I am most grateful to you, Madam Speaker, for giving me the opportunity to introduce the debate. I am grateful also to the Under-Secretary of State for the Environment, Transport and the Regions, the hon. Member for Wallasey (Angela Eagle), for being in her place to reply on behalf of the Government. It shows the real concern that so many hon. Members have for the future of rural areas that so many are in the Chamber this morning.

On 9 February 1996, in a joint letter to The Times, the then Prime Minister, the Leader of the Opposition and the leader of the Liberal Democrats wrote as follows:

"On one subject we speak with a united voice—namely in advocating the protection of our countryside in its rich personality and character."

Regrettably, less than 18 months after that optimistic letter was written, that consensus is falling apart.

Only last week, more than 100,000 people came to Hyde park because they believe that the rural way of life is now at risk. They did not attack policemen, they did not burn cars and they did not shout abuse; they were restrained and good humoured. Nevertheless, their anxieties were genuine and heartfelt.

The chief executive of the British Field Sports Society explained:

"the countryside is waking up to the fact that this Government has an urban majority that doesn't understand or, indeed, represent rural interests. Countrymen can no longer afford to be complacent; they need to put their heads above the parapet and be counted. The urban majority must listen to the voice of the countryside before it is too late."

Over a period, some of those who sought a rural way of life have felt to some extent marginalised. The issue has now come forcefully to a head, however, with a new Government who are clearly bent on institutionalising urban-based political correctness. We have a Government who are dedicated to destroying country sports, which are an integral element of country life from both social and economic points of view.

The United Kingdom is one of the most urbanised countries in Europe, and that is especially true of England. There is hardly a place in this country that would not fall within city limits if it were in the United States. Hardly a farm is more than 30 miles from a major town or city.

For many, commuting has become a way of life. Increasing accessibility has fundamentally changed the relationship between town and country.

It is forecast that the number of households in England and Wales will increase by 4.4 million by the year 2010, and many of those people will wish to settle in the countryside. Pressures on space and services are causing considerable alarm among those already living in the countryside.

There is, however, considerable potential for redeveloping existing urban areas. It is up to the new Government to decide how to implement the Environment Act 1995 in relation to the so-called brown-field sites. I hope that the Minister will give some clear signs this morning, because many in the rural areas believe that there is unacceptable pressure for new developments on green-field sites.

In 1995, my right hon. Friend the Member for Suffolk, Coastal (Mr. Gummer), when Secretary of State for the Environment, published a comprehensive White Paper entitled, "Rural England—A Nation committed to a Living Countryside". I applaud him again for that initiative. The White Paper began by declaring the countryside to be a national asset. It went on to outline the ingredients for sustainable development, such as meeting the economic and social needs of people who live and work in rural areas, conserving the character of the countryside while accommodating necessary change, and improving the viability of existing villages and market towns.

Yet something has clearly gone wrong. Many rural dwellers have already lost confidence in the new Government's desire and ability to protect their interests. Sadly, I believe that their fears are justified. We know that 13 million people live in the countryside or in small towns. These 13 million share exactly the same hopes, aspirations and concerns as everyone else about housing, transport, law and order, jobs, schools, health and recreational activity. But there are essential differences, because of remoteness and small scale, planning and transport differences, and the desire of many to enjoy fully the recreational opportunities of country living.

Even in rural counties such as Suffolk, the bias in service provision is manifestly towards the urban parts of the county. My right hon. and hon. Friends will confirm exactly the same situation in Labour-controlled local government throughout the country.

The Government's precise view of the future of local government is unclear. May I directly tell the Minister that the prospect of yet another tier of administration in rural areas is deeply unwelcome? The mentality of urbanisation that exists in the Labour party threatens the proper administration of our country way of life.

Regional assemblies are bound to be based in towns and cities and take powers away from parish and local councils in rural areas. The previous Government sought to enhance the powers of parish councils. Now, my constituents are in a state of limbo about the Government's plans for the administration of country areas. They are fully entitled to some clarity.

Suffolk county council, for example, while for ever reciting the "lack of resources" mantra, has given, effectively, an open cheque book commitment to an expensive park and drive scheme in the city of Ipswich. Yet, disgracefully, I cannot even get a much-needed footpath built in a rural village in my constituency, allegedly because there is no money. Similarly, lorries shatter the peace of rural villages because local authorities will not give urgent and sufficient priority to properly co-ordinated lorry management schemes, which are very much required.

Let us look at employment, which, as in the rest of the country, has been a considerable success story. One of the most disappointing features of the new Government is the way in which they are fundamentally failing to understand the increasingly fragmented nature of our economy. Apart from the agricultural sector, throughout the country there are thousands of people with offices in their homes, in rural cottages or converted barns, linked to their main offices or customers via the telephone, fax, Internet and e-mail. They may go to an office in a city only once or twice a week. Much of that activity is highly creative. It suits modern life styles. It is flexible. Some people may wish to work only part time.

We saw in the 1980s the massive job downsizing in large companies. Workplace fragmentation and the growth of outsourcing have flowered in this country. Now, bluntly, that is at risk. Having given away our employment rights when we signed up to the social chapter, we shall inevitably be at the receiving end of employment directives that will kill off this highly successful evolving process.

The European social and economic model is an employment disaster. The huge rural depopulation of France illustrates that clearly. The imposition of a minimum wage coupled with job-destroying directives will play havoc with the rural economy.

Will the hon. Gentleman admit that the only places in Britain where there is a minimum wage are rural areas, because the Conservative Government failed to abolish the agricultural wages councils?

I am afraid that the hon. Lady entirely misses the point. There has been a diversity of economic activity and job creation away from the agriculture sector in rural areas precisely because there is not the sort of regulation that has destroyed employment in rural areas in countries such as France. I am astonished that she fails to understand that.

It is always interesting when Ministers come to the Dispatch Box so badly briefed about the minimum wage. The agriculture wages council—

It is a board.

The agriculture wages board, which is an exact model of what the Government want to bring in, has a minimum wage of £2.95. It would be nice to know from the Minister whether £2.95 will be the national minimum wage.

My hon. Friend is quite right. Perhaps the hon. Lady is not aware that there are many jobs other than farming that sustain the rural economy. Clearly, she is utterly ignorant of that fact.

Most businesses in rural areas employ fewer than 20 people. The most helpful thing that the Government could do to enable them to compete is to cut business rates, as we promised in our manifesto. Already, rate reliefs are available for village shops and post offices. They do not want to see a return to the local control of business rates by local authorities, some of which are instinctively anti-business. They do not want to be beholden to local authority officials whose ability to gold plate European health and safety legislation is legendary. Regrettably, the only policy that the Government have so far announced is the statutory right to interest, which was opposed by the overwhelming majority of small business organisations.

Rural areas need a balanced transport system. The imposition of new so-called green taxes in the latest Budget has had a particularly damaging effect on rural car users. It is to be hoped that the privatisation of our rail services will mean a more effective and balanced challenge to road hauliers. However, any sense of urgency so far is lamentably lacking. In my constituency, the A11 is a death trap and the Elveden crossroads truly life-threatening.

Valiant efforts have been made by interested parties, with considerable success, to resolve these problems co-operatively. I sought the help of the new Minister for Roads simply to bring this all together, only to be told that the whole roads programme was indefinitely under review. There appears to be nothing that is not under review. It is ludicrous that, after Labour waiting 18 years to get back into government, crucial decisions affecting our lives remain in suspended animation. People in rural areas have a right to know what transportation policies will be pursued.

On the subject of reviews, may I also tell the hon. Lady of the very real anxiety of many of my constituents following the announcement of the Secretary of State for Health that hospitals would close? In rural areas, there has been a dramatic improvement in the provision of primary health care through GP fundholding. Now we are, apparently, to have a fresh upheaval in the NHS with the creation of a new bureaucracy called locality commissioning groups.

I very much regret the closure of many smaller acute care hospitals over the years. Because we do not know what is happening, and there is a review, there is fear among GPs, nurses, doctors and patients that medium-sized acute care hospitals will close, too. In rural areas, that would be a catastrophe. Patients would have to travel miles to hospital or to receive visits from family and friends. It removes the essential linkage between local communities and their hospitals.

There is genuine concern that the West Suffolk hospital, in Bury St. Edmunds, which serves most of my constituents, will be closed, so let me spell it out clearly. If the Government decide that, to save money and further appease their urban supporters, they will concentrate acute care facilities in a very limited number of giant hospitals—if acute care health services are remorselessly centralised—there will be far more than 100,000 people protesting in the rural areas about the future of their health services.

Our farms are not theme parks to be trampled over at will by outsiders. There is a balance to be achieved. All hon. Members will applaud the efforts made by the Country Landowners Association in its Access 2000 statement issued last May. Much voluntary progress has been made. I very much hope that the Government will work constructively with local authorities, landowners and countryside users for sustainable access. We must not create some statutory right to roam, and never again should we witness the horrific activities of so-called new age travellers, who had nil respect for the countryside, its inhabitants or its wildlife.

There are many other areas of rural life that I should like to touch on. I am sure that my hon. Friends will do so if they are fortunate enough to catch your eye, Madam Speaker. The 1995 White Paper brought together the rural aspects of all Government policies for the first time. May I therefore ask the Government to commit themselves to a similar integrated approach to rural policy so that the uncertainties that I have spelt out can be dealt with?

Last week, in Hyde park, we witnessed a defining moment. The catalyst was the private Member's Bill that seeks to ban country sports, particularly fox hunting. Marchers came to Hyde park from Scotland, Wales and Cornwall. The Bill makes a clear distinction, albeit a spurious one, between fishing and field sports. Somehow, it is entirely legitimate and not cruel to stick a barbed hook in a fish's mouth, play with it in the water, land it and watch it suffocate. At least, that is how some might interpret the situation.

No one disputes the fact that foxes are predators whose numbers must be controlled, but, under that private Member's Bill, it would be acceptable for vixens and their cubs to be gassed in their lairs, and for foxes to be snared only to die slowly and painfully and to be shot at with the risk of injury. All those practices may well happen, but allowing a fox to be killed instantly in the jaws of a foxhound would not be acceptable.

For the record, let me point out that gassing foxes is illegal in this country.

I appreciate that, but, although it is illegal, it is—regrettably—known to happen. The culling of foxes is a particular problem for farmers. If fox hunting were banned, we might just see an upsurge in such activity, which would be thoroughly undesirable.

The former executive director of the League Against Cruel Sports, Richard Course, observed:

"When I became fully and objectively appraised of all facts, and conversant with all related arguments, it was impossible to avoid the conclusion that the prosecution of the anti-hunt case would not advance "fox welfare" and consequently could not be justified."

I dwell on the subject because the importance of fox hunting is essentially twofold. As the New Scientist put it on 19 April 1997,

"Foxhunting has helped shape the British landscape. Areas where it is common often have more hedgerow and thicket which benefit other wildlife besides the fox. These would disappear if hunting were banned."

Fourteen thousand acres of woodland are owned or managed by hunts, and 95 per cent. of hunts undertake conservation work—the maintenance of bridleways, gates and so forth—while 1.4 million carcases are disposed of each year, either free of charge or at minimum cost. Hunting is an essential part of the traditional life of the countryside and has considerable economic significance.

There are 385 registered packs of hounds and 228,000 participants in registered packs and clubs. The 1997 update of the Cobham report estimated direct employment at 15,300 and direct expenditure at £176 million, with a turnover of £122 million involving 9,700 separate businesses. Five thousand pubs are patronised for hunt meets and other fixtures. The hunt is a broadly based social activity, often taking place in remote country areas: it is a way of bringing people together. Seventy per cent. of all woodland planting on English and Welsh farms is for sporting purposes.

Earlier, I tried to express the concern of rural dwellers about such matters as the rural economy, transport, health services, access and so-called green taxes. That concern, however, is merely a backdrop to the exploding sense of alienation from the urban-based, politically correct values that are clearly hallmarks of the present Government.

This is a matter of fundamental principle. No one can deny the right of anyone in our democracy to dislike fox hunting, to argue against it, to ignore it or even to find it repulsive. It is wholly different, however, when that right is translated into the punishment of those with whom such people disagree—their punishment as criminals.

How would the law be enforced when a farmer sought to cull foxes, and tried to flush them out with his dogs? Would that be a criminal activity? Where is the line to be drawn? Foxes are predators: they kill for the sheer pleasure of it. Savagely tearing the limbs off lambs and decapitating chickens, ornamental ducks or even swans has nothing to do with the need to eat. Yet we return to the same principle: should the state have the right to punish someone for his activities simply because the majority find them distasteful, and, in so doing, to have a severe impact on the economy of rural areas?

Last year, 3.3 million people went fishing and more than 700,000 shot game and wild fowl. Annual direct expenditure on country sports runs at £3.8 billion and has provided more than 60,000 full-time jobs. Indirect expenditure totals £2.4 billion and has provided 31,000 jobs. Government income runs at more than £600 million.

In our urbanised society, nature has become entirely removed from what we eat. It is a kind of carnal disembodiment. Butter and milk bear no relation to cows; eggs bear no relation to chickens; and chickens bear no relation to feathers. What is really repulsive is the way in which our new politically correct elite decides, in an inconsistent, illiberal and intolerant way, what is good for us all. Rural Britain is patronisingly viewed as some kind of Disney theme park.

When the sensitive luminaries of Islington, Hampstead and Highgate sit down to eat, the only thing that is wild about the poached salmon is the price. For them, a visit to the countryside all too often means a visit to a luxury health hydro, where they can "de-stress" after all the exhausting intellectual gymnastics of what they have decided is and is not currently politically correct.

My hon. Friend has set out a great many facts and figures for the record, and for the edification of Labour Members. Should we not also record the fact that fewer than half a dozen Labour Back Benchers have bothered to attend the debate?

I thank my hon. Friend for making that point, which is at the heart of the debate. Rural issues cannot be distinguished from the mainstream of British life; they are part of the nation. The contempt with which the Government are treating rural areas is, however, manifest in the number of Conservative Members who are present.

There is a serious point to be made, to which my hon. Friend has alluded. A substantial part of our population should be allowed to continue a way of life that is currently under threat. This is not only about hunting, but about all the activities that are linked with it: gymkhanas, horse trials and point-to-points. Those who despise the rural life will inevitably go after shooting as well. Not only would the whole rhythm of country life be affected by such moves, but trees, fences and hedgerows would soon be at risk.

Before the general election campaign, the Prime Minister declared his desire to lead one nation. He talked of the community and of social cohesion, and the electorate responded. Only weeks after the election, however, the uncertainties that had already stirred in rural Britain have been translated into real fear and anxiety. The Government's policies so far appear to be at worst hostile, and at best irrelevant, to the needs of rural Britain. I hope that the Prime Minister will not go down in history as the first Prime Minister to cause an irrevocable and damaging split between the rural and urban parts of our nation.

We have had a rocky start from this Government. I urge the Under-Secretary of State for the Environment, Transport and the Regions to listen carefully to the concerns of people living in the countryside in the years ahead. They are entitled to the same consideration as everyone else. They are entitled to a policy framework and services adjusted to their needs, and should not to be treated as second-class citizens.

I appreciate the opportunity to contribute to the debate. I congratulate the hon. Member for West Suffolk (Mr. Spring) on securing the debate, although I disagree with almost everything that he said. I represent a rural constituency and I won that seat from the Conservatives in 1992. My hon. Friends the Members for Forest of Dean (Mrs. Organ) and for Stroud (Mr. Drew) are present. They won seats from the Conservatives in the recent general election. Many Labour Members speak for rural areas. Conservative Members do not represent as much as a single tree or field in Scotland and Wales.

The Conservative party is not the only party which speaks for rural Britain. The Labour party achieved its highest-ever vote in rural areas on 1 May. We wiped out the Conservatives in rural Scotland and rural Wales. Many of my hon. Friends speak in the Chamber and run the country on behalf of rural Britain as a whole.

I hope that the debate will focus on positive points. In the spirit of cross-party co-operation, I say immediately that I welcomed much of what the previous Government did to recognise the needs of rural areas. I welcomed the proposals in the White Papers for rural Scotland, Wales and England. I welcomed the fact that "Rural England" was produced by the previous Government, and I recognise that the document "Working Countryside for Wales" was important. However, the debate should be put in the context of the Conservative Government's performance on rural issues.

I should like to draw Conservative Members" attention to the Environment Select Committee's report on rural England, which highlighted problems that the Conservative Government had caused and which they had to face in the previous Parliament. Their documents proposed a certain strategy, but the Environment Select Committee's report highlighted rural poverty, the need to sustain market towns, the removal of large tracks of woodland and the need to develop key targets to achieve improvements in rural areas, which the previous Government failed to do.

