The hon. Gentleman really ought to get the facts right—they are very clear. The amount of pollution in the air is falling, and we now have a European framework directive as a result of action led by this country. That directive is crucial. Much of the pollution caused by traffic in this country is blown over the channel, so we must make sure that it is seen as a European problem. We also have the Environment Bill, which gives us the power to act. Moreover, we are giving local authorities much more power to deal with the matter locally. The hon. Gentleman must know the facts before he stands up and pontificates.

Is my right hon. Friend aware that most people, especially those affected by asthma, are praising the lead that Britain has taken? Having secured the regulations, however, will he try to ensure that the regulations are observed and properly monitored, and that when they are broken, prosecutions are quickly brought? Is not what worries many people the breach of regulations—even those that already exist?

My right hon. Friend is right. That is why we are increasing the number of monitoring stations. We have a number of temporary stations, and we are introducing local authority monitoring stations into the network. It is why we are giving local authorities specific and direct powers to deal with the worst problems, and why we and no other Government introduced monitoring which enables us to announce to the public when the weather makes it likely that asthma sufferers will experience particular difficulties. That is why, next year, we shall have even tougher measures to deal with pollution from road vehicles, and that is why the European Community is dealing with these matters at European level—which is the only sensible way in which to deal with pollution that knows no national boundaries. My right hon. Friend is quite right; what he says contrasts starkly with questions of this type.

Will the Secretary of State look again at atmospheric pollution from the generating industry? In particular, will he consider the Drax power station area, where flue gas desulphurisation equipment has been installed at massive cost but is not running, while dirtier plant is running? Is that not a crazy system, and is there not a need for reform?

When I last visited Norway, the Green movement there welcomed me with a specially written English leaflet saying that Britain had done better than any other country in regard to sulphur, that we were doing better than Norway herself, and that, having not been prepared to sign up to the 30 per cent. club in advance, we had done better than that. The hon. Gentleman is right to draw attention to the generating industry: overall, it has contributed greatly to Britain's new reputation as the clean man of Europe.

My right hon. Friend will know that, in the past, it has been very difficult to detect particulates—the fine particles in the air that emanate from diesels and the like. I am sure that he will welcome the news that AEA Technology at Winfrith, in my constituency, has just invented and developed a process to monitor particulates. Will the Department look carefully at the new equipment, and ensure that it is available both to the Department and to local authorities as soon as possible?

I should be happy to consider that. I should also remark that atomic energy provision has contributed considerably to the reduction of pollution—atomic energy stations that the Labour party would close down.

Single Regeneration Budget

19.

To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment when he intends to issue regional guidance for the second round of bidding for the single regeneration budget. [33392]

The bidding guidance for the second round of the single regeneration budget challenge fund was issued on 12 April 1995.

I thank the Minister for his answer. I am sure that he will agree that there is an urgent need for regeneration funding in Dagenham and other parts of east London. Will he ensure that the guidelines provide clear criteria so that local authorities do not waste vital resources in the bidding process and, of equal importance, that the criteria provide for long-term regeneration rather than short-term expediency?

As the hon. Lady is aware, her area has been successful in the past, so it will learn from that. I understand that it is making bids again, so obviously it has accepted the positiveness of that approach. One of the advantages of the SRB is its flexibility. It is horses for courses, so we must have sufficient flexibility to allow some really innovative ideas to come forward. I do not want to be restrictive in any way.

I congratulate my hon. Friend and his colleagues on the development of the single regeneration budget. My only objection to that budget is the fact that, so far, no bid has been successful in Gravesham. The problem that my hon. Friends encounter in Gravesham is that the Labour local council has been pretty incompetent in putting together its bids. May I ask my hon. Friend to consider the bid for east Gravesend and give every encouragement to the Labour council to get a bid into proper order, so that we get the developments there that we have always needed, and that the Conservative Government would like to bring about?

We should encourage the hon. Gentleman, with his expertise, to use the expertise of the private sector in his area and to help that council to get it together—or get it together without, necessarily, the local authority.

Will the Minister accept that the first round of bidding under the SRB began as a lottery and ended in farce? Why do the Government consistently refuse to publish a clearly defined regional regeneration statement concerning the Government's policy? Does the Minister accept that such action will save the enormous amount of time, effort and resources that are currently being spent on the part of those who bid? Or is the truth of the matter that the Government simply have no regional regeneration policy?

The hon. Gentleman has constant tunnel vision on matters such as that. He appears to believe that the local authorities have the only way of doing things. The local authorities have failed, and the SRB is so broad that it allows for bright ideas, innovation and success.

If the hon. Gentleman feels that the first round was a failure, he should consider the results, and the fact that we are building on the approach that was previously adopted. The success of the approach is the reason why we have had so many strong bids this time. The competition is stronger, and the bids are better, this time, and they will improve, step on step, throughout the years.

Regional Government

21.

To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment what representations he has received about the need to introduce regional government in the east of England. [33394]

None. I detect no desire for regional government in East Anglia, but I do find anger at the Labour party's suggestion that Scottish Members of Parliament should vote on East Anglian issues while East Anglian Members of Parliament could have no say on Scottish issues.

Does my right hon. Friend and neighbour agree that the last thing that people in East Anglia want is an additional new layer of local government on top of parish councils, district councils and county councils? Does he share my opinion that that is simply a device from our opponents to impose more useless bureaucracy on our people?

I suspect that my hon. Friend's message has been communicated to the Labour party. It is having some difficulty in maintaining its view on regional government in the teeth of public opposition. However, if it drops its view on regional government, it will have to explain why Members of the House will be divided into two classes—those who can vote on United Kingdom matters and those who can vote only on English matters.

There is plenty of demand—indeed, a need—for regional government in England. We certainly need it in London. Why can we not have a Greater London authority based at county hall where it belongs, rather than using county hall as a venue for rave parties?

We now see the real face of Labour; it does not change at all. That overspending body was lost without any regret. The Labour boroughs do not want to see the return of the Greater London council. They have learnt that, through co-operation with their neighbours, they can meet the strategic needs of the capital city. As the Minister with responsibility for London, I must say that we deliver a better deal now than the GLC ever did.

Housing Renovation (Lancashire)

22.

To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment how many homes in Lancashire require major renovation to bring them up to acceptable standards. [33395]

On the basis of the data from the most recent returns, it is estimated that 55,000 dwellings in Lancashire were statutorily unfit on 1 April 1994. However, more than a third of them could be made fit by the owners at relatively little expense.

Does the Minister appreciate that 65 per cent. of the houses in my constituency were built before 1919 and more than 40 per cent. need improvement work in order to bring them to acceptable standards? Given that background, how can the Government propose, with a straight face, to do away with mandatory improvement grants and leave it to the discretion of local councils who do not have the cash or the resources to make any kind of impact?

I am interested to hear the hon. Gentleman's comments, because I would have thought that local authorities would be able to take full advantage of the proposals in the White Paper and allocate resources where they were most needed through the new home repair grants and the disabled facilities grant. Home owners can take the opportunity to repair their homes, and they will be able to do so increasingly as a result of the prosperity that we are creating in Lancashire and elsewhere through sustainable economic growth.

Long-Term Unemployed (Recruitment) (Northern Ireland)

3.30 pm

I beg to move,

That leave be given to bring in a Bill to amend the Fair Employment (Northern Ireland) Act 1976 to encourage recruitment of the long-term unemployed.

I wish to say something about the context of the Bill. Much has been done in this area already in Northern Ireland. In fact, "Labour Research" of May 1995 published an article which said that Northern Ireland leads the way on fairness laws. It pointed out that Northern Ireland is doing much better with fairness laws than we are doing with race discrimination laws on the United Kingdom mainland.

The Fair Employment (Northern Ireland) Act 1976 was amended by section 55 of the Fair Employment (Northern Ireland) Act 1989 to add a new section 37C to encourage applications from under-represented communities and to approve any action taken in pursuit of affirmative action and to bring it within the law. Section 58 of the 1989 Act defined the affirmative action as

"employment of members of the Protestant or members of the Roman Catholic communities in Northern Ireland".

My Bill would add a new section 37D to the 1976 Act, which would extend permission for "affirmative action" to acts done

"in preferring those persons who have been unemployed for the previous year or longer"

in pursuance of affirmative action.

It is important to point out what the legislation would not do. It would not force employers to recruit, but would allow them to recruit if they so wished and if they thought that it was in the interests of their business and the greater cause of affirmative action to do so. It would benefit both communities. It is very sad to have to say that there are two communities; I think that we are talking here about people from both traditions, and hopefully one day they will live in the same community.

The Bill would allow the possibility of employment for many people who have been in excellent training schemes. I have visited Northern Ireland in the past few months to look at those training schemes. The problem is that, although many people in Northern Ireland are highly trained, they are still among the long-term unemployed. I have seen people take the trouble to take higher national and graduate courses and training schemes, only to return once again to the long-term unemployed register.

More importantly, the Bill will allow deep pockets of long-term unemployment to be targeted by foreign assistance. A Bill has just passed through the House of Representatives in the United States which says that the International Fund for Ireland money must be used in areas of high unemployment. The reality is that assistance cannot be targeted at the moment without the amendment that I propose to the Act.

The Bill would also allow for intermediate employment schemes, such as Glasgow Wise, which I have heard praised by those from Northern Ireland who have seen them in action. Those schemes could be transferred to Northern Ireland and targeted at the long-term unemployed.

More importantly, why should we do that for the long-term unemployed in Northern Ireland when there are long-term unemployed elsewhere? The long-term unemployed in Northern Ireland are a symbol and a reality of the failure of the policies in Northern Ireland. I believe that they are a barrier to the long-term peace process in Northern Ireland. Despite the £3.4 billion transfer to Northern Ireland, there is still a massive surplus of long-term unemployed.

It is said that two thirds of the unemployed are to be found in Roman Catholic communities. I thank hon. Members who are Ulster Unionists for providing details of the problems in their constituencies. In East Antrim, 50 per cent. of the people in Rathcoole are unemployed and benefit-dependent. South Belfast is symbolically seen as a well-off community, but there is deep unemployment in Taughmonagh, and in the Village area on the Donegall road. I know from hon. Members of the situation in North Down. Unemployment exists throughout Northern Ireland. It has a large long-term employed population, who will have no stake in the future peace unless they can share in the peace dividend.

The world and the House looked on in the past few weeks, as we saw displays of discontent and the burning of vehicles over a particular issue, fuelled by the anger of the long-term unemployed. We saw also sectarian parades undertaken not out of pride, as they should be, but in anger against another community. The members of the other tradition are always seen as enjoying prosperity rather than the tradition to which one belongs, which is an indictment of how little has been done by the Government.

One factor contributing to long-term peace will be demilitarisation—getting arms off the street. Others include a return to the rule of law, the withdrawal of paramilitary policing, democratic free elections on a non-confessional basis and the right to work. In proposing my Bill, I ask for only one additional cautious step to be taken.

3.38 pm

I apologise to the hon. Member for Falkirk, East (Mr. Connarty) for opposing his Bill, because I do not challenge his motives. The Bill's objectives are entirely laudable, but I have a severe problem with the hon. Gentleman seeking to introduce legislation that would have the effect of reforming and amending the Fair Employment (Northern Ireland) Act 1976.

That legislation is an essential foundation for fair employment in Northern Ireland that has to do with discrimination—principally on religious grounds. In seeking to amend the 1976 Act as a way of achieving entirely laudable objectives, the hon. Member needs to think through the consequences.

When the 1976 Act came before the House, it was introduced by the then Minister of State, Northern Ireland Office, the right hon. Member for Salford, East (Mr. Orme), not only as a party political measure but after considerable discussion through the usual channels and in a working party established to consider fair employment in Northern Ireland.

That Committee was originally chaired by my right hon. Friend the Member for Southend, West (Mr. Channon), and subsequently by Mr. William van Straubenzee, then Member of Parliament for Wokingham and also a Northern Ireland Minister. That working party devised the basis for the Bill introduced by the right hon. Member for Salford, East on 16 February 1976.

The debate on the Floor of the House involved the then Labour Minister and Conservative Opposition spokesman, and a number of hon. Members expressed grave concern at even the passage of that legislation. In view of the assurances then given by the right hon. Member for Salford, East, it would be wholly wrong to use the 1976 Act as a vehicle for the objectives of the hon. Member for Falkirk, East.

I say that because much feeling was expressed, especially by my hon. Friend the Member for Southend, East (Sir T. Taylor), who then represented Glasgow, Cathcart. He said that it was wrong for the Government to bring forward legislation relating solely to fair employment in Northern Ireland. He felt that there was religious discrimination throughout the country. I am prepared, of course, to acknowledge that long-term unemployment in Northern Ireland is far too high. I note that the hon. Members for Antrim, East (Mr. Beggs) and for Upper Bann (Mr. Trimble) are in their places.

No one can deny that long-term unemployment in Northern Ireland is a problem. It is no more of a problem, however, than long-term unemployment in my constituency, which suffered tremendous redundancies in the 1980s in the steel and fishing industries. I have always maintained that, when legislating for a certain part of the kingdom, we should always have regard to the implications for other parts of it.

To introduce a Bill to amend the 1976 Act would open up a can of worms, bearing in mind the difficulties that the House encountered when the Act was passing through the House. More importantly, an amending Bill would create unfairness in the rest of the kingdom, especially in constituencies such as mine, where there are many long-term unemployed.

Legislation of the sort proposed by the hon. Member for Falkirk, East should not be tagged on to existing legislation. The hon. Gentleman referred to the 1989 amendments to the 1976 Act. I had grave misgivings about those amendments. I felt that we were exposing ourselves to undoing all the delicate arguments that were advanced during 1974–75 before the 1976 Act went on to the statute book. I was anxious in 1989, and I would be loth to use a second opportunity in less than 20 years to use the 1976 Act as a vehicle for what I agree are laudable objectives. That is not the way to proceed.

I remind the hon. Member for Falkirk, East of the views expressed on Second Reading of what became the 1976 Act by a former Member, the right hon. J. Enoch Powell. He and his party opposed the measure. Mr. Powell said from the Unionist Bench that he felt that any opportunity that the House used to legislate separately for employment opportunities in Northern Ireland, be it to improve the prospects of the long-term unemployed or to improve the lot of someone who might suffer discrimination, would be more likely adversely to affect his constituents than to assist them. His view was endorsed by many Members representing the Official Unionist party, and by the late Sir James Kilfedder. It was taken up by other Members from across the political divide in Northern Ireland.

We should be extremely wary before we use an opportunity that would be presented by the Bill to open up a can of worms. I suggest to the hon. Member for Falkirk, East that the correct approach would be to introduce a Bill concerned solely with promoting long-term unemployment opportunities throughout the United Kingdom. Many of my constituents worked in the steel industry for 20 or 30 years, and they have been unemployed for five or 10 years. The same can be said of those who worked in the fishing industry in Grimsby.

It would not be fair to them for the House to legislate especially for Northern Ireland while they continue to suffer employment. It is with a heavy heart, and with great regret, that I ask the House not to grant the hon. Gentleman's leave to bring in his Bill.

Question put:—

The House divided: Ayes 111, Noes 53.

Division No. 210]	[3.45 pm
AYES
Adams, Mrs Irene	Litherland, Robert
Ashton, Joe	Lynne, Ms Liz
Austin-Walker, John	McAllion, John
Banks, Tony (Newham NW)	Macdonald, Calum
Beggs, Roy	McKelvey, William
Beith, Rt Hon A J	Mackinlay, Andrew
Brown, N (N'c'tle upon Tyne E)	Maclennan, Robert
Bruce, Malcolm (Gordon)	McMaster, Gordon
Campbell, Menzies (Fife NE)	McNamara, Kevin
Campbell, Ronnie (Blyth V)	Madden, Max
Campbell-Savours, D N	Mahon, Alice
Canavan, Dennis	Marshall, David (Shettleston)
Chidgey, David	Marshall, Jim (Leicester, S)
Clwyd, Mrs Ann	Martin, Michael J (Springburn)
Connarty, Michael	Martlew, Eric
Corbyn, Jeremy	Michael, Alun
Cox, Tom	Michie, Bill (Sheffield Heeley)
Cunliffe, Lawrence	Miller, Andrew
Cunningham, Jim (Covy SE)	Molyneaux, Rt Hon James
Dafis, Cynog	Morley, Elliot
Dalyell, Tam	Mowlam, Marjorie
Dixon, Don	Mullin, Chris
Eagle, Ms Angela	Murphy, Paul
Eastham, Ken	O'Brien, William (Normanton)
Faulds, Andrew	Parry, Robert
Field, Frank (Birkenhead)	Prentice, Gordon (Pendle)
Fyfe, Maria	Purchase, Ken
Galloway, George	Rendel, David
Gapes, Mike	Roche, Mrs Barbara
Garrett, John	Rooker, Jeff
Godman, Dr Norman A	Ross, William (E Londonderry)
Graham, Thomas	Rowlands, Ted
Hanson, David	Salmond, Alex
Hardy, Peter	Sedgemore, Brian
Hill, Keith (Streatham)	Sheerman, Barry
Hogg, Norman (Cumbernauld)	Simpson, Alan
Hood, Jimmy	Skinner, Dennis
Hoon, Geoffrey	Smith, Llew (Blaenau Gwent)
Howarth, George (Knowsley North)	Spearing, Nigel
Hughes, Kevin (Doncaster N)	Spellar, John
Hutton, John	Steinberg, Gerry
Jackson, Glenda (H'stead)	Stevenson, George
Jackson, Helen (Shef'ld, H)	Stott, Roger
Jones, Lynne (B'ham S O)	Sutcliffe, Gerry
Jones, Martyn (Clwyd, SW)	Taylor, Matthew (Truro)
Jones, Nigel (Cheltenham)	Timms, Stephen
Kennedy, Charles (Ross, C&S)	Tipping, Paddy
Khabra, Piara S	Touhig, Don
Killfoyle, Peter	Trimble, David
Kirkwood, Anchy	Turner, Dennis
Lewis, Terry	Tyler, Paul

Vaz, Keith	Wise, Audrey
Wareing, Robert N	Worthington, Tony
Watson. Mike	Young, David (Bolton SE)
Wicks, Malcolm	Tellers for the Ayes:
Williams, Alan W (Carmarthen)	Mr. Harry Barnes and
Winnick, David	Mr. John Gunnell.

AYES
Alexander, Richard	Hawkins, Nick
Arnold, Jacques (Gravesham)	Hunter, Andrew
Banks, Matthew (Southport)	Hurd, Rt Hon Douglas
Banks, Robert (Harrogate)	Lawrence, Sir Ivan
Biffen, Rt Hon John	Maitland, Lady Olga
Booth, Hartley	Montgomery, Sir Fergus
Bowden, Sir Andrew	Neubert, Sir Michael
Boyson, Rt Hon Sir Rhodes	Nicholls, Patrick
Bruce, Ian (Dorset)	Nicholson, David (Taunton)
Butterfill, John	Rathbone, Tim
Carlisle, Sir Kenneth (Lincoln)	Redwood, Rt Hon John
Carrington, Matthew	Riddick, Graham
Chapman, Sir Sydney	Robathan, Andrew
Colvin, Michael	Rowe, Andrew (Mid Kent)
Deva, Nirj Joseph	Shaw, David (Dover)
Duncan, Alan	Smith, Sir Dudley (Warwick)
Duncan-Smith, Iain	Speed, Sir Keith
Dunn, Bob	Spring, Richard
Durant, Sir Anthony	Stanley, Rt Hon Sir John
Emery, Rt Hon Sir Peter	Sweeney, Walter
Fry, Sir Peter	Thompson, Sir Donald (C'er V)
Garel-Jones, Rt Hon Tristan	Thornton, Sir Malcolm
Gorst, Sir John	Viggers, Peter
Grant Sir A (SW Cambs)	Waterson, Nigel
Greenway, Harry (Ealing N)	Whitney, Ray
Hamilton, Rt Hon Sir Archibald	Tellers for the Noes:
Hampson, Dr Keith	Mr. Michael Fabricant and
Harris, David	Mr. Michael Brown.

Question accordingly agreed to.

Bill ordered to be brought in by Mr. Michael Connarty, Mr. Harry Barnes, Mr. Richard Burden, Dr. Norman Godman, Miss Kate Hoey, Mr. Norman Hogg, Mr. Jim Marshall, Mr. David Marshall, Mr. Calum Macdonald, Mr. William O'Brien, Mr. Mike Watson and Mr. Jimmy Wray.

Long-Term Unemployed (Recruitment)(Northern Ireland)

Mr. Michael Connarty accordingly presented a Bill to amend the Fair Employment (Northern Ireland) Act 1976 to encourage recruitment of the long-term unemployed: And the same was read the First time; and ordered to be read a Second time upon Friday 20 October, and to be printed. [Bill 171.]

Sir Alan Urwick

3.58 pm

I beg to move,

That this House expresses its appreciation to Sir Alan Urwick, KCVO, CMG, for his 43 years of distinguished public service, including six years as Serjeant at Arms; and extends to him its best wishes for his retirement.

The motion is in the name of the Prime Minister, the Leader of the Opposition and the leaders of all the other parties in the House. This is one of those occasions when Members in all parts of the House, as is evidenced by the signatures to the motion, can put aside party divisions and join together in paying tribute to a distinguished servant of the House who is shortly to leave us.

Unlike his predecessors, Sir Alan came to the House as Serjeant at Arms not from a background in the armed services but from the diplomatic service, which he joined in 1952. After tours of duty in western Europe, the middle east, Moscow and Washington, he reached the highest ranks of his profession, serving as Her Majesty's ambassador in Amman and in Cairo, and as high commissioner in Ottawa.

Sir Alan took up his appointment as Serjeant at Arms when he left the diplomatic service in 1989. He rapidly found out what life is like in this place during the summer recess: the Serjeant's usual quarters were uninhabitable, because the builders had taken them over, so he had to set up his office in a corner of one of the Committee Rooms. [HON. MEMBERS: "Oh yes."] As I sense some other hon. Members may feel, that is a familiar experience, and one which his successor is about to inflict on me and my secretary.

Over the past six years, Sir Alan has responded with the courtesy and skill we would expect of a professional diplomat to the many and varied demands which the House and its Members have made of him personally and of his Department. The security of the House has continued to be one of his major responsibilities, even in the more relaxed atmosphere of recent months, and the pressure on accommodation has been unremitting. I know that you, Madam Speaker, and the whole House have appreciated the way in which Sir Alan has dealt with those continuing concerns, and the effort he has devoted to the service of Members.

One of the major changes with which Sir Alan has had to cope during his term of office has been the implementation of the Ibbs report, which led to the House taking control of its own works programme. The Parliamentary Works Directorate has now been established as an integral part of the Serjeant's Department, and the evidence of its activities is all around. The ease with which that considerable change has been brought about reflects much credit on all those involved, Sir Alan not least among them.

As we say farewell to Sir Alan, we welcome as his successor Peter Jennings, the Deputy Serjeant, who came here nineteen years ago as Major Jennings of the Royal Marines, and is well known to us all.

I am sure Members on all sides will join me not only in expressing our thanks to Sir Alan, but in wishing him and his wife Marta a long and happy retirement.

4.1 pm

On behalf of Her Majesty's Opposition, the Ulster Unionists and the Scottish National party, I join the Leader of the House in paying tribute to the Serjeant at Arms on his retirement. We thank him for all his work.

As the Leader of the House has said, the motion has been signed by all parties, because in the past six years Sir Alan has given service to Members from all sides of the House and, indeed, to our staff as well. His greatest achievement has been to help make substantial progress in providing additional and improved accommodation for Members and the Departments of the House. However, perhaps Sir Alan is best known to the public for his distinctive dress, which is often the subject of comment and question from our constituents when they visit the House.

After a long and distinguished career in foreign service, to which the Leader of the House has referred, Sir Alan was appointed Serjeant at Arms. One of his first acts was to hand over the Serjeant at Arms' residence in Speaker's Court, so that members of the shadow Cabinet could be provided with more reasonable office accommodation in the Palace. Perhaps I should declare an interest, as I have a room in that block. My room is not as spacious as that of my right hon. Friend the Member for Kingston upon Hull, East (Mr. Prescott), who works in the old drawing room. It might be indiscreet to go further and reveal who is working in the Serjeant's old kitchen.

Sir Alan's family motto is "Verum nobilissimum est" which, as you know, Madam Speaker, means "Truth is the most noble". Perhaps we should keep those words in mind when we debate standards in public life.

During his six years in the House, Sir Alan has overseen enormous changes in the services required from his Department, and the size of the estate it administers. In the post-Ibbs review era, Sir Alan has played a full part in servicing both the Accommodation and Works Committee, and the Administration Committee.

I hope that Sir Alan and the House will not mind if I use this occasion to pay tribute to Sir Alan's staff for the responsive way they react to our requests, and also to wish his successor well. I am sure that the whole House will wish to be associated with the remarks of the Leader of the House. We all want to thank Sir Alan for his efforts on our behalf, and to wish him well in the future.

4.5 pm

On behalf of my right hon. and hon. Friends in the Liberal Democrat party—and indeed, the other parties not mentioned by the hon. Member for Dewsbury (Mrs. Taylor)—I extend our best wishes and thanks to Sir Alan Urwick for his most careful and courteous attention to the requirements of hon. Members and the care that he has taken over many important matters, in particular security.

When it comes to the duty of the Commission to advise on the appointment of a Serjeant at Arms, there is a difficult balance to strike between the relative advantages of a background in military service, which has been the norm in that post; the advantages of promoting from within the service of the House, a practice that is also important; and bringing in experience from elsewhere.

It is a difficult balance, but I feel that we were right in advising that a period under the stewardship of Sir Alan would be valuable for the House, bringing as it did an outside experience at a time when it was necessary to look again at some of our traditional ways of doing things. That experience has been valuable to the House, and we are grateful for it. We wish his successor well, confident that he will discharge the job in an extremely efficient manner.

Question put and agreed to.

Resolved,

That this House expresses its appreciation to Sir Alan Urwick, KCVO, CMG, for his 43 years of distinguished public service, including six years as Serjeant at Arms; and extends to him its best wishes for his retirement.

Standards In Public Life

It will, I think, be for the convenience of the House if we debate together motions Nos. 3 to 8. I have to tell the House that I have selected the three amendments to motion No. 7—(a), (b) and (c) in the name of the hon. Member for Dewsbury (Mrs. Taylor)—and sub-amendment (x) to amendment (a), which is in the name of the hon. Member for Caithness and Sutherland (Mr. Maclennan).

At the end of the debate, I will first put the Question on motion No. 3. Then I will ask the Leader of the House to move successively motions Nos. 4, 5 and 6. When each of those has been disposed of, I will ask the Leader of the House formally to move motion No. 7. Then I will call Mrs. Taylor formally to move her amendment (a), followed at once by Mr. Maclennan formally to move sub-amendment (x). The House will then take its decisions in reverse order, as we always do—first, that sub-amendment (x) be made to amendment (a); then that amendment (a), with or without amendment, be made to the main Question.

It is important to recognise that, if amendment (a) is agreed to, amendment (b) will fall. If amendment (a) is not agreed to, I will immediately call Mrs. Taylor formally to move amendment (b). When amendment (b) is disposed of, I will immediately call Mrs. Taylor formally to move amendment (c).

When amendment (c) is disposed of, I will put to the House the main Question, as amended or not, as the case may be. Finally, I will call the Leader of the House formally to move motion No. 8.

Having given that introduction to our procedures today to ensure that all hon. Members are quite clear about what they are debating and what they will be dividing on at the end, I have to tell the House that I must limit Back-Bench speeches to 10 minutes.

4.7 pm

I beg to move,

That the appointment of a Parliamentary Commissioner for Standards be set in hand under arrangements to be made by Madam Speaker on the advice of the House of Commons Commission and in accordance with the recommendations of the Select Committee on Standards in Public Life.

With this it will be convenient to discuss the following: Motion 4—

That, with effect from the beginning of the next Session, a new Select Committee on Standards and Privileges should be established to take over the existing functions of the Committee of Privileges and the Select Committee on Members' Interests and to consider complaints concerning Members' conduct referred to it by the Parliamentary Commissioner for Standards.

Motion 5—

That this House endorses the principle of a Code of Conduct, and instructs the appropriate Select Committee to prepare such a draft Code for approval as soon as possible, taking into account the suggestions of the Nolan Committee and any relevant overseas analogues; and whilst restating its commitment to the objectives of the Resolution of the House of 15th July 1947 relating to Privileges, accepts the need to review its wording in the context of the work to be undertaken on the draft Code.

Motion 6—

That, with effect from the beginning of the next Session, the Resolution of the House of 12th June 1975 relating to Members' Interests (Declaration) (No. 2) be amended by leaving out the words "the giving of any written notice or".

Motion 7—

That this House endorses the need for an examination of the recommendations of the Nolan Committee relating to consultancies (including multi-client consultancies) and disclosures in the Register of Members' Interests; and instructs the Select Committee on Standards in Public Life to conduct such an examination and to seek to bring forward proposals on these matters by the end of the current Session.

Amendments (a), (x), (b), (c), (y) and (d) to motion 7.

Motion 8—

That this House agrees with the recommendations contained in the First Report from the Select Committee on Standards in Public Life (House of Commons Paper No. 637) relating to—
(1) the principal duties of the Parliamentary Commissioner for Standards (paragraph 14);
(2) the method of removal from office of the Commissioner (paragraph 23);
(3) the preparation of amendments to Standing Orders relating to a Select Committee on Standards and Privileges (paragraph 40);
(4) the preparation of a draft Code of Conduct (paragraph 47);
(5) the preparation of guidance on registration and declaration of interests (paragraph 50);
(6) a review of the law relating to bribery of Members (paragraph 52); and
(7) updating, and improving the availability of, the Register of Members' Interests (paragraph 66).

I am sure, Madam Speaker, that the admiration for you felt by the whole House will be increased further by your exposition.

I shall not speak at length, not because the subject is unimportant, but for three obvious reasons: this is a relatively short debate, designed to enable the House to take some initial decisions paving the way for further work; many hon. Members wish to speak; and as the motions are precisely in the terms recommended by the Select Committee which I chaired, the case I would wish to make will already be familiar to the House from the report that is before it.

The Select Committee's terms of reference, set by the House on 6 June, were to consider the first report of the Nolan committee

"so far as it relates to the rules and procedures of the House; to advise on how its recommendations might be clarified and implemented; and to recommend specific resolutions for decision by the House".

It was asked to

"report as soon as possible"

and, in any case,

"to make an interim report not later than Friday 7 July".

It was, frankly, a bit of a close-run thing. We agreed our report at about 7 pm on 6 July, after sitting 14 times in 14 sitting days, which I am told is an average of about two hours a day and something of a record. However, as a result, the report is a good deal more substantial than anyone might reasonably have expected, on that time scale, when the Committee was established.

For that, I hope that I may be allowed to pay tribute to the members of the Committee, not only for the amount of work they did, which is no doubt obvious from what I have just said, but for the way in which they did it, which made my task as Chairman infinitely easier, even in the relatively few areas where disagreements could not be fully resolved.

The result is that, of the six resolutions to which I am speaking, five were agreed unanimously. It is to those five that I shall speak, briefly, before coming at a little greater length to the area that proved more contentious. For the convenience of the House, I shall use the numbering not from the Committee's report but from the Order Paper.

Motion 3 invites the House to agree that work should go forward on the appointment of a Parliamentary Commissioner for Standards, on the basis set out in the Select Committee report. The proposal does, I hope, meet some—I hope all—of the sensitivities reflected in our debate on 18 May, in particular in indicating that the Commissioner would be appointed by the House and that he would operate under the general powers of a Select Committee of the House.

Motion 4 invites the House to agree the replacement, with appropriate transitional arrangements for specific inquiries already in progress, of the Committee of Privileges and the Select Committee on Members' Interests by a single Select Committee on Standards and Privileges. For reasons set out in paragraphs 27 to 41 of the report, we believed that to be better than the existing arrangements, and better than what we felt were the rather over-complex arrangements proposed in the Nolan report.

At this stage, I should like to pay tribute, briefly but wholeheartedly, to my hon. Friend the Member for Wealden (Sir G. Johnson Smith), who is Chairman of the Select Committee on Members' Interests, and the members of that Committee for the work that they have done over the years.

Will the Leader of the House make it clear that, in our recommendations on the formation of the new Select Committee, we stated that we believed that it should be substantially smaller than the present Privileges Committee?

Yes, I am happy to confirm what the hon. Gentleman says. He will know that, having chaired the Privileges Committee, I feel strongly that 17 is too large a number for a body to do the work that the Committee is asked to undertake. I believe that that view is shared by virtually all members of the Privileges Committee, and that, whatever else happens, there will probably be a general welcome for the suggestion that a Committee doing that kind of work should comprise fewer than 17 members. I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman.

Motion 5 invites the House to commission work towards a code of conduct, drawing on what is said in the Nolan report and, as appropriate, from other sources, including "Erskine May". I think that that suggestion came initially from the hon. Member for Dewsbury (Mrs. Taylor) in her evidence for the report. The motion envisages, I think sensibly, that such a code would be in fairly broad terms and would be supported, as it would have to be, by more detailed rules such as those which, for example, currently govern the Register of Members' Interests.

Motion 6 picks up what is in effect a Nolan recommendation—although not clearly presented as such in the report—for further strengthening of our existing rules on declaration in relation to the Order Paper. It extends the present requirement for specific indication, which is only for the lead signatures on an early-day motion, to all early-day motion signatures, written or oral questions and amendments to Bills. I hope that the House will regard that as a sensible extension.

Passing by motion 7 for the moment, motion 8 seeks the House's endorsement of seven of the Committee's recommendations which do not in themselves require the passage of a specific resolution. They are set out in the motion by reference to the relevant paragraphs of the report.

I return to motion 7, which concerns the Nolan committee recommendations relating to consultancies, including in particular consultancies with what are described as multi-client lobbying firms, and the disclosure of contracts, including an indication of the remuneration involved.

In essence, the view of the Select Committee, by a clear majority, was that, in the time available—even with the effort that it put in—it was not possible to fulfil the House's remit to clarify the Nolan recommendations to enable the Committee to put to the House well-defined and workable propositions on which it could sensibly make decisions, and that the right course of action was therefore that proposed in motion 7.

The many definitional and line-drawing problems, which led the Committee to that conclusion, are set out in paragraphs 77 to 83 of the report. I shall not rehearse them at length, but simply draw attention to some of them. For example, at various points in his report, Lord Nolan uses expressions such as "the provision of services in their capacity as Members", "activities in Parliament", and "Parliamentary services".

It is not clear whether those expressions mean the same thing or different things, and none of them is further defined. For example, is any of them meant to include such activities as casual journalism or broadcasting? Those matters, in my view and in that of the Committee, need to be carefully thought through.

Can the right hon. Gentleman say whether that phraseology means that the Committee intends to go back and look at the detail, so that it can implement the Nolan recommendations; or that it will examine the Nolan recommendations with a view to changing them, especially in respect of the declaration of amounts and the banning of multi-client consultancies, as recommended by Lord Nolan?

I shall return to the matter in moment, but the point that I am seeking to make is that, when there are three phrases—to apply it to the example that I am touching on—which do not self-evidently mean the same thing, and they are used in different ways in different parts of the report, and are nowhere further defined, there is some significant difficulty in determining what the House would be deciding, unless some further work is done on that.

That is a key point, and on that would depend the House's ability to take a decision about any of the matters to which the hon. Lady has adverted, in the clear knowledge of what precisely it was doing. That is the problem that I am seeking to address.

On that point, is it not a fact that the recommendations which have been made, especially in our amendments, clarify the situation? The principle goes before the House; the House accepts it. There may have to be some small alteration, but surely that is the way to proceed.

I will briefly comment on the amendment in a moment, to which I note that the right hon. Gentleman's name is added, but I am sure that the hon. Member for Dewsbury will speak to the amendments that she has tabled. I imagine that she intends to do so. If I may, I would prefer to listen to what she says before commenting further. I will make a brief comment later in my speech, which will also pick up something that the right hon. Gentleman has just said.

To give another example, it is not clear whether the proposed ban on consultancies with multi-client organisations, which the Nolan report recommends, is meant to apply only to what can be described as lobbying and public relations firms, as the argument in paragraph 55 of the report implies, or to organisations of any type—a much wider category—as the recommendation a couple of pages later seems to suggest. If lobbying organisations only are to be covered by any new ban, we obviously need to establish a clear and workable definition of such organisations and what distinguishes them from others which might otherwise be caught.

Then again, the Nolan report acknowledges that difficult issues arise in relation to Members who practise in legal and other professional firms, offering what are described, but not further defined, as "Parliamentary services of any type". The suggestion is that a Member should not maintain his connection with such a firm unless arrangements can be made to separate the Member's interest in the firm from that part of its work. But as the Select Committee report notes in paragraph 81,

"it is far from clear what might in practice be regarded as fulfilling such a requirement",

and the Committee is certainly not yet in a position to suggest how such a Chinese wall might be achieved.

Thus, as I have said, what the Select Committee proposes is clearly set out in motion No. 7. It says:

"That this House endorses the need for an examination of the recommendations of the Nolan Committee relating to consultancies (including multi-client consultancies) and disclosures in the Register of Members' Interests; and instructs the Select Committee on Standards in Public Life to conduct such an examination and to seek to bring forward proposals on these matters by the end of the current Session."

The alternative view is set out in the amendment unsuccessfully moved by members of the Select Committee, in that Committee, which can be found on pages 29 to 32 of the Committee's report. It is, of course, mirrored in the amendments tabled by the hon. Member for Dewsbury, to which, as I have said, she will no doubt speak in a moment.

To the right hon. Member for Salford, East, I simply say this. As I have said, I will not seek to pre-empt the hon. Lady's arguments, beyond saying that, in my view at least, the tenor of the amendments seems amply to confirm the need for further clarification before the House could sensibly adopt them as decisions.

Not only as the Chairman of the Select Committee presenting its recommendations, but as Leader of the House, I say simply that it will, of course, be for the House to decide whether it wishes to go down the path sketched out by the Nolan report in these as in other respects. But if we are to ban certain activities, we need to be absolutely clear what it is that is banned. If we are to require public disclosure of what is at present private, the requirement should be as clear as we can make it.

The Nolan report criticises our existing rules for their lack of clarity and uncertainty. We shall do no service either to the reputation of this House or to the standards of public life if we simply replace one set of ambiguities and uncertainties with another. I therefore strongly urge the House to endorse motion No. 7 as it stands, along with the other motions on the Order Paper.

4.20 pm

I shall try to be brief, as the Leader of the House was, and I shall move our amendments at the appropriate time. At the start of the debate, all hon. Members should reiterate the interests they have. I tell the House, therefore, that mine are, as recorded in the register, that I am sponsored by the GMB, that I receive research report from Unison, and that I am an adviser to the Association of Teachers and Lecturers. I also have an entry in the register following the gift of football tickets earlier this year.

No one should doubt the importance of this debate; it is important for two reasons. First, it is important to hon. Members, for the reason that some Conservative members suspect, because we shall have to make changes in the way that we operate as a Parliament and as individuals.

The second reason is more important. Today, we have an opportunity to start the long process of restoring public confidence in this House, and, indeed, in our democratic process. If we make the right decisions today, we shall not only start to clean up Parliament, but begin to stem the tide of cynicism which is eroding our parliamentary democracy. If we get it wrong, public confidence will be reduced even further, we shall all be tarred with the same brush, and we shall all be blamed for the abuses of the few who flout the rules.

When we previously debated the issue on the Floor of the House, the atmosphere was somewhat frenzied, and the House did its reputation no good. The Leader of the House made a suggestion at the end of that debate that the whole issue should be referred to a Select Committee. I freely admit that I was extremely suspicious, and thought that the suggestion was a delaying tactic in response to Conservative Back-Benchers who wanted to block the Nolan recommendations altogether. There followed, therefore, discussions and correspondence between us, and the Opposition had to feel satisfied that some progress would be made before agreeing to allow the Select Committee to go ahead.

Were not the negotiations on the setting up of the Committee delayed by Opposition Members? Did not the Committee's work become even more frantic as a result, as we tried to fit in all the work in the short time available before we produced an interim report?

The comments of the Leader of the House about the way in which the Committee worked were correct. I do not think that it was frantic. It was difficult to fit in everything in the time we had, but we did it.

One reason why the Opposition insisted upon a tight time scale, and asked the Leader of the House to agree that 7 July should be the deadline for an interim report, was that we wanted to make sure that progress could be made. That is the reason why we are having this debate today. As the Leader of the House said, we had 14 sittings in 14 days and, for the most part, there was—despite what the right hon. Member for Epsom and Ewell (Sir A. Hamilton) said—a good working atmosphere in the Select Committee. That is reflected in many of the practical proposals that have been made in the report, and which were mentioned by the Leader of the House.

I intend to deal with the amendments in some detail later, but first I want to say a few words about the matters on which there was agreement. We made considerable progress about the role and principal duties of a Parliamentary Commissioner for Standards. We reached agreement on the recommendation that the House of Commons should eventually approve that person, but that the mechanisms for appointment should be set in motion by the Speaker and the House of Commons Commission.