We all share the aim of removing rural poverty, as the hon. Gentleman calls it. Does he truly think that the introduction of a minimum wage will contribute to removing rural poverty? In an interview during the general election campaign with the distinguished journalist from The Sunday Times, A. A. Gill, the present Deputy Prime Minister, with welcome candour, said that the introduction of a minimum wage was likely to increase unemployment.

I strongly support a minimum wage. During the general election campaign, many of the people who work in the rural parts of my constituency supported a minimum wage. Many of the farmers in my constituency, who are legion, lobbied me strongly when the Conservative Government tried to abolish the agricultural wages boards. Farmers and people in rural areas in my constituency recognise the need for an inclusive society in which everyone has a stake and in which people are part of the businesses in which they work.

One of the things I am most looking forward to in this Parliament is the establishment of a low pay commission, so that people in rural and urban areas can contribute to the decision on a reasonable level for the minimum wage. That will ensure an end to some elements of rural poverty in our communities.

We have had 18 years of Conservative government and 18 years of their stewardship of rural areas. The hon. Member for West Suffolk knows my constituency well and is a frequent visitor. He is aware that many rural areas have suffered dramatically under Conservative rule. Rural crime has risen. I could show the hon. Gentleman the former police stations in the rural areas of my constituency that were closed by the Conservatives. I could take him to see many of farmers and rural constituents who have suffered dramatically from rural crime. Dyfed Powys police have organised a conference next week at the Royal Welsh show to highlight the issue of rural crime. It is an important matter, and the Conservative party failed to deal with it during their stewardship of the rural community.

Do the Government intend to reopen those police stations in the hon. Gentleman's constituency?

The Labour Government will put resources into policing to ensure that we reduce crime. There is a difference between removing police stations and reducing rural crime cover, and examining that issue in the light of the damage done by the previous Government. We will put resources into policing to ensure that rural as well as urban areas are covered.

Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

In a moment. There is a limited amount of time, and many hon. Members want to speak.

With regard to transport, 33 million bus journeys per year were lost in Wales thanks to rural bus deregulation. On housing, we have had inappropriate planning policies, many planning appeals have been allowed and council house building has been prevented, thus reducing the number of affordable homes in rural areas. Great damage has been done on a range of issues as a direct result of the Conservative Government's policies.

Bearing in mind the fact that the Chancellor of the Exchequer has already confirmed expenditure policies for the current and the next financial year, will the hon. Gentleman tell us how much extra money will be spent on rural policing over and above that which the previous Government announced?

The Chancellor has said that the target limits for the next two years are the same, but the priorities within them will be reviewed. A fundamental and comprehensive spending review is being undertaken, which will examine levels of spending and what has been done. We should also consider the key issue of crime prevention in rural areas to ensure that we reduce crime. The Government will improve on the previous Government's performance in many aspects of policy.

The hon. Member for Mid-Sussex (Mr. Soames), who has now left the Chamber, referred to wage levels. The Conservative Government launched an assault on the agricultural wages boards and tolerated rural low pay and rural poverty. I look forward to the establishment by the new Labour Government of a minimum wage and positive policies to tackle those issues.

The previous Government's record on education was appalling. The main concerns in my constituency during the previous Parliament were nursery vouchers and the potential for selection in schools, both of which had a dramatic effect on rural areas. If there is selection and if there is only one major school in a nearby town, many rural people will require additional transport to get their children to school. The rejection of the nursery voucher scheme in Wales was overwhelming in rural areas. The vast majority of petitions that I received from rural areas during the previous Parliament were about nursery voucher provision. The Conservative Government's education policies did great damage to my rural constituents.

People in rural areas are concerned about the removal of shops and pubs. The possible privatisation of the Post Office caused great fear in rural communities. The sell-off of woodlands and the destruction of hedgerows were part of a range of policies that the previous Government followed, and I hope that the Under-Secretary of State for the Environment, Transport and the Regions, my hon. Friend the Member for Wallasey (Angela Eagle), will address those problems.

There is also the farm crisis fiasco of BSE, which has cost billions of pounds of taxpayers' money and has destroyed many rural incomes and rural communities. It has put great pressure on the people whom some Conservative Members purport to represent.

One reason why there are 164 Conservative Members and 418 Labour Members is the previous Government's failure—[Interruption.]

Order. There is much shouting in the Chamber. Hon. Members should not try to shout down the hon. Gentleman because he expresses an opinion with which they do not agree.

Many of my hon. Friends are out running the country, which is why they are not here at the moment.

The BSE crisis had a tremendous impact in rural areas. I should like to see some key policies put into practice in the countryside. We must look at economic prosperity to see how the Government can encourage small and medium-sized businesses to develop.

Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

Time is pressing. I have given way a number of times and I must make progress so that other hon. Members may have an opportunity to speak.

I want economic renewal in rural areas. The hon. Member for West Suffolk spoke about information technology. I hope that the Government will extend information technology services and encourage them in many parts of rural Wales, especially in my area. The hon. Gentleman spoke about the important issue of developing rural communities and businesses. The Government should support a modern reappraisal of IT and put some effort and resources into it.

The Government should encourage environmentally sustainable businesses, help farmers to diversify, and encourage and develop tourism. They should use the proceeds of the windfall tax, which will shortly be on stream, to help young people in rural areas where there is high and persistent unemployment. Community projects would create employment opportunities for such young people.

The Government should concentrate on the protection and enhancement of the countryside environment and set national strategies for the protection of rural areas. That will entail considering hedgerows and the retention and planting of woodlands so that we can rebuild the rural community that was decimated by many of the Conservative Government's policies. There should be a Minister in each Department responsible for countryside matters, and the Government should help to provide low-cost housing by assisting housing associations and using some capital receipts to allow local authorities to build small developments of rented accommodation. That would allow many of my constituents to stay in the communities in which they were born and have grown up.

The current review of transport policy should enable bus services to be examined again so that they are improved in many of my rural communities. Many Conservative policies caused great damage, and there is much that the new Government need to do. Their policies will help all the people of the United Kingdom and specifically many of my rural constituents.

The Government should consider using lottery funds to help rural areas. There is much that a people's lottery can do to refurbish village halls and to provide amenities in villages and playing fields. Rather than concentrating lottery money on the major towns and projects, spending should be diversified and put into local communities. That would encourage small organisations as well as the large, well-prepared, well-briefed organisations to have access to lottery money.

There is an opportunity for people in rural areas to work with the new Government. Many of us live and work in rural areas and speak for their inhabitants. The Government have an opportunity to do much good work that will undo some of the damage caused by the Conservative Government. We shall govern for all the people of this United Kingdom. All our people have a stake in it, and we speak for rural areas as strongly as do the fox hunters, the shooters and Conservative Members.

The debate takes place in the immediate aftermath of the great countryside rally in Hyde park, which I attended. The countryside is under threat from a range of influences, which my hon. Friend the Member for West Suffolk (Mr. Spring) has described. Stupid bureaucrats, greedy speculators, rogue gangs and cultural and material vandalism have all placed the countryside that we all love and cherish under threat.

The rally seemed to polarise two important issues on the issue of fox hunting. One of those issues is the tension between town and country, which has been exacerbated, particularly by spiteful and malicious press coverage in, for example, The Mirror. It referred to people who live in the countryside as bumpkins, and the reports seemed to be written by a gang of reporters who have no feeling for the countryside or the cause of animal welfare, which they pretend to espouse. Presumably they went out and ate enormous plates of steak and chips after filing their reports.

The second issue that has been affected by the polarisation is animal welfare, which the single-minded obsession with fox hunting is threatening. My credentials in this field are well known and I hope that the House will allow me briefly to weary it with them. My maiden speech supported a Bill to abolish hare coursing, which was presented by the Secretary of State for the Environment, Transport and the Regions when he was in opposition, and I voted for his later Bill to protect wildlife.

When I was Minister for Trade, I drafted legislation on fur labelling which is currently being enacted by the European Union. I have participated in many such activities, including joining the picket line at Dover docks. That was probably not the best way to ingratiate oneself with the Conservative associations which I was assiduously courting at that time.

I do not hunt and I do not permit hunts to cross land that I own. Some types of hunting are cruel and sadistic. They include the practice of stopping up, which, for Labour Members who do not know about it, involves blocking a fox's earth so that, at the end of the pursuit, the fox cannot go underground, digging him out when he does go underground, and cubbing. There should be a close season on that pastime. Stag hunting is another such pastime. The right way to get rid of a stag is with a Mannlicher .273 with a telescopic sight, not tearing it to pieces in water.

Those who favour a Bill on fox hunting must be prepared to make some concessions. There is a majority feeling on the topic that cannot be ignored. If Labour Members and the Government are prepared to make illegal—and they should be illegal—the practices that I have identified, they could allow the pursuit of a fox across the countryside. That practice is deeply rooted in the pageantry of our rural history, is seated in 300 to 400 years of practice and has not only a pictorial but a sporting element attaching to it. If they can sanitise it by taking out practices that are genuinely offensive, barbarous and cruel, they would be well advised to allow it to continue.

The whole question of animal welfare has become so polarised that matters that do require attention—laboratory experiments, brutalities in stockyards, factory farming and the horrendous industrialised exploitation of animals, which takes place daily—all need to be addressed urgently by the House. There is a danger that, if Labour Members get rid of fox hunting, they will feel that they can turn their attention to other things—that they have done their duty in the animal welfare sector and can move on. This is an important subject which requires careful attention and proper analysis. There is room for a compromise along the lines that I have suggested.

I thank the right hon. Member for Kensington and Chelsea (Mr. Clark) for his contribution, and agree that that issue is dear to many people in rural areas and needs full debate and full investigation. However, it is fascinating that, in a debate on rural policies, the hon. Member for West Suffolk (Mr. Spring) and the right hon. Member for Kensington and Chelsea talked almost exclusively about a minority blood sport. There has not been much comment on what is at the heart of rural issues.

One of the reasons why Labour won so many rural seats in the general election in May is that we addressed the real issues in rural areas. Conservative Members have talked about people coming to the rally from Scotland, Wales and Cornwall. Where is the Conservative representation in those areas? The idea that Conservative Members represent the countryside is nonsense. It is the Labour Government who represent people in rural areas, because we address the issues that concern them.

The hon. Lady entirely misses the point. The Labour party is in government. It is now responsible for rural areas. We should like some answers on policy issues, which, so far, it is pushing out of the way. That is the whole point of this exercise.

The point of the exercise is to show that the past 18 years of Conservative Government have decimated rural services and rural transport, have hindered access to affordable housing and have put rural areas at a disadvantage compared to urban areas.

The biggest problem in rural areas is access to jobs, to advice and to housing. Because of the 1985 bus deregulation, the Conservatives cut off at the knees any opportunity for rural areas to be able to develop a good communication and transport infrastructure. The pursuit of the market principle which the Conservatives followed relentlessly for 18 years, with the threats on the Post Office, rail privatisation, bus deregulation, the development of out-of-town shopping and inappropriate housing development, is the reason why rural areas felt increasingly marginalised, looked to Labour and said, "Yes, you have the policies that address our concerns." Added to the chaos in the agriculture sector and the total mishandling of the bovine spongiform encephalopathy crisis, people lost all confidence in the Conservatives.

Problems in rural areas are often difficult to identify because people suffering social deprivation often live in small pockets, cheek by jowl with wealthy people. In my constituency, there are small pockets of deprivation in places such as Broadwell, Bream, Lydney and Cinderford, but they are cheek by jowl with affluent commuter areas such as Newent and Newnham. The problems are therefore difficult to identify.

The second problem is that, in many ways, rural areas deprivation problems are worse than those of urban deprivation because of the problem of access. That is biggest issue in rural areas. People need to get a job and to training. In the Forest of Dean constituency, there are three principal towns: Lydney, Cinderford and Coleford. People can take a bus only from Coleford to Cinderford. They cannot get one from Lydney to Cinderford, yet it is the centre of further education, skills and training. That means that people live in rural areas do not have access to the services that they require.

One thing that we must do in the transport review is to make bus services accountable to local communities so that they have a say in the frequency of service, the route and the setting of fares. The 1985 deregulation increased the poverty of rural areas almost incalculably.

The other issue is the release of capital receipts. The lack of affordable quality housing leads to distress and homelessness in rural areas. Capital receipts will allow local authorities to improve the housing stock and maintenance, and, more important, to build social housing in rural areas.

Is the hon. Lady aware that most capital receipts have been raised in relatively pleasant rural areas and that the greatest social deprivation is likely to be found in cities? Therefore, most of our carefully preserved and raised capital receipts in rural areas will be spent elsewhere in England.

That is not true. The hon. Gentleman should consider where the capital receipts are held. I absolutely refute that. The Labour Government have clearly said that we need to consider housing need and the best value that can be delivered, so we will move funds appropriately.

Local authorities in rural areas where there is housing need to hold capital receipts.

Having sat on the Standing Committee that considered the Local Government Finance (Supplementary Credit Approvals) Bill, which releases that money for housing spending, I believe that I am right in saying that, in the hon. Lady's constituency, the proposed formula will leave it worse off than it would have been if its authority had been left to spend its own capital receipts. I believe that I am right in saying that her constituency is one of those that will suffer under the system that the Government propose to introduce.

Forest of Dean district council holds capital receipts of about £11.4 million, and we can deploy that money in all sort of projects, involving co-operatives, maintenance and grants to projects such as Anchor "Stay Put" to increase housing stock quality.

We need access not only to affordable social housing and transport, but to new technology—information technology. We do not want rural areas to become information poor. Labour's plans for putting ports and outlets through telecottages, schools, libraries, hospitals and colleges, and for access to cable and the super-highway, will enable rural areas to end their marginalisation and to be at the centre of the information revolution in Britain. That is important because such a revolution, through the training and the access that it offers, means that it will not matter whether you live in a small rural hamlet or in the centre of the metropolis. You will be equal with one another: you will shall have equal access to training and equal opportunity.

We must develop and sustain rural areas. In the past, it has been considered that large-scale private housing developments would be a way to provide sustainable economic growth to rural areas. I totally refute that. That is not the way forward. We are left in Gloucestershire with a vestige of Tory planning. There are plans to build estates of 1,000, 1,500 and 2,000 homes in areas of Gloucestershire such as Painswick, Sedbury and Tutshill. That is wholly inappropriate to those small villages. It is not the way forward and we are fighting to ensure that those plans do not go through.

Instead, we need to build on all the opportunities that the countryside offers. There is a strong arts and crafts heritage in the Forest of Dean. Indeed, in the British economy, the money deployed from culture is greater than that from manufacturing. There are many examples of rural areas being regenerated and revitalised through the growth of small-scale arts and crafts business that grow into large ones, such as Laura Ashley, Robert Walsh in Chipping Campden and Dartington in south Devon. Lottery money should be used to encourage the arts and crafts heritage in rural areas so that we can build sustainable small and medium-sized enterprises.

Will the hon. Lady join me in supporting the work of the Rural Development Commission? Will she oppose any moves by her Government to abolish it?

You are scaremongering.

Order. Perhaps I could help the hon. Lady. On a number of occasions, she has used the term "you". She involves the Chair when she does so. I am reluctant to call her or order, but it might help her, so early in her career, to take note of such matters.

I apologise, Mr. Deputy Speaker, for my lack of politeness to the Chair.

It is important to develop sustainable small and medium-sized businesses, using all the rich opportunities of the countryside such as leisure, tourism, culture and the arts. We need sustainable economic growth. We must deal with the real needs of the countryside.

I have been listening closely to the hon. Lady's thoughtful speech. She criticised my hon. Friends for what she thought was an excessive preoccupation with country sports. I hope that she will forgive me for saying that she seems studiously to be avoiding any reference to that subject. Does she propose to vote for a ban on fox hunting? If so, did she inform her electorate of that before the election?

I have avoided the subject because it is a minority activity. The real issue is policies in rural areas. The Government will deliver policies on transport, housing and economic development that will deal with all the needs of rural areas.

I have had the great pleasure and privilege of being born and brought up in my constituency. Therefore, I speak from some experience of life in rural areas and the impact of Government policies on that, rather than from—as is all too often the case—the perspective of people who have moved there latterly from better-off backgrounds and suburban environments, and have a rather idyllic and out-of-touch view of what living in rural areas is all about.

I was surprised that the hon. Member for West Suffolk (Mr. Spring) should imply that all the ills facing the countryside are due entirely to the policies implemented by the Labour Government over the past two months, rather than those implemented by the Conservative Government over the past 18 years.

I remember going to the Lizard area when the Cury hunt was out. The whole community came together and my mates and I chased around on our pushbikes to see what was happening, although I do not remember the hunt ever catching a fox. I do not think that whatever happens to that leisure pursuit will have a significant impact on the economies of rural areas. I agree with the hon. Member for Forest of Dean (Mrs. Organ) that there are far more pressing issues facing rural areas.

Conservative Members talk about leisure pursuits, but there should have been more support from the previous Government to improve facilities in rural areas. For example, they should have recognised—in the teeth of prejudice—the need for improved skateboarding facilities. Too often, we think about the leisure needs of the privileged, but the less well-off also have leisure needs. Providing those facilities would contribute considerably to the economies of rural area—

Skateboarding!

The right hon. Gentleman represents the rural area of Kensington and Chelsea. He appears to be opposed to skateboarding in rural areas. It is an important issue. We want to tackle crime in rural areas, and providing leisure facilities for young people is important to that. Indeed, it is far more important than the wholly unimportant issue of fox hunting.

rose—

I will not give way. There have been many interventions from Conservative Members, and the Minister is waiting to reply to the debate.

Cornwall is an example of how the previous Government affected the economy of a rural area. Over the past 18 years, it has been at the bottom of the earnings league. It has one of the highest levels of unemployment among rural areas. As the hon. Member for Forest of Dean accurately and rightly pointed out, the environment has been under great threat from the let-rip attitude of previous Tory environment Ministers, who have allowed rural areas to be over-developed with speculative housing and out-of-town supermarkets, despite the strong objections of local authorities.

The Conservative Government's White Paper predicated that 4.4 million more houses would be needed by the year 2016. Where does the hon. Gentleman think those houses will be built? Does he want to deny people who want to move out of the cities the opportunity to live in rural areas? That would be the consequence of no further development in rural areas.

The fundamental flaw in the Conservative Government's policy was that they based their estimates of future population growth on past levels. That is spurious and I object strongly to that approach to planning needs.

Cornwall is a good example of population growth. It has grown faster than anywhere other than the county of Buckinghamshire, which has the new town of Milton Keynes. That growth has not been integrated with economic policies; instead, there has been a massive increase in unemployment. Growth and economic policies have not gone hand in hand. If the hon. Member for Cotswold (Mr. Clifton-Brown) is concerned about accommodating people in rural areas, what about the local people who have made homeless by Tory policies?

I share my hon. Friend's analysis of the behaviour of a Tory Government run by a suburban party.

It is very difficult for me to listen to the comments of some Members because, tomorrow, we will discuss capping provisions that will have disastrous effects on rural services in my own county of Somerset. I hope that some of the hon. Members who have spoken so eloquently on rural services in today's debate will support the counties of Somerset and Oxfordshire in tomorrow's debate on the issue.

On the matter of planning and housebuilding—

Order. The hon. Gentleman's intervention is far too long.

I am sure that the matter mentioned by my hon. Friend the Member for Somerton and Frome (Mr. Heath) will be debated fully tomorrow. Because of my deep experience of the pains and pleasures of living in rural areas, I have a great deal to say—as I am sure that hon. Members will appreciate—on the matters that we are debating. However, I am aware also that I must leave time for the Minister's reply.

The past 18 years of Tory Government policy have led to an increase in homelessness in rural areas. The housing market is often called an open housing market, but it is a private housing market. In Cornwall, we have one of the nation's biggest mismatches between earnings levels and house prices. Opportunities for local people to get on to the first rung of the housing ladder are very few and far between, and those trying to obtain a council house in a remote rural area cannot get one.

In the private rented sector, the tourist industry has taken precedence. Rural areas therefore face enormous pressures, making it incredibly difficult for local people to find accommodation.

Building speculative, executive homes in rural areas does not answer the housing needs of local people. Those needs were also not met by the Tory Government's legislation, which allowed council tax reductions of 50 per cent. for second-home owners in rural areas. Such measures simply further encouraged the iniquitous trend towards second-home ownership, which—hand in hand with homelessness and a shortage of affordable housing—has greatly increased in many of the villages in my constituency.

Although many rural issues must be addressed, I specifically ask the Minister to tell us whether an integrated rural policy will be developed involving all Departments, including the Department of the Environment, Transport and the Regions, the Department of Trade and Industry, the Department of Health—because many cottage hospitals are under threat—and the Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food.

We must also recognise the important role of the Rural Development Commission and the Countryside Commission. It was rather rich for my hon. Friend the Member for Tweeddale, Ettrick and Lauderdale (Mr. Moore) to question the Government's commitment to the Rural Development Commission. They have withdrawn funds from the commission and spent some of its core budget on the frivolous activities of rural challenge. I hope that the Minister will address the issue of integrated policies.

I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for West Suffolk (Mr. Spring) on securing this debate. Judging by the level of interest shown by hon. Members, especially Opposition Members, we could use a full day's debate on the subject every week for some time to come. I pay tribute to him on his speech, in which he made many important points. He is a resolute champion of rural interests in Suffolk.

My right hon. Friend the Member for Kensington and Chelsea (Mr. Clark) expressed views for which he is well known. I have no doubt that other hon. Friends, if they could have spoken in the debate, would have dealt in some detail with the points that he raised. I hope that they will have an opportunity to do so in a future debate.

I regret to say that I felt that the speeches by Labour Members demonstrated the nature of the problem. There may be many Labour Members in this Parliament, but there are very few with an understanding of the countryside. Judging by the attendance for today's debate, very few Labour Members have even an interest in the countryside.

Among the very important points raised by my hon. Friend the Member for West Suffolk were the irrelevance of an additional tier of government for rural areas; the bias of many county councils—certainly it is true of Suffolk county council—against rural areas and in favour of urban areas, where Labour party support has traditionally been concentrated; neglect of—

Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

No. I am sorry, but I do not have time to give way.

Other points raised by my hon. Friend the Member for West Suffolk were the neglect of important rural assets, such as footpaths, and the impact of the minimum wage on the rural economy. I note that the hon. Member for Delyn (Mr. Hanson) did not say at what level the minimum wage which he so enthusiastically supported should be set.

On field sports, I reiterate my robust opposition to any legislation that aims to outlaw traditional country sports. In that context, will the Minister be able to tell us whether the fact that so many Labour Members support such legislation is connected to the £1 million donation to the Labour party from the International Fund for Animal Welfare? In the previous Parliament, in early-day motion 726, that organisation was described by Sir David Steel as

"a private company … which is simply an animal rights lobbying organisation fleecing money from the public and enriching its operators".

Will the hon. Lady tell us whether the Labour party solicited that donation? In view of the Labour party's proclaimed commitment to opening up details about party funding, will she tell us—I am sure that she will not wish to dodge the question—whether the International Fund for Animal Welfare approached Labour, if Labour did not approach the fund?

Given the size of the donation, one must assume that the Labour party made detailed inquiries about the nature of the fund's activities. Will the Minister therefore tell us on what basis the Labour party judged that fund to be a suitable organisation from which to accept money? What discussions were held between Labour and the fund on the issue of field sports? If she cannot answer those questions in her reply, will she write to me and place a copy of her reply in the Library?

My hon. Friend the Member for West Suffolk mentioned the White Paper on rural England, which was published—to widespread acclaim—in 1995. A progress report, "Rural England 1996", assessed the achievements of the 12 months following publication of the White Paper. At the conclusion of "Rural England 1996", there was a commitment to making subsequent progress reports in 1997 and thereafter. Will the Minister confirm that the Government intend to honour that commitment? Will she confirm also that future progress reports will contain the same helpful check list, listing every individual commitment, which was originally made in the 1995 White Paper and occupied the last four pages of "Rural England 1996"?

My hon. Friend the Member for West Suffolk also mentioned access—a crucial issue for many people living in the countryside. Will the Minister now tell the House what is meant by the Labour party's manifesto commitment, which refers to

"greater freedom for people to explore our open countryside"

but adds:

" We will not, however, permit any abuse of a right to greater access"?

Does that commitment mean that there will be legislation to introduce a statutory right to roam? If it does not mean that, what does it mean?

Does the Minister understand that the uncertainty—indeed, the threat—about the Government's intentions does nothing to encourage further progress on voluntary agreements with landowners, which have secured such an enormous increase in the amount of open countryside to which the public now enjoy access?

My final comments deal with the all-important matter of resources. In the 2 July Budget, the Chancellor of the Exchequer announced his smash-and-grab raid on pension funds by abolishing the advance corporation tax credit. Even now, two weeks later, the full impact of that smash-and-grab raid has not yet been fully understood. The consequences of the Chancellor's raid are devastating for rural areas and for the local authorities that are responsible for those areas. Norfolk county council, for example, now faces an annual shortfall of £5 million a year in its pension fund, which is more than 1 per cent. of its total budget. In Lincolnshire, the equivalent figure is £2.45 million; and, in Somerset, it is £2.1 million a year.

The shortfalls have already started to accumulate—the change was made effective two weeks ago—and they need to be made good very urgently. If local authorities are to act responsibly in the interests of their employees and future pensioners, they cannot allow their pension funds to fall into substantial deficit. Therefore, local authorities' contributions to those pensions funds must rise.

There are three options to meet the cost of those higher contributions. The first is that services can be cut; the second is that council tax can sharply rise; and the third is that the Government will raise the revenue support grant. There are no other options. Will the hon. Lady tell the House today which of the choices the Government propose to adopt? If she cannot tell us, will she at least say when she thinks the Government will announce which option they have chosen?

To put a little flesh on the argument, in Norfolk more than 200 teachers may now face the sack, making a total mockery of the Government's election promises about class sizes. As the hon. Member for Putney (Mr. Colman) warned the Chancellor before the Budget, no increase of the sort required by the abolition of ACT could be afforded by local authorities without their having to make further cuts in services to their local residents. Millions of anxious people in the countryside will be hanging on the Minister's words this morning. They are wondering whether the Chancellor's smash-and-grab raid will cut services in their areas. Their uncertainty and anxiety should be ended at the earliest possible date.

I greatly regret that there is no time to pursue the other important issues raised in the debate. The Minister may not be able to respond to all the points raised by me and my colleagues, but I hope that she will deal with as many as she can. In passing, I remind her that I am still waiting for a letter from her on related issues that I raised in a debate on 10 June.

The importance of rural issues has been reflected in today's attendance and in the quality of the speeches, especially those of my colleagues. In the afterglow of their election victory, the Government may think that a majority derived from urban constituencies gives them the right to ride arrogantly and contemptuously over country dwellers and their concerns, but last week more than 100,000 people issued a powerful warning to the Government in Hyde park. This week, my hon. Friends have repeated that warning to the House. The Government ignore that warning at their peril. The Minister now has a chance to show that the Government will at least start governing in the interests of all the people in this country, including those who enjoy and live and work in the countryside.

I congratulate the hon. Member for West Suffolk (Mr. Spring) on his success in securing this debate, but he and some of his colleagues have missed the opportunity to deal with some of the real issues facing people who live in rural areas.

It is interesting to find that, in the general election, the hon. Member for West Suffolk suffered a 13 per cent. swing to Labour in his rural area. His majority is now only 1,800. When people had the chance to express their views about the previous Government's 18 years in office, there was a huge swing against the hon. Gentleman and the Conservatives—that is the real view of the people of rural Britain, not that expressed by the people in Hyde park last week.

Will the hon. Lady give way?

No, I have fewer than 10 minutes. Plenty of Conservative Members—well, all 11 who managed to stay for the entire debate, which is not a startling turnout—have had the opportunity to speak.

The hon. Member for South Dorset (Mr. Bruce), who accused me of not being briefed, left the Chamber for some of the debate and then returned, misquoted the levels of the minimum wage recently agreed by the agricultural wages board. For his information, they now stand at £4.20 an hour for ordinary labourers and £3.06 an hour for casual workers.

rose—

No, I am not giving way.

On a point of order, Mr. Deputy Speaker.

Is it really a point of order?

It is indeed, Mr. Deputy Speaker. I want to ask your advice on how I should proceed. I left the Chamber to check the figures, and I find that I did mislead the House. The minimum wage for an 18-year-old is £2.60 an hour, not £2.95, and for a 16-year-old it is £1.84.

That is not a point of order.

Out of interest, the hon. Gentleman's majority is now 77. There was a 15 per cent. swing against him, which again shows the views of rural voters on the previous Government's 18 years in office.

Conservative Members have presented a caricature of the urban-rural debate. I understand that people have very powerful feelings about fox hunting and some issues which may be coming before the House in private Members' Bills, but this debate should rightly have been about the issues raised by, for example, my hon. Friend the Member for Delyn (Mr. Hanson) in his excellent contribution, my hon. Friend the Member for Forest of Dean (Mrs. Organ) and, indeed, the hon. Member for St. Ives (Mr. George).

They spoke about the problems that rural people face every day—the problems of transport, access to schools, hospitals and housing, especially for young people who face having to leave the places in which they were born because they cannot afford to live there. They are the issues that affect the everyday lives of people in our rural communities. It is a great pity that Conservative Members could not spend very much time even thinking about them because they were so obsessed with issues such as hunting, which the House will be debating.

Conservative Members made great play of last week's Hyde park rally. We were all privileged to hear the speech of the right hon. Member for Henley (Mr. Heseltine), who told the rally that what he sees as the threat to hunting is a

"vicious onslaught on a treasured tradition of rural life."

Where were Conservative Members—in fact, where were the members of the public who were in Hyde park last week?—when the right hon. Gentleman decimated the coal industry and destroyed 55,000 jobs in rural areas? The Conservative Members were in the Lobbies voting for it, so we shall take no lectures on hypocrisy from them.

In the time left to me, I should like to ask Conservative Members to take this opportunity to condemn—[Interruption.]

Order. There is a great deal of noise from Opposition Members, which is unfair when a Minister is replying to the debate.

Will Conservative Members take this opportunity to condemn the threats received by my hon. Friend the Member for Worcester (Mr. Foster)? A snare was recently sent to him in the post. He received a letter saying that the writer

"would like to throw your entrails to the dogs."

Another said:

"You will not live to see the end of your Bill".

A third said:

"You and your family ought to find bolt holes"—

[Laughter.] Death threats may be funny to Conservative Members, but they do not reflect well on the people who send them. I would expect the party of law and order—it still prides itself on that title despite its record in office—to condemn such assaults on free speech.

Will Conservative Members also condemn some speakers at the Hyde park rally who threatened to burn forests and poison water supplies and who stated that that rally would be the last peaceful one? These are not the activities of people to whom we should listen seriously. Conservatives Members need to realise that the majority of people in the countryside are anti-hunting. We must also remember that hunting is not a town-country issue—it is a moral issue, which is why there will be a free vote for Labour Members, should the Bill be debated.

In the very limited time I have left, I shall point out that the Government believe in opportunity, fairness and prosperity for all. That applies equally to urban and rural areas.

Will the hon. Lady give way?

No. I have only two minutes left—be real.

In our manifesto, we gave a number of pledges on rural matters. We pledged to recognise the special needs of rural areas and communities, not to allow public and transport services in rural areas to deteriorate, to give greater protection to wildlife, and to give greater freedom to people to explore the open countryside. It has already been said from the Dispatch Box that the principle of access is not negotiable, but we are aiming for an extremely wide-ranging consultation with all the parties involved on the question of access to the countryside. The consultation paper will be issued before the end of the year. We want to hear everybody's views so that we can come up with workable legislation that will be supported as widely as possible.

The Conservatives brought us BSE, transport deregulation and the poll tax, which decimated the incomes of many rural people. They have no representation in Scotland and Wales. Their concern about fox hunting and many issues that people in rural Britain feel are irrelevant sits pretty ill. If they want to get back on to the Government Benches within a reasonable time, they must modernise. They need to realise that they have to represent the real interests, views and life styles of all people in Britain if they are to have a chance of regaining the trust of the electorate.

On a point of order, Mr. Deputy Speaker. I appreciate that the Minister had a limited amount of time, but two pieces of information were given to the House during the exchanges. The first is about the minimum wage. The Library has just given me the figure, which is £1.84 for 16-year-olds. The hon. Lady—

Order. The hon. Gentleman has already commented about that. It is not a matter for the Chair. Any facts and figures given by hon. Members are given in good faith. It is not a matter for the Chair, and the hon. Gentleman cannot put the record straight on a point of order.

I thank Madam Speaker for making time available for a debate on this important national problem.

After the miners' strike of 1984–85, the previous Government instructed British Coal to sell its stock of houses. At that time, it owned 165,000 or 170,000 houses of different types that had been built at various times in colliery areas. In 1984, parts of some of the older villages were put up for auction to any speculator who would buy them.