We dealt with the relationship with the Nolan committee, which I know was causing concern to some Conservative Members. On the structure of Committees, the Nolan committee recommended that there should be a sub-committee of the Privileges Committee. The Select Committee explored many options, because that same objective could have been achieved in different ways.

We have recommended the merger of the Members' Interests Committee with the Privileges Committee, to establish a new Standards and Privileges Committee. We have not prescribed in the report that there should be a sub-committee, but we recommend that sub-committees should be allowed. We recommended unanimously, as my right hon. Friend the Member for Salford, East (Mr. Orme) said, that the Committee should be smaller than the existing Privileges Committee.

The hon. Lady has identified a tide of cynicism, but does she accept that perception is as important as—if not more important than—fact in setting the reputation of the House? Does she also accept that people associate the Privileges Committee with perks and special favours? Has not the time come to update the language of the House, so that, when the Committee is reconstituted—as I think it will be—it can also be renamed, so that its work can be better understood by those who do not understand the practices of the House?

The hon. Gentleman mistakes the original meaning behind the words "Privileges Committee". The Committee was not meant to give privileges, but to protect the House. We did consider the naming of the Committee, but we felt that it would be clearer if we continued to use that name following the merger of the Committees.

The difficulties in the existing Privileges Committees meant that some of the inquiries were delayed, although we did agree on one important recommendation—that the new Committee should be able to sit in the recess to facilitate quick decisions where speed was necessary. There was general agreement that these proposals were practical, would improve the existing situation, and would be in line with what the Nolan committee recommended.

On the code of conduct, we agreed that there was a need to update the 1947 resolution, and that is referred to in the motion on the code of conduct.

Before the hon. Lady moves away from the subject of the Committee and the commissioner—subjects on which we spent some time on the Committee—does she agree that we pushed further forward than Nolan had recommended on those matters, and, in so doing, clarified and put something forward that could improve the existing structure?

Yes, I think the suggestions in the report about the way in which detailed work, such as the work on a code of conduct, could be carried out are very significant. The House will be asked today not to determine the details, but to decide on what should happen in principle. The formula that we have adopted is one that I would recommend to the House.

There was consensus in all those areas, and progress was made. There was agreement on the Nolan committee's recommendation that there should be broader consideration of the merits of parliamentary consultancies generally; I believe that you, Madam Speaker, had already referred that issue to the Privileges Committee. Let me now deal with the areas of disagreement: multiple consultancies, and the disclosure of contracts and amounts earned.

Our amendments have been tabled to give hon. Members a choice when they vote. Amendment (a) provides for straightforward implementation of the Nolan committee's recommendations on disclosure. If it is rejected—which I hope will not happen—amendment (b) provides a fallback position, providing for acceptance of the committee's recommendations in principle. Those who consider the committee's time scale too tight, but who accept its proposals in principle, will be able to vote accordingly.

In Committee, we tabled amendments that have presented the House with the options that are before us now, and recommended that they be part of the main body of the report. We were disappointed that the Committee rejected our proposals, and that the hon. Member for Caithness and Sutherland (Mr. Maclennan) did not support our amendments.

Perhaps the Liberal Democrats had the opportunity for second thoughts; it appears from the Order Paper that some of the hon. Gentleman's colleagues may have had words with him and shown him the error of his ways. This evening, they will have an opportunity to vote for or against the specific proposals in the Nolan report: for or against the Nolan recommendations in principle. All will become clear when the votes take place.

Let me say a word to any hon. Member who is considering voting against the amendments. I do not think that the constituents of any such Member will understand why there should be secrecy. Tomorrow, when newspapers publish the names of those who voted for secrecy, constituents will be checking to see which hon. Members went through which Lobby.

Would the hon. Lady care to tell the House whether she regrets having been a director of a consultancy and lobbying company until this issue became a matter of public interest? Would she also care to tell us how much she earned?

The hon. Gentleman is trying too hard. [HON. MEMBERS: "Answer."] I have answered the question on another occasion. I even raised the matter when I gave evidence to the Nolan committee. Hon. Members should read the record. No, I do not regret anything that I have done. I am perfectly willing to comply with any of the new rules, and disclose any fees I earn outside the House. I hope that the hon. Member for Rutland and Melton (Mr. Duncan) will be equally willing to declare everything that he earns in relation to parliamentary activities. [Interruption.]

Order. This is a serious debate, and I do not think that it should be spoilt by foolish and childish gesticulations and comments. I hope that we can maintain a high standard of debate.

Thank you, Madam Deputy Speaker. That is exactly what we are trying to do. Some of my colleagues feel that Lord Nolan did not go far enough—

May I ask the hon. Lady about the wording of amendment (a)? It refers to

"contracts relating to the provision of services in their capacity as Members".

Does the hon. Lady agree that Members of Parliament should not be allowed to do anything that an ordinary lobbyist or anyone else can do, and have the same access, and that therefore anything that we in particular are able to do should not be allowed in any case? All of us, as Members of Parliament, may be recruited to do other work on the basis that we have a position as a Member of Parliament; therefore, surely the logic of what the hon. Lady says is that every penny that any Member of the House earns should be declared if we go down that route.

I was saying that some of my hon. Friends believed that Lord Nolan's committee's recommendations did not go far enough. Some people do believe that there should be no possibility of any outside income. Some people believe that any outside income—whether from family businesses, legal work or journalism—should be declared in the Register of Members' Interests. I have even heard it mooted that all MPs should have their tax returns made public, as happens in some other countries.

If Members of Parliament did make their tax returns public, would they be accurate?

My hon. Friend makes a good argument. I believe that there is a requirement of accuracy on all of us in all of these matters.

Let me, for the benefit of the hon. Member for South Dorset (Mr. Bruce) and others, describe the rules as I see them—the rules by which many people felt that the House was operating already, and had operated for many years, as I outlined in the evidence that I gave to the Nolan committee.

There should be no possibility of any Member of the House being paid cash for questions, cash for amendments, cash for speeches, cash for early-day motions or anything of that kind—either to make them or not to make them. That should be our starting point.

I am obliged to the hon. Lady, but I wish that she would reflect on what she has said. I am a supporter of Nolan, as it happens, and I have no difficulty with any of its conclusions. However, the unleashing of press hysteria on the basis that a Committee of the House of Commons has not reached a final conclusion on certain narrow issues appears an extraordinary threat to hold over the House, and not appropriate for a serious Opposition spokesman, when the proposition before the House is that that Committee, supported by the Liberal Democrats, supported by Conservative Members, should conclude on narrowly defining, appropriately, something that will bear on the existence of every Member of the House.

If the hon. Gentleman believes that, he may not wish to vote for our first amendment, but he can certainly vote for our second amendment, which accepts Lord Nolan's recommendations in principle, but does not specify the time scale or the definitional problems that he may be suggesting. He will, on that basis, be able to vote for our second amendment.

I was discussing the proposition that there should be no payment for MPs for any activities of that kind.

It is, of course, permitted—

Would the hon. Lady explain, on this section of her speech, the way in which she envisages that proposition applying to retainers by trade unions to Members of Parliament, including payment to Members of Parliament's constituencies for their election expenses and their agents and other costs in their constituencies?

I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for mentioning that matter, not least because, as recently as yesterday, I asked the Leader of the House to remove the Government's veto on Lord Nolan's committee considering party political funding before the next general election. We would all welcome an early investigation of that full matter.

I had not intended to intervene, but it would help me to have one thing clarified that arises from another aspect of the different phrasing used in different parts of the Nolan committee report. In its summary of recommendations, in paragraph 14 on page 4, the hon. Lady will find that it said:

"Full disclosure of consultancy agreements and payments, and of trade union sponsorship agreements and payments, should be introduced immediately."

I want to be absolutely clear that the hon. Lady's amendment is intended to embrace both types of payments.

Absolutely. If the right hon. Member looks at the register, he will see that it makes most of that clear. If there are any doubts, we are happy to confirm that those sorts of payments will be covered by our amendment.

I shall pick up where I left off on the previous query. I have mentioned the things that hon. Members cannot do. It is permitted for hon. Members to advise people outside the House. We all do that, whether it is updating constituents or informing groups about parliamentary and party issues. Hon. Members are sometimes paid for their services, but more often—especially on this side of the House—we are unpaid.

If any hon. Member is paid for advice of that kind, I believe that that should be made known under the present rules. I believe that the amounts that hon. Members receive should also be made public so that constituents and others can judge how important that role is, how much time is involved and what is an hon. Member's level of commitment. If an hon. Member gives advice for money, the desire to continue a contract might be thought to influence that hon. Member. Therefore, I believe that we need transparency. Conservative Members cannot duck that issue.

Will the hon. Lady give way?

I will give way, but then I shall continue as I have already spoken for too long.

It is an important issue. Hon. Members who are company directors, in an executive or non-executive capacity, may, in the course of their duties—perhaps only once every 10 years—inform their colleagues about an issue associated with their parliamentary work. According to her definition, the hon. Lady is effectively saying that all such earnings must be declared.

If advice of that sort is given, it falls into that category and it must be declared. I think that hon. Members would do well to err on the side of transparency. We should recall the words of the Prime Minister on that issue. He said:

"We have now seen the report. I have said repeatedly that I favour greater transparency".—[Official Report, 23 May 1995; Vol. 260, c. 704]

When the Prime Minister established the Nolan committee, he required it to report within six months because of the depth of public concern about the issue. The Prime Minister has also said that he accepts the broad principles of the Nolan committee report. We shall therefore watch very carefully how the Prime Minister votes today—if he votes at all.

We suspect that the issue is central to the concerns that Conservative Members expressed during the last debate. Some Conservative Members might dress up their opposition, but the principle of transparency—which the Prime Minister claims is so important to him—must be paramount. I believe that our decisions should reflect the urgency with which the Prime Minister charged the Nolan committee. Therefore, we should try to meet the Nolan committee's timescale in dealing with those important issues. If hon. Members fail to accept our amendment this evening, we will lose an important opportunity to start restoring public confidence in this place.

4.42 pm

As I had the opportunity to speak when the House debated the issue in the first instance, I shall add only a few words at this stage. The story is not over by any means.

The hon. Member for Dewsbury (Mrs. Taylor) described the previous debate as frenzied. I do not think that she should accuse the House of being frenzied. She screamed throughout her speech, and throughout every interruption, for immediate action without proper consideration.

I am grateful to the right hon. Gentleman for giving way. I shall ignore his charge that I was screaming, which is not characteristic of my behaviour.

In the previous debate, I suggested exactly what I have suggested today—that we should meet the Nolan time scale. The Select Committee on Standards in Public Life proved that it is possible to achieve the time scale with regard to the other resolutions and we believe that it is possible to achieve it with declaration of income as well.

The hon. Lady demanded at the end of that debate that we should reach full decisions and put everything into operation. I cannot imagine anything more frenzied than that in relation to matters that will affect every Member of Parliament now and in future. Again today, the hon. Lady has demanded immediate action.

He could not have been listening to her.

Order. I should appreciate it if hon. Members would refrain from making seated interventions.

I take no satisfaction from the fact that the committee sat for 14 consecutive working days to try to comply with the time scale. What opportunity could members of that committee have of discussing the issues with Members of Parliament? If the hon. Lady wants the views of right hon. and hon. Members to be ignored, that explains a great deal about the attitude displayed by Opposition Members. We know which particularly Labour Members have been working for years for this. They are consumed by an insatiable desire to pry into other people's affairs. This time, they believe it will give them an enormous advantage when the general election comes.

The hon. Lady, adopting a threatening attitude, said that the constituents of right hon. and hon. Members on this of the House in particular will never understand if we stand by our principles and vote against her. My constituents will understand it perfectly well, because they know what Opposition Members are about and they are not prepared to put up with it. My constituents accept that the House is capable of running its own affairs.

I am unhappy about the report's proposal to merge the Privileges Committee with the Committee on Members' Interests. It may be that the Privileges Committee, having 17 members, cannot function as easily as it would like. When I served on that Committee, its membership was not that large and it had no difficulty functioning. Also, when the Privileges Committee is considering a case, the individual under consideration is not allowed to hear the rest of the evidence or to be represented. Those are much more serious questions for individual Members of Parliament.

I do not care for the proposed amalgamation of the two Committees because the Privileges Committee has always held by far the highest position, being respected by everybody. It has reached fairly serious decisions, albeit infrequently, when hon. Members or outsiders have been summoned to the Bar of the House to hear the Committee deliver its judgment. That Committee's work is vitally important. The status of the Select Committee on Members' Interest is quite different. The Privileges Committee should maintain its present position.

The right hon. Gentleman broke the Committee's rules.

The hon. Gentleman is being as tiresome as usual. I refer him to the decision of the Members' Interests Committee in respect of Lloyd's. It took no—

The right hon. Gentleman broke the rules.

Order. I did not expect to have to reprimand the hon. Member for Workington (Mr. Campbell-Savours) or other hon. Members again, but that appears to be necessary.

The Members' Interests Committee took no evidence from anybody concerned with Lloyd's and then made the ridiculous proposal that any hon. Member's particular interest in Lloyd's should be fully displayed, for which there was no justification.

rose—

I will not give way to the hon. Gentleman. When those points were brought to the notice of the Chairman—

On a point of order, Madam Deputy Speaker. Will you confirm for the record that the former Prime Minister broke a rule of the House of Commons? He now defends the fact that he breached that rule.

I have no knowledge of that matter and cannot comment.

When the matter was brought to the notice of the Chairman of the Committee, he invited members of Lloyd's in this place to go to him and other members of the Committee who wished to be present to explain the situation, which we did. The Committee's decision was then withdrawn because it knew that it was wrong. These are the consequences of carrying on with doctrines without consulting Members who may be involved. If that process continues, the Committee that deals with Members' interests, or a joint Committee if that proposal goes through, will be absorbed for ages in a process of compiling House of Commons law on Members' interests.

We have already heard that the Nolan report does not clarify anything. Lord Nolan does not bother. He does not even try. He uses three phrases without saying what each of them means. As different issues arise the Committee will have to set about creating House of Commons common law on Members' interests. That will absorb all its energies. If the Committee on Members' Interests is combined with the Privileges Committee, the time of what is now the pre-eminent Committee in this place will be absorbed unnecessarily. For these reasons I do not approve of the combining of the Committees.

I repeat what I have said about that which is being demanded of Members' interests. If a Member states that he has an interest, that covers everything. It always has. The House knows that whatever a Member says is governed by the fact that he has an interest. Knowledge of the bracket of income is not required to decide whether a Member has an interest. The decision does not require a contract. The Member will have registered, and he will have said so in the House. None of the things is needed that the insatiable desire to pry into other people's affairs has demanded. That is particularly so when it comes to the Nolan committee.

The right hon. Gentleman has been a member of the Privileges Committee and I was a member of the first Committee to deal with Members' interests. Does he agree that privilege is the privilege of the electorate, which we carry as a trust? Does he agree also that many of our electors would not think about prying into private affairs but think that Members should be transparent when it comes to matters that may affect their representation in this place? It is felt that we should engage all our attention on that and not be diverted into other channels such as selling information that is available to us. That is surely the concern of the electorate, and rightly so.

We are not being forced into anything. Every Member has his own will, takes his own decisions and is responsible for them. When one thinks that all this was brought about by two—

Idiots.

Yes, they would agree that they were idiots. It was a put-up job by a Murdoch newspaper. That is what has brought all this about. The hon. Gentleman knows my views for I have never concealed them.

There is no justification for requiring all the details that are now being demanded. But the pressure will continue for more and more details. Next, the hon. Member for Dewsbury will be demanding that all Members' bank accounts be shown to her. The hon. Member for Sheffield, Heeley (Mr. Michie) is hiding his eyes in shame. He has every right to do so.

rose—

Order. Ten minutes is now up. I trust that someone else wants to speak.

rose—

I call the hon. Member for St. Helens, North (Mr. Evans).

4.54 pm

rose—

I hope that my 10 minutes will start from when I begin my speech, Madam Deputy Speaker. I take it that my 10 minutes will start now.

At the outset—

On a point of order, Madam Deputy Speaker. There is some misunderstanding. The hon. Member for Heeley leaned towards me and started to rise, and I gave way so that he might intervene.

I am sorry to have to inform the right hon. Gentleman that the 10-minute rule is in operation, so it is not possible for him to continue.

At the outset, I proudly declare my sponsorship by the Amalgamated Engineering Union. It is the only interest that I have in the Register of Members' Interests and it has been declared ever since the register was established. I have no other interests to declare to the House.

I pay tribute to the Select Committee's Chairman who, in a quite splendid style, sought to obtain unanimity throughout our deliberations. I am sure that all would agree that he did a splendid job.

I have been somewhat disturbed during the past few weeks at some of the personal criticisms that have been levelled at Lord Nolan by a number of Members. Words such as "ambiguities", "muddled" and "fudged" have been used. The committee was a distinguished committee which included some long-serving parliamentarians, including the right hon. Member for Bridgwater (Mr. King), my right hon. Friend the Member for Bethnal Green and Stepney (Mr. Shore) and the right hon. Lord Thomson.

I have been a Member of the House for 21 years, but those three distinguished parliamentarians have been in the House for much longer than I have been. They have all been Cabinet Ministers and to suggest that people of that calibre are muddled and have produced a fudge is a slur on them, their reputations and the work that they have done in the House.

Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

I have only 10 minutes.

Those three members of the committee, as well as its other distinguished members, know their way about politics and about Parliament. In case anyone has missed it, it should also be noted that Sir Clifford Boulton, a former Clerk of the House, was a member of the committee. If anyone knows his way around the Standing Orders and procedures of the House, it is Sir Clifford Boulton.

For some hon. Members to imply that the interim Nolan report was somewhat eccentric and muddled, produced by a rather other-worldly figure who simply does not understand the real world occupied by Members of Parliament was, at best, disingenuous and, at worst, deliberately misleading. The Nolan report was a unanimous report by 10 distinguished individuals from various walks of life who know what life is all about, and it is grossly insulting to them to suggest otherwise.

It is equally important to record that there were substantial areas of unanimity among the Select Committee members. Unanimity on the acceptance of most of Nolan's recommendations was easily achieved—in some instances with little discussion. Accepting the need for a Parliamentary Commissioner for Standards and how that individual should be appointed was an important duty that the Committee performed.

A code of conduct for Members of Parliament would be of enormous benefit to new Members coming into the House after a general election. I well remember that, when I came into the House in March 1974, no one told me anything about anything. I was simply left to my own devices to find out things as best I could.

Nothing has changed.

As my hon. Friend says, nothing has changed in the interim.

The Nolan committee recommended a new Select Committee on Standards and Privileges. The Leader of the House knows my views and I make the plea that such a Committee should be established soon, start work and take over the functions of the present Select Committee. The present Select Committee, which has done an excellent job, has a limited life and it is important that the new Committee should get into its stride and start work.

The motion concerning the declaration of Members' interests also establishes an important procedure. If a Member tables an amendment to a Bill or asks a written question, and Members have to declare their financial interests, we will all be able to see—including Ministers—whether he has an interest in that area.

The same applies to the updating of the 1947 resolution on Members' outside interests. We are reiterating the resolution, as Nolan asked us to do, but we are saying that we think that it could be updated to suit the change in standards between 1947 and 1995–96.

We parted company on three issues. The first involved hon. Members being employed by lobbying companies that provide paid parliamentary services to multiple clients. The second involved the requirement that hon. Members should, from the beginning of the next Session, deposit with the registrar any contracts they have with any company relating to the provision of services. The third, and much more significant, issue involved hon. Members having to declare their earnings from outside interests from the beginning of the next Session.

There were a number of occasions in the Select Committee when we touched on those subjects. We did not settle the subject at the very last sitting, at the 11th hour, but discussed it on a number of occasions. On every occasion, the attitude of Labour members of the Committee was that two options should be presented to the House. One option was the Nolan recommendations as printed in Lord Nolan's report; the second was that we accept the principle of Nolan, but provide further time to study some of the details.

The Conservative and Liberal Democrat members of the Committee made it clear that they would not accept, and would not put their name to, Lord Nolan's words on the Order Paper of the House of Commons as appearing to come from the Select Committee. That is why we divided at the final stage.

Lord Nolan, in his unanimous report, made it clear that those were the two matters of great significance that the committee felt were at the heart of the decline in the public's perception of parliamentary standards and should be acted on immediately. Lord Nolan included those issues in his report and asked us to take action to solve those problems as quickly as possible, and certainly by the start of the next Session.

While the Labour members of the Select Committee accepted, and made it clear that we accepted, Lord Nolan's report, we were not dogmatic about it. In our view, it was not for 10 members of a Select Committee to remove Lord Nolan's words. We felt that it was for the House of Commons to take that decision once the options had been placed before it. The Tory and Liberal Democrat members sought to deny that opportunity, which is why we have placed the words on the Order Paper again today. We want to give every hon. Member the opportunity to vote for the Nolan report or to vote for the amendment that accepts the principle.

The Leader of the House carefully crafted the amendment that is contained in paragraph 86, and now appears on the Order Paper. The resolution that the majority passed in the Committee states:

"That this House endorses the need for an examination of the recommendations of the Nolan Committee".

I am highly suspicious of those words. If the recommendation had stated:

"That this House endorses the principle of the recommendations of the Nolan Committee"

and had instructed the Select Committee to conduct such an examination and make proposals, that could well have been acceptable to the majority of the Committee.

However, a number of Tory Members have made it clear throughout the debate that the thought of disclosing their earnings is anathema. A former Prime Minister, the right hon. Member for Old Bexley and Sidcup (Sir E. Heath) made that abundantly clear in his short speech on the subject. Such right hon. and hon. Members simply do not realise that the subject causes so much concern to the general public. The very thought that Members of Parliament have outside interests for which they receive substantial sums of money, directly and only because they are Members of Parliament, is a cause of public concern.

If Conservative Back Benchers tonight turn down the option of disclosing income, they will go a long way to persuading the public that they, as a party, are determined to bury the Nolan committee's recommendations.

I have already paid tribute to the Leader of the House's chairmanship of the Select Committee, and I understand the difficulties that he has faced. He recognises that there is a strong wish in his party to kick the Nolan report as far as possible into the long grass in the hope that, in the next three or four months, the Tories can come up with some alternative—any alternative—that will result in Lord Nolan's recommendations being shelved. If the Tories do that, they will be making an appalling mistake for which they will subsequently pay.

5.4 pm

I shall begin by immediately declaring various interests that are recorded in the Register of Members' Interests.

In considering the amendments and motions before us, we should bear in mind the introductory paragraph of Lord Nolan's report. It states that, when inquiring into the growing public concern about standards in public life, it became

"equally clear from a considerable body of this evidence that much of the public anxiety about standards of conduct in public life is based upon perceptions and beliefs which are not supported by the facts."

When the matter has been presented in the press, that paragraph has not been quoted. On the contrary, the extent of the problem has been grossly exaggerated, but for the reputation of the House it is important and right that we should deal with the problem.

The deadlines set on the Nolan committee report and the Select Committee have not been the least bit helpful in achieving a sensible outcome of the deliberations—nor has the shortness of today's debate. I do not agree with what the hon. Member for St. Helens, North (Mr. Evans) said about the Nolan committee's report. It is true that it is a distinguished committee, but it would be charitable to think that it was the lack of time that led to the report's quality.

Having studied it in much greater depth than I did at the time of the debate on the Adjournment—I suppose that I have studied it as closely as anyone in the House—I am forced to the conclusion that it is as inadequate in its analysis as it is bad in its drafting. Therefore, the Select Committee has had to do what the Nolan committee should have done in the first place.

Lord Nolan deals with three issues: Members of Parliament, Ministers and civil servants, and quangos. The report goes through those issues at the beginning, and then again, for a second time. As we found in the Select Committee, one spends one's entire time bobbing back and forth, as the report is extremely badly drafted.

In addition, Lord Nolan is very concerned about the issue of timing and when particular proposals should be carried through. But if the Nolan committee had given the matter much thought, it would have realised that some of the actions that it said should be taken immediately could not sensibly be taken until subsequent inquiries, which it said should be done during the following year, had taken place. The report is badly drafted, and, as my right hon. Friend the Leader of the House said, it is sadly inadequate when it comes to defining its terms and explaining what it has in mind. It is right that the Select Committee should have done what it can to clarify the situation.

In the time available, the Select Committee has done a remarkable job. We sat day after day, with total disregard for the effect that would have on other programmes. I add to the tribute paid by the hon. Member for St. Helens, North to my right hon. Friend the Leader of the House for his chairmanship of the Committee. I do not know how he has survived the past two months.

Not only has he carried out his functions as Leader of the House, with constant appearances at the Dispatch Box, but he has performed his role as Chairman of the Privileges Committee as well as Chairman of the Select Committee. He has also stood in for the Prime Minister at Prime Minister's Question Time when necessary, and has had a number of other governmental and private matters to deal with—what Mr. Macmillan used to describe as "little local difficulties". My Tight hon. Friend has done a remarkable job. Other hon. Members on both sides of the Committee have also done so.

I do not think for one moment that the Committee delayed matters unnecessarily. We dealt with an immense range of subjects and have done much to clarify the position and, in some respects, toughen up the Nolan proposals in respect of what is now proposed in relation to the Parliamentary Commissioner and the new Committee—on which I do not agree with what my right hon. Friend the Member for Old Bexley and Sidcup (Sir E. Heath) said.

We have done well in clarifying the relationship between the Commissioner and the new Select Committee structure. We have toughened up the proposals. We dealt with a number of issues, such as declaring interests on the Order Paper, which Lord Nolan had omitted to do.

The Select Committee looked carefully at the subject of declaration. We were forced to the conclusion that we could not do it in the time available.

I was puzzled by the threats of the hon. Member for Dewsbury (Mrs. Taylor) about what our constituents would think. No one says that we should not go ahead, and no one is procrastinating: it is absurd to suggest that. We have worked flat out all the time, and I understand that it is proposed that we should meet again tomorrow when the House has risen. But an article in The Observer on Sunday stated, "My goodness, they are trying to hook it into the long grass." That is not the case, but we must have sensible proposals to present.

One cannot deal with the issue of multi-client consultancies until the overall picture of consultancies is clear, and we must clarify that as quickly as possible. In the context of the declaration of contracts, it seems that, effectively, three categories of consultancy have to be taken into account. Some contracts do not arise in any way from membership of the House. It is clearly inappropriate to declare such contracts, and I think that Nolan recognised that. It is arguable that some of the matters that are now registered ought to be deregistered, because they are not relevant in this context.

At the other extreme, some consultancies are quite clearly designed to enable an outside interest to have advocates in the House to put down questions, perhaps to move amendments, to entertain in the Dining Rooms, and to effect introductions to Ministers and so on. An examination of the rather convoluted passages in the existing resolutions of the House and the Select Committee suggestions on the matter show that those activities ought to be banned. That is a personal view. However, if they are banned, the issue of declaration of amounts does not arise.

Will my right hon. Friend give way?

I cannot give way, because of the time that is available.

The Select Committee generally, and certainly the Conservative Members on it, advocated a tougher stance than Nolan has established. He did not distinguish, as one must do, between activities by the client that reach into the House and advice from the House to those outside. That is an important distinction. If a consultancy simply involves advice on parliamentary matters, the question of amounts does not seem relevant, because it does not in any way affect performance in the House. That is the crucial issue.

I hope that the work of the Select Committee can continue. It has been one of the best Committees, in terms of all-party consensus, that I have come across. Despite the general partisan exchanges in this debate, the. Committee ought to be able to reach a sensible conclusion and present positive proposals for the House to consider at an early date.

It would not be right for us to pass the issues to the new Committee. The existing Committee, on which I had the privilege, if it be that, of sitting, should be concerned with structure, and the new Committee should concern itself with the issues of operation and individual cases. If that is done, it will restore the reputation of the House. It is important for that to be done, but the process has not been helped by the time scale in which we have attempted to resolve an extremely complex and important problem.

5.13 pm

I shall begin by declaring that my interests are set out in the Register in the usual way. The previous debate on the recommendations of Lord Nolan's committee on standards in public life was on a take-note motion. Widely differing views were expressed at that time, but today hon. Members must take decisions. The overriding need is to approve the resolutions, which were designed to give effect to the recommendations of the Nolan committee. At the same time, we must resolve to complete the task of implementation in the time scale that was recommended by Nolan.

In reaching decisions, none of us is likely to forget the circumstances that gave rise to the report. The good name of the House, and its keystone place in our democracy, must be in the mind of every one of us. The House validates Government. If that process were to be corrupted by the self-interested action of Members, it would diminish our claim to speak for the country.

Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

Because of the time constraints, I will not give way.

If the House could not speak for the country, who would? This old institution reached its central representative role in the life of the country only through a process of evolution. Of course the House has not always risen to that challenge. Individual Members bring to its debates personal partialities and human idiosyncrasies, but in the process of debate there is sometimes distilled the true sense of where the people's interests lie. It is that which is put at risk if Members allow their outside interests, especially their outside financial interests, not merely to dominate their own judgment but to exert influence upon the judgment of the House.

Some would argue, although Nolan did not, that such outside interests are wholly incompatible with fully functioning membership of the House. Certainly the demands on each Member are such that there can be little time for extensive outside activity. Nolan sought to protect the honesty of debate by calling for openness about those interests. The report specifically advocated the severance of any direct financial link between Members and those whose business is to seek to sell influence over Parliament and Government.

Nolan worked fast, and that may have presented the problems to which the right hon. Member for Worthing (Sir T. Higgins) referred. The Select Committee also worked fast, but I hope that the House will agree to accept its resolutions, which were unanimously adopted by the Committee. Those significant resolutions are: to proceed with the appointment of an independent Parliamentary Commissioner for Standards; to bring together within one Committee the work of the ancient Committee of Privileges and the modern Select Committee on Members' Interests; and to put in hand the preparation of a code of conduct for Members of Parliament.

Those evolutionary developments should assist the House to investigate fairly and thoroughly allegations of wrongdoing that are made against hon. Members. They should also help in the process of monitoring the adequacy of the rules to deal with any slippage in standards.

On the two specific outstanding matters of disclosure and lobbying—to define them broadly—on which the Select Committee did not have time to reach conclusions, Nolan was quite clear on one matter. It was that controls should be in place at the beginning of the next parliamentary Session. The purpose of the amendments in my name and those of my right hon. and hon. Friends is to ensure that the House can do just that.

My amendment (d) to the final resolution which was tabled by the Leader of the House is intended simply to strengthen the instruction to the Select Committee to present precise proposals in those two areas by the end of this Session, to which in any event the resolution aspires.

My amendments to the motion in the name of the hon. Member for Dewsbury (Mrs. Taylor) and her hon. Friends would provide that, in the event of the Select Committee failing to present such precise proposals in that time scale—it must be remembered that the Committee was charged only to present an interim report, which is what it has done—the two broad, less precise, proposals of the Labour party, which are contained in amendments (a) and (c), would take effect from the beginning of the next Session.

As the hon. Member for St. Helens, North (Mr. Evans) said, amendments (a) and (c) use the language of the Nolan committee, and for that reason are superficially attractive. However, they leave grey areas, which might be used by self-serving Members to avoid their obligations. It would not serve the interests of the House to have unscrupulous Members able to exploit loopholes.

To take one example, if the House believes that any association with a firm that engages in lobbying, be it a firm of solicitors or accountants or a public relations company, should be banned, in my judgment it should explicitly say so, and not rely on the general language of the Nolan committee. If the House considers that it is not illegitimate to belong to such a firm, providing that Members' contracts preclude lobbying activity, that alternative should be explicitly provided for.

I do not believe that the Nolan committee, in making its recommendations, considered that it was removing from the House the responsibility to draw up its own precise rules. Rather, I believe it sought to make recommendations outlining the purpose of the rules that should be implemented in order to renew the standing of Parliament. It clearly left it to the House to define precisely what those rules must be to make its. recommendations effective.

I emphasise that, working as the committee did, the Nolan timetable can be met, although I do not doubt that we will have to work hard during the summer recess. We will all remember that it is all the people who sent us here whose interests we must represent in the House. By our decisions today, we can renew their confidence that we will not be diverted by private or partial interests from that overriding duty.

5.20 pm

I and my colleagues on the Nolan committee have had to experience the reaction of the House and others outside to our report. We did not have a particularly happy first debate, and I hope that today's debate will be an improvement on it. The contribution of the hon. Member for Dewsbury (Mrs. Taylor), however, who appeared deliberately to threaten hon. Members, was the singularly most ill-judged contribution that we have had to the discussion.

I have listened with great interest to the comments and criticisms by many of my right hon. and hon. Friends. I have also taken note of the comments of Opposition Members. The right hon. Member for Bethnal Green and Stepney (Mr. Shore) shared responsibilities on the Nolan committee, and I would like to think that we strove deliberately to conduct that committee on a non-party political, non-partisan basis. It was the better for it.

I should be grateful if the hon. Member for Dewsbury conveyed to the Leader of the Opposition the fact that I particularly regretted the way in which he has considered the matter. I also regret that my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister's response to the Nolan committee recommendations was met with a manifestly party political reaction at Prime Minister's Questions. It does not serve the interests of the House to approach the matter in that way.

I have had to endure the criticisms levelled against the Nolan committee. I also noted the Opposition's ridicule when my right hon. Friend the Leader of the House proposed at the end of the previous debate that a Select Committee should be set up to consider the Nolan recommendations. I do not think that there is anyone in the House who now doubts the need for that Committee, which Nolan specifically recommended in our report.

I congratulate the Select Committee on Standards in Public Life on the work that it has done. I might say with tongue slightly in cheek that, having had to endure the slings and arrows of some of my hon. Friends at what were suggested by some to be ludicrous recommendations in the Nolan report, I am encouraged to find how many of those recommendations have been warmly endorsed, either by the Government in their excellent response to the recommendations we made about Ministers and appointments to quangos, or by the Select Committee.

Despite the criticisms of bad drafting and lack of clarity of thought, I am grateful to my right hon. Friend the Member for Worthing (Sir T. Higgins) and the Committee for carrying through, clarifying and improving, as I hoped and knew that it would, a number of the recommendations we made. I was told that the idea of a Commissioner could not possibly work—I congratulate the Committee on seeing the advantages of it. I also congratulate it on appreciating the merits of our suggestions on the Committee's structure. I accept that my right hon. Friend the Member for Old Bexley and Sidcup (Sir E. Heath) disagreed with them.

It is important to consider the particular point that is the source of division: what is meant by advocacy. My right hon. Friends the Members for Old Bexley and Sidcup and for Worthing criticised the Nolan committee for lack of clarity, and questioned whether it had spelt out sufficiently clearly what exactly was meant by the activities that Members might conduct in the House on behalf of outside parties.

The hon. Member for Caithness and Sutherland (Mr. Maclennan) got it precisely right. For all the kind words of the hon. Member for St. Helens, North (Mr. Evans) about the three experienced parliamentarians who served on the Nolan committee, we did not presume to impose our judgment. The Nolan committee deliberately did not dot every "i" and cross every "t", in the knowledge that it would be for the House finally to decide on that most difficult of matters.

The hon. Member for Dewsbury spoke about voting tonight for the straightforward implementation of Nolan. As one of the members of that committee and one of the authors of its report, I do not believe it is possible to do that. As yet, nothing has been determined. Are we to say that we will, in principle, impose certain conditions on such activities of which we do not know at the moment? We must determine what those activities are. I stand by the Nolan report. People who seek to advocate in the House and sell their position as a Member of Parliament to provide services in this House to others are in a different category from other hon. Members.

In an intervention, the hon. Member for Dewsbury swept together advice outwards and advocacy inwards. Not a single member of the Nolan committee took that view. We regarded advice outwards as positively helpful in many cases to a parliamentary democracy, and positively part of a Member of Parliament's responsibilities. Advocacy inwards is not in the same category.

The right hon. Gentleman obviously did not listen to what I said. I clearly said that advocacy on behalf of people for payment is not allowed, while giving advice out is allowed. I made that clear in my evidence to the Nolan committee, as I did in my speech tonight. The right hon. Gentleman has said that he will not support Opposition amendment (a), so I hope that he will feel able to support the Nolan recommendations in principle, which are embodied in amendment (b).

It is not a question of what is permitted. Advocacy—the selling of one's services in order to provide services in the House—is in a different category from that advisory function that hon. Members have often quoted in debates on Nolan. One cannot, understandably, refuse to give advice. If people ask us what is going on in Parliament, we cannot say, "I am forbidden to give you that advice." I have never heard anything so fatuous in my life. We say often enough that we are cut off from people outside, so of course we must be prepared to give advice.

It is important to consider what activities the category of advocacy covers. The right hon. Member for Bethnal Green and Stepney would agree with me that the Nolan committee found it difficult to reach a decision on that and to determine where to draw the line. As the right hon. Gentleman and I said in the previous debate, to an extent we passed the buck to Parliament. That is why the hon. Member for Caithness and Sutherland is right to say that the Nolan committee recommendations are a challenge for the House. I agree with my right hon. Friend the Member for Worthing that that deliberation is not a delaying tactic.

There is no point in going from the current unclear situation to yet another unclear situation. We have to have the courage to face up to the problem posed by advocacy, put it right and then determine the conditions that should apply to those who practice it.

5.28 pm

I declare that I am a sponsored member of the union Unison, which entails a £600 payment to my local constituency per annum in accordance with the Hastings agreement—a published document. I receive no personal financial gain.

I should also like to pay tribute to the work of the Select Committee on Standards in Public Life, and the progress it has managed to make in the short time available to it. I welcome the fact that agreement has been reached on certain issues. Anyone who has served on the Select Committee on Members' Interests knows of the genuine difficulties encountered when considering the detail behind some of the matters at issue tonight.

I therefore welcome the proposals on the Order Paper, which seek the agreement of the House and on which we will vote. I particularly welcome the appointment of a Parliamentary Commissioner for Standards, which would be established if the appropriate order goes through quickly. That is essential. The report says that the Commissioner might be part-time. I hope that he will be full-time, because a great deal of work needs to be done. The House should take the post seriously, make it full-time, and get it up and running as quickly as possible.

I also welcome the abolition of the Members' Interests Committee and its merger with the Privileges Committee. Even though I am a member of the Members' Interests Committee, we have had a great deal of difficulty not only with partisan problems and a breakdown of the consensus upon which the success of the Committee was built—which has made it impossible for us to do our work—but in trying to get hold of the facts.

The concept that the Commissioner will be able to gather the facts, and have the wherewithal to do it efficiently, will make the operation of this part of the proposed changes much more efficient and rapid. Therefore, it will be much fairer to any hon. Member who might be referred to the new Committee.

Like some of my hon. Friends, I am extremely worried about the wording of motion No. 7, which refers to

"the need for an examination of the recommendations of the Nolan Committee"

that deal with the nub of the issue, which is the declaring of amounts received and the banning of multi-client consultancies. Many of our constituents regard that as the most crucial of the Nolan recommendations, and we must deliver it.

I do not agree with everything in the Nolan report, but I am willing to go along with it, because rescuing the reputation of this House and ensuring that the people believe that we are in this House for public service, not private gain, are too important to be left to quibbling around the edges of the little bits of Nolan with which we do not agree. We must move quickly to ensure that both the declaring of the amounts and the banning of multi-client consultancies are put into effect as quickly as possible.

The phrase

"the need for an examination of the recommendations of the Nolan Committee"

suggests that, upon examination, the Select Committee on Standards in Public Life might decide that the recommendations on the two issues which I believe the public regard as crucial to our credibility in making these reforms should not be implemented. That would be a serious error, and it would bring the House into disrepute.

That is why I would have preferred to see the phrase "an acceptance in principle" about the issues. We could then have looked at what I agree are sometimes difficult practical interpretations and definitions. However, I do not think that definition is impossible, or that it is impossible to do so in a tight manner.

There is doubt in the minds of those who are perhaps cynical' that the Government really will deliver on those two important areas. Whatever welcome progress there is on the implementation of the rest of the Nolan reforms, if we procrastinate and do not deliver on the issues of declaring the actual amounts and banning multi-client consultancies, we will fail to reassure our constituents that we can put our own house in order.

As the Nolan report said, it is not credible to argue that, if someone has a financial consultancy that is worth £5,000, somehow that can be equated with one that is worth £50,000. Our constituents have a right to know if we are making money as a direct consequence of our membership of this House—that is the key issue—and how much money we are making, so that they can make their own judgment about how we are spending our time, how credible we are as independent advocates of their interests in this place, and whether we might have our heads turned by private financial interests. That is a wholly reasonable issue, on which we must agree.

I know that some Conservative Members think that it is none of the public's business to know how much money they earn, even in such a direct area. Unfortunately, we cannot maintain credibility without making that concession to the public. We are not saying—and Nolan did not say—that we should declare all our private earnings. I am a full-time member of the House, and have no other earnings to declare. Some people think that being a Member of Parliament is a full-time job, and that there should not be the time to do all sorts of other jobs.