The houses were first offered to the miners. Many of them purchased their homes, even though the pit was closing. However, many elderly miners did not want to buy their houses, because they were 50 or 60 and not in the best of health, so they carried on renting. The houses were sold en bloc in many areas throughout the country—south Wales, Yorkshire, Nottinghamshire, Derbyshire, Durham and Scotland. The speculators moved in and snapped up the houses, often for as little as £3,000 or even £1,500 each.

I am particularly concerned about the village of Warsop Vale, on the boundary of Nottinghamshire and Derbyshire, abutting on to the constituency of my hon. Friend the Member for Bolsover (Mr. Skinner). A landlord called Dennis Rye bought many houses in Derbyshire and Nottinghamshire. The area has had nothing but problems since.

The houses in Warsop Vale were built around the turn of the century—probably at about the time of D. H. Lawrence. A D. H. Lawrence film could be made there, with the back ginnels and the back yards. They were decent terraced houses. With improvement grants from the council, bathrooms had been added to the backs of the houses. It was a happy village. There are people of 75 who were born in the village, worked all their life at the pit, married someone from the village and still live there. It was a good community with thriving pubs and shops.

The past 12 or 13 years have been disastrous. The private tenants moved in by the landlords as the pensioners died were often transient residents. Many had been evicted or had left their wives and run off with someone else. The private landlords advertised in the papers for them. The tenants had no feeling for the community, often staying for just a few weeks. Their weekly rent for a small terraced house was sometimes up to £55 or £60, paid by housing benefit. We protested strongly about that, but the Government of the time were in favour of a free market for rented houses and were happy to pay £50 or £60 housing benefit for each house. The area became like a transit camp, and the problem grew and grew.

When the previous Government restricted the rents to more or less what the council would have charged—about £20 or £25 per property—the private landlords decided that the houses were not worth letting. It was easier to let them stand empty and try to make the council take the blame or get a lump sum from the council for the empty houses.

The houses were soon vandalised. Kids threw bricks through the windows and organised gangs moved in to strip them of anything with a second-hand value—radiators, taps or doors. Anything that could be unscrewed was taken. Kids in the neighbourhood, who had no jobs and no future at the pit, as their fathers had had, set fire to parts of the houses. Some houses became infested with vermin. Warsop Vale and many other villages now look like a war zone. Places have been shelled and set on fire and look like houses after the blitz. I lived through the blitz as a little boy and remember seeing some houses inhabited and others left derelict for a long time.

The miners who bought their houses cannot sell them. They have modernised the houses and made them into what we in our neck of the woods call little palaces. Many have double glazing, new doors and central heating. They are unsaleable because of the empty houses next door that have been set on fire, have rats or are vandalised. The whole place is in a terrible state. European grants have been given to some villages to renew the pavements and the lighting, but there has been nothing for the housing.

It is impossible to attract new industry. Anybody thinking of setting up a new factory looks at the housing and the wreckage and moves elsewhere. There are so many empty sites available in pit areas that people can take their pick. There may be subsidence problems in the area because of the old pits. People whose families have lived next to a colliery for 100 years, with heavy lorries going back and forth, klaxons sounding at night, night shifts and dust from the spoil heaps now have to put up with the houses turning into slums.

In addition, the Fitzherbert estate now wants to move in and quarry for thousands of tonnes of limestone, as do Tarmac, Redland and any other company that knows that it can enhance the value of the old pit site by £1 million simply by getting planning permission for limestone extraction.

We are talking about people who have suffered all their lives. They have no hopes unless the new Government take action. I have been going to the village for many years saying that we need a new Government and new policies.

Does my hon. Friend agree that, because of the rundown of the villages, amenities such as thriving shops, pubs and telephone kiosks to which he referred have been lost? The old people who made the village no longer have those back-up amenities. That is a further problem for them, adding to my hon. Friend's argument that something should be done for such communities.

My hon. Friend is right. The pub in Warsop Vale has shut. The post office shut and reopened as part of a grocer's shop. Bus services are poor. Elderly people are trapped in their houses, unable to get to a supermarket. It is like a backwater of Kentucky.

Five years later, British Coal again tried to auction off the houses, and there was uproar. My hon. Friends the Members for Mansfield (Mr. Meale), for Normanton (Mr. O'Brien), for Rother Valley (Mr. Barron), for Bolsover, others who want to speak in today's debate and even some Tories, protested strongly at the inhumane attitude of auctioning off people's lives. The Government agreed and told British Coal to sell houses to housing associations.

Later types of houses, made from concrete slabs, which were built in 1947 because miners were coming down from Durham and Scotland, are now in the hands of housing associations, but they have problems. Many of them need repairs. The iron bar that runs through the concrete slab is often rusted or rotten. Some miners bought such houses, but now find that they are stuck with them because building societies say that they do not have a long life and they will not provide mortgages on them. The housing stock is not very good at all, although I must say that the housing associations that took over the houses have been excellent landlords, and the scheme has worked in that respect.

The landlords who bought the houses for about £1,500 each have made enormous profits. They have managed to take in rents of £50 or £60 a week for 10 or 12 years, while spending negligible amounts on the houses. Now that they realise that they cannot get such rents, they want to sell the houses to the local council for about £17,000 each.

So, along with one or two other private landlords, Mr. Dennis Rye in Warsop Vale, who bought 80 houses, 20 of which have been vandalised and are standing empty, wants to take about £1 million out of the small village of 280 houses. The modernised houses with two or three bedrooms, an attic and a bathroom, which have had grants spent on them and on which many people have spent a lot of money, still sell for only £21,000 each. In London, the same houses would go for £80,000 or £100,000.

The local owner-occupiers and decent tenants have been very angry for many years. Reports have been produced and there have been meetings, but we have got nowhere. Numerous surveys on housing conditions have been conducted by various officers of district and county councils, but everybody blames each other. We need Government action to get something done.

I understand that the Housing Corporation in the east midlands has a surplus of £3 million, so there is cash available if it is a question of housing associations buying the houses. Three or four weeks ago, my hon. Friend the Member for Mansfield and I clashed with the housing associations at a meeting. It seems that they admit that they have the cash but are interested in spending it only on the houses they already own, and are not keen on using it to purchase houses from private landlords and improve such houses. They accept that the Housing Corporation in the east midlands is sitting on the money, but put up strong resistance and display a marked reluctance to taking over houses from private landlords.

The Government have announced that there will be extra cash from the receipts of the sale of council houses, which is very welcome. The announcement was received with acclaim. Obviously, the scheme will be phased in. Local councils have reacted by saying that the money must go on modernising council houses and that they would prefer to spend the cash on their own council houses rather than private rented houses, which nobody wants to touch with a barge pole due to the amount that needs to be spent on them.

There is a problem with the old compulsory purchase powers. When Roy Hattersley was chairman of housing and I was deputy housing chairman on Sheffield city council in the 1960s, the council compulsorily purchased thousands of houses at a time. All that the landlord got was the value of the site. The regulation was simply applied to houses that were unfit for human habitation. I know as well as anybody that they were unfit because I lived in one.

Such houses had lavatories that did not work, they were infested with rats and they were next to belching chimneys and drop hammers. We grew up in such conditions. It was accepted that such houses were unfit for human habitation, compulsory purchase orders were made and the scheme worked—the council built council houses and people were rehoused.

The Housing Act 1985 took away such powers from local councils. Compulsory purchase orders were allowed in certain circumstances, but councils had to pay the market price—whatever it was—and the price had to be agreed with the landlord. Owners are not against selling the houses—they would not mind at all selling them—but they want £17,000 for a house for which they paid £3,000 12 years ago and for which they have charged a rent of £3,000 a year—perhaps they have taken £30,000 in rent in total. That does not add up, and it cannot go on.

In its election manifesto, the Labour party gave an undertaking that council receipts from the sale of council houses which are received but not spent by councils will be invested in building new houses and rehabilitating old ones, and that the scheme will be phased in to match the capacity of the building industry. It quite rightly said that the cash from capital receipts can not only be spent on council houses but can be used for the provision of new social housing in partnership with registered social landlords, for private-sector renovation, for improving energy efficiency and for raising the quality of a neighbourhood by, for example, encouraging or promoting mixed development.

The problem is that there are loopholes in the system. Even if councils had the cash to spend, private landlords would blatantly exploit the loopholes in the legislation. In 1996, the Government introduced the Housing (Fitness Enforcement Procedures) Order. Sections 86/189 and 86/190 should help councils to grab hold of negligent landlords, but there are too many loopholes.

The legal loopholes include landlords being allowed 28 days to start repairs; so they start, and then they stop. The council takes the landlord to court, so he starts again, and then he stops again. Then he does just enough repairs to take the matter outside the law, which covers "substantial disrepair", and says that he has taken the safety measures and does not need to do anything else. The procedures include vague clauses such as the council has to be "minded to take action"—whatever that might mean—and "give fair warning" that it is thinking about taking such action. If the landlord does not do something, the council thinks about it a bit more.

The maximum fine is £2,500. Private landlords laugh at that. It is an offence if somebody intentionally fails to comply with the council order, but it is very difficult to prove such intention in court. Did the person deliberately not comply, not understand the order or employ contractors who went off moonlighting, or could the contractor not find his tools? Usually, the contractors are part of the landlord's business, anyway. The system is full of loopholes, and is not working.

We have a new Government commitment to license landlords of houses in multiple occupancy, which is very good. Such landlords should have to apply for a licence to run houses. There are already thousands of problems with students who are being ripped off and who have to take out massive student loans to pay £40 a week for one room to somebody they do not know or cannot find and who is not implementing any safety measures such as providing fire escapes.

I hope that my hon. Friend the Minister will consider licensing not only houses in multiple occupancy but any dwelling or property where a landlord deliberately keeps it empty or uninhabitable in order to try to put pressure on the council, do a deal, or simply because the property is going up in value. Any house that is boarded up—even if the landlord cannot be bothered to board it up and squatters are allowed in—should be licensed. The existence of such houses is unfair on tenants who live next door, have mortgages and have spent money on their house, but cannot sell it because it looks straight across at a slum with smashed windows where kids run in and out.

It is estimated that 20 per cent. of private rented property is unfit or uninhabitable.

We should introduce new offences. It should be a separate offence for a landlord deliberately to refuse to maintain a house in fit condition for habitation. We should say that no landlord is entitled to receive housing benefit if he refuses to carry out repairs. We should also prohibit landlords from increasing rents if they refuse to do repairs and we should refuse certificates and licences to such landlords.

We should also pass legislation so that tenants of landlords who refuse to do repairs have the right of compulsory purchase of their rooms, perhaps as a co-operative. If the council has not got the money, the tenants could get together and buy their houses at a price agreed with the independent valuer. If that does not work, perhaps because the tenants are elderly, they should have the right to vote for a housing association to take over from the landlord at an agreed price. Such measures would go a long way towards deterring such behaviour by landlords. We should have a licensing system, and we should strengthen laws that compel decent behaviour from landlords.

Only 10 per cent. of chief environmental officers currently think that the previous Government's Housing Grants, Construction and Regeneration Act 1996 has worked. Only 1 per cent. of them believe that it has improved standards. The Act is deregulation gone mad. The previous Government took away all the regulations and let the landlords do what they wanted.

I do not wish to detain the House much longer, but I wish to put on record the recommendations of the legal experts of Mansfield district council, who have a good approach to the problem. I am sure that the Coalfield Communities Association, which has about 80 members among towns, villages and district councils who share the same problems, agree with the legal experts' opinions.

The experts suggest that the Government should abolish the order made under section 86 of the Housing Grants, Construction and Regeneration Act 1996, which is known as the Housing (Fitness Enforcement Procedures) Order 1996; abolish the requirement restricting local housing authorities from specifying the commencement of work earlier than 28 days from the date of service of section 189 and 190 notices; abolish the provision whereby section 189 and 190 notices are suspended on appeal; introduce a fast-track appeals procedure for Housing Act action; change the level of fines that can be awarded on successful prosecutions for failure to comply with sections 189 and 190 to a minimum of £1,000 and an unlimited maximum; change the mens rea of section 198A offences from "intentional" to "without reasonable excuse"; introduce a new provision whereby people commit a summary offence if they fail to maintain their dwelling in a condition fit for human habitation without reasonable excuse; introduce a new power to allow local housing authorities to make control orders on properties that are not houses in multiple occupation; introduce a licensing scheme for all private lettings; introduce a provision under which landlords are not entitled to increase rents unless a certificate from the local housing authority states that the property is fit; introduce legislation to enable aggrieved private tenants to purchase compulsorily their houses collectively or to vote to transfer to a registered social landlord who would buy at the district valuer's valuation; simplify and accelerate compulsory purchase powers; and, finally, introduce legislation whereby housing benefit is payable only to approved landlords.

I am sorry that I have not had the chance to notify the Minister of those points, but the council's legal experts delivered their opinion to me only yesterday. I thank him for giving his time to listen to the debate and I know that many of my hon. Friends wish to speak. I am certain that the Government, if they go about it the right way, can solve the problem.

I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Bassetlaw (Mr. Ashton) for initiating the debate today. The problems he has described are mirrored in all the coalfield areas, as exemplified by the fact that several of my colleagues are here today to speak on the issue. My hon. Friend gave a list of suggestions by Mansfield district council. Its environment department is certainly at the sharp end of dealing with the landlords who cause problems.

One particular landlord in my area has already been mentioned—Dennis Rye. He has got houses all over the place, including Yorkshire, and I reckon that he has houses in 12 or 15 constituencies. He has spread his net far and wide. In the Pleasley area of Bolsover, which is not very far from Mansfield, Dennis Rye owns some 70 houses. In 1987, he decided to apply for grants, and Bolsover district council agreed to give him grants to improve the houses. Dennis Rye then decided that he wanted grants to make the properties into flats to make more money. The council said that he could have the money, but he appealed against that decision. That dragged out the procedure.

Some years later, Dennis Rye said that the properties should be demolished. So the Bolsover district council, as the Mansfield district council would have done, said that it would put in an order to demolish the houses, which were unsightly and like a bomb site, as my hon. Friend the Member for Bassetlaw described. What did Dennis Rye do? He appealed against the demolition order. The case went to court again and was dragged out further.

Such cases usually go to magistrates courts, but sometimes to the county courts. Sadly, all the magistrates courts work separately, but many deal with the same small number of landlords. Although my hon. Friends and I are aware of the landlords' efforts in all the different areas, the magistrates, for some reason, are not aware that they are being taken for a ride.

In the 1990s, after Dennis Rye had appealed against the demolition of the properties in Pleasley, the Bolsover district council decided to serve repair notices. We all know the problem with those. The landlord gets a builder to knock a nail in a skirting board and that is enough for the magistrates to say that the landlord has made a start on repairs, even though people are still living in terrible conditions.

The process is dragged out even more. Bolsover district council currently has three outstanding actions against Dennis Rye, but the environmental health department knows that the chances of solving the problems are remote, as it told me yesterday, unless the law is changed in the way suggested by my hon. Friend the Member for Bassetlaw.

We all know that the examples in Warsop Vale and in New terrace in Pleasley that I have mentioned are not isolated instances. As my hon. Friend said, many houses were sold off in job lots to landlords in London. I have evidence that, in some cases, groups of houses were sold three times in a month, with each successive purchaser making money from the ribs of miners and their families living in those properties. Eventually, the ownership of the properties ended up in tax havens.

Many landlords have agents in the coalfields. There is an agent in Creswell, a wonderful model village that was built at the turn of the century. Some 200 houses were built in a circle and, at the time, were an example of state-of-the-art building. For many years, while the pit was open, the village had a vetting procedure. The local National Union of Mineworkers and the residents ensured that anybody who took over an empty house was vetted. There was nothing wrong with that, and it gave an element of democracy, but it went when the pit shut.

The Tories—who are not here now, although they were in the Chamber for the previous debate about fox hunting—should understand that this debate is also about rural life. Each of those areas is a village. We are talking not about towns, but about tiny little communities. The Tory Government smashed them as they closed pit after pit. They may not have realised, although I am sure they did, that they took away the mantle of security that existed for the people who lived in those villages.

The net result is that there are no more vetting procedures in Creswell model village, with the result that the houses have been taken over by Villagate Properties, which is based at Westerham, Kent. When repairs are needed, I have to write to someone in Kent, after trying the agent first.

People are coming in from all over the place. My hon. Friend referred to the transient population. About a month ago, some paedophiles finished up living in Creswell model village. I will not go through the details, but they do not live there any more. Action was taken. Least said, soonest mended, but court cases will follow.