Certainly, many of our constituents and people who work in certain jobs in industry who are restricted by their contracts from working in other jobs would agree with that. We must make the concession, and be seen to be making it. If we prevaricate and hope that we can kick these two issues into the long grass, we will fail to reassure people about the vibrancy and honesty of our democracy, and we will be doing a great disservice to the House.

Tonight is the time to support the amendments moved so ably by my hon. Friend the Member for Dewsbury (Mrs. Taylor), to reassure our constituents that we are absolutely determined to deal with the issue as quickly as possible, in an open and honest way. We must reassure them that we are not trying to preserve privileges that are no longer relevant and to allow people who have brought the House into disrepute to continue to get away with squeezing between the cracks and the ambiguities in the rules.

We must be open and honest in our declarations, and give up a small amount of our privacy to demonstrate the honesty and straightforward vibrancy of our democracy. We must not allow the House to descend even further in public esteem. The issue is that important.

I hope that the House will take this early opportunity to support the amendments, so that we can make progress, as quickly as possible, in the two vital areas to which I have referred.

5.36 pm

Like others, I wish to declare non-executive directorships, which are shown in the Register of Members' Interests. I do not have, nor ever have had, any consultancies.

In the time available, I shall make just two points. Unfortunately, I was not able to participate in the previous debate on the Nolan report because I was leading the British-American parliamentary group delegation on its annual visit to and meetings with the Senate in Washington. One of the points I would have wished to have stressed then, and wish to stress now, and which formed the bulk of my early evidence to the Nolan committee, is that I strongly believe that it would greatly weaken this House, the Government and parliamentary democracy if outside interests were barred or in any way greatly inhibited as a result of any recommendations in the Nolan report.

I gave many reasons for taking that view in my evidence to Nolan. I am therefore delighted that the committee strongly took up my theme. It said in paragraph 19 of its report,

"we consider it desirable for the House of Commons to contain Members with a wide variety of continuing outside interests. If that were not so, Parliament would be less well-informed and effective than it is now, and might well be more dependent on lobbyists."

That is absolutely right. It continued:

"A Parliament composed entirely of full-time professional politicians would not serve the best interests of democracy."

Again, that is absolutely right.

I have no objection to those who spend an entire working career in politics and in Parliament, but Parliament should not be mainly composed of those sorts of people. In some of the debate surrounding the Nolan committee, there was a real threat that some people believed that it should be and would try to further that particular cause.

In paragraph 20, the Nolan report said:

"We should be worried about the possibility of a narrowing in the range of able men and women who would be attracted to stand for Parliament if Members were barred from having any outside paid interests. We believe that many able people would not wish to enter Parliament if they not only had to take a substantial drop in income to do so but also ran the risk of seeing their livelihood disappear altogether if they were to lose their seats."

That, too, is absolutely right. That is why I was delighted that the Nolan committee strongly reaffirmed those points and that my right hon. Friend the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster, in his statement to the House yesterday, robustly defended that point of view.

The hon. Member for Dewsbury (Mrs. Taylor) referred to concerns outside the House. One such concern that is widely held is that able people will not in future wish to enter the House if we put too many barriers in the way of their doing so. That is why I am concerned about one paragraph of the draft code of conduct contained in the report. We are discussing setting up a procedure and having a draft code of conduct now. This illustrates a point, made several times in the debate, that some areas of the Nolan report are not at all clear.

The particular part of the draft code of conduct to which I want to draw attention is that which states:

"Where, in the pursuit of a Member's Parliamentary duties, the existence of a personal financial interest"—

not a contract or consultancy for lobbying—

"is likely to give rise to a conflict with the public interest, the Member has a personal responsibility to resolve that conflict either by disposing of the interest or by standing aside from the public business in question."

That seems at best fuzzy, ambiguous and unclear and, at worst, directly in conflict with the principles to which the Nolan drew attention. It illustrates exactly the kind of problems that we now face, although I am not criticising the Nolan committee because it had to do its work in such a short time.

rose—

I cannot give way because of the shortage of time.

I suggest to my right hon. Friend the Leader of the House and those who will be examining the draft code of conduct that the particular point to which I drew attention must be redrafted substantially. If it is not, it will mean either that Members with valuable experience will not be able to participate in debates or Select or Standing Committees—we all recognise their value—or that they cannot participate in particular votes, which would undermine the whole process of the House. Although I have dealt with it only briefly, I feel very strongly about that aspect of the drafting of the code of conduct as it has a bearing on the principles behind the debate.

My second point relates to motion 7 and consultancies. I had quite a long discussion about this issue with members of the Nolan committee when I gave my evidence. I said early on that it was very difficult to know where to draw the line and that we were looking to the committee to give us guidance about where to do so. I am not at all surprised that the Nolan committee threw the issue back to Parliament, which is what it effectively did by drawing attention to multi-client consultancies, but saying that, in every other sphere, it is for Parliament in the next year to consider how to proceed. The reason why the Committee threw the matter back to Parliament is that it is difficult to define precisely, and we have to get it right.

I am therefore not surprised that the Select Committee, under the chairmanship of my right hon. Friend the Leader of the House, who did a superb job, said that in 14 working days it could not reach a conclusion on issues with which the Nolan committee said that it could not properly deal in six months. In addition, my right hon. Friend's Committee had to deal with other precisely defined matters, so it seems wholly reasonable for the House to support motion 7.

Not only was the threat issued to Members of Parliament by the hon. Member for Dewsbury (Mrs. Taylor) ludicrous but it debased the debate. I have no doubt that she has previously criticised—many members of her party certainly have—legislation that has been drafted too hastily. She is now asking for an over-hasty decision when there are still so many fuzzy matters to be settled. To suggest that our constituents could then be told that we had not fulfilled our parliamentary duties because we had agreed to do something that was not workable in practice is a ridiculous threat.

The position adopted by my right hon. Friend and the majority of the Committee was entirely right. Given that the Nolan committee took some time to reach a position that is still unclear, and given that it also threw some matters back to Parliament, it is entirely reasonable to ask the Committee to spend another three months trying to reach a workable solution.

5.42 pm

I am a member of the Select Committee on Standards in Public Life. I shall speak briefly but must first declare an interest. I am a sponsored member of the Amalgamated Union of Engineering Workers from which I receive no personal payment whatsoever.

What about the office? Put a figure on it.

A sum of £600 goes directly to the office and is openly declared. All that we are asking is that such moneys be declared. As has been said, if Nolan wants to continue to examine the issue, we are more than willing to participate in that examination. We have nothing to hide.

I wish to take up a point made by the right hon. Member for Bridgwater (Mr. King), a distinguished member of the Select Committee. He said that many strands were not tied together—and the Select Committee had some difficulty in that respect—but the motions that we debating are an attempt to implement what Nolan recommended. He wanted his recommendations in place by the next Session, and we are asking that they be approved in principle. We have come a long way down that road. No one is saying that every "i" has been dotted and every "t" has been crossed—that is not the case—but there is agreement in principle. We are therefore not asking for a debate in the next three months on whether we should implement the recommendations; what we are asking the House to do is to accept the principles and decide that they shall be implemented.

The previous Prime Minister spoke about being locked in Committees and not talking to anyone else so we would not know what others were thinking. Our Committee had many hours of discussion and, had he been there, he would have heard the many representations that we received from fellow Members of Parliament from all parties. We had a very open discussion, and I pay tribute to the Leader of the House for the way in which he chaired the Committee. For my sins, I am a member of the Privileges Committee and the Select Committee on Standards in Public Life. The right hon. Gentleman did a sterling job. We disagreed fundamentally on some matters—we are debating some of them tonight—but the Committee worked exceedingly hard to find a solution.

When all is said and done, Nolan's recommendations are moderate in many ways. We are not asking for the moon. The Nolan committee was established because of problems created, regrettably, in the House. However, our record as a democratic Parliament is probably better than most. We admit that there is a problem with which we have to deal, and we want to put in place a series of recommendations, nine tenths of which I believe are acceptable and will be voted so by the House.

I urge the House to go one step further and implement the principles set out in the motions. In the coming three months, let us examine the fine print and see whether we can make any improvements. If we do that, we shall be ready to implement the Nolan recommendations from day one of the next Session. That, I believe, is what the public want.

5.47 pm

I declare only those interests which are included in the Register of Members' Interests as I have no others.

I doubt whether the concept that Lord Nolan's recommendations are to be regarded as "set in stone", which appears to be the Opposition's view, is correct. After all, they are simply recommendations made by a committee comprised of human beings. It is up to the House to decide whether it wishes to take all of them, some of them or whatever is necessary. I do not accept all the recommendations, and I believe that I should say so at the beginning of my speech.

I listened with great care to the hon. Member for Dewsbury (Mrs. Taylor). She has come in for some criticism, but, on the whole, I think that her speech was very moderate until she began to say that we should "clean up" Parliament, thus giving the impression that Parliament was in the mire and that we all needed a code of conduct to show us how to behave. In fact, 99.9 per cent. of Members of Parliament are operating in a honourable and proper way and therefore the phrase "start to clean up Parliament" does this House a considerable disservice.

May I congratulate my right hon. Friend the Lord President of the Council and Leader of the House of Commons on the work of the Select Committee and his success? I do not admire, however, the fact that there were 14 sittings in 14 days. I do not think that is the way that Committees should have to work. A little time for consideration in depth, especially on matters of such great importance, would have been better. I realise that he had a time scale to meet, but that is not the way in which I would recommend that other Committees should have to function.

I rather thought that the chairmen of other Select Committees might be a bit nervous about that precedent, but I would not urge it on the Procedure Committee.

I am very glad to hear that because I have no intention of carrying such a precedent forward.

I turn to motion 3 concerning a Parliamentary Commissioner for Standards. I understand and accept the recommendation, but I suggest that the person who is appointed must have real knowledge of the working of Parliament and of this House. I do not think that we should just appoint a distinguished judge or lawyer who may be very good at his own profession but has no real knowledge of what goes on in this place. That point is of considerable importance to the appointment.

I turn to the code of conduct. It seems to me that all that is really recommended is that we revert to the standards that used to exist in the House. I immediately accept the need for transparency, but I have always believed that it has existed. Way before there was a Register, I published all the things that I did in business in "Who's Who". Indeed, when I was working on the Select Committee on Trade and Industry and it considered the accounts of the Post Office, it was possible that a company of which I was chairman would have a future contract with the Post Office. I immediately declared an interest, yet the Clerk said that there was no need to do so because it was only something that might happen and did not exist. Yet because of that possibility, not only did I declare the interest, I would not sit on the Committee while the Post Office accounts were being considered. That was the sort of transparency which I believe that nearly every Member of Parliament always considers. I was not special in the way in which I reacted.

I do not accept the concept that somebody must look only after the parliamentary aspect of what they are elected for. May I say why I do not accept it? When I was adopted to fight my by-election in 1967, my constituency wanted to know that it was taking as a candidate a person who had been in business, a person who had been successful in business, who would be able to keep up certain of his business interests if elected and would not be, as it would say, bogged down in politics and nothing else. We must not give way to the idea that a person must only be a full-time Member of Parliament.

I say quite clearly, however, that no attempt to influence matters in the favour of an employer through consultancy, directorship or advisory position, whether by question, early-day motion, letters to Ministers or delegations to Ministers should ever be allowed. That should be absolutely banned. Indeed, any specific lobbying for something for which a person is paid as a director should be banned.

When I was a director of Phillips Petroleum UK Ltd.—which I am not at the moment—I always declared my interest when I spoke in the House. In fact it allowed me to speak with perhaps a little more knowledge and understanding on energy matters than other hon. Members. I made it absolutely clear and bent over backwards never to allow anything that I did or said to be seen to work for the company which employed me. That is the way in which hon. Members can and should react positively and properly in the House.

Any hon. Member who takes part in and is paid to influence the House in favour of something outside his parliamentary duty should be treated most severely—even excluded from the House. If that were the case, I would see no need whatever for any revelation, publication or declaration of earnings. I warn the House that the moment we start demanding that hon. Members—even a small group of them—declare what they are earning, that is the moment we open that door. It will not be very long before other people will be pushing for the publication of every outside earning of every Member of Parliament. Then income tax will have to be made public as well. Members of Parliament have some right to a little privacy. As long as Members behave properly and honourably, as our constituents expect of us, I would urge the House to go forward in that way.

I find therefore that I cannot accept the Opposition's amendments. The approach was somewhat provocative. There is no need to demand the publication of earnings. That would be an unnecessary interference in the affairs of an Member. It in no way tells our constituents whether we are doing our job properly or not. They can judge that from what we say in the House, what we do in our constituencies, what we say in our letters and how we pursue their interests. That has nothing to do with what we are paid.

I therefore urge the House to reject the Opposition amendments. The motions moved by my right hon. Friend the Leader of the House should be passed and passed with unanimity.

5.56 pm

I wish to declare my relationship with the union Unison, which helped fund a surgery for my constituents in Workington.

The right hon.Member for Honiton (Sir P. Emery) would have the public believe that we are trying in some way to prevent him from having interests outside the House of Commons. May I make it absolutely clear that we are not seeking to do that at all? All we are seeking to do is ensure that, when Members use Parliament to make additional money, it should be revealed to the wider public. That is all we are trying to do, and I think that that is a perfectly fair arrangement.

Now that the right hon. Member for Old Bexley and Sidcup (Sir E. Heath) has returned to his place, may I say that his failure to realise that his 10 minutes was up at the end of his speech summed up for many of us the whole debate. Some hon. Members really believe that they are beyond the rules; that the rules do not apply to them. That is why the right hon. Gentleman failed to register an important interest of his two years ago in the House of Commons Register.

When I breach rules by using a word in this Chamber which is not even vulgar, I am asked to leave, and I am excluded from the House of Commons for 24 hours. When the right hon. Gentleman breaches a major rule of the House of Commons and acts as a fig leaf for another 11 hon. Gentlemen, his actions are ignored.

rose—

I do not intend to give way. He did not give way to me.

As far as I can see, in this debate Conservative Members intend to use every ruse in the book to ensure that multi-client consultancies are maintained, and that they retain those interests. They are out to block the reform of consultancy advocacy—they want to retain it. The reason is that they simply cannot afford to live on £33,000 a year. That is what is behind this debate. Conservative Members with two kids away at public school are spending, before tax, more than £30,000 a year; that is the truth of it. They know that, if they are to be able to fund their annual bills, they must find ways in which to use Parliament to earn extra cash. That is why many of them will never go into the Lobbies to block commercial consultancy advocacy.

Those Conservative Members will equally go to the wire on the disclosure of payments, irrespective of what happens in the Committee, irrespective of the debate outside in the country and irrespective of the national opinion polls. Many Tory Members will never, in any circumstances or in any conditions, be prepared to disclose under a banding system the amount they earn, because they simply do not want that information to be made public.

I have worked out a way in which to deal with this block. It may well be that the Select Committee on Standards in Public Life, whose report we are discussing today, has now come up against the wire. I do not think that the Committee will be able to do a lot more work, because it is up against a block. The block was shown by the defeat of the relevant motion in Committee, which many Conservative Members intend to defeat again tonight if they can.

The answer to the block is to be found in the rules of the House which provide, in exceptional circumstances, for Committees to deliberate in public. If the Select Committee deliberates in public, the block will be removed, because the moment the television cameras go into the Committee, Conservative Members will not be able to use proceedings to block the necessary reforms which we believe stand behind the Nolan proposals.

Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

No. I do not intend to give way.

We may appear to be setting a precedent. The reality is—we have now had a ruling to this effect—that it is possible for the Committee to deliberate in public.

Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

I do not intend to give way.

I want to go further. Many hon. Members have referred to updating the 1947 resolution. I shall read my update, which bans advocacy; such a ban is part of the real Nolan agenda. In his report, Lord Nolan did not take the decision to ban, because, as he says, 157 Members of Parliament would be affected by such changes. Indeed, those hon. Members were elected to the House on the basis that they could retain their consultancy arrangements. Lord Nolan was not prepared to go down that road, although it is clear to anyone who has read the text that that was where his sympathies lay.

I give the House the text of a resolution that would deal with the matter—a 1995 resolution. My resolution reads as follows:

"It is contrary to the usage and dignity of the House that a Member should:
(a) bring forward by any speech or question,
(b) advocate in this House or among his fellow Members,
(c) promote either directly or indirectly with Ministers of the Crown or Crown Servants,
(d) promote amongst representatives of the local authorities or any other public bodies
(e) use the services and facilities of the House to develop, advance or promote

—any Bill, Motion, matter, or cause in return for a fee, payment, retainer, reward or benefit in kind, direct or indirect, which the Member has received, is receiving or expects to receive, or any member of his or her family has received, is receiving or expects to receive."

If at some stage we accept that proposal, which I have not tabled as a motion today for reasons that have been argued and which I perfectly understand, we shall effectively have banned consultancy advocacy, and I believe that that ban must be introduced.

We are not banning advisory consultancies. All we are saying about them is that some are dependent on membership of the House of Commons and the very exclusive knowledge that we acquire from being Members of the House. If we are advising organisations outside the House, the income, quite properly, should be declared, because the income is exclusively determined by the fact of membership of the House of Commons. Without membership, hon. Members would be of no use in providing advice.

We would go even further on general directorships. Hon. Members may be directors of companies that make widgets or, as I was once, of a company that manufactures clocks, or whatever. There is no question of contracts having. to be laid, or stipulating bandings of payments. The House and the public are not interested in what Members of Parliament earn or in what directors of companies earn. We are interested only when that income derives directly from membership of the House of Commons, and when Members of Parliament advise clients under a regime in which advocacy consultancy has been abolished. Those are essentially the reforms that many of us are pursuing.

I have another way in which to proceed; I would not necessarily proceed on the basis of the motions that we intend to carry this evening, although they will be helpful. The motion that deals in principle—only in principle—with payment bandings should go through. However, I believe that we should codify all the rules in a code of conduct.

I have spent my spare time in the past few weeks drawing up a code of conduct, which sets out in detail many of the motions before the House tonight, but which also goes further, in so far as it deals with the director of the widget manufacturing company, the advisory consultancy and the advocacy consultancy. All the rules would be there in the code.

My view is simple. If we develop a code on that basis—I hope in time to be able to publish my own code—we shall meet public concerns on these matters, and we shall stop once and for all the use of this place by people who want simply to make money out of membership of it.

6.5 pm

I declare my interest as a company chairman and practising business man.

Not unnaturally, I measure my support for the motions today against the checklist I made when I spoke in the House in May and when I wrote to Lord Nolan at the start of his work. Before I go further, I join others who have congratulated my right hon. Friend the Leader of the House on the assiduity with which he and his Select Committee have worked in recent weeks. I have not known of another Committee of the House that has got through so much work in so short a time. The whole House should be grateful to my right hon. Friend.

I am at ease with much of the Committee's report, in particular with self-regulation and the code of practice. I wanted there to be an ethical adviser, especially for new Members. The Committee has gone further, but I find nothing objectionable in that.

I wanted parliamentary questions that arose from a paid external retainer or consultancy to be starred or marked in some other agreed form. I believe that this is the effect of the convoluted wording of motion 6, and I hope that my right hon. Friend the Leader of the House can confirm that I am right in that assumption. I repeat: I hope that, when my right hon. Friend winds up, he can confirm that I am right in my assumption that motion 6 will ensure that, when a Member has an interest in a question that he has tabled, it is starred or marked in some way to indicate that fact.

I can confirm that. I am afraid that my attention wandered for a moment. However, I thought that I had made that point clear in my opening speech.

I am grateful to my right hon. Friend for confirming that point.

There is one point of omission, unless I have misunderstood. The Committee wants the Register of Members' Interests to be updated more quickly. I believe that the recommendation should go further. I believe that no Member should act in any matter in which he has an interest if he has not already put that interest on the Register. Until he has declared that interest on the Register, he should not take any action that is a result of that external retainer. I hope that my right hon. Friend the Leader of the House will put that suggestion on to the agenda for his Committee in future sittings.

I hope that, broadly, the requirements that will be laid on Members of the House of Commons as a result of the motions today will have their parallel in the Upper House. If they did not, that would be an odd omission in the proper workings of Parliament.

I now turn to the speech made by the hon. Member for Dewsbury (Mrs. Taylor). I wrote down what she said. She said that duties should engage all our attention. Those were the words she used, as she will find when she looks at Hansard tomorrow. Some Members of Parliament may have an hour or an hour and a half a day in which they may want to do what they feel like doing. If such a Member spends that time pursuing a business interest, he is making himself more able to be a more useful Member of Parliament than if he simply spent it chatting to his friends or enjoying a long lunch.

We need Members with real experience of matters outside the House. I see a difference between a Member of Parliament who is advising an outside body—such as a trade association, a trade union or a company—about the effect of matters in Parliament on that body, and a Member who is accepting advice from that body. It is right that the House should recognise that there is a difference there, and there may be a broader consensus on that matter than may have been thought.

Motion 7 is a matter of controversy, and I believe that the Committee was right in its recommendation. We need to consider carefully the effects of the amendments, which could, on a hot July afternoon, stampede the House into ill-considered requirements which could have unsatisfactory and unforeseen effects. We have suffered considerably in recent years from uncertainty about the rules of the House and what is right or not right. It would be very unfortunate for the House if, through these amendments, it exchanged one lot of ambiguities for another.

There may well be areas where consensus can be reached. I do not find objectionable the registration of the non-financial terms of a contract entered into by a Member to provide services to an external organisation. There may be a consensus in the House that that might be a way forward. But there seems to be a good deal of division in the House about publication of the amounts of payment. That, I put it to the House, is irrelevant.

The hon. Member for Dewsbury says that such amounts should be disclosed, because they show how much work a Member is doing. They do nothing of the sort. Some Members are worth £10 an hour, while others are worth £250 an hour. If a Member is paid £1,000, is it for four hours' work or 100 hours? I would not even pay £10 for some Members, but that is by the way. The amount paid is no indication of the work done, and the hon. Lady—with great respect—is quite wrong in assuming that there is a direct relationship.

The hon. Lady went on to say that the amount should be disclosed, so that it can be seen how important the work is to the Member. If a Member has nothing other than his parliamentary salary to rely on, a payment of £5,000 may be very important. But if he happens to have a private income of £20,000 or £30,000 a year, a payment of £5,000 will make practically no difference to him.

The hon. Lady is wrong in assuming that there is a direct relationship between the disclosure of the amount of money and the effect that that money has on the work that a Member is doing. It would be misleading if the House were to have such a degree of disclosure. Opposition Members wish to satisfy idle curiosity and create envy. They wish to act as levellers down in every respect. For those reasons, the House should reject the amendments and accept the motions.

6.13 pm

Those listening to the right hon. Member for Old Bexley and Sidcup (Sir E. Heath) and, just more recently, the right hon. Member for Honiton (Sir P. Emery) would have no idea whatsoever why the Nolan committee was set up. Listening to the right hon. Member for Old Bexley and Sidcup, one could imagine that—apart from the two individuals concerned—there was no particular reason why the Nolan committee was set up, although the right hon. Gentleman did not say that the Prime Minister was wrong to do so.

I believe—like all my Labour colleagues—that the Prime Minister was right to do what he did. But it is unfortunate that the Prime Minister has not given the sort of lead to Ministers that I would like to have seen. The Prime Minister has been asked repeatedly at Question Time if he is in favour of financial disclosure, as recommended by Nolan, but he has refused to give an answer.

Apart from Tory Members, there are very few people in the country who do not recognise—as we do on the Labour Benches—that reform in the way in which we should deal with outside financial interests is absolutely essential. Is there a single newspaper in the country—I do not know of one, no matter how Tory the newspaper—that does not believe that what Nolan recommended and what we consider to be the very minimum should be put into effect?

Have any constituents written letters to say "Don't implement Nolan—it is totally wrong; it is an intrusion into privacy; you are undermining your position as Members of Parliament; it is totally alien to the parliamentary way of life"? Have the right hon. Members for Old Bexley and Sidcup and for Honiton received such letters? I very much doubt it. There is a consensus that reform is necessary. Hence the reason we believe that Nolan has made a number of recommendations on financial disclosure which are essential.

I have received no letters at all, on either side of the argument.

In that case—according to the right hon. Gentleman—there is no need to proceed along the lines that the Opposition and Nolan believe to be necessary.

I must say straight away—I do not know whether I will be believed by Conservative Members or not—that I do not favour a ban on outside interests. I know that one or two of my hon. Friends are in favour of such a ban, or so they say. I can see no particular mileage for Labour Members in having full-time Tory Members. We get much more mileage the other way. One or two of my colleagues may disagree, but I do not believe that it would be useful to a Labour Government to have full-time Tory Members—whatever the numbers who manage to get into the next Parliament—doing their best, as the Opposition will do, to undermine that Labour Government.

Such a ban would be impractical. How could we have a ban on outside activities? Could we stop a Member writing a book and getting money from it? Could we try to stop a Member receiving payment for writing articles? It is simply impractical, and I have never argued in favour of that. I do not believe that many Labour Members would argue for such a ban. To some extent, such a ban could be a denial of a Member's basic civil liberties, and I would put it as strongly as that.

I have for some years written to the Chairman of the Select Committee on Members' Interests to urge that there should be at least some financial disclosure. I am not boasting at all, as the Committee Chairman and other members of the Committee will know of my interest. The right hon. Member for Old Bexley and Sidcup says that we are just trying to get information on other Members, and that it is unnecessary. I do not see the matter in that light at all.

Despite what the hon. Member for Hampshire, North-West (Sir D. Mitchell) said, there is a great deal of difference between someone receiving a relatively small sum—it may not be a relatively small to some of us, but that is by the way—of several hundred pounds or £2,000, and someone receiving a very substantial sum of money. Most people would understand that there is a difference.

I believe that Nolan's recommendations on this matter were right. I am not trying to say that I proposed all these ideas before Nolan, but in writing to the Committee at the time, I said that the exact sums were not necessary, and that the amounts should be listed in bands.

indicated assent.

The right hon. Member for Wealden confirms that that was what I said.

Of course, outside interests can have an unfortunate effect. When apartheid was operated in South Africa, I had a strong suspicion—I was not alone in this view—about some, if not all, of the Tory Members who got up at every opportunity to say that they were against apartheid, but went on to act as apologists for the South African Government. I believe that they might have had a commercial interest of sorts.

The same applies to other countries. Those who apologise for the dictatorship in China may be expressing the sincere view that there should be no protests about what is happening in that country; on the other hand, a commercial interest may be involved—who knows? It may not be, but we have understandable suspicions. It is possible that hon. Members are involved in financial dealings with companies that have relationships with countries governed by dictatorships.

When outside interests are mentioned, Conservative Members tend to say—indeed, they have said it today—that outside interests provide experience. They say, "We do not want to be full-time parliamentarians; outside interests help us in our work." It is remarkable, is it not, that the outside interest that Tory Members defend at every opportunity is very restrictive? This is not the kind of work in which the vast majority of our constituents are engaged; very few of my constituents are involved in consultancies and directorships.

I am not talking about combining the profession of barrister or solicitor with being a Member of Parliament. I find it difficult to believe that Conservative Members engage in such activities because they want to bring their experience to the Floor of the House.

My hon. Friend the Member for Workington (Mr. Campbell-Savours) is right. Why not be honest about this? I agree that there are some exceptions, but most hon. Members who take outside work of the kind that I have described do so for financial reasons: as my hon. Friend said, they do so because they want extra income. They do not want to rely on the basic parliamentary salary; they want a certain standard of living.

Although it is not a standard of living that I enjoy, or wish to enjoy, I appreciate that most Conservative Members want a different life style from that which they are likely to have on their current salary of £33,000 before deductions. As my hon. Friend also said, those with children at private schools will not get far on that amount. But why not be frank, and admit it? That would be far better than hiding behind the facade that outside work is all for the sake of parliamentary experience, and makes better Members of Parliament. No one really believes that.

What about the intrusion into our privacy? The other day, in a supplementary question, I expressed the view that there was no justification for the tabloids' intrusion into people's private lives, including the lives of a number of Members of Parliament—mainly Tory Members so far, although it could well be us on some future occasion.

When it comes to financial matters, however, what about the Register of Members' Interests? Is that not an intrusion into privacy? Which Tory Member today will stand up and say that it should not be allowed, as some did when it was to be established? The next step—an important step—is for us to clean up our act, so that we can be proud of the House of Commons rather than feeling that unsavoury actions have undermined our collective integrity and reputation. We should put that behind us. The very minimum is what Nolan has recommended, but it is clear that the right hon. Member for Honiton (Sir P. Emery) is against the principle of financial disclosure, and clearly many other Conservative Members strongly agree with him.

I believe that we are right to press our amendments and accept the principle of Nolan. As I have said, the sooner we clean up our act as a Parliament the better it will be, not only for us and our constituents but for British democracy.

6.23 pm

I, too, declare an interest. I have always been scrupulous about that; in fact, on one occasion, the Chairman of the Select Committee on Members' Interests said that I had declared too much rather than too little.

It seems to me that Nolan was born from knee-jerk reaction out of panic—panic induced by media hysteria and political expediency.

On a point of order, Madam Speaker. Will you ensure that the hon. Member for Wellingborough (Sir P. Fry) declares precisely what he does? He is directly affected by the debate, but he has not declared an interest.

If hon. Members have an interest to declare, it is appropriate for them to do so in this debate.

Thank you, Madam Speaker. May I declare immediately that for some years I have worked a multi-company consultancy? The hon. Member for Workington (Mr. Campbell-Savours) knows that perfectly well, but he may be surprised to learn that that is not the basis of my objections to some of the Nolan report.

I can live with that, however; I take the point. What I find hypocritical is the way in which the hon. Member for Dewsbury (Mrs. Taylor) defended her previous directorship of a multi-company agency. She said that she had no objection to declaring what she had been paid. That is not the point, however: under Nolan, she would be prohibited from being a director of such an agency. Was she ashamed of the work that she did for the agency? If she was not, why is it such a terrible sin today?

I said that I accepted the Nolan recommendations, not because I am ashamed of anything that I have done in the past, but because other hon. Members have breached rules that many of us thought already existed. I think that the Nolan recommendations would help to clean up everyone's act.

That is interesting. It seems that the hon. Lady thought that the rules already existed, and therefore does not think that any new rules are needed.

The hon. Member for Wallasey (Ms Eagle) said that we should give something up, but declared that no one had paid her anything. It is very easy to give up something that one has never enjoyed, so hers is hardly an effective argument. The hon. Member for Walsall, North (Mr. Winnick) said that we should do what the press wants. I have no doubt that the press is very interested in the hon. Gentleman's sex life; would he allow the publication of articles about how he behaves in the privacy of his own home? As the hon. Gentleman knows, his is a stupid argument.

The important point that has emerged from the debate is that my right hon. Friend the Leader of the House is absolutely right: it is very difficult to define what should be declared and what should not.

Let me say to two members of my party—one a former Cabinet Minister—that if they seriously believe that all hon. Members who are company directors are made company directors because people like their faces, they are abusing their own position. Hon. Members on both sides of the House are given company directorships basically because they are Members of Parliament. I do not wish to name them, but I know that that is the case.

In those circumstances, it becomes exceedingly difficult for any company director to give even the faintest advice to his fellow directors or his company that could possibly impinge on his position as a Member of Parliament—if we accept the Opposition's definition. He would be put in the ludicrous position of being unable to speak in the House on many issues.

Let me say to my right hon. Friend the Member for Honiton (Sir P. Emery) that it is all very well to say that hon. Members should not take part in a debate when they have an interest. What about general issues such as company taxation or pension law? According to my right hon. Friend, it would be wrong for any hon. Member who was a director of a company affected by such issues to make a speech about them. I consider that an unfair and unworkable restriction on comment.

As has emerged in the debate, what is important is whether advocacy—being paid to pursue an interest in the House—should be banned, and whether it should be subject to a declaration of income. We have already heard quite enough arguments to show that that requires much more detailed consideration.

I see no difference between a Member of Parliament who advises a trade association and a Member of Parliament who advises a trade union. I am aware of no reason why a Member of Parliament who assists a trade association is in any way different from a Member of Parliament who is a lawyer, whose law firm advises clients, or an accountant, whose accountancy firm advises clients, or a company director, who advises his fellow directors. That is the type of problem that we must solve in the present discussion, and I hope that the Select Committee will do it.

I am sick and tired of the hypocrisy that comes from Opposition Members. [HoN. MEMBERS: "Hear, Hear."] One would suppose that Labour Members of Parliament never did anything wrong, and were never influenced. I have sat on a Select Committee and watched Labour Members read the questions prepared by their trade unions, and if that is not trying to influence the course of the Select Committee, I do not know what is. So let us get away from the idea that the only hypocrisy is among Conservative Members. There is just as much among Opposition Members.

I do agree with the Opposition about one thing. It is important that we now get it right. Whether we like Nolan being created or not, we have to live with it, and presumably we must make it work in a way that is acceptable to the majority of Members. There is a great danger in going too far. The further we go, the more likely it is that we shall end up with total declaration of income, which will undoubtedly mean that the quality of people who want to stand in elections for this place will go down.

I commend my right hon. Friend the Leader of the House for the motion that he has placed before the House. It is clear, from the composition of the Committee and the contributions that those Members have made, that they are learning of the difficulties, which I and others have outlined this afternoon, in trying to define the various types of consultancies that should take place. I have faith in the Committee. I certainly have no faith in the amendments tabled by the hon. Member for Dewsbury.

6.30 pm

The hon. Member for Wellingborough (Sir P. Fry) said that, if transparency comes in—if the truth about what is happening to Members' income is known—the reputation of the House will suffer. Many of us would regard that as an admission of guilt.

The problem, as my hon. Friends have said, is a matter of income—not only income from outside sources, but total income—and the sums that Conservative Members are paid from outside the House affect that.

I have before me a list of 156 hon. Members who voted against our increases in wages and allowances, but who declare very substantial interests. I could read that list out, but it would take all the time available to me. Those 156 hon. Members have said that £31,000 is a proper income for Members of Parliament. If they believe that, there is no reason why they should take sums of money from outside.

What sums of money? I declare an interest—in receiving occasional fees from journalism and broadcasting, but never more than £5,000 a year. I am not sponsored, and I never will be. Conservative Members use that argument against us. The usual sums of money that come in from trade union sponsorship are very small and in almost all cases go directly to the constituency.

I believe that the Opposition should break the direct link between Members of Parliament and individual unions, because Members of Parliament should not be for hire. I know of no union that pays more than £1,000, but one Conservative Member has confessed that he receives £200,000 in income, not from what he was doing previously, and not from any job, but because he is a Member of Parliament.

It is crucial that those sums are declared. One Labour Member declares 12 jars of honey per year. It is reasonable to assume that the people who give 12 jars of honey do not get as much work out of their Member of Parliament as do the companies who pay £200,000 a year hiring a Conservative Member.

It was a sad day for the House when it approved a Select Committee recommendation that there should be transparency on Lloyd's, but its decision was not respected by very senior Members, including an ex-Prime Minister, who said that they would ignore it and that they would not give the details about their income. That was a disgraceful act against the reputation of the House of Commons, and it is what we are discussing today.

Our reputation as the mother of Parliaments has been besmirched by Conservative Members who have become used to huge incomes from outside this building. We are elected as Members for our own constituency and to represent our parties. We were not elected as Members for the transport and general workers party or the general, municipal, boilermakers and allied trades party or megagreed plc; we are here to represent our constituents.

I shall give a practical example of a road safety issue that led to hon. Members being assailed on one side by trade unions arguing a particular case. The example concerns bull bars, with which I have been very much involved. A union in my constituency represents people who manufacture bull bars. Jobs were at stake. If I had been sponsored by that union, it would have put pressure on me to act in a certain way. On the other side, the firms that manufacture the bull bars would, through their trade associations, have brought pressure to bear on a Conservative Member of Parliament.

Who speaks for the victims of the accidents caused by bull bars? They cannot pay to hire any Member of the House. We do not know who they are; there is no interest there. If hon. Members say that I must speak because of my trade union—I criticise my own party in that regard—or that I must speak because of the firm, because otherwise no one will speak for them, I ask, "Who speaks for all those interests such as the charities and the people who cannot afford to hire Members of Parliament?"

The message of today's debate, and the message of Nolan, is that the country is sick of the idea that Members are paid—and paid handsomely—to represent interests. Labour Members must sever the link between unions and individual Members, which is a venal sin. The sins on the other side are mortal because the sums involved are very great.

I want to remind my hon. Friend, who is my colleague in Newport, that, throughout the long time that I have served in the House, I have been sponsored by the Transport and General Workers Union. I have never personally received a penny from that trade union. Any money that has been received has gone directly to my constituency party. My union card is just about my most treasured possession, and I fully support the principle of sponsorship of Members.

I have for some time been president of the constituency party to which my hon. Friend refers. Of course there was nothing wrong with the tradition because it was established when Members had no pay. I am saying that the Government are now using that arrangement as a stick to beat us with and to undermine the principle. Such a link is not worth retaining, although we must maintain a strong link between the trade union movement and our party.

I am grateful for being called, rather unexpectedly, in the debate. The matter is of enormous importance, and it is a great shame that the Conservative Members who have spoken are obviously speaking for their interests—for their wallets—rather than for the proud principles of the mother of Parliaments.

6.37 pm

I congratulate. my right hon. Friend the Leader of the House, who chaired the Select Committee on Standards in Public Life, on the way in which he handled it. Throughout our proceedings, there was constructive debate by hon. Members from all the political parties represented, which I found interesting and informative.

In some senses, I arrived at the Committee with apprehensions and anxieties, but during the debate I saw us shape and reshape aspects of the Nolan report so that we delivered to the House today, especially in the first six resolutions, something of which I think we all may feel justifiably proud.

I am especially proud of the report that we have delivered in respect of the Commissioner and the new Committee. As my right hon. Friend knows, I was especially keen on, and pursued, the idea of natural justice throughout that part of our discussions.

The thing that I am most interested in—I am keen that the House should recognise it—is that we shall have replaced what I believe is the flawed system that we have now, which is in some senses a form of kangaroo court for accused Members, with a system whereby the individual concerned, as and when they are brought before either the Commissioner or the Committee, will have the right to have someone with them as an adviser and the opportunity to cross-examine those who make allegations.

The hon. Gentleman misrepresents the wording in the report.

If he reads the report, the hon. Gentleman will find that it does say that. We must address immediately the key question of the Committee and the Parliamentary Commissioner. The matter of the Commissioner may be linked to the code of conduct. Perhaps we should think about it a little more. One or two hon. Members have drawn my attention to the fact that, in paragraph 14, we accept that the principal duties of the Parliamentary Commissioner should include:

"Receiving and investigating complaints about the conduct of Members (whether related directly to alleged breaches of the Code or not) and reporting his findings to the Committee through the Sub-Committee appointed for that purpose."

I have talked to the hon. Member for St. Helens, North (Mr. Evans) about that issue and he referred to it earlier. We should not create a charter whereby disgruntled citizens with an axe to grind pursue hon. Members and make obscure and absurd accusations against them simply because they disagree with the way in which hon. Members go about their duties. Constituents have the right to decide at the end of the life of a Parliament whether they like or dislike the way in which their representatives have performed. I hope that we shall clear up that matter during further deliberation.

The critical motion—7—has caused the greatest amount of discussion and argument today. I think that, in many ways, we have managed to miss the point and the real problem. I listened to what the hon. Member for Dewsbury (Mrs. Taylor) said. At the end of a good speech, she suddenly delivered a warning—if not a threat—about tonight's vote. I accept that the hon. Lady is trying to galvanise the attitudes, the instincts and perhaps even the fears of hon. Members in an attempt to get them to think carefully about how they will vote. I have thought about what I intend to do, and I have absolutely no problem with voting down the amendments to motion 7.

One of the amendments asks us to examine the principle. I believe that it is quite impossible for us to implement the Nolan report in principle because it is impossible to ascertain what that principle is. The problem with Nolan—it will require further discussion—

Delay.

If the hon. Gentleman would engage his brain before his mouth, he might learn something. The problem is that, in its rush to complete the report, the Nolan committee did not address the real problem. Our constituents are most concerned about certain reprehensible activities, which have been reported in the press. The 1947 resolution clearly states that advocacy should not be allowed, but the Register of Members' Interests has confused the issue. The principle must be that paid advocacy should not be allowed, but that principle is not enshrined in the amendments.

During the Committee hearings, I proposed an alternative which appears in paragraph 74 of the report. I have not amended it tonight, although it may have some flaws, because I intend to raise it myself and to force the House to decide whether to accept my proposals at a later stage. We must look at the 1947 resolution, define "advocacy" and then rule it out. It could take the form of being forced by an outside interest to put down written questions, to table or sign early-day motions or to table amendments to legislation. There may be further discussion about the issue; I accept that.

The point is that I will not vote for the amendments tonight because I believe that we need to go further than Nolan has gone. We must consider the problem with regard to hon. Members' outside interests. There has been much talk about the amount of money that hon. Members earn. For most hon. Members, who are remunerated with small amounts of money from a variety of different sources, such as trade unions, consultancies or multiple client agencies, the result is much the same. The fact is that that should not happen.