I want to stress to the House that the people of Creswell regarded that episode as an insult to them. They had worked hard—the miners at the pit—and now they see all those people coming in and upsetting their community.

I am not saying that everything can be done in next to no time. We have five years, but we do not want to wait for five years; we want to start now. We have a Minister who knows a little about housing. As we know only too well on both sides of the House, not every hon. Member who reaches the Front Bench is well equipped to do the job immediately, but the Minister understands the subject and should be able to make a flying start.

My hon. Friend the Member for Bassetlaw presented a good number of proposals. Every village in the mining communities is affected. I could go on to speak about Langwith, Shirebrook and many others. They follow a similar pattern. People have been deserted by the previous Government. Their jobs have been taken away, and now they are having to put up with living in communities that are falling apart, with desolation and dereliction all around them, as at New Terrace, Pleasley.

My hon. Friend suggested the action that could be taken, and I agree with much of what he said, bearing in mind that local authorities are spending thousands of pounds going to court. Environmental teams in local authorities should be given the power to work together. They know the landlords who are causing all the trouble. Each local authority is litigating separately, but those who want to do so should be able to take joint action against rogue landlords such as Dennis Rye.

My hon. Friend referred to various housing Acts. Local authorities have the power to take a landlord to court to enforce the repair of properties and maintenance of sites, and the need to clear up the dereliction should be part of the argument for the local authority to exercise those powers.

I agree with my hon. Friend the Member for Bassetlaw about fast-track litigation, although that is a matter for another Government Department. I hope that my hon. Friend the Minister will consider that. My hon. Friend also dealt with the licensing of landlords.

For a local authority to enforce a compulsory purchase order, as I understand it, it must be based on housing gain. A local authority should be able to obtain a compulsory purchase order on the grounds that the property is unsightly and a mess—that would deal with Rye, both in Warsop Vale and in New Terrace, Pleasley—or if they can prove that there is constant litigation and that the landlords are using the courts to drag the process out.

I conclude on a more general point, which my hon. Friend may not support immediately. Many of the problems have occurred not just in mining communities, but on a wider scale, because one of the first acts of the Tory Government after their 1979 victory was to introduce the right to buy, which everyone talks about. However, another factor that caused mayhem for many people in our communities was short hold tenancies—the power of landlords to grant three-month or six-month tenancies and then kick people out. That shifted housing powers away from tenants—not that they ever had much power—to landlords. I hope that in the next five years our Government will review short hold tenancies and return to the system of intervention and control.

I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Bassetlaw (Mr. Ashton) on securing this opportunity to debate such an important subject.

Like my hon. Friend, I have in my constituency a large number of properties that were once owned and managed by the former National Coal Board, and as in Bassetlaw, the decision to sell off those properties in the Rother Valley, and the clumsy and disjointed way in which the sell-off was handled, has had serious and damaging consequences for several of the villages in my constituency.

The Rother Valley has three estates consisting of former NCB homes—at Aston, Kiveton Park and Maltby. The houses on the estates were constructed using pre-reinforced concrete. They were built in factories and assembled on site. In the 1950s, at the age of eight, I moved into one of those houses, when I moved from North to South Yorkshire.

Because of their flawed design, the houses on those estates have been classified as defective under the terms of the Housing Defects Act 1984. I understand that those provisions are contained in more recent housing legislation. The steel in the houses is corroded because the concrete has let water in. The steel has expanded, rusted and forced the concrete up on the outside. Consequently, no one will loan money against such a house.

The properties were sold off in lots at auction. Various parts of the estates were bought up cheaply by organisations and individuals who had little or no interest in maintaining the estate as a whole. Some properties were sold by the NCB to sitting tenants in the 1970s and 1980s, and were bought back by the local authority under the 1984 Act.

I shall describe the situation at one estate, Kiveton Park, in my constituency. Florence Unity Biby Richardson and Clive Richardson of Wimbledon own 20 of the houses. Great Parndon Investments of Harlow in Essex owns 14 houses. Michael Windle from Skipton owns 40 houses. He also owns houses on the Maltby estate. Paul Wright of Worksop owns 18 properties at Kiveton Park. DetaRock Properties owns four houses, Globe Properties owns one, and Rotherham borough council, having bought back houses from sitting tenants under the 1984 Act, owns 43.

One of the houses on the estate has a great history, as my case work revealed. The landlord proved to be so bad and difficult to deal with that the London solicitors who were acting as his agents eventually gave up on him. They cancelled their agreement with him and refused to deal with inquiries about the property's state of disrepair. I was told by the firm of solicitors to contact the landlord direct—he lived in Baghdad. He, like many other people, had bought the property at an auction in the Connaught rooms. He had seen photographs of the houses, which looked like decent, three-bedroomed semi-detached houses. No one had told him of the concrete construction that had been classified as defective. He thought that he could spend a few thousand pounds and make a profit.

The fragmentation of the ownership of what are called locally the "White City" estates was only the beginning of the present problems. Although some money is available to make the necessary repairs and correct the building faults of some of the houses, that money is too slow in coming through. When it arrives, the piecemeal way in which it has to be used can itself be a contributory factor in the decay of the estates. I shall return to that thought at the end of my speech.

The Housing Defects Act 1984 allows local authorities to buy such properties from their owners, but it does not fully cater for the circumstances on the former NCB estates. Rotherham borough council was reluctant to buy the residents out, because it had never previously owned the stock and did not consider itself responsible for the situation. The Act made the council responsible, but it showed great reluctance, and I had a public falling out with it about how quickly it should respond and buy the properties back.

While the wrangling about the status of the houses continued, many of them fell into disrepair, and even dereliction, as they became empty. Many hon. Members will know that, when a property becomes empty, that can be the beginning of a steep downward cycle in its useful life. Properties that are empty for any length of time tend to fall into serious disrepair.

With the former Coal Board houses, disrepair can be brought about even more quickly by the new absentee landlords who refuse to take their obligations seriously. Last month, I received from an environmental health officer at my local council a letter that highlights one of the problems:

"As houses become empty they are vandalised and frequently set on fire … Since March, I have served a stream of Statutory Notices on two landlords to make such houses secure. Most recently, two properties on one road have been boarded or bricked up following such action. One by the Council in default."

My local council has thousands of pounds outstanding because it has had to take action to protect the interests of the people who live on the estates, especially in terms of the safety of young children. It has spent thousands of pounds because we cannot get the landlords to act responsibly.

Empty and derelict properties also become targets for theft, especially on the estates, where metal fixtures and fittings are sold for scrap. The latest craze on one of the estates is the removing of drainage covers, despite the fact that they are heavier than some of the inside fittings. Of course, the open manholes then become a health and safety hazard. They get filled with rubble, which blocks the drains and causes further environmental health problems.

In some cases, the problems of the estates are becoming so bad that even the infrastructure is failing. A letter from Yorkshire Electricity, which was forwarded to me, says that the company noted concerns about the state of the supply cables, but:

"There will be a need to take an overview of the best approach to resolving this problem since there are so many interested parties on the White City Estate".

That was a reference to the estate on which I was brought up. A couple of years ago I took Jeremy Walker, who works in the Government regional office in Leeds, to see that estate, and showed him the house that I moved into at the age of eight. It was derelict and had been vandalised. People had been in and stolen all the copper, including the main means of stopping off the water. Water was jetting up into the kitchen ceiling, and somebody had thrown an old mattress down to try to stop the flow. The house next door had been burnt out completely, right up through the roof tiles.

My constituents have had to live with those conditions for years. We have had a decade of such problems on the estates, and they are not nice places to live now; they are certainly not like the place that I moved to in 1955 with the rest of my family.

In some cases, fire damage in empty houses means that the only suitable course of action is demolition. However, because of the way in which the bundles of houses were sold, it is never certain that a single landlord will own adjacent houses that may also need to be demolished. An argument is taking place now about one house that needs to be demolished but is attached to another. The landlord refuses to do anything about the situation, so we cannot demolish a property that is causing a hazard on the estate.

On two of the estates a scheme is in place to reinstate properties, and the work is being done by a local housing association. I congratulate the housing association, which is doing some magnificent work, especially in view of the circumstances on the estates. In some parts of the estate, schemes have been agreed to new build by both demolition and reinstatement of homes under the Housing Defects Act.

The greatest problem is that money for the schemes trickles out too slowly to cope with the scale of the problem. A scheme gets going in an area, but the following year it has to stop, because we cannot get the funding from the Housing Corporation to the housing association. My local council, which owns houses on the estates, is giving them gratis to the housing association so that the process of regeneration can take place. None the less, the problem is still difficult.

Perhaps the most important factor is the botched manner in which the former Coal Board properties were sold by the Conservative Government. It means that no one organisation has control of the process of regeneration, and no proper sanctions exist to make the various parties work together.

The lack of co-ordination leads to fire-gutted houses, open to vandalism, being left standing in otherwise tidy streets. It leaves boarded up houses next to well-maintained ones, and means that properties in need of repair are de-prioritised as resources are reallocated to secure properties that, although they are beyond repair, cannot be demolished. That is not right; nor is it a sound use of public money.

While all that is taking place, tenants' associations have been working closely with housing associations and builders estates to improve their own environment. I pay tribute to the tenants on the estates, who have got together and set up tenants' organisations, which are now arguing with the authorities to get things done. Without them, I do not know what would be happening on those estates now.

We have the same sort of problems in the Rhondda valley, especially associated with such estates, and with unemployment. One of the direct results and hidden charges is the relationship between the scenes of vandalism that my hon. Friend is describing, and general criminality. Unfortunately, it seems that, on some of the estates, the aura and ambience of criminality will not be overcome in this generation. A long-term effect on the community has been created.

Yes, I am sure that that is right—but today I shall not go into the wider issues, beyond the economics of the estates to their social problems, which are there for all to see.

Will the Minister have the time to come to the Rother valley and see for himself what action is required to speed up reinstatement and regeneration of the former Coal Board houses? I believe that action must have two main elements.

First, the sloppy handling of the sale of the houses must be rectified. There must be some mechanism to require the various owners to work together better. I do not know whether that should be through some form of compulsory purchase, but it must be done. Public money is being spent in a "patchwork quilt" way because of the ownership of the houses, and that is not good public investment for the future. None of us would choose to invest the money that we, as taxpayers, are investing in the estates in that particular way, but at the moment we have no choice because of the major problems caused by multi-ownership.

Secondly, we need to tackle the skewed system of resourcing repairs and renovations. That means putting in place a better and more coherent system for releasing money to reinstate properties. More money, in bigger blocks and more regularly paid, is needed if the estates are to recover their former prestige.

There is no doubt that the work now being done is improving the estates. The problems are slowly being solved. However, that work throws up questions about how landlords, who are not eligible for current grants, can fit in with the regeneration schemes. Some of them sit and do nothing. All they want is the rent from the properties, yet we as taxpayers may be spending money through housing associations on the house next door, to reinstate it and give it a 30-year life against which money can be borrowed. That is not common sense. If the Minister visits my constituency, I hope that he will address that issue.

Once again, I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Bassetlaw for bringing this important matter before the House. I hope that my hon. Friend the Minister will be positive and get out of the ways of the previous Government—ways that caused many of the problems on the estates.

I am grateful to my hon. Friend the Member for Bassetlaw (Mr. Ashton) for making this debate possible. I am pleased to follow my hon. Friends from coalfield communities who have spoken graphically of the pain and anger in those communities in Nottinghamshire and throughout the country.

There is no doubt that we have had 18 wasted years. Coalfield communities feel strongly that the previous Government buried the coal industry and tried to walk away. My hon. Friend the Minister should be aware that there are high aspirations for what the new Government can achieve for those communities.

People in coalfield communities are characterised by a continual desire for improvement: they always want better for their children than they have had for themselves. They want their children to have better jobs and education, and they are crying out for new investment, new hope and a new future under Labour. It is clear that new investment in housing can bring new hope.

I want to confine my remarks to the fairly narrow subject of housing associations. My hon. Friend the Member for Bassetlaw and others spoke of houses that have fallen into private ownership. My hon. Friend made the strong case that housing associations may have a role in acquiring those houses and renovating them. However, at present those housing associations that own ex-British Coal houses have a liability. I want them, as social landlords, to discharge that liability.

We live in a crazy world in which money from the public purse is given, through legal aid, to tenants of housing association houses to sue their landlords. It is absolutely right for us to work with housing associations and put pressure on them to do up their ex-National Coal Board houses.

In the east midlands, 1,800 houses passed to housing associations in 1984, split three ways between Leicester housing association, Nottingham community housing and East Midlands housing association. It was envisaged that they would renovate those houses, but their efforts were stymied because they were denied grant by what I consider a vindictive attitude on the part of a former Secretary of State, Nicholas Ridley. They were told that they had to fund the renovation by the sale of some of their housing stock, which has proved impossible as the housing industry has declined.

Who wants to buy a derelict house in Bilsthorpe or Calverton, say, for £15,000, £20,000 or £21,000? The associations have not been able to achieve those sales to fund the renovation of the remaining stock. We must move towards renovation and lifting the moratorium on grant for housing associations.

In the Newark and Sherwood district council area alone, 320 housing association houses in such places as Bilsthorpe, Calverton and Rainworth need repair and renovation; in the current year, only 23 are being improved. That is a good benchmark of what has happened up to now. In Newark and Sherwood alone, it will take another 16 years to put all the housing association houses back into good repair.

My hon. Friend the Minister should reconsider the moratorium. I know that he is aware of correspondence from Leicester housing association. Let me reassure him that I am not asking for extra money or for new money. I am concerned about the way in which the Housing Corporation spends its money. I know that its east midlands regional office has £2.4 million of unallocated funds for the current year. Why cannot some of that be applied to regenerating housing association properties? That would lever in more funds, and double the amount up to perhaps £5 million.

The situation in the east midlands is not unique; it is repeated throughout the country. We should examine the reserves held at regional offices. More important, let us have fairness, not favours, for coalfield communities. Housing associations want to be able to bid for housing grant. They do not understand why they should be precluded from doing that by a vindictive action of some years ago.

My hon. Friend the Minister is well versed in housing matters, and enthusiastic about energy and conservation issues. The kind of housing of which we are speaking has a national home energy rating of only 3.6; when the houses are refurbished, their energy rating rises to 9. Condensing boilers, new windows and loft and wall-cavity insulation can make them energy-efficient. We should be doing that. People should not have to live in damp and cold houses.

Coalfield communities in Nottinghamshire and throughout the country have high expectations in general, and even higher expectations of the new Labour Government. They want new investment in housing, new hope for their families and a better future for their children. They want the blight of poor and derelict housing to be cleared up.

I ask my hon. Friend the Minister to give people some hope by saying today that he will take steps to investigate the moratorium on grant for housing associations and introduce some fairness for the first time in 18 years, so that they can aspire to a better future for their children and their communities.

I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Bassetlaw (Mr. Ashton) on securing this debate, which is important because it gives the House the opportunity to focus on housing in coalfield communities. My hon. Friend referred to the vast number of British Coal houses—the scale is not always appreciated—that were sold off in the 1980s: the figure is between 70,000 and 80,000.

Some dwellings are still being sold off. In the most recent batch, which went along with British Coal's land sales, about 800 houses were sold. Many of them were in terrible disrepair, which is why many tenants did not want to exercise their right to buy. My hon. Friend the Member for Bassetlaw touched on another important reason why those houses were not bought by the tenants: many of those who lived in the houses were former miners, some of whom had been disabled in the colliery and could not work; many were retired; and many were miners' widows.

British Coal put the houses on market and, as my hon. Friend the Member for Rother Valley (Mr. Barron) pointed out, many were bought up by middle eastern business men and have changed hands time and time again, so the tenants cannot always trace the current owner.

The local authorities could not buy because they did not have the money to purchase the housing stock. At the time it was passed on to the market, there was an assault on mining communities. In the 1980s, the Government had a mentality of revenge and sold off houses without giving miners and former miners an opportunity to voice their thoughts on what ought to happen to the housing stock.

Whole villages have been sold off. Two villages in my constituency had a great deal of Coal Board housing—Dodworth on the west side of the constituency and Elsecar on the east. The contrast_between the two villages is clear. At Dodworth, many people were in a position to buy their houses—they were still working in the collieries. In general, the miners bought their houses.

As my hon. Friend the Member for Sherwood (Mr. Tipping) pointed out, miners were able to express their aspirations—I would say their "individuality", which is rather different from Opposition Members, who would say "individualism". Miners were able to express their individuality in their houses. Anyone who travels through Dodworth on the main Manchester road will see that the housing stock is in good repair and is a great credit to the village.

At Elsecar on the eastern side of the constituency, the former Coal Board housing stock is in disrepair. Recently, the local press has referred to an estate there being like Beirut, as it is so bad. There is vandalism and houses have been burnt down and demolished, yet we cannot trace the landlords to clean up the rubbish. Consequently, the rest of the village sees the area as a dumping ground. That has blighted the estate. People who purchased their homes on the Elsecar estate and spent money to make them look decent cannot sell their properties. As I said, some of the landlords cannot be traced, yet mountains of rubbish need to be cleared away.

My hon. Friend the Member for Bassetlaw pointed out what needs to be done. He took advice from housing experts in Mansfield. I urge my hon. Friend the Minister to consider relicensing and compulsory purchase so that local authorities can tackle the problem and restore the dignity of those estates and people can live there in decency.

I wish to introduce a Welsh dimension into the debate, although the Minister is not responsible for housing in Wales, to emphasise that this is a countrywide problem. Fortunately, I live in what might well be the oldest mining community in Great Britain. As a result, there is an enormously high level of owner-occupancy. People bought their houses from the Coal Board many years ago. The houses are terraced and 78 or 80 per cent. are owner-occupied, so the problem of large, rundown housing estates with communal poverty is not quite as acute as elsewhere. There are, however, ex-Coal Board estates throughout the south Wales valleys that are suffering such problems.

In the owner-occupied areas, there is a lack of grants for repair, and some of the housing stock dates back well over 100 years. The houses are little palaces. People have taken enormous pride in building up their homes over many years.

On the newer Coal Board and municipal housing estates, we have the problem that has been so graphically outlined by hon. Members from Nottinghamshire and Yorkshire—the fabric of individual houses is deteriorating. As a result of that and the lack of occupancy, there is general deterioration on the estates. As I said in an intervention on my hon. Friend the Member for Rother Valley (Mr. Barron), that breeds criminality. The kids have nothing to do and are exploited by the drug pushers, who use the empty and vandalised houses almost as resting places in between the times when they peddle their obnoxious trade. It is not just a housing problem, but an enormous social problem. It is not merely neglect of houses, but neglect of people and communities.

Hon. Members representing mining communities throughout Great Britain have seen the great rundown in our communities in the past 10 years as a result of the previous Government's vindictive actions against the coal industry. We represent areas of enormous pride. We do not come to this place with begging bowls, asking for action to be taken. With the present Labour Government, we are certainly not begging but demanding that action be taken. That is why our communities have stayed faithful to the Labour party for so many years. It is not as though we are on the edge and might be able to sway the balance—not that this Government need that in electoral terms. We have a right to a return from this Government for our communities and the Government will neglect our communities at their peril.

Our communities are proud, and they are not, in general, poverty-stricken. They have produced many leaders. The south Wales valley communities have probably turned out more musicians, poets and writers—I apologise to my English friends for being arrogant. In the Rhondda valley alone, we have six or seven brass bands, four or five of which are of championship standard. Some have won the European championship. We have musicians who are renowned all over the world. Leaders and conductors of symphony orchestras have come from the Rhondda valley and its schools, as have poets and actors.

Throughout south Wales, great names in British cultural life have contributed, through either the Welsh medium or the English language. We are proud communities. All we are asking is that some effort be focused back on to the problems that have been created, particularly in the past 10 years.

The Coal Board and the coal owners before it got their pound of flesh out of our communities. For years, we talked about the masters who lived in London. We want some return. I tell the Minister, and through him his colleagues in the Welsh Office who are responsible for housing: we now require them to do something for our communities. For many years, they have contributed to the wealth of Great Britain. Now, our youngsters—our new generations—require a return.

I congratulate the hon. Member for Bassetlaw (Mr. Ashton) on raising this important subject. This debate is a supreme example of how difficult it can be to translate the good intentions of politicians into practical solutions. Indeed, it is almost a case study on the diminishing returns of good intentions.

This is indeed a debate about rural communities and the quality of life of those who live in villages built around coal mines that have closed down. When I was a Housing Minister, in the late 1980s, I had the privilege of visiting Mansfield and Bolsover. I still have on my wall a presentation that I received from Bolsover district council showing the Creswell crags.

I am reminded of that visit because I had high hopes following it. I had seen the extent of the dereliction and disrepair that were the inheritance of the nationalised Coal Board. I saw the high hopes of people in those rural communities, who were exercising their right to buy and hoping that housing associations and new landlords would reinvigorate the housing in those areas. It is therefore distressing to hear about the sheer magnitude of the waste of valuable housing resources that the debate has highlighted and of the human misery generated among responsible householders who are locked into a deteriorating environment.

The debate takes me back about 19 years when I was the chairman of a housing committee in a borough that inherited 1,066 empty, vandalised and squatted houses from an old Labour council, which had believed in public housing and despised private investment in housing. That council wanted more and more control and regulation. Those public sector solutions were manifestly unsuccessful in the London borough of Wandsworth in the 1970s. My experience makes me extremely sceptical about some of the solutions that are being canvassed by Labour Members. We hear about more compulsory purchase powers, more penalties for private landlords and more local authority ownership. Such policies are no more likely to be successful in future than in the past.

It was interesting to hear the hon. Member for Bolsover (Mr. Skinner) praising the idea of vetting procedures. There was cross-party political consensus for many decades that we should move away from such procedures. I have in mind the old housing associations that used to have vetting procedures. Council tenants in Wandsworth and Southampton used to tell me that, when they first became tenants, they had been vetted and approved. They had demonstrated how responsible they were, only to find that people moving into the house next door were quite the reverse. I am delighted to hear that there is a move back to vetting procedures. They are, of course, entirely at odds with much that is contained in the Housing (Homeless Persons) Act 1977.

I was interested also in the comments about housing benefit. If the benefit were paid at a higher level, it is clear from what the hon. Member for Bassetlaw said that at least houses would be occupied—perhaps they would not be occupied by ideal tenants, but they would be in use. As soon as housing benefit was reduced, landlords said, "It is not worth our while bringing these houses into use." Houses have become empty and derelict as a consequence of vandalism. The message is that, if we try to buck the market, we end up in the counter-productive situation of housing stock not being used when we know that there is a crying need among many people for housing.

This is an important debate, and I look forward to hearing how the Government think they will solve the problems that have been highlighted.

I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Bassetlaw (Mr. Ashton) on securing the debate, thereby giving us the opportunity to debate a subject of real concern to many people living in former mining areas and in some continuing mining areas. The economic and social problems of such areas are of great concern to the Government. We recognise especially the specific problems that are associated with some of the housing that was previously owned by the National Coal Board.

We have heard a series of disturbing stories setting out a catalogue of neglect and mismanagement. Examples have been presented of communities exploited by unprincipled absentee landlords. That is serious cause for concern, and we are determined to ensure that more effective action is taken to tackle and resolve these problems.

As my hon. Friend the Member for Bassetlaw explained, in the 1980s the Coal Board, under pressure from the former Conservative Government, began a programme of disposal of its homes, which at the time consisted of about 80,000 units. Within the North Nottinghamshire coalfield, about 1,800 were purchased by a consortium of housing associations; others were purchased by local authorities. Mansfield district council holds about 490 former NCB properties. Other properties were purchased by their former tenants, while some were purchased by private landlords, often buying in job lots at auction.

Warsop Vale, the area about which my hon. Friend the Member for Bassetlaw spoke at some length, was built at the turn of the century for workers at the nearby Warsop pit. Of the 200-plus houses in the village, 88 were purchased by Ashfield Nominees Ltd., a company under the Dennis Rye organisation. About 30 others are in the ownership of smaller private landlords. More than half the houses in the village are owned by private landlords. The remainder were purchased by former NCB tenants, who purchased their own homes.

The Government are extremely concerned about the problems of disrepair in the nation's housing stock. In the wider context, we are encouraging local authorities to make every effort to ensure that owners of unfit properties take remedial action without resorting to enforcement powers. Renovation grants and home repair assistance are available at the discretion of local authorities to help home owners on low incomes to improve their properties. However, owners have a responsibility to maintain their own properties, and local authorities are under a statutory duty to enforce the housing fitness standard. We are reviewing the housing fitness standard and enforcement procedures and we shall publish a consultation paper in the autumn.

Authorities have a range of enforcement options at their disposal. Where a local authorities identifies a property as unfit against the requirements of the standard, it must come to a decision and take one of the enforcement options as the

"most satisfactory course of action"

for dealing with the property.

These options are, first, to serve a repair notice specifying the repairs required to make the property fit; secondly, to make a closing order prohibiting residential use of the property; thirdly, to make a demolition order or to declare the area in which premises are situated to be a clearance area; and, finally, to serve or renew a deferred action notice. Such a notice specifies the repairs that are required to make the property fit, but shows that no immediate enforcement action will be taken. In reaching a decision about which of these options is the most satisfactory course of action, a local authority is required to have regard to the statutory code of guidance for dealing with unfit premises set out in circular 17/96.

My hon. Friend the Member for Bassetlaw raised several important technical issues suggested by Mansfield district council that affect its ability to operate the procedures that I have been describing. I hope that my hon. Friend will appreciate that, on technical issues of this nature—I received notice only today—it is not possible for me to give him an immediate response. I shall carefully consider all the points that he raised, and I shall write to him.

Some of the properties in the area of which my hon. Friend spoke are now owned by housing associations. About 10 years ago, a consortium of associations bought about 1,700 tenanted properties from British Coal with a mixture of housing association grant and private finance. In the late 1980s, a policy was drawn up to the effect that housing association grant should not be made available for the acquisition, improvement or repair of tenanted stock transferred from public sector landlords to housing associations. The previous Administration refused to review that policy, which therefore made it impossible for social housing grant to be made available to housing associations to carry out works to former Coal Board property passed to them.

I have asked officials in the Department of the Environment, Transport and the Regions to conduct a review of the application of social housing grant for the improvement of such properties owned by housing associations. We need to consider the extent to which acquisition costs could reasonably have been expected to reflect the need for future work to the stock. That is why we need some consideration of these issues before reaching a decision. We are reviewing the application of policy and I expect to be able to make some announcement before too long on whether there will be a variation of the previous policy.

I recognise that the problems that concern my hon. Friend the Member for Bassetlaw are predominantly those that relate to properties that are owned by private landlords. In principle, we value a revived private rented sector. It has important and positive role to play in meeting part of the country's housing needs. All too often, it is the sector with the greatest problems of disrepair.

I welcome the fact that many local authorities have established regular liaison forums with the private landlords in their area. These are proving valuable both to landlords and to the local housing authorities, whose job it is to ensure that local housing needs as a whole are met. That sort of co-operative arrangement with decent landlords is to be applauded. It will not work, however, where landlords are unwilling positively to participate in tackling the problems of their area. The Government will have no truck with any exploitative slum landlord who is not interested in providing reasonable quality housing at a reasonable rent.

To deal with these problems, we are committed to introducing a compulsory licensing system for houses in multiple occupation, as the worst conditions in the private rented sector are generally found in such properties. We are drawing up a framework for a licensing scheme so that we can be ready at the earliest legislative opportunity. We expect to issue a consultation paper later this year.

My hon. Friend suggested that the consultation paper should be extended to cover empty properties, such as the derelict homes in Warsop Vale that he described. The Government are not convinced that that would be the most appropriate response, because the licensing of houses in multiple occupation is designed to cope with a situation where a significant number of tenants share the same property and where, as a result, there are particular problems of squalor, and, sometimes, danger because of fire and other hazards.

The issues are very different for empty properties. The licensing framework which we are approaching would not be appropriate for those different circumstances. That does not mean that we are indifferent to the issue of empty properties; indeed, we are extremely concerned about it. I shall say a little more later about our response to empty properties.

I am sympathetic towards the particular problems faced by tenants in Warsop Vale and many other areas. During 1996, Warsop Vale residents association commissioned a survey of properties in the area that were owned by private landlords. The survey, entitled "Stop the Rot", revealed that the wall, floor and roof structures were in generally good condition, but that 36 of the 39 properties surveyed were unfit for human habitation. Of the 23 full internal surveys carried out, 22 of the properties were found to have conditions prejudicial to health and a cause of public nuisance. That was due to a wide range of design issues, disrepair and dampness, creating hazards or conditions prejudicial to health. However, the surveyors noted that, with moderate investment, the properties could provide good-quality housing for many years to come.

I am pleased to know that Mansfield district council has responded robustly to the report. Between January 1994 and June 1997, the council served 30 notices requiring specific repairs to be carried out to make properties fit. Of those notices, 29 were related to properties owned by one landlord.

However, since the publication of the "Stop the Rot" report, Mansfield district council has stepped up its activity and introduced a policy of inspecting six properties each week at Warsop Vale alone. In the past month, it has inspected 19 properties and served eight "minded to" notices, showing its intention to pursue enforcement action. The council is prepared to fund the costs of the repairs and reclaim them from the landlord through the legal system, and informs my officials that it is confident that it can complete the works within the next two financial years. We are keen that it should continue to pursue this vigorous action to tackle the problems.

The problem of empty properties was also raised. I should say straight away that the Government are determined to bring empty properties that are needlessly neglected back into use by promoting good practice by local authorities and tackling underfunding through the phased release of local authority capital receipts. Local authorities have a key role to play in bringing privately owned empty properties back into effective use in their areas. They are best placed to know where those properties are and who owns them.

Local authorities can deploy a wide range of approaches to get empty properties back into use—from advice to landlords who are simply unaware of procedures and the terms under which they might let, to grants or fitness enforcement procedures, to which I have referred. Solutions may require a corporate approach by local authorities, working in partnership with housing associations, private owners, property professionals and other public and voluntary bodies.

I welcome the fact that local authorities in the east midlands region, with the encouragement of the government office, recently set up an empty homes forum to tackle vacancy rates in the region. I hope that it will provide a sharper focus for tackling the particular problems to which my hon. Friend the Member for Bassetlaw referred.

Another approach to the problems of the properties in Warsop Vale might be for a housing association to buy them from the landlord by agreement, provided that the landlord is prepared to sell at a reasonable price. My hon. Friend suggested that the Housing Corporation has a surplus—I think £3 million was quoted—which could be used for that purpose. That is not correct. The east midlands and eastern regions of the Housing Corporation have between them a reserve, not a surplus, of £3.5 million, but it has been allocated for needs-related expenditure and will be allocated during the year to a number of projects for housing investment. In any event, my understanding is that the landlord is unlikely to be willing to sell on reasonable terms.

That brings us to the issue of compulsory purchase. Local authorities have powers to acquire houses and land, either by agreement or by compulsion, for a variety of reasons. Those include the subsequent transfer of the property to a third party, such as a housing association that intends to provide housing accommodation on that land. In theory, that would enable the council to acquire the buildings and set in motion procedures for their improvement.

Let us not forget in this consideration of a particularly hard case that compulsory purchase is a draconian power, and should be used only as a last resort. Moreover, it is not always the most cost-effective means of solving a problem. It must be for the local authority to decide the most appropriate way of tackling the problem. We do not propose to dictate to local authorities; it is for them to decide the most appropriate solution. However, where other options fail, where properties are left needlessly empty and local authorities believe that compulsory purchase is appropriate, the Government will not stand in the way.

My hon. Friend discussed the issue of valuation and suggested that site value might be a more appropriate basis on which to base compensation. I should explain that the Land Compensation Act 1961 provides that owners of land expropriated by compulsion should receive its open-market value—the amount that the owner would have received had the transaction occurred between a willing seller and a willing buyer in an open market. That is a fair basis for compensation, and it is used worldwide.

It would be wrong to expropriate property without any compensation—compulsory purchase order procedures do not provide for that—but we should bear it in mind that, in the instances that we have been considering, open-market values could be very low indeed, possibly even lower than the site value, where the property is derelict and where costs are associated with clearing the property if it cannot be used. It is not necessarily an advantage to value properties for compulsory purchase on a site valuation basis. The open-market valuation for derelict properties may be very low indeed.

The problem with many of the options that I have described is the resources available to local authorities to be able to carry out necessary works. We recognise that, under the previous Government, resources provided for housing were cut savagely year on year. The Government are committed to redressing the chronic under-investment in housing. That is why, immediately after the election, we made a capital receipts initiative one of our priority actions. Under the initiative, we are providing local authorities in England with an extra £174 million this year and an extra £610 million next year.

These resources will be directed at housing and associated regeneration needs, and will be available for both public and private sector housing. I should stress, however, that in the first instance it will be for individual authorities to determine where the local needs and priorities lie and to direct resources accordingly. We do not propose to impose a rigid central diktat on the application of the resources, but we expect authorities to apply them efficiently, economically and effectively. We have consulted on this matter.