The best way to tackle the problem is to cut out the cancer at source: we must put a halt to advocacy. We should not try to define what companies are good or bad. Hon. Members will find ways around that. They will write new contracts and they will register their interests in a different manner. It concerns me that the Nolan report provides a means of avoiding the controls that are in place at the moment. The Register of Members' Interests is far more stringent than Nolan would have us accept. There are routes through it—the definitions are ill thought out.

We must have more time to consider the matter. We undertake to give the House the opportunity to reach a decision by the end of the Session. There is no question that that undertaking will be avoided. I shall put forward the argument that we must deal with advocacy and I hope that hon. Members will support me when the time comes. Tonight is not the time to put down a point of principle because that point of principle does not exist.

When we have completed our deliberations, we must ensure that our proposals are workable, that they will stand the test of time and that they will put a stop to the constant backbiting. Hon. Members from all political parties represent their constituents very honourably, even though they may have outside interests. The reality is that, most of the time, this place behaves with great dignity and honour. I think that it is high time that we enshrined that principle. We must offer the House a workable proposal that will stand the test of time.

6.47 pm

This has been a much better tempered debate than the previous one on 18 May. I think that I have missed only one speech by Conservative Members, who have certainly been less hostile to the concept of Nolan than they were on that day. In the main—I accept that there will be some resistance—hon. Members seem to accept the thrust of the Select Committee's report and the majority of the agreed amendments.

I refer in particular to natural justice and representation before the Privileges Committee, to which the hon. Member for Chingford (Mr. Duncan Smith) referred. That matter has been raised before. The Committee did appear to be a kangaroo court, but the Select Committee has now made recommendations about how the new investigatory process will work in order to achieve representation and natural justice. Although it does not involve full cross-examination, it is a much fairer and more acceptable system. There will be speedier justice because the new Privileges Committee will be able to meet when the House is not sitting.

That said, it is almost a case of the lull before the storm. Judging from the comments that have been made both inside and outside the Chamber, the end game for most hon. Members is how to kill off the two central issues that divide the House and upon which we shall vote tonight: the banning of multi-client lobbies and financial disclosure. That is the bottom line and that is where the battle lines will be drawn. The problem will not go away after today. Time may be won or it may not, but, at some point, the issue will return to haunt the Government.

I do not have time to refer to all the speeches, but I completely reject the former Prime Minister's allegation that the Opposition are trying to pry into the affairs of others. We want disclosure of activities relating to the public position of Members of Parliament—nothing more, nothing less.

rose—

I also reject completely the suggestion that my hon. Friend the Member for Dewsbury (Mrs. Taylor) was threatening Conservative Members. Tomorrow, this debate will be fully reported in the press and hon. Members who seek to frustrate or oppose disclosure, which will only be from November anyway, on the banded basis of the money or multi-client lobby, will be listed and questions are bound to be asked.

rose—

The Prime Minister set up the Nolan committee to work quickly, and it has. After the Select Committee reported on 11 July, a leader in The Independent stated:

"The fuss that Tory MPs are making is remarkable, considering how mild is the dose of probity that Nolan has prescribed."

rose—

Order. My understanding is that the hon. Member for Birmingham, Perry Barr (Mr. Rooker) does not wish to give way.

I do not wish to give way, Madam Speaker.

It was stated in The Times on 11 July that

"it was clear long before the Nolan report was published in May that its recommendations on MPs' duty to disclose their outside interests was likely to face hostility in the Commons."

The Times commented that lack of leadership by the Prime Minister, in not saying specifically whether he agreed with Nolan, has allowed dissent on the Conservative Benches. That bodes ill for the future. We want a decision and the public rightly expect the House to make a positive decision.

I say without party rancour that it is true, save for one or two cases, that the Opposition must and have sought to avoid taking a holier than thou approach, because every Member of Parliament is tainted in the eyes of the public as a consequence of the actions of a few hon. Members. It has been made clear by some Members of Parliament in comments made outside the House that accepting Nolan would mean bringing in outsiders, wrecking hundreds of years of parliamentary sovereignty and putting the whole edifice of democracy at stake. I reject that as absolute nonsense.

I was surprised that, last week, the right hon. Member for Wokingham (Mr. Redwood)—whom I have given notice of this reference to him—made remarks that created headlines on Saturday such as

"Redwood rallies the Right with attack on Nolan"

and

"Redwood to attack Nolan in bid for right-wing crown".

He said that Nolan breached parliamentary sovereignty and that this

"undermines the very foundations of our settled and unwritten constitution."

I do not share that view, which is based on a bygone age of ignorance, trust and deference on the part of the British people. In those days, we were privileged to enjoy something that we do not have today—a law-abiding society, and a Government and Parliament that were honourable and capable. There was consensus on public service and probity among people who might be termed the elite, which created a legitimacy of popular consent outside the House. Long before I entered the House, custom and tradition were enough to restrain the abuse of office and power.

Those days are gone and Parliament must change. No change means no chance for Parliament in the court of public opinion, which is the court in which we find ourselves. The public want written rules and codes, and want them enforced. The public will not accept Members of Parliament being a law unto themselves because they are the law makers. Members of Parliament for hire give the impression of a Parliament for hire, and we must stamp that out. We are hired by our constituents and that is where it should stop. Why should Members of Parliament who hire themselves out want to prevent disclosure of the contracts and financial amounts involved? Is it because they pretend to have influence with Ministers and officials in exchange for reward? If so, we should be told and the public should know. If a local councillor did the same, he would be committing an offence.

No honourable Member of Parliament can claim in the House tonight that implementing all of Nolan in spirit and in practice would interfere with any of our prime functions, which are to represent our constituents, hold the Government to account and serve as the forum of the nation in which ideas can be debated—whether they be good, bad or tasteless. The conduct of policy and politics must change and be seen to change. The decline in deference is to be welcomed, but the decline in consensus and trust between Government and the governed, between Parliament and the people, is to be deplored.

Members of Parliament are responsible for leadership and for setting a new agenda. We are responsible for leaving the political process in a better, healthier state than the one in which we found it. That can only be done if we vote tonight to start implementing in full all the Nolan recommendations.

6.55 pm

I agree with the opening remark of the hon. Member for Birmingham, Perry Bar (Mr. Rooker), that this debate was of significantly better quality than the one on 18 May, a week after the Nolan report was published. I say with a tinge of regret that the tone just adopted by the hon. Gentleman did not contribute to that better quality. I could have wished that the hon. Gentleman had adopted a calmer and more measured tone, in the way that informed the majority of today's speeches.

Is my right hon. Friend aware that a high proportion of Labour Members receive benefits under contracts for trade unions not just for asking a couple of questions but questions by the sackload, generated by union research departments? Worse, Labour Members speak on behalf of trade unions, as we saw in last week's debate on the railways. Worst of all, Labour Members vote in the interests of trade unions. Should not that sort of thing be banned?

That point is touched on in the Nolan report and it relates to a question that I put to the hon. Member for Dewsbury (Mrs. Taylor) during her speech. It is plain from paragraph 14 on page 4 of the report, where its recommendations are summarised, that it is envisaged that the same rules as would apply in respect of consultancies in certain circumstances would apply also to trade union sponsorship—including the value of any support services, which can be significant. I agree with my hon. Friend that that aspect should be taken into account, and it will be taken into account in the continuing work of the Select Committee that I have been chairing, if the House agrees to motion 7.

I arrived for this debate minded to vote for the Opposition amendments, but having listened to most of the debate, I am persuaded that there are matters of real detail. I still support the case for transparency, so can my right hon. Friend assure me that if I vote with him tonight, I will not be voting for deliberate delay and for undermining the Nolan report?

I hope and believe that I can give my hon. Friend that assurance. I was going to say, emboldened by the remarks of a number of hon. Members on both sides of the House—not least members of the Committee, who were good enough to say kind words about my chairmanship of it—that no member of the Committee could credibly claim that I have been leading and chairing the Committee in a way designed to cause delay and to avoid the best possible progress.

I acknowledge, of course, that everything must ultimately rest on my word. I hope, however, that my conduct as Chairman of the Select Committee on Standards in Public Life and what has been said about that in the debate lends credibility to the assurance that I give my hon. Friend that deliberate delay is not the purpose. I hope that I read the hon. Member for Dewsbury aright and that I am not putting words into her mouth when I say that in her opening remarks she came close to saying that when I first sketched the proposal for a Select Committee, first privately to her and then more publicly in the debate on 18 May, she thought that I was trying to push the whole issue into the long grass and have delay, but had changed her mind during the Committee's proceedings.

The Leader of the House will recall that at the end of the debate on 18 May I asked him to specify the Committee's remit, and it was that on which we negotiated. The issue was whether we could clarify and implement the recommendations. That was critical. There has not been delay except for the crunch issue.

I am grateful to the hon. Lady. Our exchanges led to the terms of reference, to the date of 7 July being set, to the intensive programme of activity that the Committee has undertaken and to a substantial number of motions being put to the House in an almost incredibly short period. That lends credibility to the assurance that I have given my hon. Friend the Member for Spelthorne (Mr. Wilshire). I want to assure the hon. Members for Workington (Mr. Campbell-Savours) and for Wallasey (Ms Eagle), who if I may put it in this way were among the sceptics, that our purpose is not delay.

I shall try to lend credibility to something that by definition is not capable of absolute proof. I do not believe that the terms of motion 7 are consistent with delay, pushing into the long grass, trying to bury or whatever. The fact that the Committee has power to meet during the recess, unlike the Privileges Committee, for example, until last night or the night before, is not consistent with delay. The fact that I have arranged a meeting for tomorrow afternoon, on the first day of the recess, is not consistent with delay. It is not consistent with delay that I have asked members of the Committee to bring their diaries with them tomorrow afternoon with a view to ascertaining whether we can arrange some meetings in September, it being not unreasonable for them to be away a bit during August.

The Leader of the House rightly identifies me as something of a sceptic. Will he try to reassure me further by taking the opportunity to say that the Committee will be trying to implement the Nolan recommendations in two crucial areas rather than merely examining them? As a sceptic, I am worried that examination will lead to excuses not to implement the crucial recommendations to declare levels and to ban multi-client consultancies.

I shall not reiterate what I have said. I shall seek to ensure that the Committee will proceed, as it has proceeded, faithfully to fulfil its terms of reference, to advise the House on how the Nolan recommendations might be clarified and implemented, and to put forward specific motions on which the House might decide. We have demonstrated that we have been able to do that in areas that appeared to be extremely difficult six to eight weeks ago. I believe that we shall be able to do so in other areas but that remains to be demonstrated.

There is another reason why I believe that approach to be the right one, and it has been demonstrated clearly by the debate. There has been almost no comment or criticism on and of any of the motions that I have proposed with the exception of the one that is undoubtedly contentious. On 18 May, however, there was near revolution in some quarters over the very idea that we might have a Commissioner for Parliamentary Standards. By painstakingly working through the proposals and devising the arrangements that are reflected in motion 3, we have been able to bring proposals before the House that I judge, on the basis of the debate, to be broadly and generally acceptable to right hon. and hon. Members on both sides of the House.

Significant reservation has been expressed about only one of our proposals, and that was by my right hon. Friend the Member for Old Bexley and Sidcup (Sir E. Heath). I suggested within the Committee that there should be the establishment of a new Committee of standards and privileges. I shall not rehearse all the arguments. In my view, that suggestion, if implemented, would not lower the status of the Privileges Committee but would raise the status of the work that has hitherto been done by the Select Committee on Members' Interests. I do not believe that the new Committee wold be any less prestigious than the Privileges Committee has been over the years. I do not intend that it should be.

The proposal, if implemented, would avoid the difficult overlap that has occurred in recent times between investigations of the Select Committee on Members' Interests and the Privileges Committee. I think that that overlap was in the mind of my right hon. Friend the Member for Old Bexley and Sidcup. I remind him that it was the hon. Member for Dewsbury, I think, who said that it was specifically envisaged that the new Committee would have the power to create sub-committees partly to deal with or to meet the problem of overlap should it arise.

Perhaps my right hon. Friend will quickly answer the point made by my hon. Friend the Member for Chingford (Mr. Duncan Smith): that if an Opposition Member, or even a Conservative Member, is bad at answering his constituency correspondence and is not seen in the constituency enough, that will be a matter for the electorate and not for the commissioner.

Yes, of course I can. The hon. Member for St. Helens, North (Mr. Evans) will confirm that we discussed that very issue in the Committee. We recognised that there could be a channel for vexatious complaints of any sort. If my hon. Friend reads the report carefully he will find that a number of the provisions that we have suggested are explicitly designed to avoid such a channel opening, which I think he and every other Member would think unreasonable. That approach is partly responsible for the passage in paragraph 26 of the report of the Select Committee on Standards in Public Life, which reads:

"Where, however, the Commissioner decided that no prima facie case had been established, he would merely report the facts to the Committee. The Committee would inform both the complainant and the Member concerned, but no details of the complaint would be published."

That is an important safeguard that is directed exactly to the concern that my hon. Friend has expressed.

Those who are members of the Select Committee will have had a sense of déjà vu during the course of some of the arguments that have been advanced this evening. Without insulting anyone, I hope, I should say that little has been said during the debate that appeared to me to add significantly to the arguments that were deployed before the Select Committee and lead me to feel that I should respond in a significantly different way, or additionally, from or to my comments in opening the debate.

I have not heard seriously questioned from the Opposition Front Bench or from the Back Benches on either side of the House the real need to undertake more detailed work before anyone can be sure of what we are talking about when we say implement Nolan. My recommendation remains that the House should pass motion 7 as it stands.

Question put and agreed to.

Resolved,

That the appointment of a Parliamentary Commissioner for Standards be set in hand under arrangements to be made by Madam Speaker on the advice of the House of Commons Commission and in accordance with the recommendations of the Select Committee on Standards in Public Life.

Select Committee On Standards And Privileges

Resolved,

That, with effect from the beginning of the next Session, a new Select Committee on Standards and Privileges should be established to take over the existing functions of the Committee of Privileges and the Select Committee on Members' Interests and to consider complaints concerning Members' conduct referred to it by the Parliamentary Commissioner for Standards.—[Mr. Newton.]

Code Of Conduct

Resolved,

That this House endorses the principle of a Code of Conduct, and instructs the appropriate Select Committee to prepare such a draft Code for approval as soon as possible, taking into account the suggestions of the Nolan Committee and any relevant overseas analogues; and whilst restating its commitment to the objectives of the Resolution of the House of 15th July 1947 relating to Privileges, accepts the need to review its wording in the context of the work to be undertaken on the draft Code.—[Mr. Newton.]

Members' Interests (Declaration)

Resolved,

That, with effect from the beginning of the next Session, the Resolution of the House of 12th June 1975 relating to Members' Interests (Declaration) (No. 2) be amended by leaving out the words "the giving of any written notice or".—[Mr. Newton.]

Consultancies And Disclosures In Theregister Of Members' Interests

Motion made, and Question proposed,

That this House endorses the need for an examination of the recommendations of the Nolan Committee relating to consultancies (including multi-client consultancies) and disclosures in the Register of Members' Interests; and instructs the Select Committee on Standards in Public Life to conduct such an examination and to seek to bring forward proposals on these matters by the end of the current Session.— [Mr. Newton.]

Amendment proposed: (a), line 1, leave out from 'That' to end and add

'from the beginning of the next Session Members should be required to deposit in full with the Parliamentary Commissioner for Standards any contracts relating to the provision of services in their capacity as Members; that such contracts should be available for public inspection; that from the same time Members should be required to

declare in the Register their annual remuneration in respect of such agreements; that the use of bands of up to £1,000 and thereafter every £5,000 be treated as an acceptable way of complying with this requirement; and that an estimate of the monetary value of benefits in kind, including support services, should also be included.'.— [Mrs. Ann Taylor.]

Amendment proposed to the proposed amendment: (x), in line 9, at end add

'subject to the proviso that this Resolution shall only take effect if the Select Committee on Standards in Public Life has not brought forward proposals on these matters by the end of the current session which define precisely the meaning of contracts relating to the provision of services in their capacity as Members.'.— [Mr. Maclennan.]

Question put, That the amendment to the proposed amendment be made:—

The House divided: Ayes 15, Noes 515.

Division No. 211]	[7.09 pm
AYES
Beith, Rt Hon A J	Maclennan, Robert
Bruce, Malcolm (Gordon)	Maddock, Diana
Campbell, Menzies (Fife NE)	Michie, Mrs Ray (Argyll & Bute)
Chidgey, David	Rendel, David
Foster, Don (Bath)	Taylor, Matthew (Truro)
Harvey, Nick	Tyler, Paul
Jones, Nigel (Cheltenham)	Tellers for the Ayes:
Kennedy, Charles (Ross, C&S)	Mr. Archy Kirkwood and Mr. Simon Hughes.
Lynne, Ms Liz

NOES
Adams, Mrs Irene	Berry, Roger
Ainger, Nick	Betts, Clive
Ainsworth, Peter (East Surrey)	Biffen, Rt Hon John
Ainsworth, Robert (Cov'try NE)	Blair, Rt Hon Tony
Alexander, Richard	Blunkett, David
Alison, Rt Hon Michael (Selby)	Boateng, Paul
Allason, Rupert (Torbay)	Bonsor, Sir Nicholas
Allen, Graham	Booth, Hartley
Amess, David	Boswell, Tim
Ancram, Michael	Bottomley, Peter (Eltham)
Anderson, Donald (Swansea E)	Bottomley, Rt Hon Virginia
Anderson, Ms Janet (Ros'dale)	Bowden, Sir Andrew
Arbuthnot, James	Bowis, John
Armstrong, Hilary	Boyson, Rt Hon Sir Rhodes
Arnold, Jacques (Gravesham)	Bradley, Keith
Arnold, Sir Thomas (Hazel Grv)	Brandreth, Gyles
Ashby, David	Bray, Dr Jeremy
Ashton, Joe	Brazier, Julian
Atkins, Rt Hon Robert	Bright, Sir Graham
Atkinson, David (Bour'mouth E)	Brooke, Rt Hon Peter
Atkinson, Peter (Hexham)	Brown, Gordon (Dunfermline E)
Austin-Walker, John	Brown, M (Brigg & Cl'thorpes)
Baker, Rt Hon Kenneth (Mole V)	Brown, N (N'c'tle upon Tyne E)
Baker, Nicholas (North Dorset)	Browning, Mrs Angela
Baldry, Tony	Bruce, Ian (Dorset)
Banks, Matthew (Southport)	Budgen, Nicholas
Banks, Robert (Harrogate)	Burden, Richard
Banks, Tony (Newham NW)	Burt, Alistair
Barnes, Harry	Butler, Peter
Barron, Kevin	Butterfill, John
Bates, Michael	Byers, Stephen
Batiste, Spencer	Caborn, Richard
Battle, John	Callaghan, Jim
Bayley, Hugh	Campbell, Mrs Anne (C'bridge)
Beckett, Rt Hon Margaret	Campbell, Ronnie (Blyth V)
Bellingham, Henry	Campbell-Savours, D N
Bendall, Vivian	Canavan, Dennis
Benn, Rt Hon Tony	Cann, Jamie
Bennett, Andrew F	Carrington, Matthew
Benton, Joe	Carttiss, Michael
Beresford, Sir Paul	Cash, William

Channon, Rt Hon Paul	Fenner, Dame Peggy
Chapman, Sydney	Field, Frank (Birkenhead)
Chisholm, Malcolm	Fishburn, Dudley
Church, Judith	Flynn, Paul
Clapham, Michael	Forman, Nigel
Clappison, James	Forsyth, Rt Hon Michael (Stirling)
Clark, Dr David (South Shields)	Forth, Eric
Clarke, Eric (Midlothian)	Foster, Rt Hon Derek
Clarke, Rt Hon Kenneth (Ru'clif)	Foulkes, George
Clarke, Tom (Monklands W)	Fox, Sir Marcus (Shipley)
Clelland, David	Fraser, John
Clwyd, Mrs Ann	Freeman, Rt Hon Roger
Coe, Sebastian	French, Douglas
Coffey, Ann	Fry, Sir Peter
Corvin, Michael	Fyfe, Maria
Congdon, David	Galbraith, Sam
Connarty, Michael	Gale, Roger
Conway, Derek	Gapes, Mike
Cook, Frank (Stockton N)	Gardiner, Sir George
Coombs, Anthony (Wyre For'st)	Garel-Jones, Rt Hon Tristan
Coombs, Simon (Swindon)	Garnier, Edward
Cope, Rt Hon Sir John	Garrett, John
Corbett, Robin	George, Bruce
Corbyn, Jeremy	Gerrard, Neil
Cormack, Sir Patrick	Gilbert, Rt Hon Dr John
Corston, Jean	Gillan, Cheryl
Cousins, Jim	Godman, Dr Norman A
Cox, Tom	Godsiff, Roger
Cran, James	Golding, Mrs Llin
Cummings, John	Goodlad, Rt Hon Alastair
Cunliffe, Lawrence	Gorst, Sir John
Cunningham, Jim (Covy SE)	Graham, Thomas
Cunningham, Rt Hon Dr John	Grant, Sir A (SW Cambs)
Cunningham, Roseanna	Greenway, Harry (Ealing N)
Curry, David (Skipton & Ripon)	Greenway, John (Ryedale)
Dalyell, Tam	Griffiths, Nigel (Edinburgh S)
Darling, Alistair	Griffiths, Win (Bridgend)
Davidson, Ian	Grocott, Bruce
Davies, Bryan (Oldham C'tral)	Grylls, Sir Michael
Davies, Rt Hon Denzil (Llanelli)	Gummer, Rt Hon John Selwyn
Davies, Quentin (Stamford)	Gunnell, John
Davies, Ron (Caerphilly)	Hague, William
Davis, David (Boothferry)	Hain, Peter
Davis, Terry (B'ham, H'dge H'I)	Hall, Mike
Denham, John	Hamilton, Rt Hon Sir Archibald
Deva, Nirj Joseph	Hampson, Dr Keith
Devlin, Tim	Hanley, Rt Hon Jeremy
Dewar, Donald	Hannam, Sir John
Dicks, Terry	Hanson, David
Dixon, Don	Hardy, Peter
Dobson, Frank	Hargreaves, Andrew
Dorrell, Rt Hon Stephen	Harman, Ms Harriet
Douglas-Hamilton, Lord James	Harris, David
Dover, Den	Haselhurst, Sir Alan
Dowd, Jim	Hattersley, Rt Hon Roy
Duncan, Alan	Hawkins, Nick
Duncan-Smith, Iain	Hawksley, Warren
Dunn, Bob	Hayes, Jerry
Durant, Sir Anthony	Heald, Oliver
Dunwoody, Mrs Gwyneth	Heath, Rt Hon Sir Edward
Dykes, Hugh	Heathcoat-Amory, David
Eagle, Ms Angela	Henderson, Doug
Eastham, Ken	Hendry, Charles
Eggar, Rt Hon Tim	Heseltine, Rt Hon Michael
Elletson, Harold	Hicks, Robert
Emery, Rt Hon Sir Peter	Higgins, Rt Hon Sir Terence
Etherington, Bill	Hill, Keith (Streatham)
Evans, David (Wetwyn Hatfield)	Hinchliffe, David
Evans, John (St Helens N)	Hodge, Margaret
Evans, Jonathan (Brecon)	Hoey, Kate
Evans, Roger (Monmouth)	Hogg, Rt Hon Douglas (G'tham)
Ewing, Mrs Margaret	Hogg, Norman (Cumbernauld)
Faber, David	Hood, Jimmy
Fabricant, Michael	Hoon, Geoffrey
Fatchett, Derek	Horam, John
Faulds, Andrew	Howard, Rt Hon Michael

Howarth, Alan (Strat'rd-on-A)	Mahon, Alice
Howarth, George (Knowsley North)	Maitland, Lady Olga
Howell, Sir Ralph (N Norfolk)	Major, Rt Hon John
Howells, Dr. Kim (Pontypridd)	Malone, Gerald
Hoyle, Doug	Mandelson, Peter
Hughes, Kevin (Doncaster N)	Mans, Keith
Hughes, Robert G (Harrow W)	Marek, Dr John
Hughes, Roy (Newport E)	Marland, Paul
Hunt, Rt Hon David (Wirral W)	Marshall, David (Shettleston)
Hunt, Sir John (Ravensbourne)	Marshall, Jim (Leicester, S)
Hunter, Andrew	Marshall, Sir Michael (Arundel)
Hurd, Rt Hon Douglas	Martin, Michael J (Springburn)
Hutton, John	Martlew, Eric
Illsley, Eric	Mates, Michael
Ingram, Adam	Mawhinney, Rt Hon Dr Brian
Jack, Michael	Maxton, John
Jackson, Glenda (H'stead)	Mayhew, Rt Hon Sir Patrick
Jackson, Helen (Shef'ld, H)	Meacher, Michael
Jamieson, David	Mellor, Rt Hon David
Janner, Greville	Merchant, Piers
Jenkin, Bernard	Michael, Alun
Jessel, Toby	Michie, Bill (Sheffield Heeley)
Johnson Smith, Sir Geoffrey	Milburn, Alan
Jones, Gwilym (Cardiff N)	Miller, Andrew
Jones, Jon Owen (Cardiff C)	Mills, Iain
Jones, Lynne (B'ham S O)	Mitchell, Andrew (Gedling)
Jones, Martyn (Clwyd, SW)	Mitchell, Sir David (NW Hants)
Jones, Robert B (W Hertfdshr)	Moate, Sir Roger
Jopling, Rt Hon Michael	Monro, Sir Hector
Jowell, Tessa	Montgomery, Sir Fergus
Kennedy, Jane (L'pool Br'dg'n)	Moonie, Dr Lewis
Key, Robert	Morgan, Rhodri
Khabra, Piara S	Morley, Elliot
Kilfoyle, Peter	Morris, Rt Hon Alfred (Wy'nshawe)
Kirkhope, Timothy	Morris, Estelle (B'ham Yardley)
Knapman, Roger	Morris, Rt Hon John (Aberavon)
Knight, Mrs Angela (Erewash)	Moss, Malcolm
Knight, Greg (Derby N)	Mowlam, Marjorie
Knight, Dame Jill (Bir'm E'st'n)	Mudie, George
Knox, Sir David	Mullin, Chris
Kynoch, George (Kincardine)	Murphy, Paul
Lait, Mrs Jacqui	Needham, Rt Hon Richard
Lamont, Rt Hon Norman	Nelson, Anthony
Lang, Rt Hon Ian	Neubert, Sir Michael
Lawrence, Sir Ivan	Newton, Rt Hon Tony
Leigh, Edward	Nicholls, Patrick
Lennox-Boyd, Sir Mark	Nicholson, Emma (Devon West)
Lestor, Joan (Eccles)	Norris, Steve
Lewis, Terry	O'Brien, Mike (N W'kshire)
Lidington, David	O'Brien, William (Normanton)
Lightbown, David	O'Hara, Edward
Lilley, Rt Hon Peter	Olner, Bill
Litherland, Robert	O'Neill, Martin
Lloyd, Rt Hon Sir Peter (Fareham)	Onslow, Rt Hon Sir Cranley
Lloyd, Tony (Stretford)	Oppenheim, Phillip
Lord, Michael	Orme, Rt Hon Stanley
Loyden, Eddie	Ottaway, Richard
Luff, Peter	Page, Richard
Lyell, Rt Hon Sir Nicholas	Paice, James
McAllion, John	Parry, Robert
McCartney, Ian	Patnick, Sir Irvine
Macdonald, Calum	Pattie, Rt Hon Sir Geoffrey
MacGregor, Rt Hon John	Peacock, Mrs Elizabeth
MacKay, Andrew	Pearson, Ian
McKelvey, William	Pendry, Tom
Mackinlay, Andrew	Pickles, Eric
Maclean, Rt Hon David	Pickthall, Colin
McLeish, Henry	Pike, Peter L
McLoughlin, Patrick	Pope, Greg
McMaster, Gordon	Portillo, Rt Hon Michael
McNair-Wilson, Sir Patrick	Powell, Ray (Ogmore)
McNamara, Kevin	Powell, William (Corby)
MacShane, Denis	Prentice, Gordon (Pendle)
McWilliam, John	Prescott, Rt Hon John
Madden, Max	Primarolo, Dawn
Madel, Sir David	Purchase, Ken

Quin, Ms Joyce	Sutcliffe, Gerry
Radice, Giles	Sweeney, Walter
Randall, Stuart	Tapsell, Sir Peter
Rathbone, Tim	Taylor, Mrs Ann (Dewsbury)
Raynsford, Nick	Taylor, Ian (Esher)
Redwood, Rt Hon John	Taylor, John M (Solihull)
Renton, Rt Hon Tim	Temple-Morris, Peter
Richards, Rod	Thomason, Roy
Riddick, Graham	Thompson, Sir Donald (C'er V)
Robathan, Andrew	Thompson, Jack (Wansbeck)
Roberts, Rt Hon Sir Wyn	Thompson, Patrick (Norwich N)
Robertson, George (Hamilton)	Thornton, Sir Malcolm
Robertson, Raymond (Ab'd'n S)	Thurnham, Peter
Robinson, Geoffrey (Co'try NW)	Timms, Stephen
Robinson, Mark (Somerton)	Tipping, Paddy
Roche, Mrs Barbara	Touhig, Don
Roe, Mrs Marion (Broxbourne)	Townend, John (Bridlington)
Rogers, Allan	Townsend, Cyril D (Bexl'yh'th)
Rooker, Jeff	Tracey, Richard
Ross, Ernie (Dundee W)	Tredinnick, David
Rows, Andrew (Mid Kent)	Trend, Michael
Rowlands, Ted	Turner, Dennis
Ruddock, Joan	Vaughan, Sir Gerard
Rumbold, Rt Hon Dame Angela	Vaz, Keith
Sackville, Tom	Viggers, Peter
Sainsbury, Rt Hon Sir Timothy	Waldegrave, Rt Hon William
Salmond, Alex	Walden, George
Sedgemore, Brian	Walker, Rt Hon Sir Harold
Shaw, Sir Giles (Pudsey)	Waller, Gary
Sheerman, Barry	Walley, Joan
Sheldon, Rt Hon Robert	Ward, John
Shephard, Rt Hon Gillian	Wardell, Gareth (Gower)
Shepherd, Colin (Hereford)	Wardle, Charles (Bexhill)
Shersby, Sir Michael	Wareing, Robert N
Short, Clare	Waterson, Nigel
Simpson, Alan	Watson, Mike
Sims, Roger	Watts, John
Skinner, Dennis	Wells, Bowen
Smith, Andrew (Oxford E)	Welsh, Andrew
Smith, Chris (Isl'ton S & F'sbury)	Wheeler, Rt Hon Sir John
Smith, Sir Dudley (Warwick)	Whitney, Ray
Smith, Llew (Blaenau Gwent)	Whittingdale, John
Snape, Peter	Wicks, Malcolm
Soames, Nicholas	Widdecombe, Ann
Spearing, Nigel	Wiggin, Sir Jerry
Speed, Sir Keith	Wilkinson, John
Spellar, John	Willetts, David
Spencer, Sir Derek	Williams, Rt Hon Alan (Sw'n W)
Spicer, Sir James (W Dorset)	Williams, Alan W (Carmarthen)
Spicer, Michael (S Worcs)	Wilshire, David
Spink, Dr Robert	Wilson, Brian
Spring, Richard	Winnick, David
Sproat, Iain	Winterton, Mrs Ann (Congleton)
Squire, Rachel (Dunfermline W)	Winterton, Nicholas (Macc'f'ld)
Squire, Robin (Hornchurch)	Wise, Audrey
Stanley, Rt Hon Sir John	Wolfson, Mark
Steen, Anthony	Wood, Timothy
Steinberg, Gerry	Worthington, Tony
Stephen, Michael	Wray, Jimmy
Stern, Michael	Wright, Dr Tony
Stevenson, George	Yeo, Tim
Stott, Roger	Young, David (Bolton SE)
Strang, Dr. Gavin	Young, Rt Hon Sir George
Straw, Jack	Tellers for the Noes:
Streeter, Gary	Mr. Simon Burns and
Sumberg, David	Dr. Liam Fox.

Question accordingly negatived.

Question put, That amendment (a) be made:—

The House divided: Ayes 248, Noes 282.

Division No. 212]	[7.25 pm
AYES
Adams, Mrs Irene	Eastham, Ken
Ainger, Nick	Etherington, Bill
Ainsworth, Robert (Cov'try NE)	Ewing, Mrs Margaret
Allen, Graham	Fatchett, Derek
Anderson, Donald (Swansea E)	Faulds, Andrew
Anderson, Ms Janet (Ros'dale)	Field, Frank (Birkenhead)
Armstrong, Hilary	Flynn, Paul
Austin-Walker, John	Foster, Rt Hon Derek
Banks, Tony (Newham NW)	Foulkes, George
Barnes, Harry	Fraser, John
Barren, Kevin	Fyfe, Maria
Battle, John	Galbraith, Sam
Bayley, Hugh	Gapes, Mike
Beckett, Rt Hon Margaret	Garrett, John
Benn, Rt Hon Tony	George, Bruce
Bennett, Andrew F	Gerrard, Neil
Benton, Joe	Gilbert, Rt Hon Dr John
Berry, Roger	Godman, Dr Norman A
Betts, Clive	Godsiff, Roger
Blair, Rt Hon Tony	Golding, Mrs Lin
Blunkett, David	Graham, Thomas
Boateng, Paul	Griffiths, Nigel (Edinburgh S)
Bradley, Keith	Griffiths, Win (Bridgend)
Bray, Dr Jeremy	Grocott, Bruce
Brown, Gordon (Dunfermline E)	Gunnell, John
Brown, N (N'c'tle upon Tyne E)	Hain, Peter
Burden, Richard	Hall, Mike
Byers, Stephen	Hanson, David
Caborn, Richard	Hardy, Peter
Callaghan, Jim	Harman, Ms Harriet
Campbell, Mrs Anne (C'bridge)	Hattersley, Rt Hon Roy
Campbell, Ronnie (Blyth V)	Henderson, Doug
Campbell-Savours, D N	Hill, Keith (Streatham)
Canavan, Dennis	Hinchliffe, David
Cann, Jamie	Hodge, Margaret
Chisholm, Malcolm	Hoey, Kate
Church, Judith	Hogg, Norman (Cumbernauld)
Clapham, Michael	Hood, Jimmy
Clark, Dr David (South Shields)	Hoon, Geoffrey
Clarke, Eric (Midlothian)	Howarth, Alan (Strat'rd-on-A)
Clarke, Tom (Monklands W)	Howarth, George (Knowsley North)
Clelland, David	Howells, Dr. Kim (Pontypridd)
Clwyd, Mrs Ann	Hoyle, Doug
Coffey, Ann	Hughes, Kevin (Doncaster N)
Connarty, Michael	Hughes, Robert (Aberdeen N)
Cook, Frank (Stockton N)	Hughes, Roy (Newport E)
Cook, Robin (Livingston)	Hutton, John
Corbett, Robin	Illsley, Eric
Corbyn, Jeremy	Ingram, Adam
Corston, Jean	Jackson, Glenda (H'stead)
Cousins, Jim	Jackson, Helen (Shef'ld, H)
Cox, Tom	Jamieson, David
Cummings, John	Janner, Greville
Cunliffe, Lawrence	Jones, Barry (Alyn and D'side)
Cunningham, Jim (Covy SE)	Jones, Ieuan Wyn (Ynys Môn)
Cunningham, Rt Hon Dr John	Jones, Jon Owen (Cardiff C)
Cunningham, Roseanna	Jones, Lynne (B'ham S O)
Dafis, Cynog	Jones, Martyn (Clwyd, SW)
Dalyell, Tam	Jowell, Tessa
Darling, Alistair	Kennedy, Jane (L'pool Br'dg'n)
Davidson, Ian	Khabra, Piara S
Davies, Bryan (Oldham C'tral)	Kilfoyle, Peter
Davies, Rt Hon Denzil (Llanelli)	Lestor, Joan (Eccles)
Davies, Ron (Caerphilly)	Lewis, Terry
Davis, Terry (B'ham, H'dge H'I)	Litherland, Robert
Denham, John	Livingstone, Ken
Dewar, Donald	Lloyd, Tony (Stretford)
Dixon, Don	Loyden, Eddie
Dobson, Frank	McAllion, John
Dowd, Jim	McCartney, Ian
Dunwoody, Mrs Gwyneth	Macdonald, Calum
Eagle, Ms Angela	McKelvey, William

Mackinlay, Andrew	Rogers, Allan
McLeish, Henry	Rooker, Jeff
McMaster, Gordon	Rooney, Terry
McNamara, Kevin	Ross, Ernie (Dundee W)
MacShane, Denis	Rowlands, Ted
McWiliam, John	Ruddock, Joan
Madden, Max	Salmond, Alex
Mahon, Alice	Sedgemore, Brian
Mandelson, Peter	Sheerman, Barry
Marek, DrJohn	Sheldon, Rt Hon Robert
Marshall, David (Shettleston)	Short, Clare
Martin, Michael J (Springburn)	Simpson, Alan
Martlew.Eric	Skinner, Dennis
Maxton, John	Smith, Andrew (Oxford E)
Meacher, Michael	Smith, Chris (Isl'ton S & F'sbury)
Michael, Alun	Smith, Llew (Blaenau Gwent)
Michie, Bill (Sheffield Heeley)	Snape, Peter
Miburn, Alan	Spearing, Nigel
Miller, Andrew	Spellar, John
Molyneaux, Rt Hon James	Squire, Rachel (Dunfermline W)
Moonie, Dr Lewis	Steinberg, Gerry
Morgan, Rhodri	Stevenson, George
Morley, Elliot	Stott Roger
Morris, Rt Hon Alfred (Wy'nshawe)	Strang, Dr. Gavin
Morris, Estelle (B'ham Yardley)	Straw, Jack
Morris, Rt Hon John (Aberavon)	Sutcliffe, Gerry
Mowlam, Marjorie	Taylor, Mrs Ann (Dewsbury)
Mudie, George	Thompson, Jack (Wansbeck)
Mullin, Chris	Timms, Stephen
Murphy, Paul	Tipping, Paddy
O'Brien, Mike(N W'kshire)	Touhig, Don
O'Brien, William (Normanton)	Trimble, David
O'Hara, Edward	Turner, Dennis
Olner, Bill	Vaz, Keith
O'Neill, Martin	Walker, Rt Hon Sir Harold
Orme, Rt Hon Stanley	Walley, Joan
Parry, Robert	Wardell, Gareth (Gower)
Pearson, Ian	Wareing, Robert N
Pendry, Tom	Watson, Mike
Pickthall, Colin	Welsh, Andrew
Pike, Peter L	Wicks, Malcolm
Pope, Greg	Williams, Rt Hon Alan (SW'n W)
Powell, Ray (Ogmore)	Williams, Alan W (Carmarthen)
Prentice, Gordon (Pendle)	Wilson, Brian
Prescott, Rt Hon John	Winnick, David
Primarolo, Dawn	Wise, Audrey
Purchase, Ken	Worthington, Tony
Quin, Ms Joyce	Wray, Jimmy
Radice, Giles	Wright, Dr Tony
Randall, Stuart	Young, David (Bolton SE)
Raynsford, Nick
Robertson, George (Hamilton)	Tellers for the Ayes:
Robinson, Geoffrey (Co'try NW)	Mr. Joseph Ashton and
Roche, Mrs Barbara	Mr. John Evans.

NOES
Ainsworth, Peter (East Surrey)	Bellingham, Henry
Alexander, Richard	Bendall, Vivian
Alison, Rt Hon Michael (Selby)	Beresford, Sir Paul
Allason, Rupert (Torbay)	Biffen, Rt Hon John
Amess, David	Bonsor, Sir Nicholas
Ancram, Michael	Booth, Hartley
Arbuthnot, James	Boswell, Tim
Arnold, Jacques (Gravesham)	Bottomley, Peter (Eltham)
Arnold, Sir Thomas (Hazel Grv)	Bottomley, Rt Hon Virginia
Ashby, David	Bowden, Sir Andrew
Atkins, Rt Hon Robert	Bowis, John
Atkinson, David (Bour'mouth E)	Boyson, Rt. Hon Sir Rhodes
Atkinson, Peter (Hexham)	Brandreth, Gyles
Baker, Rt Hon Kenneth (Mole V)	Brazier, Julian
Baker, Nicholas (North Dorset)	Bright, Sir Graham
Baldry, Tony	Brooke, Rt Hon Peter
Banks, Matthew (Southport)	Brown, M (Brigg & Cl'thorpes)
Banks, Robert (Harrogate)	Browning, Mrs Angela
Bates, Michael	Bruce, Ian (Dorset)
Batiste, Spencer	Budgen, Nicholas

Burt, Alistair	Heald, Oliver
Butler, Peter	Heath, Rt Hon Sir Edward
Butterfill, John	Heathcoat-Amory, David
Carlisle, John (Luton North)	Hendry, Charles
Carlisle, Sir Kenneth (Lincoln)	Heseltine, Rt Hon Michael
Carrington, Matthew	Hicks, Robert
Carttiss, Michael	Higgins, Rt Hon Sir Terence
Channon, Rt Hon Paul	Hogg, Rt Hon Douglas (G'tham)
Chapman, Sydney	Horam, John
Churchill, Mr	Howard, Rt Hon Michael
Clappison, James	Howell, Rt Hon David (G'dford)
Clarke, Rt Hon Kenneth (Ru'clif)	Hughes, Robert G (Harrow W)
Coe, Sebastian	Hunt, Rt Hon David (Wirral W)
Colvin, Michael	Hunt, Sir John (Ravensbourne)
Congdon, David	Hunter, Andrew
Conway, Derek	Hurd, Rt Hon Douglas
Coombs, Anthony (Wyre For'st)	Jack, Michael
Coombs, Simon (Swindon)	Jenkin, Bernard
Cope, Rt Hon Sir John	Jessel, Toby
Cormack, Sir Patrick	Johnson Smith, Sir Geoffrey
Cran, James	Jones, Gwilym (Cardiff N)
Curry, David (Skipton & Ripon)	Jones, Robert B (W Hertfdshr)
Davies, Quentin (Stamford)	Jopling, Rt Hon Michael
Davis, David (Boothferry)	Key, Robert
Deva, Nirj Joseph	King, Rt Hon Tom
Devlin, Tim	Kirkhope, Timothy
Dicks, Terry	Knapman, Roger
Dorrell, Rt Hon Stephen	Knight, Mrs Angela (Erewash)
Douglas-Hamilton, Lord James	Knight, Greg (Derby N)
Dover, Den	Knight, Dame Jill (Bir'm E'st'n)
Duncan, Alan	Knox, Sir David
Duncan-Smith, Iain	Kynoch, George (Kincardine)
Dunn, Bob	Lait, Mrs Jacqui
Durant, Sir Anthony	Lamont, Rt Hon Norman
Dykes, Hugh	Lang, Rt Hon Ian
Eggar, Rt Hon Tim	Lawrence, Sir Ivan
Elletson, Harold	Leigh, Edward
Emery, Rt Hon Sir Peter	Lennox-Boyd, Sir Mark
Evans, David (Welwyn Hatfield)	Lidington, David
Evans, Jonathan (Brecon)	Lightbown, David
Evans, Roger (Monmouth)	Lilley, Rt Hon Peter
Faber, David	Lloyd, Rt Hon Sir Peter (Fareham)
Fabricant, Michael	Lord, Michael
Fenner, Dame Peggy	Luff, Peter
Fishburn, Dudley	Lyell, Rt Hon Sir Nicholas
Forman, Nigel	MacGregor, Rt Hon John
Forsyth, Rt Hon Michael (Stirling)	MacKay, Andrew
Forth, Eric	Maclean, Rt Hon David
Fox, Sir Marcus (Shipley)	McLoughlin, Patrick
Freeman, Rt Hon Roger	McNair-Wilson, Sir Patrick
French, Douglas	Madel, Sir David
Fry, Sir Peter	Maitland, Lady Olga
Gale, Roger	Major, Rt Hon John
Gardiner, Sir George	Malone, Gerald
Garel-Jones, Rt Hon Tristan	Mans, Keith
Garnier, Edward	Marland, Paul
Gillan, Cheryl	Marlow, Tony
Goodlad, Rt Hon Alastair	Marshall, Sir Michael (Arundel)
Goodson-Wickes, Dr Charles	Mates, Michael
Gorst, Sir John	Mawhinney, Rt Hon Dr Brian
Grant, Sir A (SW Cambs)	Mayhew, Rt Hon Sir Patrick
Greenway, Harry (Ealing N)	Mellor, Rt Hon David
Greenway, John (Ryedale)	Merchant Piers
Grylls, Sir Michael	Mills, Iain
Gummer, Rt Hon John Selwyn	Mitchell, Andrew (Gedling)
Hague, Wiliam	Mitchell, Sir David (NW Hants)
Hamilton, Rt Hon Sir Archibald	Moate, Sir Roger
Hamilton, Neil (Tatton)	Monro, Sir Hector
Hanley, Rt Hon Jeremy	Montgomery, Sir Fergus
Hannam, Sir John	Moss, Malcolm
Hargreaves, Andrew	Needham, Rt Hon Richard
Harris, David	Nelson, Anthony
Haselhurst, Sir Alan	Neubert, Sir Michael
Hawkins, Nick	Newton, Rt Hon Tony
Hawksley, Warren	Nicholls, Patrick
Hayes, Jerry	Nicholson, David (Taunton)

Nicholson, Emma (Devon West)	Stephen, Michael
Norris, Steve	Stern, Michael
Onslow, Rt Hon Sir Cranley	Streeter, Gary
Oppenheim, Phillip	Sumberg, David
Ottaway, Richard	Sweeney, Walter
Page, Richard	Tapsell, Sir Peter
Paice, James	Taylor, Ian (Esher)
Patnick, Sir Irvine	Taylor, John M (Solihull)
Patten, Rt Hon John	Temple-Morris, Peter
Pattie, Rt Hon Sir Geoffrey	Thomason, Roy
Peacock, Mrs Elizabeth	Thompson, Sir Donald (C'er V)
Pickles, Eric	Thompson, Patrick (Norwich N)
Porter, Barry (Wirral S)	Thornton, Sir Malcolm
Portillo, Rt Hon Michael	Thurnham, Peter
Powell, William (Corby)	Townend, John (Bridlington)
Rathbone, Tim	Townsend, Cyril D (Bexl'yh'th)
Redwood, Rt Hon John	Tracey, Richard
Renton, Rt Hon Tim	Tredinnick, David
Richards, Rod	Trend, Michael
Riddick, Graham	Vaughan, Sir Gerard
Robathan, Andrew	Viggers, Peter
Roberts, Rt Hon Sir Wyn	Waldegrave, Rt Hon William
Robertson, Raymond (Ab'd'n S)	Walden, George
Robinson, Mark (Somerton)	Waller, Gary
Roe, Mrs Marion (Broxbourne)	Ward, John
Rowe, Andrew (Mid Kent)	Wardle, Charles (Bexhill)
Rumbold, Rt Hon Dame Angela	Waterson, Nigel
Sackville, Tom	Watts, John
Sainsbury, Rt Hon Sir Timothy	Wells, Bowen
Shaw, Sir Giles (Pudsey)	Wheeler, Rt Hon Sir John
Shephard, Rt Hon Gillian	Whitney, Ray
Shepherd, Colin (Hereford)	Whittingdale, John
Shersby, Sir Michael	Widdecombe, Ann
Sims, Roger	Wiggin, Sir Jerry
Smith, Sir Dudley (Warwick)	Wilkinson, John
Smith, Tim (BeaconsSeld)	Willetts, David
Soames, Nicholas	Wilshire, David
Speed, Sir Keith	Winterton, Mrs Ann (Congleton)
Spencer, Sir Derek	Winterton, Nicholas (Macc'f'ld)
Spicer, Sir James (W Dorset)	Wolfson, Mark
Spicer, Michael (S Worcs)	Wood, Timothy
Spink, Dr Robert	Yeo, Tim
Spring, Richard	Young, Rt Hon Sir George
Sproat, Iain
Squire, Robin (Hornchurch)	Tellers for the Noes:
Stanley, Rt Hon Sir John	Mr. Simon Burns and
Steen, Anthony	Dr. Liam Fox.

Question accordingly negatived.

Amendment proposed: (b), in line 1, leave out from `endorses' to end and add,

'the principle that contracts relating to the provision of services by Members acting in that capacity should be deposited in full in the Register of Members' Interests and be available for public inspection, and that the annual remuneration from such contracts, including estimates of the monetary value of benefits in kind, should be declared in the Register; and instructs the appropriate Select Committee to prepare detailed rules to give effect to this Resolution taking account of the need for clear and workable definitions of the term "contracts" and of the case for requiring all such agreements to be put in writing.'.—[ Mrs. Ann Taylor.]

Question put, That the amendment be made:—

The House divided: Ayes 261, Noes 283.

Division No. 213]	[7.38 pm
AYES
Adams, Mrs Irene	Austin-Walker, John
Ainger, Nick	Banks, Tony (Newham NW)
Ainsworth, Robert (Cov'try NE)	Barnes, Harry
Allen, Graham	Barron, Kevin
Anderson, Donald (Swansea E)	Battle, John
Anderson, Ms Janet (Ros'dale)	Bayley, Hugh
Armstrong, Hilary	Beckett, Rt Hon Margaret

Beith, Rt Hon A J	Gilbert, Rt Hon Dr John
Benn, Rt Hon Tony	Godman, Dr Norman A
Bennett, Andrew F	Godsiff, Roger
Benton, Joe	Golding, Mrs Llin
Berry, Roger	Graham, Thomas
Betts, Clive	Griffiths, Nigel (Edinburgh S)
Blair, Rt Hon Tony	Griffiths, Win (Bridgend)
Blunkett, David	Grocott, Bruce
Boateng, Paul	Gunnell, John
Bradley, Keith	Hain, Peter
Bray, Dr Jeremy	Hat, Mike
Brown, Gordon (Dunfermline E)	Hanson, David
Brown, N (N'c'tle upon Tyne E)	Hardy, Peter
Bruce, Malcolm (Gordon)	Harman, Ms Harriet
Burden, Richard	Harvey, Nick
Byers, Stephen	Hattersley, Rt Hon Roy
Caborn, Richard	Henderson, Doug
Callaghan, Jim	Hill, Keith (Streatham)
Campbell, Mrs Anne (C'bridge)	Hinchliffe, David
Campbell, Menzies (Fife NE)	Hodge, Margaret
Campbell, Ronnie (Blyth V)	Hoey, Kate
Campbell-Savours, D N	Hogg, Norman (Cumbernauld)
Canavan, Dennis	Hood, Jimmy
Cann, Jamie	Hoon, Geoffrey
Chisholm, Malcolm	Howarth, Alan (Strat'rd-on-A)
Church, Judith	Howarth, George (Knowsley North)
Clapham, Michael	Howells, Dr. Kim (Pontypridd)
Clark, Dr David (South Shields)	Hoyle, Doug
Clarke, Eric (Midlothian)	Hughes, Kevin (Doncaster N)
Clarke, Tom (Monklands W)	Hughes, Robert (Aberdeen N)
Clelland, David	Hughes, Roy (Newport E)
Clwyd, Mrs Ann	Hughes, Simon (Southwark)
Coffey, Ann	Hutton, John
Connarty, Michael	Illsley, Eric
Cook, Frank (Stockton N)	Ingram, Adam
Cook, Robin (Livingston)	Jackson, Glenda (H'stead)
Corbett, Robin	Jackson, Helen (Shefld, H)
Corbyn, Jeremy	Jamieson, David
Corston, Jean	Jarmer, Greville
Cousins, Jim	Jones, Barry (Alyn and D'side)
Cox, Tom	Jones, leuan Wyn (Ynys Môn)
Cummings, John	Jones, Jon Owen (Cardiff C)
Cunliffe, Lawrence	Jones, Lynne (B'ham S O)
Cunningham, Jim (Covy SE)	Jones, Martyn (Clwyd, SW)
Cunningham, Rt Hon Dr John	Jones, Nigel (Cheltenham)
Dafis, Cynog	Jowell, Tessa
Dalyell, Tam	Kennedy, Charles (Ross, C&S)
Darling, Alistair	Kennedy, Jane (L'pool Br'dg'n)
Davidson, Ian	Khabra, Piara S
Davies, Bryan (Oldham C'tral)	Kilfoyle, Peter
Davies, Rt Hon Denzil (Llanelli)	Kirkwood, Archy
Davies, Ron (Caerphilly)	Lestor, Joan (Eccles)
Davis, Terry (B'ham, H'dge H'I)	Lewis, Terry
Denham, John	Litherland, Robert
Dewar, Donald	Livingstone, Ken
Dixon, Don	Lloyd, Tony (Stretford)
Dobson, Frank	Loyden, Eddie
Dowd, Jim	Lynne, Ms Liz
Dunwoody, Mrs Gwyneth	McAllion, John
Eagle, Ms Angela	McCartney, Ian
Eastham, Ken	Macdonald, Calum
Etherington, Bill	McKelvey, William
Fatchett, Derek	Mackinlay, Andrew
Faulds, Andrew	McLeish, Henry
Field, Frank (Birkenhead)	Maclennan, Robert
Flynn, Paul	McMaster, Gordon
Foster, Rt Hon Derek	McNamara, Kevin
Foster, Don (Bath)	MacShane, Denis
Foulkes, George	McWilliam, John
Fraser, John	Madden, Max
Fyfe, Maria	Mahon, Alice
Galbraith, Sam	Mandelson, Peter
Gapes, Mike	Marek, Dr John
Garrett, John	Marshall, David (Shettleston)
George, Bruce	Martin, Michael J (Springburn)
Gerrard, Neil	Martlew, Eric

Maxton, John	Sedgemore, Brian
Meacher, Michael	Sheerman, Barry
Michael, Alun	Sheldon, Rt Hon Robert
Michie, Bill (Sheffield Heeley)	Shore, Rt Hon Peter
Michie, Mrs Ray (Argyll & Bute)	Short, Clare
Milburn, Alan	Simpson, Alan
Miller, Andrew	Skinner, Dennis
Molyneaux, Rt Hon James	Smith, Andrew (Oxford E)
Moonie, Dr Lewis	Smith, Chris (Isl'ton S & F'sbury)
Morgan, Rhodri	Smith, Llew (Blaenau Gwent)
Morley, Elliot	Snape, Peter
Morris, Rt Hon Alfred (Wy'nshawe)	Spearing, Nigel
Morris, Estelle (B'ham Yardley)	Spellar, John
Morris, Rt Hon John (Aberavon)	Squire, Rachel (Dunfermline W)
Mowlam, Marjorie	Steel, Rt Hon Sir David
Mudie, George	Steinberg, Gerry
Mullin, Chris	Stevenson, George
Murphy, Paul	Stott, Roger
O'Brien, Mike (N W'kshire)	Strang, Dr. Gavin
O'Brien, William (Normanton)	Straw, Jack
O'Hara, Edward	Sutcliffe, Gerry
Olner, Bill	Taylor, Mrs Ann (Dewsbury)
O'Neill, Martin	Taylor, Matthew (Truro)
Orme, Rt Hon Stanley	Thompson, Jack (Wansbeck)
Parry, Robert	Timms, Stephen
Pearson, Ian	Tipping, Paddy
Pendry, Tom	Touhig, Don
Pickthall, Colin	Trimble, David
Pike, Peter L	Turner, Dennis
Pope, Greg	Vaz, Keith
Powell, Ray (Ogmore)	Walker, Rt Hon Sir Harold
Prentice, Gordon (Pendle)	Walley, Joan
Prescott, Rt Hon John	Wardell, Gareth (Gower)
Primarolo, Dawn	Wareing, Robert N
Purchase, Ken	Watson, Mike
Quin, Ms Joyce	Welsh, Andrew
Radice, Giles	Wicks, Malcolm
Randall, Stuart	Williams, Rt Hon Alan (SW'n W)
Raynsford, Nick	Williams, Alan W (Carmarthen)
Robertson, George (Hamilton)	Wilson, Brian
Robinson, Geoffrey (Co'try NW)	Winnick, David
Roche, Mrs Barbara	Wise, Audrey
Rogers, Allan	Worthington, Tony
Rooker, Jeff	Wray, Jimmy
Rooney, Terry	Wright, Dr Tony
Ross, Ernie (Dundee W)	Young, David (Bolton SE)
Rowlands, Ted	Tellers for the Ayes:
Ruddock, Joan	Mr. John Evans and
Salmond, Alex	Mr. Joseph Ashton.

NOES
Ainsworth, Peter (East Surrey)	Bonsor, Sir Nicholas
Alexander, Richard	Booth, Hartley
Alison, Rt Hon Michael (Selby)	Boswell, Tim
Allason, Rupert (Torbay)	Bottomley, Peter (Eltham)
Amess, David	Bottomley, Rt Hon Virginia
Ancram, Michael	Bowden, Sir Andrew
Arbuthnot, James	Bowis, John
Arnold, Jacques (Gravesham)	Boyson, Rt Hon Sir Rhodes
Arnold, Sir Thomas (Hazel Grv)	Brandreth, Gyles
Ashby, David	Brazier, Julian
Atkins, Rt Hon Robert	Bright, Sir Graham
Atkinson, David (Bour'mouth E)	Brooke, Rt Hon Peter
Atkinson, Peter (Hexham)	Brown, M (Brigg & Cl'thorpes)
Baker, Rt Hon Kenneth (Mole V)	Browning, Mrs Angela
Baker, Nicholas (North Dorset)	Bruce, Ian (Dorset)
Baldry, Tony	Budgen, Nicholas
Banks, Matthew (Southport)	Burt, Alistair
Banks, Robert (Harrogate)	Butler, Peter
Bates, Michael	Butterfill, John
Batiste, Spencer	Carlisle, John (Luton North)
Bellingham, Henry	Carlisle, Sir Kenneth (Lincoln)
Bendall, Vivian	Carrington, Matthew
Beresford, Sir Paul	Carttiss, Michael
Biffen, Rt Hon John	Cash, William

Channon, Rt Hon Paul	Hogg, Rt Hon Douglas (G'tham)
Chapman, Sir Sydney	Horam, John
Churchill, Mr	Howard, Rt Hon Michael
Clappison, James	Howell, Rt Hon David (G'dford)
Clarke, Rt Hon Kenneth (Ru'clif)	Hughes, Robert G (Harrow W)
Coe, Sebastian	Hunt, Rt Hon David (Wirral W)
Colvin, Michael	Hunt, Sir John (Ravensbourne)
Congdon, David	Hunter, Andrew
Conway, Derek	Hurd, Rt Hon Douglas
Coombs, Anthony (Wyre For'st)	Jack, Michael
Coombs, Simon (Swindon)	Jenkin, Bernard
Cope, Rt Hon Sir John	Jessel, Toby
Cormack, Sir Patrick	Johnson Smith, Sir Geoffrey
Cran, James	Jones, Gwilym (Cardiff N)
Curry, David (Skipton & Ripon)	Jones, Robert B (W Hertfdshr)
Davies, Quentin (Stamford)	Jopling, Rt Hon Michael
Davis, David (Boothferry)	Key, Robert
Deva, Nirj Joseph	King, Rt Hon Tom
Devlin, Tim	Kirkhope, Timothy
Dicks, Terry	Knapman, Roger
Dorrell, Rt Hon Stephen	Knight, Mrs Angela (Erewash)
Douglas-Hamilton, Lord James	Knight, Greg (Derby N)
Dover, Den	Knight, Dame Jill (Bir'm E'st'n)
Duncan, Alan	Knox, Sir David
Duncan-Smith, Iain	Kynoch, George (Kincardine)
Dunn, Bob	Lait, Mrs Jacqui
Durant, Sir Anthony	Lamont, Rt Hon Norman
Dykes, Hugh	Lang, Rt Hon Ian
Eggar, Rt Hon Tim	Lawrence, Sir Ivan
Elletson, Harold	Leigh, Edward
Emery, Rt Hon Sir Peter	Lennox-Boyd, Sir Mark
Evans, David (Welwyn Hatfield)	Lidington, David
Evans, Jonathan (Brecon)	Lightbown, David
Evans, Roger (Monmouth)	Lilley, Rt Hon Peter
Faber, David	Lloyd, Rt Hon Sir Peter (Fareham)
Fabricant, Michael	Lord, Michael
Fenner, Dame Peggy	Luff, Peter
Fishburn, Dudley	Lyell, Rt Hon Sir Nicholas
Forman, Nigel	MacGregor, Rt Hon John
Forsyth, Rt Hon Michael (Stirling)	MacKay, Andrew
Forth, Eric	Maclean, Rt Hon David
Fox, Sir Marcus (Shipley)	McLoughlin, Patrick
Freeman, Rt Hon Roger	McNair-Wilson, Sir Patrick
French, Douglas	Madel, Sir David
Fry, Sir Peter	Maitland, Lady Olga
Gale, Roger	Major, Rt Hon John
Gardiner, Sir George	Malone, Gerald
Garel-Jones, Rt Hon Tristan	Mans, Keith
Garnier, Edward	Marland, Paul
Gillan, Cheryl	Marlow, Tony
Goodlad, Rt Hon Alastair	Marshall, Sir Michael (Arundel)
Goodson-Wickes, Dr Charles	Mates, Michael
Gorst, Sir John	Mawhinney, Rt Hon Dr Brian
Grant, Sir A (SW Cambs)	Mayhew, Rt Hon Sir Patrick
Greenway, Harry (Ealing N)	Mellor, Rt Hon David
Greenway, John (Ryedale)	Merchant Piers
Grylls, Sir Michael	Mills, Iain
Gummer, Rt Hon John Selwyn	Mitchell, Andrew (Gedling)
Hague, Rt Hon William	Mitchell, Sir David (NW Hants)
Hamilton, Rt Hon Sir Archibald	Moate, Sir Roger
Hamilton, Neil (Tatton)	Monro, Sir Hector
Hanley, Rt Hon Jeremy	Montgomery, Sir Fergus
Hannam, Sir John	Moss, Malcolm
Hargreaves, Andrew	Needham, Rt Hon Richard
Harris, David	Nelson, Anthony
Haselhurst, Sir Alan	Neubert, Sir Michael
Hawkins, Nick	Newton, Rt Hon Tony
Hawksley, Warren	Nicholls, Patrick
Hayes, Jerry	Nicholson, David (Taunton)
Heald, Oliver	Nicholson, Emma (Devon West)
Heath, Rt Hon Sir Edward	Norris, Steve
Heathcoat-Amory, David	Onslow, Rt Hon Sir Cranley
Hendry, Charles	Oppenheim, Phillip
Heseltine, Rt Hon Michael	Ottaway, Richard
Hicks, Robert	Page, Richard
Higgins, Rt Hon Sir Terence	Paice, James

Patrick, Sir Irvine	Sumberg, David
Patten, Rt Hon John	Sweeney, Walter
Pattie.Rt Hon Sir Geoffrey	Tapsell, Sir Peter
Peacock, Mrs Elizabeth	Taylor, Ian (Esher)
Pickles, Eric	Taylor, John M (Solihull)
Porter, Barry (Wirral S)	Temple-Morris, Peter
Portillo, Rt Hon Michael	Thomason, Roy
Powell, William (Corby)	Thompson, Sir Donald (C'er V)
Rathbone, Tim	Thompson, Patrick (Norwich N)
Redwood, Rt Hon John	Thornton, Sir Malcolm
Renton, Rt Hon Tim	Thurnham, Peter
Richards, Rod	Townend, John (Bridlington)
Riddick, Graham	Townsend, Cyril D (Bexl'yh'th)
Robathan, Andrew	Tracey, Richard
Roberts, Rt Hon Sir Wyn	Tredinnick, David
Robertson, Raymond (Ab'd'n S)	Trend, Michael
Robinson, Mark (Somerton)	Vaughan, Sir Gerard
Roe, Mrs Marion (Broxbourne)	Viggers, Peter
Rumbold, Rt Hon Dame Angela	Waldegrave, Rt Hon William
Sackville, Tom	Walden, George
Sainsbury, Rt Hon Sir Timothy	Waller, Gary
Shaw, David (Dover)	Ward, John
Shaw, Sir Giles (Pudsey)	Wardle, Charles (Bexhill)
Shephard.Rt Hon Gillian	Waterson, Nigel
Shepherd, Colin (Hereford)	Watts, John
Shersby, Sir Michael	Wells, Bowen
Sims, Roger	Wheeler, Rt Hon Sir John
Smith, Sir Dudley (Warwick)	Whitney, Ray
Smith, Tim (Beaconsfield)	Whittingdale, John
Soames, Nicholas	Widdecombe, Ann
Speed, Sir Keith	Wiggin, Sir Jerry
Spencer, Sir Derek	Wilkinson, John
Spicer, Sir James (W Dorset)	Willetts, David
Spicer, Michael (S Worcs)	Wilshire, David
Spink, Dr Robert	Winterton, Mrs Ann (Congleton)
Spring, Richard	Winterton, Nicholas (Macc'fld)
Sproat, Iain	Wolfson, Mark
Squire, Robin (Hornchurch)	Wood, Timothy
Stariey, Rt Hon Sir John	Yeo, Tim
Steen, Anthony	Young, Rt Hon Sir George
Stephen, Michael	Tellers for the Noes:
Stem, Michael	Mr. Simon Burns and
Streeter, Gary	Dr. Liam Fox.

Question accordingly negatived.

Amendment proposed: (c), in line 3, leave out from second 'and' to end and add

'with effect from the beginning of the next Session, no Member shall enter into any agreement in connection with his role as a Parliamentarian to undertake services for or on behalf of organisations which provide paid parliamentary services to multiple clients, or maintain any direct or active connection with firms, or parts of larger firms, which provide such parliamentary services; and that any Member who has such an existing agreement shall divest himself of it by no later than the end of this Parliament.'.—[ Mrs. Ann Taylor.]

Question put, That the amendment be made:—

The House divided: Ayes 240, Noes 280.

Division No. 214]	[7.50 pm
AYES
Adams, Mrs Irene	Barron, Kevin
Ainger, Nick	Battle, John
Ainsworth, Robert (Cov'try NE)	Bayley, Hugh
Allen, Graham	Beckett, Rt Hon Margaret
Anderson, Donald (Swansea E)	Benn, Rt Hon Tony
Anderson, Ms Janet (Ros'dale)	Bennett, Andrew F
Armstrong, Hilary	Benton, Joe
Ashton, Joe	Berry, Roger
Austin-Walker, John	Betts, Clive
Banks, Tony (Newham NW)	Blair, Rt Hon Tony
Barnes, Harry	Blunkett, David

Boateng, Paul	Hattersley, Rt Hon Roy
Bradley, Keith	Henderson, Doug
Bray, Dr Jeremy	Hill, Keith (Streatham)
Brown, Gordon (Dunfermline E)	Hinchliffe, David
Brown, N (N'c'tle upon Tyne E)	Hodge, Margaret
Burden, Richard	Hoey.Kate
Byers, Stephen	Hogg, Norman (Cumbernauld)
Caborn, Richard	Hood, Jimmy
Callaghan, Jim	Hoon, Geoffrey
Campbell, Mrs Anne (C'bridge)	Howarth, George (Knowsley North)
Campbell, Ronnie (Blyth V)	Howells, Dr. Kim (Pontypridd)
Campbell-Savours, D N	Hoyle, Doug
Canavan, Dennis	Hughes, Kevin (Doncaster N)
Cann, Jamie	Hughes, Robert (Aberdeen N)
Chisholm, Malcolm	Hughes, Roy (Newport E)
Church, Judith	Hutton, John
Clapham, Michael	Illsley, Eric
Clark, Dr David (South Shields)	Ingram, Adam
Clarke, Eric (Midlothian)	Jackson, Glenda (H'stead)
Clarke, Tom (Monklands W)	Jackson, Helen (Shef'ld, H)
Clelland, David	Jamieson, David
Clwyd, Mrs Ann	Janner, Greville
Coffey, Ann	Jones, Barry (Alyn and D'side)
Connarty, Michael	Jones, leuan Wyn (Ynys Môn)
Cook, Frank (Stockton N)	Jones, Jon Owen (Cardiff C)
Corbett Robin	Jones, Lynne (B'ham S O)
Corbyn, Jeremy	Jones, Martyn (Clwyd, SW)
Corston, Jean	Jowell, Tessa
Cousins, Jim	Kennedy, Jane (L'pool Br'dg'n)
Cox, Tom	Khabra, Piara S
Cummings, John	Kilfoyle, Peter
Cunliffe, Lawrence	Lestor, Joan (Eccles)
Cunningham, Jim (Covy SE)	Lewis, Terry
Cunningham, Rt Hon Dr John	Litherland, Robert
Dafis, Cynog	Livingstone, Ken
Dalyell, Tam	Lloyd, Tony (Stretford)
Darling, Alistair	Loyden, Eddie
Davidson, Ian	McAllion, John
Davies, Bryan (Oldham C'tral)	McCartney, Ian
Davies, Rt Hon Denzil (Llanelli)	Macdonald, Calum
Davies, Ron (Caerphilly)	McKelvey, William
Davis, Terry (B'ham, H'dge H'I)	Mackinlay, Andrew
Denham, John	McLeish, Henry
Dewar, Donald	McMaster, Gordon
Dixon, Don	McNamara, Kevin
Dobson, Frank	MacShane, Denis
Dowd, Jim	McWilliam, John
Dunwoody, Mrs Gwyneth	Madden, Max
Eastham, Ken	Mahon, Alice
Etherington, Bill	Mandelson, Peter
Fatchett, Derek	Marek, Dr John
Faulds, Andrew	Martin, Michael J (Springburn)
Field, Frank (Birkenhead)	Martlew, Eric
Flynn, Paul	Meacher, Michael
Foster, Rt Hon Derek	Michael, Alun
Fraser, John	Michie, Bill (Sheffield Heeley)
Fyfe, Maria	Milburn, Alan
Galbraith, Sam	Miller, Andrew
Gapes, Mike	Molyneaux, Rt Hon James
Garrett, John	Moonie, Dr Lewis
George, Bruce	Morgan, Rhodri
Gerrard, Neil	Morley, Elliot
Gilbert, Rt Hon Dr John	Morris, Rt Hon Alfred (Wy'nshawe)
Godman, Dr Norman A	Morris, Estelle (B'ham Yardley)
Godsiff, Roger	Morris, Rt Hon John (Aberavon)
Golding, Mrs Llin	Mowlam, Marjorie
Graham, Thomas	Mudie, George
Griffiths, Nigel (Edinburgh S)	Mullin, Chris
Griffiths, Win (Bridgend)	Murphy, Paul
Grocott, Bruce	O'Brien, Mike (N W'kshire)
Gunnel, John	O'Brien, William (Normanton)
Hain, Peter	O'Hara, Edward
Hall, Mike	Olner, Bill
Hanson, David	O'Neill, Martin
Hardy, Peter	Orme, Rt Hon Stanley
Harman, Ms Harriet	Parry, Robert

Pearson, Ian	Squire, Rachel (Dunfermline W)
Pendry, Tom	Steinberg, Gerry
Pickthall, Colin	Stevenson, George
Pike, Peter L	Stott, Roger
Pope, Greg	Strang, Dr. Gavin
Powell, Ray (Ogmore)	Straw, Jack
Prentice, Gordon (Pendle)	Sutcliffe, Gerry
Prescott, Rt Hon John	Taylor, Mrs Ann (Dewsbury)
Primarolo, Dawn	Thompson, Jack (Wansbeck)
Purchase, Ken	Timms, Stephen
Quin, Ms Joyce	Tipping, Paddy
Radice, Giles	Touhig, Don
Randall, Stuart	Trimble, David
Raynsford, Nick	Turner, Dennis
Robertson, George (Hamilton)	Vaz, Keith
Robinson, Geoffrey (Co'try NW)	Walker, Rt Hon Sir Harold
Roche, Mrs Barbara	Walley, Joan
Rogers, Allan	Wardell, Gareth (Gower)
Rooker, Jeff	Wareing, Robert N
Ross, Ernie (Dundee W)	Watson, Mike
Rowlands, Ted	Welsh, Andrew
Ruddock, Joan	Wicks, Malcolm
Salmond, Alex	Williams, Rt Hon Alan (Sw'n W)
Sedgemore, Brian	Williams, Alan W (Carmarthen)
Sheerman, Barry	Wilson, Brian
Sheldon, Rt Hon Robert	Winnick, David
Short, Clare	Wise, Audrey
Simpson, Alan	Worthington, Tony
Skinner, Dennis	Wray, Jimmy
Smith, Andrew (Oxford E)	Wright, Dr Tony
Smith, Chris (Isl'ton S & F'sbury)	Young, David (Bolton SE)
Smith, Llew (Blaenau Gwent)
Snape, Peter	Tellers for the Ayes:
Spearing, Nigel	Mr. John Evans and
Spellar, John	Ms Angela Eagle.

NOES
Ainsworth, Peter (East Surrey)	Burt, Alistair
Alexander, Richard	Butler, Peter
Alison, Rt Hon Michael (Selby)	Butterfill, John
Allason, Rupert (Torbay)	Carlisle, John (Luton North)
Amess, David	Carlisle, Sir Kenneth (Lincoln)
Ancram, Michael	Carrington, Matthew
Arbuthnot, James	Carttiss, Michael
Arnold, Jacques (Gravesham)	Cash, William
Arnold, Sir Thomas (Hazel Grv)	Channon, Rt Hon Paul
Ashby, David	Chapman, Sydney
Atkins, Rt Hon Robert	Churchill, Mr
Atkinson, David (Bour'mouth E)	Clappison, James
Atkinson, Peter (Hexham)	Clarke, Rt Hon Kenneth (Ru'clif)
Baker, Rt Hon Kenneth (Mole V)	Clifton-Brown, Geoffrey
Baker, Nicholas (North Dorset)	Coe, Sebastian
Baldry, Tony	Colvin, Michael
Banks, Matthew (Southport)	Congdon, David
Banks, Robert (Harrogate)	Conway, Derek
Bates, Michael	Coombs, Anthony (Wyre For'st)
Batiste, Spencer	Coombs, Simon (Swindon)
Bellingham, Henry	Cope, Rt Hon Sir John
Bendall, Vivian	Cormack, Sir Patrick
Beresford, Sir Paul	Cran, James
Biffen, Rt Hon John	Curry, David (Skipton & Ripon)
Bonsor, Sir Nicholas	Davies, Quentin (Stamford)
Booth, Hartley	Davis, David (Boothferry)
Boswell, Tim	Deva, Nirj Joseph
Bottomley, Peter (Eltham)	Devlin, Tim
Bottomley, Rt Hon Virginia	Dicks, Terry
Bowden, Sir Andrew	Dorrell, Rt Hon Stephen
Bowis, John	Douglas-Hamilton, Lord James
Boyson, Rt Hon Sir Rhodes	Dover, Den
Brandreth, Gyles	Duncan, Alan
Brazier, Julian	Duncan-Smith, Iain
Bright, Sir Graham	Dunn, Bob
Brooke, Rt Hon Peter	Durant, Sir Anthony
Browning, Mrs Angela	Dykes, Hugh
Bruce, Ian (Dorset)	Eggar, Rt Hon Tim
Budgen, Nicholas	Elletson, Harold

Emery, Rt Hon Sir Peter	Leigh, Edward
Evans, David (Welwyn HatField)	Lennox-Boyd, Sir Mark
Evans, Jonathan (Brecon)	Lidington, David
Evans, Roger (Monmouth)	Lightbown, David
Faber, David	Lilley, Rt Hon Peter
Fabricant, Michael	Lloyd, Rt Hon Sir Peter (Fareham)
Fenner, Dame Peggy	Lord, Michael
Fishburn, Dudley	Luff, Peter
Forman, Nigel	Lyell, Rt Hon Sir Nicholas
Forsyth, Rt Hon Michael (Stirling)	MacGregor, Rt Hon John
Forth, Eric	MacKay, Andrew
Fox, Dr Liam (Woodspring)	Maclean, Rt Hon David
Fox, Sir Marcus (Shipley)	McLoughlin, Patrick
Freeman, Rt Hon Roger	McNair-Wilson, Sir Patrick
French, Douglas	Madel, Sir David
Fry, Sir Peter	Maitland, LadyOlga
Gale, Roger	Major, Rt Hon John
Gardiner, Sir George	Malone, Gerald
Garel-Jones, Rt Hon Tristan	Mans, Keith
Garnier, Edward	Marland, Paul
Gillan, Cheryl	Marlow, Tony
Goodlad, Rt Hon Alastair	Marshall, Sir Michael (Arundel)
Goodson-Wickes, Dr Charles	Mates, Michael
Gorst, Sir John	Mawhinney, Rt Hon Dr Brian
Grant, Sir A (SW Cambs)	Mayhew, Rt Hon Sir Patrick
Greenway, Harry (Ealing N)	Mellor, Rt Hon David
Greenway, John (Ryedale)	Merchant, Piers
Grylls, Sir Michael	Mills, Iain
Gummer, Rt Hon John Selwyn	Mitchell, Andrew (Gedling)
Hague, William	Mitchell, Sir David (NW Hants)
Hamilton, Rt Hon Sir Archibald	Moate, Sir Roger
Hamilton, Neil (Tatton)	Monro, Sir Hector
Hanley, Rt Hon Jeremy	Montgomery, Sir Fergus
Hannam, Sir John	Moss, Malcolm
Hargreaves, Andrew	Needham, Rt Hon Richard
Harris, David	Nelson, Anthony
Haselhurst, Sir Alan	Neubert, Sir Michael
Hawkins, Nick	Newton, Rt Hon Tony
Hawksley, Warren	Nicholls, Patrick
Hayes, Jerry	Nicholson, Emma (Devon West)
Heald, Oliver	Norris, Steve
Heath, Rt Hon Sir Edward	Onslow, Rt Hon Sir Cranley
Heathcoat-Amory, David	Oppenheim, Phillip
Hendry, Charles	Ottaway, Richard
Heseltine, Rt Hon Michael	Page, Richard
Hicks, Robert	Paice, James
Higgins, Rt Hon Sir Terence	Patnick, Sir Irvine
Hogg, Rt Hon Douglas (G'tham)	Patten, Rt Hon John
Horam, John	Patten, Rt Hon Sir Geoffrey
Howard, Rt Hon Michael	Peacock, Mrs Elizabeth
Howell, Rt Hon David (G'dford)	Pickles, Eric
Hughes, Robert G (Harrow W)	Porter, Barry (Wirral S)
Hunt, Rt Hon David (Wirral W)	Portillo, Rt Hon Michael
Hunt, Sir John (Ravensbourne)	Powell, William (Corby)
Hunter, Andrew	Rathbone, Tim
Hurd, Rt Hon Douglas	Redwood, Rt Hon John
Jack, Michael	Renton, Rt Hon Tim
Jenkin, Bernard	Richards, Rod
Jessel, Toby	Riddick, Graham
Johnson Smith, Sir Geoffrey	Robathan, Andrew
Jones, Gwilym (Cardiff N)	Roberts, Rt Hon Sir Wyn
Jones, Robert B (W Hertfdshr)	Robertson, Raymond (Ab'd'n S)
Jopling, Rt Hon Michael	Robinson, Mark (Somerton)
Key, Robert	Roe, Mrs Marion (Broxbourne)
King, Rt Hon Tom	Rumbold, Rt Hon Dame Angela
Kirkhope, Timothy	Sackville, Tom
Knapman, Roger	Sainsbury, Rt Hon Sir Timothy
Knight, Mrs Angela (Erewash)	Shaw, David (Dover)
Knight, Greg (Derby N)	Shaw, Sir Giles (Pudsey)
Knight, Dame Jill (Bir'm E'st'n)	Shephard, Rt Hon Gillian
Knox, Sir David	Shepherd, Colin (Hereford)
Kynoch, George (Kincardine)	Shersby, Sir Michael
Lait, Mrs Jacqui	Sims, Roger
Lamont, Rt Hon Norman	Smith, Sir Dudley (Warwick)
Lang, Rt Hon Ian	Smith, Tim (Beaconsfield)
Lawrence, Sir Ivan	Soames, Nicholas

Speed, Sir Keith	Trend, Michael
Spencer, Sir Derek	Vaughan, Sir Gerard
Spicer, Sir James (W Dorset)	Viggers, Peter
Spicer, Michael (S Worcs)	Waldegrave, Rt Hon William
Spink, Dr Robert	Walden, George
Spring, Richard	Ward, John
Sproat, Iain	Wardle, Charles (Bexhill)
Squire, Robin (Hornchurch)	Waterson, Nigel
Stanley, Rt Hon Sir John	Watts, John
Steen, Anthony	Wells, Bowen
Stephen, Michael	Wheeler, Rt Hon Sir John
Stem, Michael	Whitney, Ray
Streeter, Gary	Whittingdale, John
Sumberg, David	Widdecombe, Ann
Sweeney, Walter	Wiggin, Sir Jerry
Tapsell, Sir Peter	Wilkinson, John
Taylor, Ian (Esher)	Willetts, David
Taylor, John M (Solihull)	Wilshire, David
Temple-Morris, Peter	Winterton, Mrs Ann (Congleton)
Thomason, Roy	Winterton, Nicholas (Macc'fld)
Thompson, Sir Donald (C'er V)	Wolfson, Mark
Thompson, Patrick (Norwich N)	Yeo, Tim
Thornton, Sir Malcolm	Young, Rt Hon Sir George
Thurnham, Peter
Townend, John (Bridlington)	Tellers for the Noes:
Tracey, Richard	Mr. Simon Burns and
Tredinnick, David	Mr. Timothy Wood.

Question accordingly negatived.

Main Question put and agreed to.

Resolved,

That this House endorses the need for an examination of the recommendations of the Nolan Committee relating to consultancies (including multi-client consultancies) and disclosures in the Register of Members' Interests; and instructs the Select Committee on Standards in Public Life to conduct such an examination and to seek to bring forward proposals on these matters by the end of the current Session.