A consultation paper has been issued. We will listen to the responses. If local authorities in the areas that we have considered this morning believe that it would be appropriate for those resources to be used to help to bring back into use properties that are neglected and to raise the standards of derelict and sub-standard properties, it is my view that that would be an appropriate use of the capital receipts released.

A number of my hon. Friends spoke in the debate. I do not have time to refer in detail to all the comments. My hon. Friend the Member for Bolsover (Mr. Skinner) highlighted problems relating to Pleasley and Creswell, in his area. Those are similar to the problems of which we heard from my hon. Friend the Member for Bassetlaw.

We shall take a detailed look at the problems raised by my hon. Friend the Member for Bolsover, relating to weaknesses in the current procedures under which local authorities wishing to enforce the law are frustrated by delays caused by landlords. As part of our review of the fitness standard and the enforcement procedures, we will consider the points raised by my hon. Friend.

My hon. Friend the Member for Rother Valley (Mr. Barron) highlighted problems in properties on estates in Aston, Kiveton Park and Maltby that were sold by auction and acquired by owners with addresses as far away as Wimbledon and even Baghdad. He revealed a deplorable catalogue of neglect and dereliction. We are keen to see action in his area, as elsewhere, along the lines that I have outlined.

Order. We must move to the next debate.

I am grateful for the opportunity to talk about an issue that is very important to many of my constituents. I promise to be brief, both because I believe in brevity and to allow other hon. Members—including some with a long involvement in the issue—to have their say.

This is not a routine debate and its subject is not a routine issue. I represent many dismayed people who feel that their land and their homes are being taken from them against their will without sufficient reason. The hour is late; the official inquiry went against them and the heavy equipment will be moving on to the site any day now to begin the work of construction and, it must be said, destruction.

We are the small platoons up against the big battalions. Only one statutory body is left standing in the field and fighting in the last ditch: Mobberley parish council. The council has gone to the European Commission with a complaint that deserves—and, indeed, is receiving—a hearing: that the funding of Manchester airport with public money infringes the treaty of Rome by distorting competition within the European Community. Government money is luring airlines to Manchester that would not otherwise fly there.

Does the hon. Gentleman accept that, although Manchester airport is in the public sector, no public subsidy has been provided by the town authorities that own it? They have lent the airport money borrowed from the public works loan board—which could have been borrowed from any other source on commercial grounds. The parish council's case is that a subsidy has been provided, but it has not.

The European Commission is now reviewing the position and will make a decision.

In its complaint, the parish council cites an agreement between Manchester airport and Continental Airlines to offer slots for five years in return for landing fees at less than the market rate and a roughly similar agreement with American Airlines. There is a pattern of development that is promoting Manchester as the Heathrow of the north. While that may seem a laudable municipal ambition, it carries certain consequences, one of which is Manchester's probable expansion at the expense of other airports. Another is that 1,000 acres of Cheshire countryside will be sacrificed. That is not the march of progress; it is the march of conflict.

A further consequence is that the travelling public—who could travel more conveniently, especially on charter flights from other regional airports such as Liverpool and Leeds-Bradford—will take the long journey to Manchester, putting a further strain on a road system that is already close to gridlock for much of the time.

The figure of 50,000 new jobs was originally conjured out of a hat. On cross-examination, that figure fell to about 8,000. Many of those jobs would be created by the continuing expansion of the airport within its existing boundaries and the concentration of traffic in Manchester will clearly be to the disadvantage of Liverpool. The planners talk of disbenefit to Liverpool. That means damage and the possible loss of jobs.

Does the hon. Gentleman accept that the growth of Manchester airport that was projected at the planning inquiry—it was forecast that 30,000 people would use it in 2005—will create more jobs in Liverpool and the Merseyside area than any proposed immediate expansion of Liverpool airport?

I am coming on to the projections of passenger growth—and I think that the hon. Gentleman means 30 million people, not 30,000.

Refusing permission for the expansion of Liverpool airport, the Deputy Prime Minister said that this was by no means the end of the story. He added that he intended to take a close look at the role of regional airports in contributing to regional development—but the time to do that, surely, is before the Bollin valley has been concreted over, not after.

Much of the debate—this will be familiar to the House—depends on forecasts of future traffic. The figures in those forecasts have not been rising so fast lately. A more plausible figure for the year 2005 at Manchester airport is 20 million. Today Gatwick airport handles more than 20 million passengers a year on one runway, and it expects to be able to handle 35 million on one runway by 2012. Gatwick is a model example of what can be done with one runway. If Gatwick can do it, why cannot Manchester?

The argument is not about process and procedure, although we may well wonder about the fairness of a system that allows one side to outspend the other in the planning period by a factor of more than 10 to one. The argument is about the best way in which we should now proceed. The inspector accepted that the second runway was an inappropriate development of green-belt land and would be harmful to it and that such development could be approved only in exceptional circumstances, which he set out.

I submit that we now have a new special circumstance: the election of a new Government who are committed to an integrated transport policy. The Deputy Prime Minister emphasised that again on Monday, when he said:

"Integration is a serious matter—not a buzz word. It is about how we can use existing capacity better than we do at present. It is about putting things together so that the whole is better than the sum of the parts".

The second runway at Manchester has nothing to do with an integrated transport policy. I argue that it has more to do with a disintegrated transport policy. Manchester may well prosper at the expense of other airports. Its development was not considered with that of Liverpool, or that of the region's road and rail system; it was considered separately. If we are to have an integrated transport policy, let us have one, and let us consider—even at this late stage—whether the loss of the Cheshire countryside is in any way justifiable.

The Minister may consider that hands are tied by the last Government's decision and the result of the public inquiry, but there is the option of switching charter flights, above a certain limit, from Manchester to other regional airports, particularly Liverpool. That would relieve congestion at Manchester during the rush hours and help the development of other airports. Exactly that kind of action was taken in the early 1980s, when charter flights were redirected from Heathrow to Gatwick, and it started the regeneration of Gatwick. If such action could be taken then in the south of England, it can be taken now in the north.

Even in the present circumstances, the suggestion that Manchester's traffic growth exceeds its capacity is hard to square with common observation. I have received a letter from one of my constituents, a British Airways captain who flies out of Manchester and sees it more closely than most people, who states:

"My daily experience of airport operations makes it abundantly clear that the airport's existing runway is under-utilised. For extended periods, there are few, if any, aircraft movements."

The case for a second runway is not convincing. Those who walk the local fields and footpaths, as I did last weekend, between fences of a size and complexity that I have not seen since the end of the cold war, will wonder how convincing that case can be. In fact, there is no sufficient case, but there is every case for a pause and a review of airport and road and rail policies. Those policies hang together, or they fail together.

It would be useful at this point to pre-empt and answer the charge of NIMBYism. That unappealing acronym now has a different meaning: "not in Manchester's back yard". This is not a case against Manchester; it is a case for Manchester. Manchester must breathe, and the Cheshire green belt is one of its lungs. The development of the second runway will damage its lungs, and that damage cannot be made good.

Let us also counter the arguments that can and will be advanced about the necessary action of mitigation and damage limitation. Bats and badgers will be rehoused, hedges will be planted and ancient woodland will be replanted. We are promised the greatest migration of forestry since Birnam wood came to Dunsinane. This is about people, however. It is also about woodlands: ancient woodlands cannot be transplanted, but they can be destroyed.

The victims, however, will be people, such as those whose homes will be taken from them. There are two people observing this debate whose 17th-century farmhouse with its landscaped garden will go under the end of the runway. People have security guards living in their outbuildings, but no compensation has yet been agreed. The victims will be the people whose farms, footpaths and fields will be taken from them and the people who live beyond the perimeter of the new runway and who are unable to sell their homes, so they are, in effect, prisoners of their own property. Altogether a quarter of a million people will be affected by the noise and the extra risk factor associated with the second runway.

Those figures are not small. Behind these large issues lies the even larger issue of what kind of people we are. Are we the kind of people who will promote one airport at the expense of others? Are we the kind of people who will concrete over our inheritance? Or are we the kind of people who will pause to think, even at this late hour, and save what needs to be saved?

I have seen too much destruction in my previous life to condone it in this one. I have seen too much indifference to be indifferent now. I believe that we should pause, reflect and start anew.

I am grateful for the opportunity to speak in this brief debate, and I thank the hon. Member for Tatton (Mr. Bell) for his approach to it and for allowing time for other hon. Members to contribute. I congratulate him on the result on 1 May. Although we disagree on this issue, I acknowledge that he represents his constituents with honesty and integrity.

Half of runway two will be in my constituency, in addition to the two terminals and the 280 businesses that currently constitute the commercial community of Manchester international airport. The hon. Member for Tatton expressed his view and the views of a number of his constituents, but there is another view on runway two, which was endorsed by the inspector after a public inquiry that lasted more than 100 days and took evidence from 180 witnesses. That view is backed by the whole of the region's business community and, according to a recent MORI opinion poll, supported by 80 per cent. of local residents. I also support the view that the decision to go ahead with runway two is the most important strategic decision that has been made in the north-west region for decades, and that the extra capacity that will flow from that decision will unlock the region's economic potential and make the north-west a focal point in the global economy.

I must dispute some of the figures that the hon. Member for Tatton gave. The current and projected rate of growth in air passenger travel will result in 30 million passengers passing through Manchester airport by 2005, not 20 million as he stated. That is double the current rate. With those additional passengers will come 15,000 new airport jobs and as many as 35,000 further jobs elsewhere in the region. Those figures were not plucked out of a hat, as the hon. Gentleman said, but are well researched and well founded projections.

Some 2,000 of my constituents who live barely a mile from Manchester airport are out of work. Some of the young people in Wythenshawe, whom I represent, are third generation unemployed. They have given up hope of ever finding a job. The hon. Gentleman described the people of Tatton as concerned and dismayed. I ask them to put themselves in the place of those unemployed people and to imagine what it is like. Runway two may be their only chance of ever finding employment.

The least well known aspect of the £172 million investment, of which runway two is a part, is the environmental mitigation package, which the hon. Gentleman acknowledged. The eco-warriors labelled it as window dressing, but it will mean more ponds, new hedgerows and new grasslands and woodlands. Manchester airport has a 15-year management plan, so those 850 acres of countryside will be protected.

No one wants unwarranted destruction of the environment, but sustainable development requires social cohesion and economic progress as well as environmental protection. I believe that the plans for runway two have all three elements.

I welcome this opportunity to put arguments in favour of the second runway and the development of Manchester airport, in addition to those put by my hon. Friend the Member for Wythenshawe and Sale, East (Mr. Goggins).

The essence of the case made by the hon. Member for Tatton (Mr. Bell) was that the extra traffic could be diverted to Liverpool airport and that the people of Merseyside would welcome that. He misunderstands European law and the freedom of airlines to travel where they want. Neither United Kingdom nor European law provides a power to tell airlines to land at Liverpool when they want to land at Manchester. If there were such a law, I hope that the hon. Member for Tatton would oppose it. Why should people who want to fly from Manchester have to go to Liverpool or anywhere else?

Airlines use airports because of the facilities that they offer. They can benefit from being able to transfer passengers to other airlines. In cities around the world, such as Glasgow, Toronto and Washington, attempts to run two airports separately have failed, and they have had to be amalgamated.

It was often said during the inquiry that Liverpool airport could be used instead of a second runway. If passengers were changing planes, even if a new route were built, would they want to arrive at Manchester and then take the train to Liverpool? I suspect that they would not welcome that.

I wish Liverpool well. I welcome the Deputy Prime Minister's statement on Monday that Liverpool and Manchester airports should work together for the benefit of the whole region, but it should not be done by some dictatorial distribution of traffic, which I believe would be unlawful.

The opponents of the second runway often use contradictory arguments. I am afraid that the hon. Member for Tatton falls into the category of people who say that demand is insufficient to justify the expansion of the airport. Other people argue that demand will grow too much, that the airport is not used efficiently enough, or that it is too efficient.

It has been argued that Gatwick can manage 35 million passengers on one runway. The aircraft that use Gatwick are larger. Jumbo jets use Gatwick in a way and in a mix that is not possible at Manchester. If Manchester could accommodate as many large aircraft, it could manage with one runway. Flights from Manchester are mainly short-haul to other parts of Europe and the United Kingdom, so jumbo jets do not fly from Manchester to Schiphol or Glasgow. Smaller aircraft require a greater number of movements and have fewer passengers.

An opinion poll carried out four years ago in every constituency in the north-west of England, including Tatton, showed majority support for the second runway because of the benefit for jobs. An opinion poll carried out in January showed majority support in every constituency except Tatton, where there was a small majority against it. People in the north-west know that the second runway would produce more jobs than any other investment in the whole of the north of England.

I have only 60 seconds. I listened carefully to the speech of my hon. Friend the Member for Tatton (Mr. Bell). I call him my hon. Friend because he should have hon. Friends on both sides of the House, given the way in which he entered Parliament. He is ably looking after his constituents, and I understand that well. My home, where I have lived nearly all my life, is probably nearer to Manchester airport than the homes of many of my hon. Friend's constituents. I understand the problems, but it is important to have an international airport north of London, and Manchester has such an airport. It is the only such airport outside the south of England, and it is more important to the whole of the north of England and even to Scotland than some of the others that have been mentioned, which are feeder links to London. However, Manchester airport stands on its own. To reverse the move to the south, Manchester should have its second runway.

I congratulate the hon. Member for Tatton (Mr. Bell) on raising an issue that is important not only for his constituents but for all those who live and work in the north-west. I thank him for his generosity in allowing time for contributions by my hon. Friends the Members for Wythenshawe and Sale, East (Mr. Goggins) and for Manchester, Blackley (Mr. Stringer) and by my right hon. Friend the Member for Ashton-under-Lyne (Mr. Sheldon). They underlined my point that the issue is of great importance to the whole of the north-west.

Manchester airport is already the 18th busiest in the world, and handles more international passengers than Chicago's O'Hare airport. The proposal to build a second runway inevitably involved a wide range of aviation, economic, environmental and other issues and it became one of the biggest planning issues of the past decade. The Secretary of State at the time decided to call in the proposal because of its regional and national importance. A nine-month public inquiry was held from June 1994 to March 1995, at which parties that supported and those who opposed the runway gave evidence. Some 15,000 written representations were also taken into account. The inspector reported in August 1996 and recommended that planning permission should be granted. The then Secretary of State announced the granting of such permission in January this year.

Since the decision, opposition to the new runway has continued, and the Government have received numerous requests to revoke or review the decision. We have taken those requests seriously and examined the issues carefully. As a Cheshire girl, I would never have considered accusing the hon. Member for Tatton or any of his constituents of NIMBYism. We have concluded that it would be wrong to reopen the decision.

I am grateful for this opportunity to comment on some of the issues that were raised by the planning application, but I shall first give a brief outline of the policy background. We are committed to bringing together transport and environmental decision-making. My right hon. Friend the Secretary of State announced in the House on 5 June that we had launched a fundamental review of transport policy to provide an integrated transport system that meets the environmental and transport needs of all regions for today and the future. The review will look at short and long-term actions that are necessary to deliver an integrated transport system, and we aim to publish a White Paper in the spring. Its publication will mark the initial analytical goal setting and consultation phase in the development of that policy.

The hon. Member for Tatton spoke about possible investigation by the European Commission. There is no official investigation by the Commission. The current position is that it has asked the United Kingdom for comments on a dossier of papers that was provided to it. My Department is considering the dossier and will reply shortly. It will then be for the Commission to decide whether to take the matter further.

The accusation of state subsidy to British Airways relates to new facilities that are currently being constructed in terminal 1. The airport company agreed with BA and the other users of terminal 1 to redevelop the terminal following the opening of the first phase of the new terminal 2. The planning of that redevelopment has concentrated on increasing capacity, providing better facilities for passengers transferring between domestic and international flights and increasing the amount of retail space.

The first element of the redevelopment was a hub facility for Lufthansa and its partners. It opened last summer. Elements of the retail development are opening this summer. The final element is a new pier and associated facilities attached to the domestic part of the terminal which, in combination, will enable British Airways to combine its domestic and international operations in one part of the terminal. British Airways will not have exclusive use of those facilities. The airport company's arrangements with BA are consistent with the principles of the arrangements with other airlines for customisation of airport facilities. Airport charges will remain the same for BA as for all other users of the airport, as was explained to the Monopolies and Mergers Commission as part of the economics of the airport's charges.