Standards In Public Life(General Recommendations)

Resolved,

That this House agrees with the recommendations contained in the First Report from the Select Committee on Standards in Public Life (House of Commons Paper No. 637) relating to—

(1) the principal duties of the Parliamentary Commissioner for Standards (paragraph 14);

(2) the method of removal from office of the Commissioner (paragraph 23);

(3) the preparation of amendments to Standing Orders relating to a Select Committee on Standards and Privileges (paragraph 40);

(4) the preparation of a draft Code of Conduct (paragraph 47);

(5) the preparation of guidance on registration and declaration of interests (paragraph 50);

(6) a review of the law relating to bribery of Members (paragraph 52); and

(7) updating, and improving the availability of, the Register of Members' Interests (paragraph 66).—[Mr. Newton.]

Orders Of The Day

Children (Scotland) Bill

Lords amendments considered.

Lords amendments Nos. 1 to 336 agreed [some with Special Entry].

Bosnia

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

Before I call the Foreign Secretary, I must remind the House that Back-Bench speeches are restricted to 10 minutes.

8.3 pm

The House will be familiar with the many tragic events that have led to the present crisis in the former Yugoslavia. Thousands of lives have been lost and countless families have been displaced. Night after night, we have witnessed harrowing scenes on our television sets. We are witnessing a bloody war, in part a civil war and in part a war of aggression. It is a characteristic of civil wars that civilised behaviour rapidly gives way to the basest of acts.

Like all civil wars, this one is extremely complex. It is not, simply, three distinct groups fighting it out. In some areas, Bosnian Croats and Bosnian Muslims are together opposed to Bosnian Serbs. In other areas, Bosnian Muslims have been fighting Bosnian Croats. In yet others, Bosnian Serbs have assisted Bosnian Muslims. In one way or another, all the parties have degraded themselves, and they have degraded humanity with the ferocity of their actions. No faction is blameless, but in the enclaves, the Serbs have behaved with a savagery that has appalled the world.

In the former Yugoslavia, we have seen European man at his absolute worst. All sides have been guilty of slaughter, rape and other atrocities. I said "European man", because this civil war is happening in Europe, and that is a fact that we cannot ignore. I wish to make it clear to the House that the Government believe that what happens in Europe touches on this country's vital national interests.

The right hon. Gentleman said that it is partly a war of aggression and partly a civil war. He then went on to talk as though all the parties are equally guilty. Surely that is profoundly wrong. The Serbs are the aggressors, and they have been responsible for ethnic cleansing, the mass use of rape and torture and so on. To talk as though there were two equal sides is to distort the analysis from the very beginning of the debate.

I do not think that the hon. Lady does justice to what I said. I said that there have been atrocities on every side, and also drew attention to the particular savagery of the Serbs which we have witnessed in the enclaves. The record will bear out that that is the way I expressed myself.

Into all this chaos, the United Nations is trying to bring succour, relief and sanity. What the United Nations cannot do is end this war by military means. In practice, it can be ended only by a political solution.

The United Nations and the European Union have toiled to achieve peace through diplomacy. A history of broken promises and broken ceasefires now lies behind us, but those efforts must continue. We firmly support the efforts of Carl Bildt, the European Union's negotiator, to negotiate a recognition of Bosnia by Serbia and Montenegro, and to reopen a dialogue on the contact group plan, which we urge all parties to accept as the starting point for negotiations.

The international community deployed forces to the former Yugoslavia for the best of all possible reasons. The world could not stand aside from the slaughter. Countries from around the globe have sent troops. Britain felt the call of duty particularly strongly. We are Europeans. We are members of the Security Council of the United Nations. We understand our obligation to defend our humanitarian values, and we are privileged to have superb armed forces.

There has been from the start a serious risk that this conflict could degenerate into a regional war, setting light to the Balkans and bringing into play highly dangerous international forces. The west has a vital interest in containing the conflict.

When I was studying history, it was always a maxim of British foreign policy that one did not get involved on the ground in a Balkan war. May I remind my right hon. Friend that Germany is not involved with troops on the ground? It is surely not in our interests to have our troops there. Many people in this country feel that we should bring them back forthwith.

Germany is not a member of the Security Council of the United Nations; Britain is, and Britain feels her responsibilities acutely. As I shall point out to my hon. Friend, we are not in Bosnia to fight a war; we are there to save lives. That is the essential difference that my hon. Friend will, I hope, recognise. We have always seen that the United Nations is there to be the peacekeeper. Our forces are equipped not to make war but to move among the local population bringing food and medicine and confidence and security wherever we are able to do so.

UN forces in Bosnia are not a combatant force. We obviously cannot stop all the horrors, but that does not mean that we can do nothing. Indeed, we have achieved a great deal.

Since the United Nations, NATO and the international community have vividly demonstrated their unwillingness and inability to intervene militarily in a way which would bring this war to an end, and as the Bosnian Government naturally resist a political settlement resting on genocide and territorial gains made by external military aggression, will the Secretary of State, who does not come to this issue with any political baggage, make it clear that it is now time for the arms embargo to be lifted and the Bosnian Government to be given the means to defend their people and their territory against external Serbian aggression?

I shall come later to the question of the arms embargo, but I must say that I do not think that the hon. Gentleman speaks realistically. To bring this war to an end militarily would require the commitment of hundreds of thousands of men, equipment and armaments, at enormous risk to those forces. I do not believe that it is possible to commit those forces to this theatre.

Even if we did, our chances of success would be remote. The hon. Gentleman must recognise that the only way that this war can end is by political settlement. But there is a two-pronged approach: a political approach to try to achieve a settlement, and military forces doing what they can to bring security as and when they can.

rose—

I shall give way first to my hon. Friend.

Does my right hon. Friend agree that the one thing that he cannot possibly do in this situation is respond to Bosnian Serb aggression against UN-designated safe areas with an ignominious retreat of our own forces? Does he agree that it is vital that we do nothing to undermine the credibility of NATO, the Western European Union, or, indeed, international law?

I hope that my hon. Friend will forgive me, because I shall of course come to those important matters, but I must do so as I make progress through my speech, and I must do so in a considered way, for reasons that will become clear.

rose—

I want to make progress, but I said that I would give way to the hon. Member for Brent, East (Mr. Livingstone).

How will the Secretary of State explain to those outside this building, who see that the west mobilised hundreds of thousands of troops when its oil interests were threatened, that the Government are not prepared to take the same stand to stop the slaughter and mass rape of tens of thousands of ordinary people?

The hon. Gentleman makes a comparison which has often been made before, but which none the less I regard as fatuous. In the case of the Gulf, we intervened because there was an aggressive nation on the loose that had attacked Kuwait and threatened the entire region. In Yugoslavia, we have positioned our troops to do what we can to bring peace and save lives, and that is a noble ambition.

Will the Secretary of State give way?

No, I am going to make some progress. I shall possibly give way later.

We have achieved a great deal, and the House should remember that.

Croatia and Serbia have not been at war since 1991. The Bosnian Federation of Croats and Muslims has brought peace to central Bosnia, which has witnessed the rebuilding of civil government and the return to normal life, where before there were scenes of slaughter. Tens of thousands of lives have been saved. In 1992, the Bosnian war claimed 130,000 lives. In 1994, that was reduced to 2,500.

Today, the UN provides support for 2.7 million people; 153,000 tonnes of aid were airlifted into Sarajevo between July 1992 and April 1995. British Royal Engineers have built 42 km of road, and they keep open nearly 1,000 km of supply routes. British troops have rebuilt kindergartens, restored essential services, and taught children how to look out for mines that, for years to come, may threaten to blow them to pieces. Fourteen British soldiers have died playing their part in this operation to save others' lives.

For all our soldiers, peacekeeping brings not only danger but frustrations. We must operate with consent in a land of village apparatchiks, empire builders and local warlords. The peacekeeper must learn to negotiate without showing that frustration. But I flatly contradict those who claim that there is humiliation in what the British forces are doing. The saving of human life is noble and dignified, and I feel extraordinarily proud of the British men and women who have achieved so much.

I am sure that the whole House shares the pride expressed by my right hon. Friend in the wonderful work done by British forces in Bosnia. However, given the peculiar responsibility of Her Majesty's Government, who sponsored UN resolution 836 to establish Gorazde as a safe haven, could he say whether, when that was done in the spring of 1993, it was our intention to take steps to make those safe areas safe, or was it just intended as a form of words?

I will come to that later, but I will say to my hon. Friend—

That is the third time he has said that.

I am making a speech, and I have ordered my thoughts, as the hon. Gentleman should consider.

I shall come to the point that my hon. Friend raised, but I say to him now that the UN foresaw a need for 36,000 troops, and put out the request to the international community for them. In the event, 7,500 were forthcoming.

The deteriorating situation in Bosnia, especially after the taking of the hostages, showed that UN forces needed more protection. We sent artillery and armoured engineers immediately, and French forces and 24 Airmobile Brigade have followed.

I must make two points. First, there has been no change in the UN's mandate. The extra forces are not there to make war, any more than those who were there before them. Secondly, we remain bound by the need for consent for their arrival and deployments through Croatia and Bosnia-Herzegovina. They are sovereign nations, and we are peacekeepers, not invaders.

At no time has the UN authorised its troops to fight a war; nor are they equipped to do so. Indeed, the UN has been under-resourced to achieve even those objectives authorised by the Security Council in its resolutions. As I have just told my hon. Friend, 36,000 troops were envisaged for the enclaves. The Dutch, the Ukrainians and the British responded, but the UN's request resulted in just those 7,500 troops being committed. The safe areas, like so much else, have depended on consent.

Srebrenica has now fallen. Zepa is under attack. Once more, the civilised world has been appalled by the barbarism in the Balkans. Once again, the UN has responded. They have built tented accommodation and provided basic services for 6,300 people at Tuzla air base. They have also organised logistic support for supplies to arrive from Split.

Our own special interest lies with Gorazde. We have there nearly 200 men of the Royal Welch Fusiliers. An UNPROFOR convoy with supplies for our troops got into Gorazde this afternoon. Like others in these operations, our soldiers are equipped with neither tanks nor artillery nor heavy arms. They are in Gorazde to play a humanitarian role.

As a former member of a national service tank crew, may I ask whether the right hon. Gentleman does not think that it would be wise in the new circumstances to provide the Welch Fusiliers with some armoured cover, because in all that we were taught, armoured cover is essential in any dangerous situation?

Again, the hon. Gentleman anticipates me; I am coming to that point in the immediate paragraphs that follow. [Interruption.] I repeat, I am coming to that point in the immediate paragraphs that follow.

Each of the options on Gorazde before the international community carries its own risks. To withdraw the troops would leave the Muslims in the enclaves at the mercy of the Bosnian Serbs, and would provoke resistance from the Muslims, who would claim a gross dereliction of duty. Reinforcing the troops poses significant practical problems. We do not have the men or the guns anywhere in former Yugoslavia to stave off a determined onslaught by many thousands of Bosnian Serbs.

The road from Sarajevo to Gorazde passes through hostile territory, and has 26 bridges and eight tunnels. It poses a hazardous route for reinforcement. To reinforce by helicopter carries possibly greater risks. The aircraft are vulnerable to attack unless air defences are destroyed by a massive pre-emptive attack, with all the risks of military escalation.

Will my right hon. Friend give way?

Not at the moment.

The United Nations could use NATO to deploy its air power to deter or repel an attack, again with the risk of escalation. The Royal Welch Fusiliers have adequate supplies of fuel, food and water, and they are in good order. In its history, the regiment has proudly stood in many a perilous situation, and has emerged with honour. The safety and dignity of those men is of paramount importance to this country. I want to make it absolutely clear to the House that anyone who harms them will be held personally responsible by the Government of the United Kingdom.

Will the Secretary of State give way?

I will not give way.

None of the options on Gorazde that I have set out is appealing, but we must choose among them. The decision must be a joint one, involving the UN troop-contributing nations, NATO and the United States.

Is it not the case that the United Nations and NATO have at their command a decisive instrument, which is available and is within the theatre, yet not within the land mass of former Yugoslavia? I refer to their air power, which is off the coast and on Italian air bases. Cannot this be used if appropriate precautions are taken by the troops on the ground, both to deter future attacks on the safe havens and as a punitive reprisal to any barbaric acts of aggression by the Serbs? A civilised community has a duty to influence events within the theatre, and not just to let things slide down a slippery slope towards humiliation and withdrawal.

I listed the options to the House, and I included in those options the use of air power. Now I shall explain why I did not want to be drawn on these matters earlier.

I have to be responsible about what I say about these matters. There are those who would like to know which way our minds are turning and we have to be very careful about what we say about these matters. Therefore, I have set out in my speech precisely what I want to say on these options, and I am not prepared, even in response to my hon. Friend the Member for Ruislip-Northwood (Mr. Wilkinson), to be drawn any further on those options for our defence.

This Friday's conference in London has been convened by my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister to settle our common positions.

Will the Secretary of State give way?

I will not give way at the moment.

Will the Secretary of State give way on Gorazde?

I will not give way.

This is very important.

All right.

I am most grateful for that reconsideration. Very courteous. The right hon. Gentleman—[Interruption.] If you will be quiet, you will hear what I have got to say. I do not mean you, Mr. Deputy Speaker, but the others. The right hon. Gentleman made the assertion a little earlier that the British troops in Yugoslavia had done a magnificent job. None of us disputes that. He said that there had been no humiliation of British troops. Will he maintain that, if British troops are driven out of Gorazde, the word "humiliation" will not apply to that operation?

I have said what I am prepared to say about the military options. I have made it perfectly clear that the British Government will hold responsible any who harm our soldiers in Yugoslavia.

This Friday's conference in London has been convened by my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister so that we may settle among the nations concerned our common positions. Since last Sunday, intensive discussions have been under way to establish the military options and more broadly to concert our policy on former Yugoslavia. I must attend a further meeting this evening in connection with those options, and I very much hope that the House will forgive me if I am not here throughout the debate.

In the run-up to Friday's meetings, I can think of nothing more unhelpful than to indulge in megaphone diplomacy. I will not do so. Nothing could be more dangerous for our men in Gorazde than to rehearse the detailed merits of the military options, or to strike public postures.

Friday's meeting must chart the way ahead, but I offer these thoughts. First, the United Nations went to Bosnia and Croatia to save lives. It has done so; it is doing it still. It is becoming more difficult now, but the United Nations should stay for as long as it can do good. This operation has to be conducted with some humility. Our first concern should be with saving lives. Secondly, the real focus is on the political process. The military operation can help the political process by offering security where a ceasefire is agreed, and it can buy time for the political process. To abandon the chance to buy time is a big step.

Will the Secretary of State give way?

Thirdly, withdrawal will have its consequences. It may be militarily hazardous, and it is likely to lead to a more intensive and possibly wider conflagration. The humanitarian disasters that lie ahead could dwarf the horrors that we have seen to date. The war could spread wide, posing unforeseeable threats to the near east and Europe, and so to British interests.

Will my right hon. Friend give way?

Fourthly, we have often said that, if the arms embargo on Bosnia is lifted, the United Nations must withdraw. I reiterate that today. Equally, if the United Nations is obliged for any reason to withdraw, the United Kingdom will not oppose the lifting of the embargo.

The time is now ripe for decisions, for the warring factions to contemplate the stark reality of the withdrawal of the United Nations and for the nations involved in the peacekeeping operations in former Yugoslavia to decide on what terms they are willing to stay.

8.27 pm

This is the third occasion in three months when the House has debated Bosnia. Each time we debate Bosnia, the situation on the ground appears more grave. At the outset, I pay tribute to the courage and professionalism of the British troops who face the gravity of that crisis on the ground. Like the Defence Secretary, I have visited our forces in Bosnia and I was impressed by how, in a difficult situation, they maintained high standards of morale and of commitment to their job. If there have been failures in Bosnia, they are not failures that we can lay at the door of our troops. They are failures for which we and the other members of the international community must accept responsibility.

There have been failures. We do not do justice to the gravity of the crisis if we deny that there have been failures. The international community has failed the refugees of Srebenica to whom we gave a commitment that there would be a safe area. That was the first commitment to a safe area made in Bosnia and it was at Srebenica that that commitment was broken. If the reports on tonight's broadcasting media are correct, it looks as if we are about, in the same way, to fail the refugees of Zepa.

What has shocked many of our constituents is to see the photographs of the flood of survivors from Srebenica and to discover, two years after we had condemned the barbarity of ethnic cleansing, that it was being practised as brutally and callously as before, only this time, in areas that the United Nations had declared to be under its protection. This is not a failure for which we can pass the parcel of blame between the political parties. We all have a share in the responsibility for the failure of the international community.

There was much in the Defence Secretary's speech with which I would agree. I particularly agree that it would be entirely wrong if we were now to turn the failure in Bosnia into a defeat by withdrawing in the face of that failure. There are more than 2 million civilians throughout Bosnia who depend on the UN presence for food and fuel in winter. The UN troops do more than simply provide escorts to allow that humanitarian relief to get through. The military has turned on the gas, electricity and water throughout central Bosnia. The military often even collects the rubbish in the towns. Civil society in much of present Bosnia under the present circumstances would collapse if the UN were to walk away.

There would be military consequences for the area if the UN were to withdraw. One of the major achievements of the UN presence in Bosnia was the negotiation of a ceasefire between Croat and Muslim forces in a conflict which—at the time—was providing more casualties than the war with the Serbs. That ceasefire is still policed by UN forces—particularly British forces—who daily still inspect the ceasefire line between the two forces. If the UN forces withdrew, there is a real danger that that ceasefire would rapidly unravel.

Does the hon. Gentleman agree that whatever else may divide the House on party-political grounds, one thing that does unite us is the belief that British public opinion would not tolerate our troops in Gorazde being treated with contempt, brushed aside and disarmed so that humanitarian excesses may take place?

I wholly concur with the hon. Gentleman. British public opinion has been much more robust than some Members give credit for, and there is a willingness to see through the mandate. I also entirely agree that it does not serve the interests of our troops, this House, or the people of Bosnia, if we turn the issue into the kind of party-political dispute which it unfortunately appears to have become in Washington.

Withdrawal would have consequences of a profound character well beyond Bosnia. I find it difficult to see how we could contemplate withdrawing the UN presence from Bosnia without there being immediate demands for a withdrawal from Croatia. Such a withdrawal would leave the UN protected areas in Croatia unprotected and would reopen the prospect of President Tudjman renewing the military campaign against the Krajina Serbs. That would raise the danger of the restoration of a full-scale war between Serbia and Croatia, both of whom are—if anything—better armed than they were last time.

Nor would the consequences of withdrawal be confined to the Balkans. Throughout central and eastern Europe, there are many borders—mostly drawn on the map at Versailles in 1918—which divide ethnic communities from each other and throw together other ethnic communities. If Europe permits the borders of Bosnia to be redrawn by military force, we will send a profoundly destabilising message across central and eastern Europe. Moreover, if the consequences of abandoning Bosnia encourage conflict in any of those countries, there would be no UN expedition to contain such a conflict because, in the wake of a retreat from Bosnia, the UN may not have the authority to mount a similar peacekeeping exercise for a generation. That is what is at stake.

Yesterday, when my right hon. Friend the Member for Sedgefield (Mr. Blair) addressed the House at Prime Minister's Question Time, he said that we have a duty to uphold the UN mandate. A number of Conservative Members interrupted at that point to say that we did not have that duty. Away from the more charged and partisan atmosphere of Prime Minister's questions, I hope those Members will reconsider their response. I must say that I agree with the Defence Secretary—we do have a national interest at stake in the Balkans. That national interest is in upholding the principle that borders must not be changed by force.

Is not the point that Bosnia was a part of an internationally recognised country called Yugoslavia until just four years ago, when the international community chose arbitrarily to recognise it as an independent country against the wishes of a large number of its citizens?

One of the things that I have learnt in the past nine months is that if only one could go back to the appropriate point in history, it would be entirely possible to resolve the problems we face today. I would counsel the hon. Gentleman against saying that because the borders have existed for only four years, and are therefore not inviable. There are many borders across Europe which have been created in the past four to six years following the collapse of the Warsaw pact and the Soviet Union. Whatever doubts there may be about the wisdom of the original recognition of Bosnia, the fact is that it was recognised, and we cannot withhold from that recognised Government the right to inviable borders that we insist for ourselves and for any other independent country.

Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

The hon. Gentleman has intervened already, but I shall give way on this occasion. I am anxious not to take as long as might be normal. I appreciate that it is a three-hour debate and that other hon. Members wish to speak.

Does the hon. Gentleman accept that the borders of Croatia and Bosnia have been redrawn despite the presence of the United Nations? The UN has not prevented that from happening.

As I understand it, the hon. Gentleman is suggesting that we should now acquiesce to what military action has delivered to the Karadzic Serbs. My argument is that if we appease on this occasion, we will face similar problems across many parts of eastern Europe, and Members must not imagine that we can then stand back in isolation from those problems.

I put it to the hon. Gentleman that the Conservative party has a proud record of upholding that principle during the past 16 years it has held office, both in the south Atlantic and the Gulf. It would be perverse if this country were now not to uphold that same principle when it is challenged within Europe.

A commitment has been made by British forces in the fulfilment of the UN mandate in Bosnia. I find it a rather curious feature of some of the discussions about the crisis in Bosnia in the past few weeks that some people refer to the UN as if the UN were somebody else. They talk about the UN as if it were some other country, whose Government are to blame for the problem. The hon. Member for Bridlington (Mr. Townend) did that himself, in a way, when he intervened a moment ago.

The UN is ourselves. It is made up of countries such as us. Indeed, Britain has a leading responsibility in the UN as a member of the Security Council. We ourselves supported in the Security Council the very mandates that we are now fulfilling within Bosnia. We cannot put ourselves forward as that leading member of the UN if we do not also accept the duty to fulfil the mandates.

If our commanders on the ground, of their own volition, were at any time to say that it was simply too dangerous for our troops to stay, there must be no alternative in the circumstances but for us to withdraw the troops. But those are the only circumstances in which we should abandon our mission in Bosnia. Those who demand withdrawal in any other circumstances must ask what message that would convey to the Karadzic Serbs. I may say here that I hope throughout to refer to what are commonly called the Bosnian Serbs as the Karadzic Serbs. There are many Serbs who support the Government of Bosnia, and there are some Serbs in Pale who do not support Karadzic.

I submit that the message we are in danger of sending to the Karadzic Serbs by talking of withdrawal is that if they apply a little more pressure, we will pack up and get out of the way. If I am right, the demands for withdrawal do not serve the interests of our troops there, but make it all the more likely that they will come under that extra pressure.

Our response to the setbacks in Bosnia should not be to accept defeat and pull out, but to show a new determination to carry out the UN mandate. Two months ago, the international community demonstrated unity and resolve in demanding freedom for the UN troops taken hostage. We must now show the same unity and resolve in delivering freedom from fear and oppression to Bosnia's civilians. The fate of the eastern enclaves raises doubts about the resolve of the international community, and doubts will have been raised in the minds of the Bosnian Government and the Karadzic Serbs.

Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

I have some hard questions to ask, but I shall give way to the hon. Gentleman first.

I thank the hon. Gentleman for giving way; I know that he wants to make progress. He advanced a powerful argument for delivering an ultimatum to the aggressors—in this instance, those whom he has described as the Karadzic Serbs. What if that ultimatum is not accepted? Does it follow that one of two things must then happen? Must we be prepared to support such an ultimatum militarily? Failing that, does the hon. Gentleman accept that the alternative is to give the numerous troops on the ground—the Bosnian Government troops, that is—an opportunity to support the ultimatum by allowing them to arm themselves with heavy weapons?

I am at one with the Secretary of State for Defence on the question of lifting the arms embargo. I see no way of lifting the embargo without immediately pulling out the United Nations presence, with all the consequences that I have just paraded before the House. As the hon. Gentleman has raised the issue, let me take this opportunity to issue a plea to the United States Congress not to make such a decision, and in particular not to make it unilaterally. Unilateral action by the United States to lift the arms embargo would have profound consequences not only for Bosnia and the United Nations presence there, but for the legitimacy of United Nations resolutions on any conflict around the world that the United States had chosen to set aside.

I said earlier that some hard questions must be answered. The first is this: was there no intelligence warning of the attack on Srebrenica? Those of us who saw the photographs of the attack noted that it involved heavy artillery attacks. Did no one observe the build-up? If we knew that an attack was coming, why was the Dutch garrison at Srebrenica left at half strength? Why was there no formal protest of the kind that the Secretary of State has just made, with a warning to Mr. Karadzic? Why was there no attempt to involve President Milosevic in pressure to make the attackers back off?

It is reported that the Dutch troops requested close air support, and that their request took four days to process in Zagreb. That suggests that the pace of bureaucratic decision-making in Zagreb is wholly out of step with the urgency of the military conflict on the ground. If our response is to be more robust, and if the dual-key mechanism is to continue in its present form, we must ask whether the current UN civilian leadership is capable of the response—and the speed of response—that the military requires.

Of immediate concern to the House and the British people are the hard questions that now arise over Gorazde and the safety of the Royal Welch Fusiliers and other units of the British forces in that town—and also the safety of the tens of thousands of civilian refugees whom it is their mission to protect. The gravity and isolation of their position is underlined by the fact that in the past 24 hours they have found themselves protecting Ukrainian troops who were themselves there as part of the UN protection force.

I understand that the situation in Gorazde is now serious. Only one food convoy has gone through in the past seven weeks. The function of our troops was to observe whether the two sides were adhering to the observance of the safe area; for the past two months they have been unable to man the observation posts lest they themselves be seized as hostages. The danger is that the entire contingent will, in effect, become hostages as a result of being based in a camp at the bottom of a valley ringed by Serb artillery.

In those circumstances, I find it puzzling that over the past week it has been the French Government who have demanded the strengthening of the British garrison, while British Ministers have explained the difficulties in the way. Having heard the Defence Secretary rehearse those difficulties, I must ask why we have had British troops in such an isolated and exposed position for a year with, apparently, no prior contingency planning of what practical means could be used to strengthen their position if they came under threat—particularly in a conflict such as this. There is ample historical reason for suspecting that- the Karadzic Serbs would not remain committed to the paper undertaking that they gave not to attack.

Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

I will, but this must be the last time if I am to make progress.

What is the hon. Gentleman's message to the Royal Welch Fusiliers in Gorazde, and what action does he recommend to strengthen their position or provide them with additional cover?

The message from the House to the Royal Welch Fusiliers is that they have our full support for their mandate and their mission. Our second message must be to the Government—that every possible practical means must be found to strengthen the position of the Royal Welch Fusiliers.

The right hon. Gentleman's intervention brings me conveniently to my next point. If the Government have no practical means of reinforcing the garrison, I hope that there are contingency plans to remove the soldiers from Gorazde if they cannot sustain their position. If reports that that is being examined are correct, I hope that withdrawal will be accompanied by an agreement allowing the orderly evacuation of refugees, so that the refugees in Gorazde are not abandoned—like those in Srebrenica—to the mercy and charity of the Karadzic Serbs.

I want to raise a final issue about the military position. It arises from our last debate, when the Prime Minister announced the establishment of the rapid reaction force and presented it as a new capacity for the United Nations protection force.

Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

No. I said that I had given way for the last time; many hon. Members wish to speak, and I am anxious to make progress.

As I was saying, the Prime Minister presented the rapid reaction force as a means for the United Nations protection force to protect itself. It may well be that the relief of Gorazde is not an appropriate or realistic mission for the rapid reaction force, but it must be able to make some useful contribution to the deteriorating military situation in Bosnia. After all, we have an obligation to Sarajevo, which is now receiving one sixth of the amount of food that it requires.

I noticed yesterday that the Prime Minister did not rule out the use of that force to secure a land route into Sarajevo. If that is militarily feasible, I urge the Government to issue a valuable signal to residents of Sarajevo who are under siege that there is material assistance for them, and a clear signal to the Karadzic Serbs that the international community has the will to enforce the UN mandate where it has the capacity. That would also help to dispel some of the accusations that the rapid reaction force is little in evidence in Bosnia, because its real purpose is not to strengthen the UN presence but to assist in the removal of that presence.

The really worrying issue is that we have already committed a large quantity of our troops to the Bosnian theatre with no clear idea of what they are meant to do, and without the capacity to carry out much of what we ask of them. That is unfair to our troops and damaging to the UN, whose authority is diminished as a result. It also encourages the Serbs every time they discover that we have not the capacity to deliver on our threats or fulfil our promises.

Our future strategy in Bosnia—for I believe that we must remain in Bosnia—should include four guidelines. First, we should clarify what are the feasible military objectives, and ensure that we provide the military assets to achieve those objectives. Equally, we must ensure that we do not make commitments to objectives that we do not regard as militarily feasible. Secondly, we must show resolve in securing the objectives that we define as achievable. It would therefore be helpful if those who speculate about what those objectives might be did not in the same breath speculate about the possibility of withdrawal.

Thirdly, we must back every possible diplomatic and economic sanction to oblige the parties to the dispute to reach a political settlement. In view of clear evidence over the past two months of the support that President Milosevic has given the Karadzic Serbs, there must be no more talk in the immediate future of relaxing sanctions on Serbia. That does not mean that we should not be prepared to lay on the table now a programme of economic reconstruction for the post-war period, which might help to concentrate the minds of those in the Balkans on the enormous destruction and lost opportunities that the conflict has cost the economy.

That brings me to my final guideline. As well as containing the military expression of ethnic hostility, the international community should engage more actively in the propaganda war that manipulates that hostility.

The control of national television and press gives Presidents Milosevic and Tudjman weapons more powerful than their tanks or aircraft. The people of Serbia have never seen the candid pictures that we have of the horrors done in the name of greater Serbia in Srebrenica because, the night after that event, the news was filled with a half-hour bulletin about the record harvest in Serbia, with President Milosevic gathering it at the wheel of a combine harvester. That totalitarian control of the media is part of the reason why nationalist politicians can prolong the war, regardless of the cost to their people.

Some progress towards increasing the pressures for peace might come if a modest fraction of our effort in former Yugoslavia went into providing and supporting access to alternative pluralist news media.

There is one central message which it could offer to the peoples and the politicians of former Yugoslavia. That is that, in disappearing into their own history in search of justification for present hatreds, they are turning their back on the Europe of the future. The modern Europe is about bringing down barriers, building bridges on the economic ties that cross ethnic and cultural divisions. What is happening in the former Yugoslavia is a challenge to the values of that new Europe, to equal democratic rights, to religious tolerance, to ethnic pluralism—values which are not the monopoly of any party in the House, but are common to both sides of the House.

That is why we cannot walk away from Bosnia; not only because to do so would be to abandon civilians there to humanitarian catastrophe, but because to do so would be to walk away from our own values. There must be no doubt about our commitment to those values and that is why, in Bosnia, we should take every practical step to support and defend those values.

I remind hon. Members that all speeches are now restricted to 10 minutes, with the exception of that of the official spokesman for the Liberal Democrats.

8.52 pm

The last occasion on which the House discussed Bosnia was when my right hon. and learned Friend the Foreign Secretary made a statement a week ago. Some of the press reported critically on the exchanges across the Floor of the House that followed. I thought that those exchanges reflected reality, as have both the speeches to which the House has just listened.

The House feels very strongly about Bosnia but, with relatively few exceptions, it discusses Bosnia now with a very bitter sense of realism. In that, I believe that it is in tune with the view of the public in the country, perhaps more than some of the comments in the media.

Everyone who has followed this tragedy from the beginning, or has come to it lately, feels distressed, angered and frustrated by the suffering that we are now witnessing again. Everyone can now see that that is largely the responsibility of the Bosnian Serbs. I think that, overwhelmingly, people believe that Britain should, with others, do what we realistically can to soften that suffering and bring about a settlement.

We know that all, or almost all, those who are fighting in Bosnia have homes in Bosnia because they are Bosnian Serbs or Bosnian Croats or Bosnian Muslims. That is to say, as my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Defence said, we are dealing with, essentially, a harsh civil war, originally supported from outside, with confused fighting lines, in which cruelties and lies abound.

No solution can be imposed from outside except in one circumstance—except if we had sent a large international army on what would have been, essentially, an imperial mission, to fight, to take casualties week by week in those mountains and valleys and to stay indefinitely while the solution that we had imposed took hold.

Many commentators in many countries have overflowed with rhetoric, as though it were because of a failure of the international community that that has not happened. But the House knows that no single country has at any time suggested that that could, or should, be done. What has been much more commonly expressed is the idea that a total answer could have been achieved by lesser military means. I believe that that is, frankly, flannel.

Will the right hon. Gentleman give way?

I shall give way once, to the hon. Lady, and then I should like to make progress.

Is not the problem the pretence that we must choose between an all-out ground war and no use of force at all? Could not the UN have used force defensively, to protect the safe areas, to get the supplies through? That is the failure, and I am afraid that the right hon. Gentleman is partially responsible for it.

My right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Defence has discussed that argument. Resolution 836 and, indeed, the earlier one on Srebrenica, established safe areas and appealed for troops, which were not then forthcoming, to deal with them. I do not believe that any shame attaches to this country because, as my right hon. Friend said, we were one of the three countries that responded specifically to that request.

However, I am discussing the belief that the hon. Lady has often expressed—the idea that, somehow, by lesser military means than the total imperial mission, peace with justice could have been achieved by a few bombs in a few weeks, by a little extra equipment for the Bosnian Government, by a few extra million dollars. I really believe that that is flannel.

Would my right hon. Friend give way?

No. I have only a short time and I have given way once. I would rather get on and conclude.

There is a role for air power, as Her Majesty's Government have acknowledged for two years now, and in the next few weeks there may well again be a role for air power to deter Bosnian Serb attacks on Gorazde or Sarajevo. But I do not believe that it is possible, from the air, to bomb the Bosnian Serbs into coming to the conference table and reaching a peaceful settlement.

However, although most people in this country accept that we cannot do everything, they do not go on to conclude that we should do nothing. They support the substantial efforts that we have made—perhaps more pre-eminently than any other country, counting the aid as well as the military side—and want that effort to continue for as long as it can. As long as it can, Mr. Deputy Speaker—that is the rub.

I conclude with two short points about that. I believe that the next two or three months may be the climax in deciding whether it can. As my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Defence said, UNPROFOR depends on a minimum of consent which does not at present exist. If there is no substantial improvement, we may, by the test of the hon. Member for Livingston (Mr. Cook)—by the judgment of our military commanders—have to withdraw.

I have felt, for a bit now, that it might be right to be a little more specific about that, and to say that, unless specific improvements on the ground are achieved, unless consent is restored, it might well be the judgment of our military commanders that we could not continue. UNPROFOR might then have to withdraw. I believe that then the arms embargo would have to be lifted; the logic of what my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Defence said about that is clear.

I do not believe that either side really wants to be left alone with the other side in that bloodstained cockpit, knowing that their opponents—and that would be true of both sides—would be able to draw indefinitely on the very large quantities of weapons that are available in a world awash with arms.

I understand the operational difficulties of withdrawal, as I am sure does the House. A scheme for withdrawal that involves introducing a large North Atlantic Treaty Organisation force to help the withdrawal of a relatively smaller United Nations force will have a seismic effect on the ground, on the region. It will powerfully change the position in a way that military planners, whether in Supreme Headquarters Allied Powers in Europe or in London, cannot be sure of in advance.

Unless circumstances can be improved—unless the minimum consent can be restored—withdrawal may be inevitable because, in the judgment of military commanders, the force could not continue. That is not inevitable, but it is a real danger, and I believe that we can use that real danger to bring about the improvements that are necessary.

I conclude by congratulating my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Defence on his appointment, on the speed with which he has visited the troops in Bosnia and on the admirable and effective speech that he has just made.

Some speak as though there were some system of international order which already exists, some glass palace of peace which has already been built and which is being shattered by what is happening in Bosnia or in west Africa or the former Soviet union, where similar horrors are occurring. But there is no such thing. There is no new international order. Man's cruelty to man continues; the tragedies multiply. What does happen is that people try to avert the tragedies, try to prevent them and, when they occur, try to reduce them.

Some of those efforts succeed. They have succeeded in Namibia, they have succeeded in Mozambique, and they have partly succeeded in Cambodia. Some fail, such as in Somalia and Rwanda. Bosnia now hangs in the balance, unfortunately tilting the wrong way. On many occasions, Britain does not and should not take part; we cannot be even a part policeman everywhere. But sometimes it is right to join in the effort, as we did in Rwanda and as we are doing in Angola and in Bosnia. I am sure that it is right that we should do so for as long as that is possible, but I think that we should use the possibility of withdrawal to secure that minimum of agreement on the ground that would enable us to continue.

8.59 pm

I shall address my brief remarks to the situation in Gorazde, where one of my constituents has a son serving with the Royal Welch Fusiliers.

Despite what we have heard today, I do not know whether the House is fully aware of the real danger facing the 200 Royal Welch Fusiliers and the Ukrainian contingent in Gorazde. The British contingent has a Bosnian Serb military force at the front gate. In its garden, which is a Bosnian Muslim hinterland, there are Bosnian Muslim forces. It has been said—I do not know whether it is correct—that attempts have been made to mine the area behind the British contingent to prevent its withdrawing into the hinterland. There are also reports that there may be an ammunition factory in the hinterland producing weapons and armaments.

Gorazde is situated in a valley and is therefore surrounded by hills. There is little or no protection from the air and the 200 Royal Welch Fusiliers have very light armaments. The Secretary of State mentioned a convoy that had gone through recently, but there have been very few convoys in the past few weeks. They are dependent, probably entirely, on the consent and the permission of the Bosnian Serbs. As I discovered from meeting the Minister of State for the Armed Forces, the contingent must take its drinking water from the river Drina and that water must be purified. Getting in food parcels and letters is also dependent on the consent of the Bosnian Serbs.

As we know, the tour of duty comes to an end in early September. Britain has provided three tours of duty in Gorazde and it was hoped that the next would fall to the Ukrainian forces. It seemed that the Ukrainians were keen and happy to do that. However, I no longer think that that is the position in view of what the Bosnian Muslims are reported to have done to the Ukrainian soldiers, including taking their commander hostage and threatening him perhaps even with death. To leave Gorazde in September would again require the consent and the permission of the Bosnian Serbs. That might be forthcoming, but the Bosnian Muslims may have something to say about it also.

The stark reality is that 200 British troops are trapped: they cannot go forwards and they cannot go back. They have very few resources with which to defend themselves, they are vulnerable from the air and they are surrounded by two warring armies. There is the added danger that NATO will decide to bomb in the vicinity in an attempt to deter the Bosnian Serbs from attacking.

When this wretched war is over, perhaps some questions will be asked—such as, who put British soldiers in such a vulnerable position? They are highly trained soldiers from what is probably one of the best armies in the world. They are not peace corps volunteers. If they are put in danger—that is the nature of soldiering—we owe it to them at least to ensure that their orders are based on a rational and sensible military assessment of the dangers that they face.

We face an extremely difficult position and there are no glib answers. The Secretary of State mentioned some of the options. First, we could do nothing. We could wait, and perhaps the Bosnian Serbs might not attack. The British contingent could then leave in early September as planned. I do not know whether the Bosnian Serbs would allow our soldiers to leave. Perhaps they would. I do not know whether the Bosnian Muslims would allow them to leave. There is also a possibility of air strikes. I do not know whether that is a real option.

Secondly, there is the question of reinforcements. I suppose that it would be possible—although the Secretary of State poured cold water on the idea—to fly in a large number of troops in Black Hawk helicopters. They also would be very vulnerable and I do not know how many troops would be needed. Even if they could be brought in, they would still have to receive food and water. The logistic problems would still have to be solved and the troops would still face the possibility of spending a long Balkan winter with the Bosnian Serbs at the gate.

Thirdly, we could sit down now and attempt to negotiate with the Serbs—and, I suppose, with the Bosnian Muslims—the removal of the 200 British troops. I do not know whether that is feasible, but the consequences of that option would be quite considerable for the entire strategy in the eastern enclaves and Sarajevo.

It would be silly to pretend that there are easy answers or easy solutions. I simply ask the Secretary of State for an assurance that the welfare of British troops will be considered to be as important as the legitimate interests and welfare of other people in the Bosnian theatre of war. If our forces are asked to engage in dangerous movements or manoeuvres, their orders must be based on a proper military assessment and not upon some grand gesture designed to save the face of international bureaucrats or politicians.

9.5 pm

At the outset of the debate we heard two very fine speeches from either side of the House. I congratulate my right hon. Friend the new Secretary of State for Defence on what he had to say. It was a very fitting beginning to his time in that high office. He comes to this problem at what appears to be the final part of a miserable series of developments, with the overrunning of Srebrenica, the imminent overrunning of Zepa and great fears among many people that the worst is yet to come.

My hon. Friend said not to press him about what might be done to prevent those gloomy predictions from becoming reality; and we must not press him. However, his comments gave me new confidence that there may be ways of ensuring that Sarajevo is not strangled and that perhaps Gorazde can be saved from the ghastly horrors and tragedies that we have seen in Srebrenica and that we are now seeing in Zepa. Let us not press my right hon. Friend tonight, but let us be confident that he will, and must, find ways of stabilising the short-term situation and preventing a repetition of the miseries of the past few days.

The United Nations has a mandate to protect the enclaves. Of course, that cannot be done against a massive and determined assault by thousands of the enemy—that would be impossible. But a serious attempt can be made to fulfil that mandate and to hold the further enclaves by getting reinforcements there in one way or another. I believe that that can be done. When it is, I hope that it will be done with the consensual support of the other major allies, possibly including the Russians. Certainly the Americans will have to decide between their two policies—the one on Capitol hill and the other in the White House—because one way or the other, the Americans will be drawn into events if the situation is to be stabilised.

My plea concerns not so much the short term. We have all seen the agonies and have armchair recipes, but my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State has to bear the brunt with his other Ministers and with their opposite numbers in allied countries. My plea is that anything that we do to stabilise the short-term situation, to halt the terrifying sense of drift, is combined and interlocked with a new medium-term strategy, to prevent finding ourselves in a similar situation again—that despite a mass of good intentions, we are in an even worse position than now.

The new strategy—which must be intertwined with what is done now, whatever is being planned—should incorporate two vital, realistic elements. I do not want to see the UN humiliatingly withdraw totally. I am uneasy with the language that says that there is an absolute choice between staying and fighting and total withdrawal. The UN has done brilliant work throughout the world. It is doing brilliant work in Bosnia, although we do not hear much about it, in saving lives and safeguarding convoys. It was not necessary to send vast armies into Ethiopia to start to save lives there. I do not know whether Angola is coming right, but the UN did not send vast armies in there. There were a lot of troops in Cambodia, but a lot of work was done. As the hon. Member for Livingston (Mr. Cook) rightly said, the UN is only the sum of its parts. It does not exist as an entity in space.

The UN, through the support of its members, has done good work and there remains an agenda for United Nations personnel—civilians and the brave blue-helmeted soldiers who protect them—in the Bosnian and Balkan region. Having said that, I would not want to see a complete withdrawal. One is obviously vulnerable to the argument, "In that case, are you asking the UN forces to stay to do a job that they have not succeeded in doing?" They have not maintained the safety of the safe enclaves. They have been unable, because they are unequipped, to defend and to fulfil the trust placed in them by the wretched and tragic refugees of whom we have all seen pictures.

There must be yet another part to the strategy but it is not one that yet carries my right hon. Friend, although I drew some hope from his remarks. That part has not carried hitherto the grandee policymakers of Paris and London or the White House—although it has received almost too vigorous support in the US Congress. If we cannot provide the forces on the ground to halt the atrocities and violence of the Bosnian Serbs as they fulfil the Greater Serbia agenda, which they are determined to do, we must examine gradually and carefully, perhaps not overnight, the forces who could do that job but have been denied the weapons so far. I refer of course to the Bosnian presidency troops, who outnumber the Bosnian Serbs two to one. They are excellent fighters but at this moment do not even have enough bullets, let alone heavy weapons, to defend themselves. They do not have the trucks to deploy their forces in such a way as to add to their current desperate efforts to save Sarajevo from total starvation and strangulation.

Parallel with the saving and, I hope, holding of Gorazde—and beyond that the dignified withdrawal in due course of UN troops—should go not merely a reluctant recognition that the embargo must be lifted if we pull out, as my right hon. Friend said. I differ with him. Together with the pattern of holding Gorazde and Sarajevo in the short term must go a medium-term intention to ensure that the Bosnian presidency—the legitimate army of the legitimate Government of that hapless country—has the weapons, and maybe in due course the artillery and tanks, to defend itself. Back always comes the pat reply, "That will mean a vast escalation of the war."

That cliché gets traded around, but it has not been carefully examined. If Bosnian Serb force were met with force, I wonder whether the Bosnian Serbs would not immediately realise that the time for easy games—for walking into towns and murdering Bosnians, and the rest—is over. They would face a determined enemy and there would be a kind of stalemate. Of course it would be a bloody stalemate, but we are seeing that already. Of course it would be difficult. Of course it would be a brave decision, but there might come a morning when the two sides would say, "For neither of us is it worth fighting on. For both of us it is worth sitting down and negotiating. However agonising the negotiation and the partitioning, we must sit down and negotiate." If we go along the path that I indicated, that point could be reached.

We must we ensure that any winding down of the UN's activities is accomplished with dignity. We must ensure that UN civilian and some military operations remain, to save lives in the area. We should not just petulantly withdraw everything. Finally, beyond that withdrawal with dignity or winding down, we let the Bosnian presidency troops and the presidency government have the right and the dignity to defend themselves to show the Bosnian Serbs that there can be no winner and that they should stop the killing and negotiate. That is not only the best. way forward but, I believe, the way that events will dictate. I believe that there are no other options. Although we talk grandly of options, there is only the path that I have described, and that is the one that statesmen should now pursue.

9.14 pm

Like the right hon. Member for Guildford (Mr. Howell), I have some sympathy with the restraint that the Secretary of State for Defence displayed in deliberately avoiding enumerating the possible military options. As I think he said, at least by implication, to do so might be to provide information of advantage to those against whom some of the options might in due course be exercised.

With all due deference to the Secretary of State, the debate takes place to some extent in a vacuum. At the end of our deliberations we shall take no decisions. We all know, however, that even as we conduct the debate serious decisions may well be taken in Washington, where the Foreign Secretary has gone to have discussions with the United States Government and, I hope, with members of Congress, although some of the press reports suggest that he may find that a little more difficult than perhaps he would wish.

The debate takes place to some extent in the abstract. The fact that the Foreign Secretary has felt it necessary to go to Washington—I make no criticism of that because I believe that his judgment was correct—serves only to underline something which we have seen in the history of events in the former Yugoslavia over the past two or three years. It is that where the United Nations seeks to embark on a major operation without the wholehearted support, political and military, of the United States, its activities are necessarily inhibited. Some of us may not like that but the events of the past two or three years demonstrate it eloquently to be the case.

What else do the events of the past two or three years tell us? They tell us—I suspect that this is a lesson not yet learnt—that it is necessary to establish clear political objectives and then to provide sufficient military resources if we wish to implement Security Council resolutions.

If the strategy has been one of containment, that strategy has succeeded to some extent. We are obliged to ask ourselves, however, how long that will be the position. If events continue to take their present course, can the relative calm in Kosovo and Macedonia be maintained? If the strategy has been to feed as many people as possible, that strategy too has substantially succeeded. That is especially so in central Bosnia. If the strategy was to drive the participants back to negotiation, we would be right to acknowledge that it has been a comprehensive failure. Why has that been so?

We can track through the history of this matter and the path of the international community a lack of resolve that almost month by month, and sometimes week by week, has done nothing to increase the willingness of the Bosnian Serbs, or the Karadzic Serbs as perhaps we may now call them, to take advantage and to call the bluff, if we like, of the UN.

The House will recall that we declared a no-fly zone. It was several months, however, before we put aircraft over the former Yugoslavia to enforce it. I understand that combat air patrols are no longer being flown over the land mass of the former Yugoslavia, although they may be still be being flown over the Adriatic. We declared an arms embargo, but it was more than six months before there was an adequate fleet in the Adriatic to seek to enforce it.

Already, in the course of the debate, we have heard cries of withdrawal. I wonder how many people who cry for withdrawal have actually been to the former Yugoslavia and made any effort to assess precisely what would be involved in withdrawal. It is a country which consists, as many will know, of a lot of valleys with poor roads at the bottom of deep slopes. The idea that there is some easy withdrawal to be effected in a matter of a few weeks frankly does not stand up to even a moment's consideration if one has regard to the country's geography.

If we were to withdraw, there would be damage to the reputation of the United Nations. Some have rightly talked of the long-term consequences of withdrawal. In my judgment, however, that would be nothing compared with the short-term risk to the civilians who occupy the former Yugoslavia, and Bosnia in particular. Which of us believes that, if there was a withdrawal, hostilities would cease?

As I believe is now generally acknowledged—the Secretary of State said so expressly—if there is a withdrawal there would be no legitimacy in seeking to maintain the arms embargo. A stalemate may well come about, as the right hon. Member for Guildford said a moment ago, but one must have regard to what the consequences and circumstances would be from the moment of withdrawal and the lifting of the arms embargo until the point at which that stalemate was achieved. I beg to suggest that those consequences and circumstances might be very severe and damaging indeed.

Then we must ask ourselves: what purpose can be served by the United Nations remaining in the former Yugoslavia? Like others, I have used the illustration from time to time, that the relative calm and the return, albeit grudgingly and with difficulty, to normality in central Bosnia continues to provide a rationale for our remaining. But I begin to doubt if that is enough.

With regard to Zepa, one must be blunt. There seems little enthusiasm for or prospect of Zepa being successfully defended against a Bosnia Serb advance if that is what they choose to do. As to Gorazde, I do not—nor, I suspect, do any of us except those sitting on the Treasury Bench—have access to sufficiently adequate intelligence and information to determine whether Gorazde can be defended. Even if we were to decide that it could be defended, we would have to ask ourselves the subordinate questions: does that defence apply only to the United Nations forces who are there or, if we were talking about the defence of Gorazde, do we mean that we will defend any civilians who may find themselves under attack as well?

I do not yet hear or understand there to be any clarity in a decision of that kind. It could be argued that the mere fact of sending large numbers of troops to Gorazde, whether by helicopter or otherwise—I suspect by helicopter only because, since the road from Kisseljak to Gorazde is substantially in Bosnian Serb hands, helicopters are probably the only means of doing so—would be deterrent enough. Like other hon. Members, however, I do not have the information which would allow me to reach a certain judgment on that matter. I therefore ask myself again: what is there that we can do that we can have some assurance about?

We can say that we will not allow Sarajevo to be strangled and that we will open and maintain, with military means if necessary, a route for humanitarian relief over Mount Igman to Sarajevo. I say that for the obvious self-evident reason that we cannot have the strangulation of that city, with all the consequences for the people who live there.

The second and perhaps more long-term element of that is to say that that would show in a dramatic and forceful way that the United Nations is possessed of resolve in these matters and that where it is militarily possible it is prepared to take steps in order to ensure that the resolutions by which its presence in the former Yugoslavia is justified can be implemented robustly.

The hon. and learned Gentleman talks about military means to keep a road open. What is his estimate of the size of that military means and would it involve arming?

On the issue of armour, I do not think that there is any doubt that it would be difficult to transport it over Mount Igman, not least because one would have to bring it up by road from Split. But I am satisfied that the rapid reaction force, properly deployed—particularly its first element which, as the hon. Gentleman knows, contains artillery—plus the full repertoire of NATO air power, would be sufficient to keep open such a route were it to be established for humanitarian purposes. I have some corroboration for that as that view has been expressed on a number of occasions in the recent past. From conversations that I have had, I believe that that view carries a certain amount of authority among those who may be responsible for making the ultimate decision.

Some say that we should not do any of those things and continue to fulfil what is sometimes called, rather inelegantly but perhaps very descriptively, the muddling-through option. The muddling-through option will inevitably lead to withdrawal and it offers no clear policy objectives. It puts our forces on the ground in an impossible position—one that will be increasingly untenable. In that connection, I think that the House would want to know, within the constraints that the Secretary of State suggested at the outset, the precise role of the rapid reaction force. What are its terms of reference at this moment and what will its rules of engagement be in general terms? When may we expect it to be fully deployed and operational?

Phrases such as "defining moment" and "turning point" have been used so often in the descriptions of what is taking place in the former Yugoslavia that they have lost their ordinary meaning. But one can say without over-dramatising the situation that the future course of events in the former Yugoslavia may depend acutely on the decisions taken in the next few days. More than that, those decisions may signally affect the relationship between Europe and the United States of America and may signally determine the credibility of the United Nations in a post-cold-war world.

The resolutions of the Security Council can be enforced in a restrained way or in a robust way. Until now, the policy has been to show restraint, but I do not believe that that restraint has brought the international community—or, more importantly, the people of Bosnia—much satisfaction. The chilling image of the 20-year-old girl, anonymous and alone, who hanged herself out of desperation and hopelessness should haunt us all. That image should not drive our policies, but it should remind us of what the consequences of our policies may be.

9.27 pm

I shall begin with some brief congratulations. First, I congratulate the hon. Member for Livingston (Mr. Cook), who made an excellent and perceptive speech. I congratulate my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Defence. We all understand why he is not here now. Again, I was much impressed with what he had to say. May I also say how nice it is to see my hon. Friend the Member for Upminster (Sir N. Bonsor) on the Front Bench in his new post as Minister of State, Foreign and Commonwealth Office. I look forward to his, I trust, robust reply to the debate.

I am glad that the summit is to take place on Friday. I have made about a dozen speeches on this appalling situation over the past three and a half to four years and, in the past 18 months, I have called many times for a summit. I would, admittedly, prefer it to be at head of state level, but the fact that a specific summit is being called with this subject as the sole item on the agenda gives me some encouragement. It gives me encouragement that, at long last, a more co-ordinated, cohesive, united and resolute approach is on the cards.

The sad, deplorable story of the past three and a half years has not been one of the failure of British troops. Their bravery is unsurpassed, and we all rightly pay tribute to them every time we debate this subject. No one seeks to criticise—I certainly do not—the motives or credentials of our Government or the Opposition. But I have often been haunted by the remarks of Edmund Burke who said in this place so long ago that all that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing. I do not suggest that good men have done nothing, but it is manifestly clear that they have not done enough.

The hon. Member for Livingston, who spoke for the Opposition, did not seek to absolve himself of a degree of culpability, and in that he spoke for us all. The honour of the House is at stake far more than it was in the debate that we had earlier today. It is crucial that this situation in the centre of Europe does not become a cauldron that boils over into a European conflagration. That remains just as much a possibility as it did in the early hours of that December morning in 1991 when I drew a Consolidated Fund debate on the situation in the former Yugoslavia, and for the first time the House turned its attention to that.

I am sorry that the former Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs, my right hon. Friend the Member for Witney (Mr. Hurd) is not in the Chamber. He spoke about there being no new world order. We accept that, but it is no excuse for not seeking to build one upon Europe's disintegrating old order. That is absolutely essential.

The hon. Member for Livinston was right when he spoke about the signals that will go out if the Yugoslavian situation results in ultimate disaster. A number of us have made similar observations in the past. Irrespective of whether it develops into full-scale war, drawing in America and Russia backing opposite sides, those signals will be a recipe for international anarchy. Without the rule of law in a country there is no civil order, and without international law and respect for it, there can only be international anarchy.

We have agonised in public for far too long about the difficulties. Of course, whatever course is adopted is fraught with risks—far more so now than it would have been if those air and naval patrols had been put in when Dubrovnik was being shelled. The risks have increased as vacillation has led to the Serbs calling people's bluff time and again.

Let us consider for a moment what we are debating. President Milosevic has publicly repudiated Karadzic. He has not done enough, and there is much more that he can should do before there is any question of lifting sanctions. But he has dissociated himself from the activities of the Karadzic Serbs.

It has been said often recently in the House that the Karadzic Serbs—I think that I was the first to use that specific term—do not represent the whole Serbian population of Bosnia-Herzegovina: far from it. At most they represent possibly 50 per cent. and probably fewer. That is the group of people we are debating. They have in effect declared war on the United Nations. That is what has happened. It is not a question of embarking on a war or throwing our weight around in that sense, but of the United Nations not allowing its mandates to be set at naught by a gang of brigands.

We must therefore display determination and resolution. It must be made absolutely plain to Karadzic that Gorazde will not fall, and that Sarajevo will be relieved. Not a hair on a single Serbian head needs to be touched, but should they persist in their appalling actions and attitude, punitive action will be taken from the air and elsewhere. Of course it was right for the Secretary of State for Defence to be vague on that subject—one does not announce in advance precisely what one is going to do.

There must be no doubt in the Karadzic Serb mind that the international community means business and is not going to see its rule flouted in this appalling way by those who have despoiled villages and towns, raped women and caused mayhem.

My right hon. Friend the Member for Guildford (Mr. Howell) spoke about the lifting of the arms embargo. It has always been morally indefensible to have recognised a sovereign state, yet neither allowed it to defend itself nor defended it. My right hon. Friend the former Foreign Secretary once used unhappy words about "level killing fields". Far better that there should be a level killing field than a field of slaughter, with all the heavy weaponry in one pair of hands and none in the other.

I do not want to see a quick move to lift the embargo—that will not be necessary given the resolution I have called for. There should be absolutely no doubt, however, in the Karadzic Serb mind that ethnic cleansing will not be allowed to pay off, and that those Serbs will not be allowed to alter international borders by flouting international rules.

It is essential that, during the summer recess which we are to begin tonight, there should be no question of a great European city, which is Sarajevo—a model of multi-ethnic co-operation until a few years ago—being allowed to fall. That must not be allowed to happen, and the seige must be lifted in the interests of the new European humanity about which the hon. Member for Livingston so eloquently spoke.

If there is any major change in policy, there must be no question but that the House must be recalled to discuss it. I hope that there will be no faint hearts on the Conservative Benches or in any other part of the House, and no flinching from our country doing its duty. This is a great nation; a leading member of the European Union; a permanent member of the Security Council and a founder member of NATO.

In the very year when we commemorate the ending of the second world war, are we going to see our proud history of the past 50 years and our country's reputation besmirched by being defeated by the sort of people who are holding men and women to ransom in Bosnia tonight? I do not believe that we are. I have every faith in the Prime Minister. I hope that the summit on Friday will produce a resolution and determination and I look forward to that.

9.38 pm

Our failure and that of the international community—Britain has played an enormous part in that, in which we are all implicated, as we all agree—to stand up for what is morally right and right in international law in Bosnia has created a nightmare there, that will haunt Europe for a long time to come. It has created unbearable suffering for the people of Bosnia. The United Nations has been humiliated; NATO has been humiliated, and any petty dictator seeking to acquire territory by force must feel encouraged by what has happened in Bosnia.

Bosnia is a multi-ethnic state, recognised by the world community as an independent nation and a member of the United Nations. The population is predominantly Muslim, but it is mixed—23 per cent. of Bosnian families are a mix of Serb, Croat and Muslim. It is profoundly interesting that so much of the talk is about Serbs, Croats and Muslims, and always assumes that the Bosnian people are Muslim only.

We know that Serbia has been trying to whip up a Muslim bogeyman and suggest that Muslim people cannot have a state in Europe. We are talking about a secular Muslim European people, but there is an attempt to blackguard them as unacceptable people. The language that is used so often by the commentators, which does not refer to Catholic, Orthodox and Muslim, or Serb, Croat and Bosnian, is playing that game. That, too, is dangerous for the world. If the world is to divide and find a new enmity between the Muslim world and the non-Muslim world, that would be dangerous for all of us.

There is a deep and profound feeling of anger among Muslim people throughout the world that the world community does not extend to them the rights under international law that they expect. I saw in the press, either today or yesterday, that, when the Prime Minister of Bosnia was asked why he thought the world community had not protected Bosnia, he said, "It is because we are a Muslim people." That is profoundly wrong, and profoundly dangerous.

Following the world's recognition of Bosnia as a full state under international law, Serb aggression took 70 per cent. of Bosnian territory and 30 per cent. of Croatian territory—a grave breach of international law, trying to change internationally recognised boundaries by force. Following that came the most vile ethnic cleansing, as we have learnt to call it—slaughter, torture and mass and deliberately organised rape aimed at driving people from the land in which they have lived for generations. Those are profoundly serious war crimes.

It seems to me that the constant suggestion from British Foreign Secretaries that it is a civil war, and that the task of the United Nations is merely to supply humanitarian aid with the consent of the parties—as though the two parties are on an equal footing—is profoundly wrong in principle. It accepts that boundaries can be changed by force, and serious war crimes permitted. That has been the approach form the start, and that has been the error. Under the Vance-Owen plan, there was a willingness to change boundaries, although force had changed those boundaries. There was a willingness to appease ethnic cleansing. The contact group plan does exactly the same.

I admit that, at first, I used to think that the reason for the weakness of British policy and UN strategy was a lack of resolve—a weakness and a fudge about which I was ashamed. I now think that our Government cannot be so incompetent. I believe that there is a hidden strategy to accept a greater Serbia as a way of stabilising the Balkans. Either we have an utterly unprincipled, incompetent, pusillanimous Government, or there is a hidden strategy along the lines of, "Let it happen, because we need a big power in the Balkans to stabilise the position. We will allow a greater Serbia to be built." I am becoming more and more convinced that the latter is the underlying strategy.

Throughout the conflict—it happened again today—it has been suggested that those of us who say that more could be done are advocating all-out war; that we are saying that the UN should go to war with Bosnia. None of us has ever advocated that. Those people rule out the option of an intelligent and restrained use of force by the UN to protect international law; to use force defensively to protect the safe areas, so that any Serb aggression would be against the UN, and the Serbs would have to pay the consequences. It would also be possible to use a restricted force to get food and supplies to people in the safe areas.

The humiliation for the UN is that it takes through supplies with the consent of the Serbs, who steal fuel and food from it. In effect, we are supplying the Serbs, even though there is supposed to be an embargo. That same humiliation extends to British troops supplying Gorazde. Supplies are taken through with the permission of the Serbs, who decide what our troops can or cannot have.

That position should never have been allowed to arise, and it should be brought to an end. We should insist that, when we take supplies through to Gorazde, the Serbs will not be allowed to inspect them. I understand that there are inadequate medical supplies to cope if anything happened to our troops in Gorazde, because the Serbs will allow only certain supplies to go through. That is intolerable.

I believe that, after the taking of the hostages and the shooting down of an American plane, which were met with inaction by the west, the Serbs knew that they could take the safe areas. They knew that, even if they took our soldiers hostage, we would do nothing. Our inaction was a message of weakness, allowing the Serbs to go ahead and take the safe areas, because nothing would be done.

We now have to decide what to do, and at this point I have to agree with the right hon. Member for Guildford (Mr. Howell). I do so with regret, because I should have liked the United Nations to take a more robust line at the start. I do not believe that the choices are all-out withdrawal, including the withdrawal of humanitarian aid, or allowing the Bosnians to fight. There is a middle way. We can, and should, defend Gorazde; we must get supplies to Sarajevo; and we must continue to supply humanitarian aid to central Bosnia. But we must allow the Bosnian people to fight for themselves. We will not protect them, and it is absolutely wrong to allow them to be slaughtered.

The brave Bosnian army has absolutely no equipment, and a people who have been wronged as much as this people have must be entitled to fight for their own honour and future. It is unbearable and intolerable that we neither protect them nor allow them to fight. It is shameful, and I agree wholeheartedly, although with regret, with the right hon. Member for Guildford, that we must now move on and plan for the future, so that the Bosnian people can fight for themselves.

Our interests are very much tied up with this problem. There is a real danger for the future of Europe. We shall have our own Gaza strip, with our own secular European Muslim people, who will be angry and bitter and who will engage in any form of protest and violence—quite rightly—to defend themselves against all the wrong that is being done to them. We shall have 2 million refugees, with all the consequences and destabilisation that flow from that. We shall have a humiliated United Nations, a humiliated British Government and a humiliated NATO. All that will encourage any other petty dictator to start on the same road.

I appeal to the Government to adopt a more robust and honest strategy, and give up on the Greater Serbia strategy which I believe lies behind their rhetoric. I appeal to them to save Gorazde, supply Sarajevo, continue to supply humanitarian aid, and allow the Bosnian people to fight for their own future.

9.46 pm

I want to deal with just three aspects of this horrendous problem. The first has been touched on a number of times and concerns the civilian population, especially the people remaining in the two enclaves and in Sarajevo.

Surprise has been expressed in some quarters about what happened in Srebrenica, surprise at the speed of its collapse and some surprise about the degree of brutality in which the Bosnian Serb army subsequently engaged, although one has to say that, set against its recent history, it was acting true to form. If that was a matter of surprise, it was also the clearest and starkest possible warning to the civilian populations that remained in the other two eastern enclaves, and potentially also to the civilian population in Sarajevo itself, of what lies in store for them if the Bosnian Serb army is able to overrun those places.

If it is the case—all realistic evidence suggests that it is—that the international community is not willing to deploy the military manpower, arms and equipment on the ground in order to defend the enclaves and, conceivably, possibly even to defend Sarajevo, we cannot simply walk away from our obligations towards the civilians remaining in those places. I am certain that everyone—inside and outside the House—has been utterly appalled at the systematic brutality of the Bosnian Serbs' treatment of the civilian population in Srebrenica and the way in which they separated the men and the boys from the women and children, taking the men and boys to an unknown fate and leaving the women and children prey to the depredations, violations and rape that then occurred. We have a profound obligation to the civilian population in those remaining places.

If we cannot provide those people with the military force to enable the safe haven policy to stand up, there is an obligation on the UN and UNPROFOR to see whether we can at least develop the option of enabling a safe passage for those who wish to leave the enclaves for central Bosnia. The last possible thing that we should do is leave it until it is too late, and to leave those people at the mercy of the Serbs. We know what would happen to them.

Of course I understand totally the difficulties, not least from the Bosnian Muslim Government, because they have been foremost in resisting any suggestion that the civilian population should leave the eastern enclaves, and indeed Sarajevo, but UNPROFOR cannot simply allow what happened to the civilian population in Srebrenica to be reproduced, in Gorazde certainly, and—I hope, if it is not too late—in Zepa. We must take steps to try to provide at least the option for those who want to take it of a safe passage back to the safer areas in central Bosnia.

My second point, which has been dealt with by a number of hon. Members, and particularly by the right hon. Member for Llanelli (Mr. Davies), who has an obviously strong constituency interest, relates to the position of the small British contingent in Gorazde. My right hon. Friend the Secretary of State said that their safety was of paramount importance and I am sure that we were all extremely glad to hear him say that.

I am also glad that, entirely rightly and properly, my right hon. Friend did not elaborate on the options that he has under consideration for ensuring the safety of that contingent. We have a very special obligation to them, not least because by being non-combatants they are in a more vulnerable position than they would have been if they had been combatants. If they had been deployed to Gorazde in a combatant role, they would never have been deployed as a contingent of a mere 200 people with simply their own personal weapons—basically—to protection them. They would have been deployed in hugely greater numbers and with proper fire power at their disposal.

In circumstances where we have exposed our own service men to a huge degree of vulnerability and risk in a non-combatant role under the aegis of the United Nations, there is an overwhelming obligation on us to take whatever measures are necessary to ensure their safety. I hope and believe that my right hon. Friends will make certain that that happens. I hope that they will not place too much trust—or sole trust—in the repeated dictum that people will be held personally responsible on the Bosnian Serb side for what may happen to those who are taken hostage. Unhappily, there has been far too much evidence that that particular threat does not cut much ice. To back that up, I am sure that my right hon. Friends also have very positive measures in mind to protect the contingent involved.

My final point, which was touched on tangentially by the hon. Member for Livingston (Mr. Cook), concerns the rules of engagement which are made available to the members of UNPROFOR and especially to our own forces. In any deteriorating military situation with a capacity to escalate—this clearly is such a situation—it is absolutely essential that our service men have rules of engagement that are sufficiently flexible, sufficiently quick to operate and sufficiently delegated to commanders in quite small localities to be able to be effective in protecting them and their equipment.

Our service men clearly face a multitude of possible threats. They face the threat of being taken hostage. It is clear that they face the threat of being mined-in quite deliberately so that they are unable move with their protected vehicles. It is clear that they may at a future date face the risk of direct fire from automatic weapons, from mortars, from tanks and from artillery.

In those circumstances, it is absolutely essential that our service men have the flexibility and strength of their own rules of engagement so that they can provide for their own protection. In this House and outside, it would be considered unforgivable if a situation arose in which British forces were deprived of their weapons, were deprived of their freedom and taken hostage or, worse still, were deprived of their lives as a result of not having rules of engagement that were adequate to provide for their own security and protection. I am sure that my right hon. Friends will address that issue with the seriousness that it deserves.

This is clearly a situation of the utmost difficulty. We must deal with the realities of the fact that the international community has not put the military forces on the ground that are sufficient to impose the territorial safeguards that we in the House want. That is the inescapable reality. Unhappily, almost every country in the world has failed to deal with the problem with the strength and commitment that we have shown. I refer not least to the United States which, as a matter of policy, has refused to get committed on the ground.

In those circumstances, I see no alternative but to continue to pursue our humanitarian endeavours. We should, however, certainly keep open the option that is undoubtedly available to us—we may be coming much closer to it if we have to make a significant withdrawal—of enabling much more military help and equipment to go to the Bosnian Muslims.

9.56 pm

I never thought that I would find myself agreeing with the Secretary of State for Defence. I agree fully that the presence of UNPROFOR troops in Bosnia-Herzegovina has saved numerous lives. I also agreed with the right hon. Member for Witney (Mr. Hurd), the former Foreign Secretary, when he pointed out—it needs to be pointed out to those who put forward the idea that all this is about a Greater Serbia—that the people who are fighting in Bosnia are Bosnian Serbs, Bosnian Muslims and Bosnian Croats.

The House and the international community are agonising tonight about whether we can save Gorazde and whether we can save Zepa. It is even argued that we shall have to give up Zepa.

I remember that on 29 June, my right hon. Friend the Leader of the Opposition said that the safe areas in Bosnia must be demilitarised. That was the agreement when the safe areas were established. On 17 July, only two days ago, President Izetbegovic proposed holding direct negotiations with the Bosnian Serbs on freeing civilians in Zepa. According to BBC Monitoring, although this has not been reported in our media, the Bosnian Serbs reacted immediately as follows:

"The UN should deliver the proposal to us and we will respond to it officially. Following the events in Srebrenica the leadership of the Serb Republic would like to negotiate on Zepa with the aim of transforming it into a real demilitarised zone and to resolve all the contentious issues which caused the conflict."

[Interruption.] I can hear the howling dervishes somewhere at the back. They want to get into war—

Will my hon. Friend give way?

I will not give way; I have got only 10 minutes.

Will my hon. Friend give way?

I will not give way. My hon. Friend has had her 10 minutes and she was not interrupted.

My point is that it is possible to deal with the problems in Zepa and Gorazde by direct negotiations with the Bosnian Serbs. That was the aim of the United Nations resolution on safe havens and it should be carried out.

Will my hon. Friend give way?

No, I will not give way.

I understand that, but—

I have 10 minutes. My hon. Friends should allow free speech in this country if they want free speech in Bosnia.

My hon. Friend the Member for Livingston (Mr. Cook) compared Bosnia with the republics of the former USSR. It is true that we are seeing the break-up of a country, but the one essential difference is that the west brokered the change to an independent state in Bosnia-Herzegovina. We had nothing to do with what happened in Georgia or the central Asian republics of the former USSR. But we do bear some responsibility for allowing the Bosnia-Herzegovinan state to be established in the first place.

The situation in Gorazde and Zepa could be resolved if there was a willingness to go ahead with the suggestion that Izetbegovic made two days ago to speak to the Bosnian Serbs. What worries me is that all the initiatives taking place in Bosnia are being made either by the Bosnian Serbs or the Bosnian Muslims. The Bosnian Muslims decided to break the ceasefire at the beginning of May this year, and the Bosnian Serbs decided to advance to take Srebrenica.

I am afraid that we are engaged in snapshot diplomacy, and we are not looking at the full picture. We talk about the safe havens in eastern Bosnia when they are attacked and when pressure is being put on them. We do not look months ahead at what we may be discussing in this House about the situation in the former Yugoslavia. President Tudjman is at this moment preparing for an attack upon the Serbs in Krajina.

Nobody looks at the full picture and asks themselves why the Serbs in Bosnia-Herzegovina are involved in the conflict at all. We must learn from the facts. It is no use trying to forget what happened in 1991. The fact is that whereas the Croats in Zagreb and the Muslims in Sarajevo do not want to be ruled from Belgrade, the Serbs in Bosnia and the Serbs in Croatia do not want to be ruled either from Zagreb or Sarajevo. We must accept that fact.

Will my hon. Friend give way?

I have made it clear that I am not giving way. We must accept that if it is right to grant the Croats and the Bosnian Muslims the right to self-determination, what's sauce for the goose should be sauce for the gander. If the Serbs in Bosnia do not wish to be a part of the Bosnian state, we should look at the whole situation with that very much in mind.

Many of us have been shocked by the dreadful and bestial scenes in Srebrenica, and I share that shock with everyone else. But the television cameras were there, so we could see those events. But when a few months ago, the Croats decided to drive out the indigenous Serb population of western Slavonia—committing crimes as they went—it was not portrayed on television because the cameras were not there. If those events had been seen, we would have been just as appalled.

Tadeusz Mazowiecki, the UN human rights rapporteur, said that UN peacekeepers had seen numerous civilian bodies strewn along the road between Okucani and Novi Varos. The Croats denied access to international observers, and we did not see that. What I am suggesting and maintaining is that all of the crimes are certainly not going all the one way. We have to bear many things in mind.

It is no use talking about a Greater Serbia. All the Croats, all the Slovenes and all the Muslims once lived in the state of Yugoslavia. On 13 February 1991, long before people took any interest in the situation, I put questions about the rising nationalisms in Yugoslavia, as it then was. I was told—as I was told in a letter from the Prime Minister in April 1991—that Britain stood by the territorial integrity of Yugoslavia. As we know, that position was maintained until the time of the Maastricht treaty.

It is unfortunate, to say the least, that in order to secure concessions on the Maastricht treaty we were willing to give in to pressure from the German Foreign Office—and many people in Germany now admit that they were wrong—to accept recognition of Slovenia and Croatia. Slovenia did not matter too much; but even the Badinter report, commissioned by Lord Carrington, reported in December 1991 that if recognition was to be given to any of the republics of the former Yugoslavia, Croatia certainly should not be one of them.

It is the suppression of the Serbian population—a very large population—by the Croatian Government that has caused much of the present conflict. I will venture a bet that it will not be long before the House is debating—

Order. Time is up.

10.6 pm

I am profoundly concerned about our peacekeeping role in Bosnia. It is a very difficult role to play, and it exposes our troops to all kinds of danger. As my right hon. and learned Friend the Secretary of State pointed out, that peacekeeping role is dependent on the consent of the parties—and, in Bosnia, that consent is far from complete.

My hon. Friend the Member for Staffordshire, South (Sir Patrick Cormack) and the hon. Member for Birmingham, Ladywood (Ms Short) pressed for the restoration of frontiers and the raising of the siege of Sarajevo, among other things. All those objectives can hardly be attained by our troops in their peacekeeping role; they can be secured only by troops in their military role. I never thought that we would become so involved in Bosnia—"we" meaning both the British and the Welsh—but involved we are: very deeply involved. There are thousands of British troops in Bosnia, and about 200 members of the Royal Welch Fusiliers in Gorazde. As the right hon. Member for Llanelli (Mr. Davies) observed, the position of the Royal Welch Fusiliers is fraught with danger and difficulty.

Let us be realistic: Gorazde is probably the next so-called safe haven to be attacked by the Serbian forces. I am appalled at the prospect. We have seen what the Serbs have done in Srebrenica, where the Dutch forces were so dreadfully humiliated; we also know what has happened in Zepa, where the Ukrainians were robbed of their arms. I understand from today's tapes that their lives are now being threatened. There is not much doubt in my mind that Gorazde is next, with those 200 Welshmen there. They are not there to defend it; that is not their role. They are simply there, as far as I can make out, to mark it out as a safe haven.

I ask myself, what can those 200 Fusiliers possibly do? They are caught between opposing forces who do not even want them there, so I believe that there is nothing much that they can do. I put nothing past my young compatriots in courage and bravery, but there is very little on their side apart from the firepower of the prayers of those at home. I wish that they had more support, and I understand that the French will offer such support on Friday, but that will be military support, and their role will automatically change. I also gather from the tapes that the Bosnian Serb leader Radovan Karadzic has already said that he will attack any forces that may be brought in to Gorazde.

That is the nub of the problem. We cannot rely on any of our allies to come to our aid, despite the efforts of my right hon. and learned Friend the Foreign Secretary. The United States and France are benevolent but undecided, so let us be absolutely clear in our minds that the buck stops here. The buck stops with the Government, and they will be held responsible for what happens to our troops in Gorazde.

As I have said, I am full of foreboding. My advice is to get our troops in Gorazde out to a safer area, because we have the precedent of what has happened in Zepa and Srebrenica, where other United Nations forces have been involved. I would move them to a safer place if no sufficient reinforcements are available to support them, and it does not appear that such support will be available in time.

I shall not press my right hon. Friend on any withdrawal plan, but I hope that there is one and, if there is not, I have to say that someone is grievously at fault.

I do not disagree with my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister's analysis at Question Time yesterday of the overall position and the alternatives available to us, but I was especially struck by one sentence in his reply. He said:

"What is clear…is that it is not practical to mix war fighting with peacekeeping."—[Official Report, 18 July 1995; Vol. 263, c. 1447.]

I could not agree more. That is precisely what is happening. We are changing from a peacekeeping role to war fighting mode, and we are being drawn progressively deeper into the Bosnian war situation.

That is precisely what has happened in the safe havens. The United Nations is trying to do its peacekeeping, but the combatants are determined to fight and are doing so. In the course of fighting, they are threatening our troops. We have given strong assurances about the safety of those troops. Nevertheless there is little that we can do to stop the fighting and reduce the hazard.

Against that background, I urge the Government to regard Gorazde as a special situation. I believe that it will become a special situation shortly, if the precedents of Srebrenica and Zepa are anything to go by. We should therefore regard it as a special situation, requiring very special treatment within the overall policy. I am not talking about a withdrawal policy for the whole of Bosnia. I am discussing the specific position in Gorazde, which is under imminent threat. It is quite clear to me that the United Nations peacekeeping role has failed in the safe havens and the sooner we recognise that reality, the better it will be for us all.

10.14 pm

While listening to the debate, I have scribbled down some notes to try to structure a reasoned statement, but it has taken a turn that almost compels me to throw them away.

First, I shall establish my credentials for commenting on the situation in Bosnia. I am a member of the Select Committee on Defence, which has visited Bosnia three times in the past two and a half years—the last time about two months ago. The Minister of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs, the hon. Member for Upminster (Sir N. Bonsor), who I suppose will wind up the debate, knows all about those visits because he led them as Chairman of the Committee.

The Committee visited many military units. I must associate myself with the comments of the right hon. Member for Llanelli (Mr. Davies) because my son was in charge of maintaining the armoured personnel vehicles that went in with the Duke of Wellington's regiment when it made a dash from Vitez to Gorazde to lift the first Serb seige. If we had time—and if you would lift the rules on parliamentary language, Mr. Deputy Speaker—I could tell hon. Members exactly what my son thought about the Bosnian situation.

I have also discussed the Bosnian situation with delegates from many nations in my capacity as a member of the North Atlantic Assembly and of the parliamentary assembly of the Organisation for Security and Co-operation in Europe states, so I am as reasonably well versed about the situation as any hon. Member might claim to be. Bearing that in mind, I must comment on some of the observations made by what I would call couch commentators who may not have visited Bosnia, who do not know the terrain and who do not understand the complexities of the situation.

We tend to sit here judging the situation with the Geneva convention at the back of our minds. It is not like that. The Bosnian forces do not behave in that manner. The lack of chivalry in Bosnia has to be seen to be believed. Unless we are prepared to take that on board and accept what kind of adversaries we are dealing with among all of the combatants, we are spitting against the wind.

Two months ago, 400 hostages—many of them manacled to lamp posts and telegraph poles—were used to deter an air strike. I put it to the House that, in Gorazde, the Bosniac—hon. Members will note that I do not say "Muslim"—army has threatened to use the Ukrainians as hostages and as bodyguards against Serbian fire unless the United Nations authorises NATO air strikes against the Serb forces. What can one do in the face of that sort of treachery? It is an absolutely crazy situation.

We talk about insisting on the re-establishment of frontiers and safe havens that were never safe in the first place. The so-called safe havens were never adequately staffed and the staff were never adequately equipped. When those so-called safe havens are infiltrated by Bosniac elements and used as springboards for launching attacks against encircling Serbian troops, how safe can we expect them to be? The whole situation is fraught with such mendacity that we do ourselves a disservice by trying to make sense of it in terms of the standards that we applied previously according to the Geneva convention.

What should we do? I tried to hint at one option in the very limited time for debate following the statement the other day. When the hostages were held last time, the most effective ally we had—pressured by the Russians—

Milosevic.

Yes, Milosevic; my right hon. Friend is absolutely correct. He dragged Karadzic to the negotiations and when Karadzic left the negotiations, having been forced to climb down, he had a face like a boy with a smacked bottom. Instead of considering Milosevic's reported claim that he will help if we ease the sanctions, we must make the sanctions ever more stringent and tell Milosevic in clear terms what will happen unless he co-operates to the full in bringing the situation to an end.

We have already broken a federation between the Croats and the Bosniacs in central Bosnia, for which we should give the UN credit. I am not talking only about Britain's part, but that played by the other 41 nations. If we could succeed with the Croats and Bosniacs, who were tearing themselves apart two years ago, there is no reason—given the right approach, pressures and sanctions—why we can not do so with the others. Milosevic helped two months ago, and he can help this week.

What sickens me is the amount of criticism that is levelled at the United Nations. Members of both Front Benches have made the valid point that the UN is us. Having visited Bosnia three times during the past two years, I can tell the House that the United Nations is coming of age through this bloody awful mess. Two years ago, it was chaotic. Twelve months ago, huge improvements were to be seen. This year, the UN is a very good organisation. It is not perfect, but it has real determination and high morale. Instead of using the UN—and Britain is a member of the Security Council—as some kind of whipping boy to expunge our feelings of guilt and shame, we ought to give it credit for doing a first-class job.

The hon. and learned Member for Fife, North-East (Mr. Campbell) based much of his argument on three principles learnt in Vietnam. They are a defined objective, sufficient forces equipped more than adequately, and a clearly defined escape route. We have none of those principles operating in Bosnia. Even if we had, they would not have been workable because we have not in the past come into conflict with the standards operating in Bosnia. Until we learn that lesson, we do not have much chance of resolving the problem. I hope that we will learn the lessons by Friday, when the summit is to be held. I wish the Government well; they have the prayers of all of us.

10.22 pm

It is a pleasure to follow the hon. Member for Stockton, North (Mr. Cook). I join him in welcoming my hon. Friend the Minister of State, the Member for Upminster (Sir N. Bonsor), who was previously Chairman of the Defence Select Committee, on which I serve.

The House is right to debate Bosnia today, before it rises for the summer recess and in advance of the Lancaster house summit this Friday. I share the view of my hon. Friend the Member for Staffordshire, South (Sir P. Cormack) that we may well return during the summer recess for a renewed debate.

Although we are debating Bosnia, the broader issue of the former Yugoslavia is foremost in our minds. The United Nations was first involved in the former Yugoslavia when it established UNPROFOR 1, now renamed UNPRO. There is much unfinished business in Croatia, and it will have to be resolved before the pieces of Bosnia can be reassembled in a way that provides any chance of lasting peace. Large areas of Croatia are still unlawfully occupied by Serbia. The uneasy truce in that country has been broken because Zagreb was shelled by the Serbs. That situation must be resolved before peace can come to the former Yugoslavia.

We supported the establishment of UNPROFOR 2, but its mandate has run its course and requires redefining in light of the current situation. It is easy to say that the United Nations is faced with mission impossible. Without UNPROFOR, however, the situation would have been much worse. Fatalities have fallen from about 130,000 in 1992 to only 2,500 in 1994. That is thanks to the efforts of the UN, the aid agencies, other organisations and many volunteers who deliver humanitarian aid. Nor let us forget the work that is done by the Overseas Development Agency. Humanitarian aid has saved tens of thousands of lives. The so-called safe enclaves may not have succeeded entirely, but there is no doubt that they have substantially reduced ethnic cleansing.

We have been told that the safe enclaves required 36,000 troops to implement them and that only 7,500 were forthcoming from UN members. The first lesson is that it is no use the UN passing resolutions without first agreeing how the proposals are to be executed. It is greatly to the credit of the Government that we fulfilled our responsibilities as a permanent member of the UN Security Council by doing our bit so readily.

The UN is faced with several options. I join those who say that it would be wrong to speculate on which one should be followed. There is no doubt that an all-out NATO offensive is entirely out of the question. That has been forgotten time back. A complete withdrawal is probably wrong. Perhaps moving our troops out of Gorazde is a possibility. I know only that whichever of the options we act upon, reinforcements will be needed quickly.

Total withdrawal could well mean all-out war in former Yugoslavia. It would mean bringing Serbia, and probably Croatia, back in on opposite sides. Such a war could spread to Kosovo, Albania and Macedonia. An all-out Balkan war would ensue. Even Greece and Turkey might be involved, as might the whole of the eastern Mediterranean. I am sure that the House agrees that, in that way, lies chaos. I hope that the United States Senate has the sense not to pass Senator Bob Dole's resolution with a two-thirds majority that enables it to veto the President.

As the hon. and learned Member for Fife, North-East (Mr. Campbell) said, it is extremely expensive in terms of manpower to carry out a total withdrawal. It has been estimated that it would take 22 weeks to complete the exercise and that 60,000 more troops would be required. I should be interested to know the current estimates. Besides being morally wrong, total withdrawal would be entirely impracticable.

Whatever the UN, and the Government as a member of it do, some reinforcements are required at once. That will be a real test of how rapidly NATO's rapid reaction force can react. We know that 1,300 additional British troops are already in Bosnia. What about the remaining 4,000 from the 24 Air Mobile Brigade? Why do we have to wait until the end of August for them to arrive? Is the brigade really as air mobile as its name implies? Surely there are heavy lift air transports available on the open market that could be hired to convey these troops. Or are we waiting for a free lift from our American allies? If lives are at stake, which they are, I regret that the troops of the 24 Air Mobile Brigade have not already been flown out to Bosnia to reinforce our troops there.

Members of the Select Committee on Defence met our troops when we visited Bosnia under the distinguished chairmanship of my hon. Friend the Minister earlier this year. On behalf of my colleagues, I put on record our tribute to the British troops deployed in Bosnia and the British UN commander, General Rupert Smith. Their professionalism, courage and ability to cope with ever-changing and dangerous situations are to be admired—as they are by everyone who has seen them operate. Put simply, we have the best troops in the world. Their morale is high and their leadership is second to none.

There is, however, one matter that causes concern. I refer to the rules of engagement. My right hon. Friend the Member for Tonbridge and Mailing (Sir J. Stanley) dealt with that fully and I support everything that he said.

What about public opinion? Last night, Jeremy Paxman, whom I never thought I would would be complimenting in this place, compered the BBC programme "You Decide—With Paxman". A large invited audience, with many experts present, debated whether we should withdraw from Bosnia or stay in support of the United Nations.

Before the debate, 30,000 people voted by telephone; 57 per cent. were in favour of pulling out and only 43 per cent. wanted to stay. Following an intensive and well-informed debate lasting nearly an hour, the views of those who had voted changed to 69 per cent. in favour of staying in and only 31 per cent. in favour of pulling out.

During the debate, phrases such as, "aggression must not pay", "pulling out would be apocalyptic" and "we must reinforce the principles of the United Nations charter" were used. Those statements all seem to echo the public mood in Britain today. But best of all were the words of a mother of a British soldier serving in Gorazde. She said, "There is no shortage of military courage. What is now needed is political courage." I hope that the House will endorse that view.

10.31 pm

I am always suspicious when people such as the hon. Member for Romsey and Waterside (Mr. Colvin) talk about other people's courage. My Front Bench and some of my other colleagues will forgive me if I offer a dissenting view.

I am older than most people here and, for that reason, did national service and was tank crew. I hold the passionate belief that those of us who have the privilege to sit on green Benches in the House of Commons should not commit our fellow countrymen to hazardous situations unless they are properly protected. The fact is that they are now in a combatant role.

I am not complaining to the Secretary of State for Defence, but he was not here when my hon. Friend the Member for Stockton, North (Mr. Cook) said that these people are not abiding by anything like the Queensberry rules. It is a brutal situation. If our fellow countrymen are to be committed to a brutal situation, they really must have covering defence. That means, I suggest to the hon. and learned Member for Fife, North-East (Mr. Campbell), some kind of armoured protection.

If further action is to be taken, will there be armoured cover? If so, it is easy to put in forces, but we must be clear about the kind of circumstances in which they will be pulled out. We found that in Northern Ireland and the Russians found it in Afghanistan. Pulling out forces is a delicate, difficult matter.

Once we go into the Bosnian mire—it may be right or it may be wrong, I say to my hon. Friend the Member for Birmingham, Ladywood (Ms Short)—pulling out will not only be in my lifetime but in the lifetime, if we are not careful, of the youngest among us. That might seem like Cassandra, but I believe that that is the situation.

If more forces are put in and their role develops, whether they like it or not, into a combatant one, what is the Government's estimate of how long they will be there—we are talking in terms of decades—and are we sure that the British people have the will to carry on for decades? I do not think so. I was invited to a mess night at Catterick of my old regiment, the Scots Greys, now the Scots Dragoon Guards. Those people are serious soldiers and they would in all circumstances do their duty wherever they were sent, but they and the parachute officers who were there asked me as a politician how much support they would receive if their role became a combatant one. After what we heard from my hon. Friend the Member for Stockton, North, who is to say that it is not now, de facto, a combatant role?

My second question involves the speech of the Secretary of State for Defence. I do not want to misquote him—he will interrupt me if I have in any way misinterpreted him or done him an injustice. I understood him to say that the Government were still contemplating the use of air power and that it might well be necessary. Indeed, when in Question Time I asked a direct question on air power, there was no denial. I take it from the Secretary of State's silence that the air option is open.

If the air option were used, what would happen to those of our fellow countrymen in uniform who are pursuing a humanitarian role? As soon as those aircraft began to drop bombs, what would happen to the men in blue berets on the ground? Slit throats? In the circumstances described by my hon. Friend the Member for Stockton, North, I think that they would meet a possibly brutal end. What would the House of Commons say then? In such situations, one has to look from the other side of the hill to see the dreadful scenarios that might develop.

By taking this attitude towards the Serbs—however brutal they may have been—we are risking defying reality. One of the realities was that Tito, during his troubles with Stalin, decided to have a deterrent. It was not a nuclear deterrent; it was training the most formidable, expert, tough guerilla army in the world. That is what had been learnt from the German occupation. In that terrain, how on earth are we ever going to have military success against people who feel that they have great causes? As my hon. Friend the Member for Stockton, North explained, that is true of both sides in the conflict.

The option I have described may seem not so much craven as that we are not fulfilling our duty, but we have many duties and international obligations. I wonder whether such wealth as we have to devote internationally should not be devoted to the drought in Zambia, which is creating terrible problems, or to the appalling situation that is developing in Malawi and Mozambique. If we are talking about saving lives, there are other places in the world where, instead of becoming involved in a civil war, we may be more effective in relieving great and equal hardship.

10.37 pm

As I look around the Chamber this evening, I see many familiar faces and one or two new faces on the Government Front Bench, which I am pleased to see. We listened to the words of the Secretary of State for Defence with great care today, and understood that he spoke with great moderation. I shall perhaps return to one or two of the things he said and question him in a moment or so.

I recognise faces because this is one of the many debates that we have had on the subject of Bosnia—from the days back in 1992, when we were talking about whether troops should be committed and whether we should play a part in UNPROFOR. We were pleased that the Government decided—we felt, rather belatedly—to play their part, and have done so fully.

Every one of the debates has shown the fervour and the passion across both sides of the House. There are those who feel that we should be doing more. If I may say so to my hon. Friend the Member for Linlithgow (Mr. Dalyell), there are those with more cautious heads who, based on experience, tell us to think twice. They have the experience of being in the military, and know how difficult it is when one takes such action. The Government have to try to put matters in the balance and work out the risks to which we are prepared to expose our troops, our men and women. They must also place in the balance the gains for the world.

I know that the House will appreciate that the Opposition have not tried to make political capital out of this matter. There is far too much at stake for that: we are debating the lives of our people. It is right for us to take that view, because, in a sense, we are fighting to try to ensure that the values of the House and of our country can be brought about in the troubled country of Bosnia.

Those are the values of tolerance and understanding, of living together free from religious persecution and ethnic intolerance. Therefore, although we have our disagreements and feel strongly about many matters, we should remember that we are fighting for values and to try to get aid through and create a stable society in Bosnia so that those values, which once almost existed, can flourish in a true democracy.

Anyone would have to have a hard heart not to be moved by the telling pictures on television of the refugees streaming out of Srebrenica into the airport at Tuzla. Those refugees are wretched, emotionally broken and in utter and complete despair. I am not making a racist point when I say that those people are like most of us—Europeans. They had saved for their houses, washing machines and cars, but suddenly they found themselves with a bundle of clothes—if they were lucky. Everything had gone, and one could not but recognise the dreams that had been shattered.

I hope that our intelligence forces and military personnel in UNPROFOR in the vicinity of Tuzla will collect evidence to make sure that the war criminals who have perpetrated such crimes will ultimately have it used against them. I urge that important point upon the Secretary of State, and hope that such action will be taken.

In a sense, the haunting television pictures showed the need for UNPROFOR. I watched television over the weekend, and saw the despair of people living rough. Then we saw the order of 48 hours later. A tented village around the airport enabled people to at least live under some cover, protected from the night and the midday sun. Only one organisation could provide such help, and that is the UNHCR working with the non-governmental organisations.

I can think of no better reason for being in Bosnia than the fact that the UNHCR provided succour for those refugees, and that UNPROFOR provided cover for the UNHCR. That was brought home to me when I spoke today to the representative of Oxfam. He was speaking to me at midday from a Land Rover at the runway in Tuzla.

I asked him to explain the situation, and he said, "There are thousands of people and hundreds of tents. When I look round, I see one group giving vaccinations and another providing food for mothers." They were keeping people alive, and that representative said, "Please tell the House of Commons to keep the British troops in UNPROFOR and in Bosnia, because most of us in the NGOs will have to withdraw if UNPROFOR withdraws."

Will my hon. Friend give way?

I am short of time, and I hope that my hon. Friend will forgive me if I do not give way. I want to make one or two military points.

It is important to keep UNPROFOR in Bosnia. Perhaps I could develop that. We should remind ourselves of the debt that we and the world owe UNPROFOR. We owe a debt to the men and women of 29 nations who have gone to Bosnia, risked their lives, and, in some cases, lost them—14 of them from our country. I am full of admiration for them.

People talk about armchair generals, and I guess that we have some of them, but how can one have anything but admiration for the Bangladeshis who were sent up to Bihac? They had to fight against the rebels and the Serbs. On occasion, they had to resist the BiH, and they had one rifle between four of them. That takes some bravery. Many other ordinary soldiers have had similar experiences. We should remind ourselves that the grief of a family in Bangladesh is just as great as the grief of a family in Wrexham.

We have a particular and especial responsibility towards Gorazde, and in particular to the Royal Welch Fusiliers stationed there. The right hon. Member for Conwy (Sir W. Roberts) referred to those troops. My right hon. Friend the Member for Llanelli (Mr. Davies) repeated his grave concern about whether those soldiers have adequate protection, and have been adequately protected. That concern extended to the Government's responsibility towards them.

I spoke to someone only today who came out of Gorazde recently. The Secretary of State for Defence knows how he and an entire group achieved that, but it would not be right and proper to go into details, because we do not telegraph our military operations to the other side. I agree with the right hon. Gentleman about that, and I shall not press him on operational matters.

We know that morale of the troops is still high; they are trained professional soldiers, and can cope with the problems they face. Their families in Wales and in other parts of Britain, however, are worried sick. Despite the brave words of brave people, most of the ordinary families of those 200 soldiers are looking to the Government to ensure that those soldiers are either sent reinforcements or relieved of their duties. Whatever the Government can do to ensure their safety and that of the refugees they are there to protect will have our full support.

I have no intention of discussing operational matters. I am more aware than most of the dangers in Gorazde. My hon. Friend the Member for Carlisle (Mr. Martlew) and I spent some time with the Muslims in that safe haven. We know about the configuration of the mountains and the bluffs. We know that the access roads are mined, and that the main access to the town is through tunnels controlled by the Serbs. We know that any helicopter that flies in is a sitting duck for any artillery on the hillsides. We know about all those difficulties, but we must work out ways to get the troops stationed there out or to send others in to protect them.

Many of us were delighted when the Prime Minister announced on 31 May that a more robust contingent of soldiers would be sent to Bosnia, which would be able to react quickly if our troops or any other UNPROFOR troops were under threat. Some of them went, but for many hon. Members and members of the public, the conundrum is what has happened to 24 Airmobile.

We were told that that elite force of 5,000 self-contained personnel from two or all three services would be a rapid reaction force. That was six weeks ago, but we understand that it will be at least another four weeks before that force is operational. We understand the difficulties. We understand that some of the engineers in that force are already in Ploce making the hard stands for helicopters.

Most of us cannot understand why it will take nearly eight weeks for one of our ace elite corps, which has a prime role as a rapid reaction force, to be deployed. Why has that deployment been so slow?

Will the Minister give us some information about, or will he deny, the story that it is now planned not to deploy the full complement? Will he deny that there are plans to deploy only a half or two thirds of 24 Airmobile? The House expects to have an answer to that, without the Minister having to go into any operational difficulties.

I think that we have made our view fairly clear. We still believe that our troops and those of the other 28 nations that have personnel in the former Yugoslavia are doing a worthwhile job. We believe that, if at all possible, they should remain there.

We equally believe that, if there is one cardinal lesson that we must learn from Bosnia, it is that we do not issue ultimatums, we do not issue threats, unless we have the capability and the intention to carry them out. We must create a state in which the Bosnian Serbs will go to the table with the Bosnian Government and come to a negotiated settlement. Until they do that, there will not be peace in that country. We believe that the presence of UNPROFOR is helpful in achieving that purpose.

10.50 pm

The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs

(Sir Nicholas Bonsor)

It is obviously a great privilege for me to stand at the Dispatch Box; I only wish that there was a happier occasion on which I could do so. I hope that that will arise in due course.

The matter that we are discussing is obviously of great concern to both sides of the House and to every Member of it. I very much welcome the approach taken by the Opposition Front-Bench spokesmen, the hon. Member for South Shields (Dr. Clark), and the support that they have given the Government's policies. As the hon. Member for Livingston (Mr. Cook) said, this is not a proper occasion for party political differences. We must unite as a House to find the solution to this extraordinarily difficult problem.

Before I discuss that in more detail, I want to knock on the head something said by the hon. Member for South Shields. I assure him that there is absolutely no ground for any rumour that he might have heard that we plan to deploy anything less than the full 24 Airmobile Brigade. It is already being deployed. The plan is to deploy all the troops that were originally announced, and that will be done as fast as is possible in the rather difficult circumstances that we face.

As the House knows, there is no easy answer to the problem. As my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister told the House yesterday, at present there are only three options. The first is escalation of the conflict, into a war in which we become directly involved. I do not believe that either the House or the British people wish us to take that course.

The danger to our troops and to the humanitarian aid people would be out of all proportion to any impact that we could make in finding a proper solution to the conflict. The second option is that we continue with the United Nations humanitarian and peacekeeping activities to the best of our ability. The third option is that we withdraw our troops.

The Government's preference is clear and unequivocal—we remain convinced that UNPROFOR has a key role to play, and we want it to stay. For as long as we are able, we must do all we can to alleviate suffering by ensuring that humanitarian aid gets through to those who need it. We must pursue vigorously all avenues towards a political settlement. The Government's efforts will be dedicated to that end.

In the rather short time remaining, I want to deal with the point that have been raised in the debate. First, however, I want to set out clearly why we believe that we should stay in Bosnia to do what we can.

First, the value of the work being done by our troops and those of our allies in the areas where they are deployed is invaluable. I had the great privilege, as Chairman of the Defence Select Committee, to go to Bosnia on three occasions. As the hon. Member for Stockton, North (Mr. Cook) said, our Committee went there and looked at the problem closely on the ground.

One of the things that struck me most was the value of the work being done, not only by our troops but by the Overseas Development Administration and all the volunteers who are working in that field. We went to several towns where the water and electricity would not have been working were it not for the British input to ensure that it did.

I have no doubt whatsoever that, in the British-controlled area, it is only the presence of our troops that prevents the renewal of the conflict between the Croat and Bosniac sides. Were that conflict to break out again—which it inevitably would if we were to withdraw—the bloodshed would escalate once again to the kind of levels that my hon. Friend the Member for Romsey and Waterside (Mr. Colvin) mentioned—130,000 dead in 1992, as opposed to 2,500 in 1994. We have a responsibility—the international community and we as a member of the Security Council have a duty—to do everything in our power to prevent such a tragedy from recurring.

The consequences that were also mentioned by the hon. Member for Livingston go beyond our activities in Bosnia. I have no doubt that, if the international troops withdraw, we shall find ourselves with a rapidly worsening problem in Croatia, where the Krajina Serbs are under continuing pressure from the Croatian forces. I believe that that would break out again into a major conflict.

Of course, we all know, and have discussed many times, the real danger of the conflict spreading well beyond the boundaries even of the former Yugoslavia, and threatening the whole of the eastern region of NATO. I do not think that that is a likely outcome, but it is one that the House must take into account when deciding what we should do.

I also believe that, were we to withdraw, Serb aggression would be greatly encouraged. I have no doubt that the presence of the Dutch, difficult though it was for them, in Srebrenica prevented a much worse massacre than that which I fear may have taken place. I think that our presence around Bosnia prevents not only the Serbs but all participants in the conflict from inflicting horrific injury and torture on each other.

The hon. Member for Stockton, North (Mr. Cook) made a very good point: this is not a one-sided conflict in which there are white hats and black hats at war. It is a conflict in which the depth of bestiality is incomprehensible in a civilised world, and it is not confined wholly to the Serbs.

Having said all that, it may be that we shall have to withdraw from Bosnia because there is a limit to the risk to which it would be right for us to expose our troops. That has been said by hon. Members of all parties, and it is a point which I can assure the House the Government consider seriously when trying to find a route ahead.

My right hon. Friend the Member for Witney (Mr. Hurd), who until recently was our Foreign Secretary, pointed out that we can operate in this theatre only with the consent of the parties. As the House will know, Mr. Sacirbey has recently indicated that he may wish us to withdraw. Whether that turns out to be a diplomatic manoeuvre or a genuine request, time will tell. Certainly, were we to be requested to withdraw, the Government's position and that of the international troops on the ground would become untenable.

As the hon. Member for Livingston also said, if it becomes too dangerous for whatever reason for our troops to remain in theatre, or especially if the embargo is lifted—meaning that the Bosnians could get an unlimited supply of weapons and thus escalate the conflict—it would not be possible for us to remain in theatre.

I deal now with four specific points that the hon. Member for Livingston raised. First, he asked whether there had been any intelligence report about what was happening in Srebrenica and, if so, why did we not respond to it? I am sure that Opposition Members know and understand that it would be wrong for me to comment from the Dispatch Box on intelligence or other information that we might or might not have received.

The hon. Gentleman also asked whether the Dutch troops had requested air support. I believe that that is the case; certainly it is essential and well recognised by the Government that we should rapidly review the procedures whereby air support can be called on. While I cannot tell the House the outcome of those discussions, I can assure the House that they are being pursued vigorously, and particularly with the potential need to call it in in support of the British position if necessary.

Will the Under-Secretary give way?

I am afraid that I cannot. I have only four more minutes, and I have a great deal to get through.

The hon. Member for Livingston asked why our troops are in such an exposed position without contingency plans. Again, I have to say to him, and I am sure that he will understand, that I cannot possibly discuss contingency plans—which may or may not have been arranged—in detail and in public. I assure the hon. Gentleman, as my right hon. Friends the Prime Minister and the Defence Secretary already have, that the safety of our troops is and will remain of paramount importance to our country, and the Government are deeply aware of our duty to protect our soldiers in the positions in which they find themselves.

The hon. Gentleman asked what use the rapid reaction force would have specifically, as it is clearly not there as a fighting force. There are two particular reasons why the rapid reaction force is there, to improve the protection of the convoys and the routes along which they travel, and indeed to improve the security of those areas in which our troops are deployed; secondly, to strengthen the position and safety of our own troops. As I said before the hon. Gentleman was able to return to the Chamber, we are deploying the full complement of 24 Airmobile Brigade and all those support troops which were mentioned in the original plan.

I turn now to matters raised by some other hon. Members. The right hon. Member for Llanelli (Mr. Davies) raised the question of the safety of the Welch Fusiliers, something on which several other hon. Members commented—not least the hon. Member for Stockton, North, whose son has served in Gorazde, and who knows it well. I understand that the right hon. Member for Llanelli has been briefed by my hon. Friend the Minister of State for the Armed Services, and I hope that he found what he was told reassuring. I cannot go into the detail, any more than I could before, about the plans being made in that part of the world, but I reiterate the concern of the Government for the safety of those soldiers.

My right hon. Friend the Member for Guildford (Mr. Howell), who has apologised to me for not being able to be in the House at the moment, raised the need for strategic thinking. He is, of course, quite right. The meeting on 21 July is aimed specifically at finding such a strategy, and it is very important that we do so.

The hon. and learned Member for Fife, North-East (Mr. Campbell) made much the same point, when he said that there was a need for clear political objectives, and that we must ensure that the military capability is matched to those objectives. That was undoubtedly a failing of the United Nations plan, and it must not be allowed to recur. I fear that I am running out of time, so I apologise to those hon. Members whose speeches I have not been able to deal with.

These are complex and difficult issues, greatly exacerbated by the tragedy and the appalling level of civilian suffering that we watch. We are determined to try to find a way to move matters forward, both on the diplomatic track and with regard to UNPROFOR's mission. It is to that end that we shall be working strenuously with our partners, not only in the meeting on Friday, but thereafter. The ultimate solution must be a diplomatic and not a military one, and the international community, despite all the difficulties, must strive to find it.

There is, however, a limit to what we can do. We have offered the parties to this conflict an opportunity—

It being three hours after it was entered upon, the motion for the Adjournment of the House lapsed, pursuant to order [17 July].

Royal Assent

I have to notify the House, in accordance with the Royal Assent Act 1967, that Her Majesty has signified Her Royal Assent to the following Acts, and a measure:—

Appropriation (Northern Ireland) Order 1995
Criminal Justice (Scotland) Act 1995
Merchant Shipping Act 1995
Shipping and Trading Interests (Protection) Act 1995
Goods Vehicles (Licensing of Operators) Act 1995
Crown Agents Act 1995
Environment Act 1995
Pensions Act 1995
Geneva Conventions (Amendment) Act 1995
Sale of Goods (Amendment) Act 1995
Insurance Companies Reserves Act 1995
Landlord and Tenant (Covenants) Act 1995
National Health Service (Amendment) Act 1995
Olympic Symbol etc. (Protection) Act 1995
Licensing (Sunday Hours) Act 1995
Child Support Act 1995
Criminal Appeal Act 1995
Children (Scotland) Act 1995
Bell's Bridge Order Confirmation Act 1995
Sheffield Assay Office Act 1995
Birmingham Assay Office Act 1995
Church of England (Miscellaneous Provisions) Measure

European Community Documents

With the leave of the House, I will put motions 11 and 12 together.

Motion made, and Question put forthwith, pursuant to Standing Order No. 102(9) (European Standing Committees),

Financial Assistance For The Environment

That this House takes note of European Community Document No. 7514/95, relating to the second phase of the financial instrument for the environment; and supports the Government's objective of ensuring that the programme incorporates measures for monitoring, evaluation and dissemination to improve value for money.— [Mr. Wood.]

Relations With Mexico

That this House takes note of European Community Document No. 4966/95, on relations between the European Union and Mexico; and supports the Government's view that this is a welcome development in relations between the European Union and Mexico.— [Mr. Wood.]

Petitions

Road Safety (Leicester)

11.4 pm

The first petition concerns a crossing in my constituency on the junction of Hungarton boulevard and Steins lane. For many years, a crossing patrol operated on this dangerous junction. The local county council provided the resources for that crossing patrol. That crossing patrol was stopped but, as a result of a number of protests by local residents, including myself, there has been a temporary reinstatement of the crossing. Schoolchildren have to go past that junction every day to a number of local schools.

One thousand local residents have signed the petition, which concludes:

Wherefore your petitioners pray that your honourable House urges the Secretary of State for Education to allow Leicestershire county council to re-appoint a crossing guide on a permanent basis on this site, and your petitioners as in duty bound will ever pray.

To lie upon the Table.

Payphones (Leicester)

11.5 pm

The second petition has been prepared by a number of local residents, especially pensioners, in the Goodwood area of my constituency. They have been trying to get British Telecom to provide a payphone service in the Goodwood area because they do not have a telephone service in their homes and they feel that it is an important local amenity. More than 200 people have signed this petition, which ends:

Wherefore your petitioners pray that your honourable House calls on the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry, to provide this service, and your petitioners as in duty bound will ever pray.

To lie upon the Table.

Housing (Hampshire)

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

11.6 pm

I thank the Minister for remaining at this late hour because I want to raise the matter of housing in Hampshire, principally because of the widespread and continuing concern in my constituency about the housing plans of Hampshire county council for 2001 to 2011. The county plan envisages 48,000 extra houses, which the county claims are required to meet need arising within the county, mainly because of the welcome fact that people are living longer and the unwelcome fact of an increase in the divorce rate, involving the division of households.

I do not want to make a party point, but I tell my hon. Friend the Minister that since political control of Hampshire county council changed, there seems to have been a sea change in attitude. The previous Conservative-controlled county council resisted the figures offered by SERPLAN—the south-east regional plan—covering the period ending 2001. Now the county seems gung-ho for higher numbers.

There are, however, new factors which should in some measure limit the need for so many new houses. First, there are approximately 26,000 empty houses in the county, many in military establishments. The Secretary of State for the Environment announced on 27 June, at column 689, plans to sell off surplus empty houses within six months of them becoming vacant. I warmly welcome that and congratulate my right hon. Friend and his Ministers on bringing forward the proposal. It should make an unexpected addition to the number of houses available in the county.

Secondly, the Labour party's abandonment of its threats against shorthold tenancies means that many more landlords can now feel reassured that they can get repossession if needed, without a political risk if there were to be a change of Government. This should encourage the owners of empty private accommodation to let it, knowing that if they need to, they can get it back.

Thirdly, I was delighted that the Secretary of State announced help for the Empty Homes Agency, which helps local authorities with schemes to secure the use of previously empty houses. These three measures should shrink that total of 26,000 empty properties significantly. It is little known, but there is an important allowance that provides encouragement to people to let a spare room to a lodger. Up to £3,250 can be charged, and that income is entirely free from income tax. May I encourage the Minister to take this concession off the secret list and publicise it widely? It has considerable potential for increasing the availability of accommodation for those in need.

There are factors which bear on the overall figures of housing needed in Hampshire. For example, the proposed concentration of new housing in northern Hampshire that is planned for Basingstoke and Andover. That development is concentrated on the northern part of the Test valley. The area is due to have 3,700 houses completed by 2001. By March this year, only 699 had been built. No one believes that 3,000 houses will be built in this area by 2001.

More land has been allocated to that area under the existing plan than is needed. I shall deal with the reasons for that, but the same reasons will continue to apply. That indicates that too much land is to be allocated for the period between 2001 and 2011 in this part of the county. There are important and serious side-effects from this allocation of land. If developers have a choice between urban renewal and a green-field site, they will choose what is for them the lower cost option of the green-field site.

The Government have a target that half of all new housing should be built in re-used sites. But if there is an excess of green-field sites on offer, that urban renewal will not take place. I make a plea to the Minister to give a lead. He must encourage not just demolition and rebuild in urban areas or infill building—building a second house in a garden—but the division of existing houses to cater for smaller households.

It is no use providing additional houses in one part of the county to meet a demand which arises at the other end of the county. There is no way in which Andover and the northern Test valley will generate the demand for the numbers envisaged in the proposed county plan. It is self-evident that extra households generated in the north-east of the county will not move some 20 or 30 miles west. So we shall have no pressure for urban renewal when there is an excess of green-field sites on offer. A new settlement further east—preferably with a rail connection—would be a more effective way of meeting the demand that will arise in that area.

Modern planning is based on the concept of people living near to their employment or near to a rail link. That employment—in Andover's economy—is good, although it is less buoyant than in Basingstoke. We still have more than 200,000 sq ft of empty industrial buildings, which reinforces the indication that new housing on the scale suggested for Andover is excessive and wrongly placed.

Finally, I turn to the environment, that most precious heritage that we have received and which we have a duty to pass on to future generations with the minimum of damage. We have north of Andover some particularly attractive villages. My hon. Friend the Member for Romsey and Waterside (Mr. Colvin), who is in the Chamber, lives at Tangley, but I was referring particularly to the villages immediately adjacent to the north of Andover—Penton Mewsey, Little London, Picket Piece and Smannell. They lie at the edge of an area of high landscape value, and it has always been understood and entrenched in the Test valley plan that there should be a strategic gap between these villages and the encroachment of Andover town. Alas, the gaps have been whittled away to next to nothing, and the green lungs of the estates of northern Andover and Charlton have been moved further away. I recognise the limit of the Minister's powers in relation to the plans of Hampshire county council from 2000 to 2011, but I hope that the county will rethink this part of its proposals and that such action will be endorsed by my hon. Friend the Minister.

There is another matter about which my hon. Friend can do something. I refer to research conducted by Leicester university on the housing needs of elderly people in rural areas. Retired people account for some 30 per cent. of rural households, and a substantial proportion have been living in rural areas for more than 20 years. Many, as they get older, will welcome the availability of sheltered accommodation; but very few want to move to such accommodation in towns or urban areas.

The answer lies in using the planning system to give those people what they want, which is sheltered accommodation in rural villages. There seems to be a planning policy vacuum. I urge my hon. Friend the Minister to investigate this opportunity to release family-sized rural housing for the younger generation. Perhaps he would like to discuss the matter with some of the housing associations that specialise in such issues: he might find it well worth talking to the English Courtyard association, a non-profit-making organisation, in view of its extensive research into the opportunity to help to deal with the housing needs of people in rural areas.

11.16 pm

I am grateful to my hon. Friend the Member for Hampshire, North-West (Sir D. Mitchell) for raising an important subject. Experience shows that he is not the only person who is concerned about it; housing provision in structure plans always seems to be contentious in one way or another, both with regard to the amount of provision to be made and, more particularly, with regard to the location of new housing. Those who are likely to be affected directly by housing development may not be aware of, or may doubt, the need for such development.

My hon. Friend mentioned four ways of using vacant properties, and of making greater use of properties that are not fully used. They are no secret. I was well aware of the one with which he was particularly concerned some time ago; in fact it has been taken up, particularly in urban areas. I shall check the research done by specialist housing associations. I was very aware of those associations when I wore my previous hat; they have been very useful, and have provided opportunities in both rural and urban areas. Perhaps my hon. Friend will ensure that we have taken those points into account in the rural White Paper.

I understand my hon. Friend's concern, which reflects the anxieties of many of his constituents. They arise from the proposals outlined in Hampshire county council's consultation document, "Hampshire 2011", which reviews the Hampshire county structure plan. It identifies four areas of the county as the principal locations for major new housing development in the period up to the year 2011.

It would, I think, be useful for me to touch on the reasoning behind the figures, and the opportunities for protest and the making of adjustments. First, it is necessary for the county council to review the structure plan. The present plan, which was approved by my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for the Environment at the end of 1993, makes provision for development only up to the year 2001. That means that there is uncertainty about the planning strategy for Hampshire after 2001. If the plan-led system is to operate successfully in Hampshire, there needs to be a clear, up-to-date strategic planning framework for the necessary development over a reasonably long time scale, as I believe that my hon. Friend accepts.

The starting point for the county council, in determining the level of housing and other provision to make in its structure plan, is the Government's Regional Planning Guidance for the South East, nicknamed RPG9, published in March 1994. The guidance covers the period 1991 to the year 2006, and sets out indicative figures for the level of housing provision for Hampshire. That is given as 6,133 new houses per annum over the guidance period.

The calculation of the regional guidance housing requirement starts with my Department's household projections, which in turn derive from forecasts of the number of people likely to be living in the region during the period in question. The calculations made by my Department, in consultation with county councils, take into account such factors as the rate at which people are expected to form households, and social changes—which were recognised with what I would describe as a black look by my hon. Friend. There is a trend towards smaller houses. To be fair, the greatest trend is in the years from age 40 to demise, so it may not necessarily be a result of the divorce changes that my hon. Friend suggests. I wondered for a moment whether he was going to suggest that the county council had a hand in that, but he resisted it.

The level of housing currently proposed for Hampshire in the regional guidance reflects the need arising primarily from natural population growth in the county and is therefore largely aimed at accommodating the population already in Hampshire, plus their children. The household projections form the basis for assessing the total number of dwellings that will be needed in the region, and county councils are able to contribute to the process through SERPLAN.

Once there is a figure for the housing requirement, we ask SERPLAN to advise on how that requirement should be distributed throughout the region. We also take account of local opinions about the desirable balance between development and restraint. That was emphasised by my hon. Friend. We consider such matters as environmental constraints and the need to balance housing growth with the provision of jobs and services, in addition to market and economic demands and the broad aims of regional strategy.

All that shows that the housing requirement that county councils are asked to consider is neither an arbitrary figure imposed on them nor a matter of meeting unconstrained demand. My hon. Friend will be pleased to know that we do emphasise that the Government are firmly committed to the preservation of the countryside—obviously a matter of great importance, as emphasised by my hon. Friend.

We shall continue to emphasise the importance of making the best use of urban land for new development. When new land for development has to be found, local planning authorities must try to ensure that it is accommodated in ways that are sustainable and do not conflict seriously with the objectives of protecting and enhancing the countryside.

That is the process on which Hampshire county council is now embarked through the review of the county structure plan. In reviewing the plan, the county council needs to have regard to the regional guidance and also to other Government planning policy guidance set out in the planning policy guidance notes, but it will have its own opinions and will need also to take account of local opinions about appropriate locations for development.

The county council's initial consultation document has indicated what it considers to be the level of housing needed in the county up to the year 2011 and the way in which that can be best provided. At the same time, it must safeguard important environmental and other constraints. Those who disagree with the proposed strategy have been able to make their comments to the county council. The county council is now considering those comments and preparing a full consultation draft plan, which, I understand, is expected to be published in October. I suggest that a copy of today's Hansard may not do the council any harm.

When that draft is published, my hon. Friend and his constituents will have a full opportunity to make comments to the county council before the council makes its final proposals in the formal deposited draft plan, which is expected to be in spring 1996. At that stage, anyone who remains uneasy about the proposals will be able to make formal objections to the county council.

Although my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for the Environment is no longer required to approve county structure plans, as those are now adopted by the county councils in the same way that the district councils adopt local plans, the Department will carry out a careful scrutiny of the structure plan proposals to ensure that they are broadly in line with Government policy guidance.

As well as considering the overall levels of development proposed, we shall want to see how far the strategy and proposals for the main areas of development reflect the principles in PPG13 for sustainable development, and especially the way in which it is proposed that major development will be located in relation to existing or proposed new public transport infrastructure, so that reliance on the private car can be minimised. I emphasise the importance that my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State attaches to that aspect of planning land use.

In addition to consultations that I have already mentioned, at the first draft and deposit draft stages there will be discussion of the key issues at what is called an examination in public. There will also be an opportunity for comment to be made at the modifications stage of the process, when the county council publishes the modifications it proposes to make to the plan in the light of any recommendations made by the examination in public panel. Those concerned about the proposals at any stage of the plan can take advantage of all of those opportunities for constructive comment to make sure that their points of concern are put to the county council.

I hope that what I have said will reassure my hon. Friend that there is a proper process and that there will be an opportunity to influence the figures and the location of future developments. There will also be ample opportunity to ensure that the points that he raised tonight and his constituent's concerns are fully aired and considered.

On a point of order, Mr. Deputy Speaker. As the Adjournment debate usually runs for half an hour, the time for debate is not due to expire until 11.33 pm. I did not seek to intervene on my hon. Friend the Member for Hampshire, North-West (Sir D. Mitchell) or my hon. Friend the Minister, but as the debate has concluded eight minutes before it was due to end I wonder whether it would be in order for me to put a question to my hon. Friend the Minister

Order. It would not be in order unless the hon. Member for Romsey and Waterside (Mr. Colvin) and the Minister had agreed to that course of action.

Question put and agreed to.

Adjourned accordingly at twenty-five minutes past Eleven o'clock.

Volume 263: debated on Wednesday 19 July 1995

House Of Commons

Prayers

Adjournment (Summer)

French Nuclear Testing

Mr Stephen Spayne

Burma

Private Business

Accommodation Level Crossings Bill Lords(By Order)

City Of Westminster Bill Lords (By Order)

Oral Answers To Questions

Environment

National Park Authorities

Building And Construction Industry

House-Building Industry

Houses In Multiple Occupation

Air Quality Monitoring

Homelessness

Housing

Disused Mines (Water)

Home Energy Efficiency Scheme

Social Rent Homes

Rented Accommodation

Social Housing (London Docklands)

Dredging (Wash)

Waste Recycling

European Nuclear Waste Repository

Water Supply

Atmospheric Pollution

Single Regeneration Budget

Regional Government

Housing Renovation (Lancashire)

Long-Term Unemployed (Recruitment) (Northern Ireland)

Long-Term Unemployed (Recruitment)(Northern Ireland)

Sir Alan Urwick

Standards In Public Life

Select Committee On Standards And Privileges

Code Of Conduct

Members' Interests (Declaration)

Consultancies And Disclosures In Theregister Of Members' Interests

Standards In Public Life(General Recommendations)

Orders Of The Day

Children (Scotland) Bill

Bosnia

Royal Assent

European Community Documents

Financial Assistance For The Environment

Relations With Mexico

Petitions

Road Safety (Leicester)

Payphones (Leicester)

Housing (Hampshire)