Manchester airport has experienced sustained long-term growth in demand. It has retained its position as the UK's third busiest airport and has increased its market share over the years from 8 per cent. of all UK airport traffic in 1983 to 11 per cent. in 1993. It expects demand to grow from 12.9 million passengers in 1993 to 29.4 million in 2005, if the second runway goes ahead.

Even if the airport were restricted to one runway, demand is still expected to grow to 22.8 million passengers by 2005. However, the constraint of having only one runway would mean that there would be more pressure to find slots in off-peak times and more inconvenience to passengers. The inquiry discussed whether there could be other ways to meet the demand and decided that there was no other clear solution. The inspector recommended that there was no guarantee that demand could be diverted from Manchester airport, if it were restricted to one runway, to other northern airports.

The hon. Member for Tatton spoke about the issue that was raised by some objectors—the possibility of expanding Liverpool airport as an alternative to building a second runway at Manchester. A separate planning inquiry was held into proposals to expand Liverpool airport, as each of the Manchester and Liverpool proposals raised its own aviation, economic and environmental issues. My right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for the Environment, Transport and the Regions recently announced that planning permission had been refused for the proposed expansion of Liverpool airport.

There is nothing that I can add to that decision other than to reiterate that those proposals would have caused more environmental harm than was justified by the need. We hope that Manchester and Liverpool airports will develop in a co-operative and complementary way. That is clearly a matter for the Manchester airport management to discuss with Liverpool airport's new owners.

The hon. Member for Tatton referred to the destruction that he has seen, and said that the central issue of the debate relates to people. As my hon. Friend the Member for Wythenshawe and Sale, East said, we have seen the destruction not only of the environment but of people brought about by economic decay. That is why the runway is so important to the whole of the north-west. The airport management has calculated that its planned expansion will lead to the creation of an extra 50,000 jobs by 2005, either directly or indirectly, compared with 1993. Some 18,000 of those jobs will be attributable to the second runway rather than to some other aspect of airport expansion. We are aware that objectors have queried those forecasts, and we do not necessarily subscribe to any one set of forecasts, but we agree with the inspector's conclusion that the only real dispute is over the scale of the impact.

We are confident that the growth of Manchester airport can be achieved in line with the principles of sustainable development. The public inquiry concluded that airport expansion should not lead to extra urbanisation as there should be sufficient capacity in the conurbation to accommodate the new jobs and the extra work force. We are pleased to see that the airport authorities have entered into a commitment to increase the proportion of passengers using public transport, hopefully to 25 per cent. We have given a grant to the airport for a new rail siding so that construction material can be brought to the site without disturbing the local community.

The second runway is in the green belt and is not the sort of development that would normally be appreciated in such a belt. I have two comments about that. First, national green belt policy allows exceptions in special circumstances and the previous Secretary of State considered that the need for the runway and the economic benefit that it would bring constituted special circumstances in this case. Secondly, the decision does not represent a general relaxation of green belt policy.

The benefits that the second runway will bring to the north-west must be weighed against local environmental impacts—the hon. Member for Tatton made several points on the issue—principally on the local ecology and landscape. A development of this type and scale will inevitably have some impact on the area, and that should be taken into account in any planning decision.

The airport management has drawn up an impressive environmental mitigation package that won the endorsement of English Nature, the statutory advisers on ecological issues, and that persuaded Cheshire county council to drop its objections to the planning application. The package includes the replacement of ponds and hedgerows and improved management of the ponds and hedgerows that will remain in place—

Order. I hope that hon. Members will have noted the difficulty in half-hour Adjournment debates secured by one Member: interventions may prevent a full reply from the Minister.

Jonathan Swift once said:

"Falsehood flies, and Truth comes limping after it; so that when Men come to be undeceived, it is too late, the Jest is over, and the Tale has had its Effect".

How true that was and will be, as evidence is increasingly uncovered highlighting the potential implications of the rising incidence of autism and Crohn's disease in children, and the uptake of the mumps, measles and rubella and the measles and rubella vaccines. Indeed, the evidence shows that it is the cocktail of vaccinations that is likely to be the cause of the unexpected problem.

In the past two years, I have tabled dozens of questions and was granted an Adjournment debate on problems relating to measles and rubella vaccinations—problems ranging from lack of adequate information to parents and the possible side effects of the vaccinations to the damage itself. Over that period, I have become increasingly critical of the procedures and the side effects on some children from those vaccinations, but even my cynicism was stretched to breaking point when I read that in the latter part of the 1950s in the United States, and in the United Kingdom in the early 1960s, Down's syndrome children were used as guinea pigs in tests involving live measles vaccines. At that time, those living in the institutions concerned were described as "sub-normal".

Those tests were recently brought to the public's attention as a result of an article in The Sunday Telegraph by Victoria Macdonald, highlighting much of the research by solicitor Richard Barr and consultant Dr. Andrew Wakefield. In the past couple of weeks, articles in the Irish Independent also raised the issue. Their author, Brian McDonald, reported:

"Children, some of whom were either mentally or physically handicapped, were used in drug trials carried out in Irish orphanages over twenty years ago."

Some people, while deploring what happened in the 1950s and 1960s, may attempt to justify it on the basis that at that time we knew no better, but that is not a satisfactory explanation. For instance, Dr. Richard Nicholson, editor of the Bulletin of Medical Ethics, stated:

"People try to say that you cannot apply the same ethical standards today as you could in 1960. You have to do the research with the proper safeguards in place and the safeguards were there in 1960, but it was largely ignored by the doctors."

Dr. Wakefield of the Royal Free hospital stated:

"this is both a practical and ethical issue. You cannot extrapolate from brain damaged children to normal infants."

The response by Jackie Fletcher, who set up the national organisation JABS—Justice Awareness and Basic Support—when her child was severely brain-damaged after one of these vaccinations, said:

"The more I go into this, the more horrific it becomes".

We should be horrified, because, as Victoria Macdonald stated in her article:

"babies and young children with Down's Syndrome were used as guinea pigs by British doctors in 1960 to test an experimental vaccine for measles … children who were living in institutions for the "severely subnormal" (as they were then described) were subjected to the experiments because the doctor said it was "useful" having them in hospital where they could watch over them for adverse reactions."

She went on to state:

"one of the children died seven days after being vaccinated from a common side effect of measles, but the doctors described it as coincidental in their reports."

From an ethical point of view, tests such as those carried out in the UK in 1960 on Down's syndrome children—some of the most vulnerable people in our community—should never have taken place, because those children did not have the ability to say no. Because of their mental condition, they were passive recipients of the tests or anything else one wished to inflict on them. If we are to be worthy of the description "civilized", we can never condone those acts; otherwise, we debase our humanity. We hear of other instances, where people with severe learning difficulties have been taken advantage of; we have rightly condemned those acts and must continue to condemn them, but we must also ensure that we learn from our mistakes.

On the practical side, Dr. Wakefield argues that there are several factors which make that population

"entirely inappropriate for studies designed to detect adverse neurological events to measles vaccine."

He states:

"The susceptibility of the damaged brain to acute and delayed adverse events to measles or measles vaccine is unknown, although this may be altered when compared with the normal brain."

It was inappropriate and potentially hazardous, therefore, to extrapolate from that series of studies that the vaccines would be safe for the general population. The period of observation was limited to three weeks maximum in any one study, which is far too short a time either to detect or to exclude all adverse effects on the central nervous system.

The question we have to ask is what lessons have we have learnt from the mistakes of the early trials. The inadequacy of the three-week safety trials, particularly in relation to children with Crohn's disease, is highlighted by Dr. Wakefield, who states that there may be a diagnostic delay of up to two years. Indeed, he goes on to say that there

"have been no prospective studies of measles vaccine safety beyond the initial 3–4 weeks follow up period … Beyond this time, safety was assumed. It is notable that trial cohorts from 1964 continue to be monitored for vaccine efficacy 31 years later. It is also notable that in 1995 it was possible to use the same trial cohort to examine a possible link between measles vaccines and inflammatory bowel disease."

Those points were also made by Thompson writing in The Lancet in 1995.

As my hon. Friend knows, I have some knowledge of the problem of Crohn's disease, as my eldest daughter has been a sufferer for the past 10 or 11 years. Will my hon. Friend comment on the case of David Lawrence, a young constituent of mine who had a measles vaccination in 1994 and became very ill with a serious virus about 10 days later? Over the past two years, he has gone from being a healthy, fit young lad to a weak and sickly young lad. Three weeks ago, he was diagnosed as having Crohn's disease. His family are convinced that all his medical problems stem from that vaccination.

Solicitors and consultants involved with this work have received hundreds of similar complaints about children who have ended up with either Crohn's disease or autism. What saddens me is the response of the medical profession, which more often than not implies that there is no relationship between the vaccination and autism or Crohn's disease. People in the profession often say, "These are merely scare stories," but the example that my hon. Friend has given is repeated in my constituency. Within an hour of the measles vaccination, a young girl became seriously ill, and a couple of years later she is having treatment for autism and Crohn's disease. There are not just one or two cases: there are hundreds of cases.

Vaccine experts state:

"standard dose "further attenuated" measles vaccines are among the safest vaccines in use today".

Although the implication of that statement is that live measles vaccines are safe, it is of course relative and meaningless if safety trials of other vaccines were as inadequate as those conducted on measles vaccines.

No one denies the benefits of vaccinations, but what about the risks? Vaccines should be safe. The children are not ill; they do not have any disease when they are vaccinated. Vaccines are given as a preventive measure. The only acceptable side effects of a vaccine are those which produce no long-term damage. More than 800 families have now contacted solicitors or support groups in the belief that their children have been seriously damaged by vaccines in the same way as the child referred to by my hon. Friend.

It is worth noting that Crohn's disease among children was unheard of 15 to 20 years ago. What safeguards were in place to monitor the risks of two-dose vaccine schedules, which had been highlighted as of particular concern to international measles virus experts in the early 1990s? There was none—safety was assumed on the basis that certain Scandinavian countries, such as Sweden, had been administering two doses of measles vaccine for some years. But had Sweden or any other Scandinavian country ever conducted any safety trials of two-dose measles or measles, mumps and rubella vaccines? No, they had not.

We cannot make assumptions about the safety of the administration of, or exposure to, live biological agents. How many times in recent years have we been reminded of that fact, whether it be in relation to the Gulf war, BSE or E. coil? The chief medical officer, Sir Kenneth Calman, claimed in the Daily Telegraph on 5 December 1996 that Britons were dangerously blasé about disease. Unfortunately, the assumptions made by his Department about the safety of a second dose of measles vaccine show that the Department was equally blasé.

The Department of Health claimed that the procedure was safe because it had been given to millions of children world wide. That is not a qualification of safety. Thalidomide was given to thousands of women, but that did not make it safe. Dr. David Salisbury, principal medical officer for vaccines, had ample warning of potential problems as early as 1992. Indeed, these points have been made on many occasions to officials at the Department of Health. Unfortunately, I suspect that those who were advising the previous Government are now advising the Labour Government.

We should contrast the Government's policy on reviewing the possible negative health effects of the MMR vaccination campaign on some children with the rapid way in which Ministers have rightly intervened to support the alleged victims of Gulf war syndrome.

The previous Government tried to deny and then to avoid all responsibility for Gulf war syndrome. Yet when it comes to initiating a widespread review or reassessment of the MMR-MR vaccination campaign, Labour Ministers are sticking to the same policy reassurances as their Conservative predecessors. For example, in 1995 Tom Sackville, the then Conservative Minister, said in a written answer to me:

"There is already a well-established satisfactory system in place for monitoring adverse reactions to all medicines, including vaccines.—[Official Report, 6 November 1996; Vol. 265, c. 610.]

More recently—on 22 May—in a written question I asked the Secretary of State for Health whether he would

"establish a review of (a) the effectiveness of and (b) side effects arising from the most recent national MMR vaccination campaign."

The Minister for Public Health replied:

"The effectiveness of, and side effects arising from, the 1994 measles/rubella (MR) school-based immunisation campaign have been carefully reviewed … The campaign was very successful."—[Official Report, 22 May 1997; Vol. 294, c. 174.]

Essentially, her reply was the same as that given by the Conservative Minister.

I want to restate the need for an independent commission to study the possible links between MMR and MR and Crohn's disease and autism in children. I have been advised that work done in America by Dr. Hugh Fudenberg and Dr. Gupta, and in the United Kingdom by Paul Shattock of the University of Sunderland, demonstrates the link between vaccine damage and autism. I urge my hon. Friend the Minister to investigate that further.

What concerns me and others is Government inactivity over more than 300 cases in which parents claim that their children have been injured by one or other of the vaccines. In particular, there seems to be an extraordinarily high incidence of autism among the children concerned and a surprising number of cases of what appears to be Crohn's disease.

Autism has been dismissed as a side effect by Elizabeth Miller of the Public Health Laboratory in a memorandum to health professionals. She argues that it is simply a coincidence because most autism is diagnosed at about 18 to 30 months, which happens to coincide with the time of vaccination. What Dr. Miller does not explain in that rather simple answer is why the vaccinated children develop other symptoms at the same time as becoming autistic. Many of them develop a raging thirst; many acquire bizarre eating habits; sleep patterns are disrupted and children lose their temperature control. A characteristic common to many of the late-onset autism cases is that speech which had been previously acquired is lost. In other words, the children do not simply fail to develop—they lose what they already had.

That all tends to point to an encephalitic event, and even the Government's chief medical officer concedes that there is a possibility that the vaccine causes autism. In a memorandum to directors of public health on 7 February, he states:

"It is therefore unlikely that MMR vaccine plays a part in the development of autism in children who do not have significant neurological manifestations after immunisation."

The inference is that he concedes that the MMR vaccine does play a part if there is a significant neurological manifestation.

Crohn's disease and autism are not the only side effects reported in respect of the MMR vaccine. My attention has been brought to 122 cases in which epilepsy developed after vaccination, and numerous other cases of problems with the immune system.

Finally, nothing can be done about the decision to use Down's syndrome children as guinea pigs for live measles vaccinations in 1960. We now know that the vaccines were not innocuous. We need to be rigorous in the design of safety standards. We need an independent investigation into the links between MMR and MR and Crohn's disease and autism in children. Until then, we should consider suspending the multi-dose MMR vaccines in favour of single-dose vaccines. We should also suspend the revaccination programmes because no safety trials have been conducted on them.

I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Blaenau Gwent (Mr. Smith) for raising this important issue. I pay tribute to his relentless pursuit of information and inquiry.

I was very concerned when I heard about the use of the measles vaccine on children in residential care in the United Kingdom in 1961—the issue that has prompted this debate. I have uncovered as much of the story as possible and will set out the facts available to me. It is important that hon. Members should recall the context and the extent and seriousness of measles at the time.

In the 1950s, measles in the UK had settled into a cycle of large epidemics every other year. The annual notifications ranged from a minimum of 150,000 to a maximum of 700,000 cases, with up to 300 deaths a year. Measles was a killer both in this country and around the world. Against that background of serious disease, work was progressing internationally to produce safe and effective vaccines. During the 1950s, candidate vaccines had been developed and by 1960 many had already undergone clinical trials in the United States. The results of those trials were reviewed and evaluated in the New England Journal of Medicine on 28 July 1960.

Does my hon. Friend accept that the trials conducted in the United States involved about 170 to 180 children, the vast majority of whom would have been regarded at that time as mentally sub-normal? I know that that is an awful phrase, but it was the one used at that time.

I should be very happy to supply to my hon. Friend all the information available to me on those studies. I should be happy also to supply him, for his information, with the material that has been provided to me for this debate.

Based on encouraging results from the tests, the authors provided suggestions for future study and subsequent use of measles vaccine. Based on their safety and efficacy data, the authors concluded:

"At this time it seems appropriate to recommend the extension of clinical trials of attenuated measles vaccine in special groups."

A "special group" means one in which measles causes high levels of serious illness and death.

I have made a point of starting my reply to this debate with information about the 1960 published review, because it predates the first United Kingdom trial of measles vaccine. The authors of the 1961 UK study referred to the 1960 review in their research. The UK study was built on the US work, and based on the recommendation that special high-risk groups be examined.

Some children have long been known to be at higher risk of suffering severe consequences of measles. Those groups include children with conditions such as Down's syndrome, cerebral palsy, cystic fibrosis and malnutrition. Children with Down's syndrome, such as those in the study, have congenital heart disease, which means that they are much more likely than other children to die or suffer serious injury from measles.

Children in residential care are also a high-risk group. Not only do those children often have underlying medical problems, but measles spreads very rapidly in closed communities. It has been estimated that the introduction of measles into residential units was associated with 70 per cent. to 90 per cent. of attack rates in susceptible children. It is worth nothing that, in May 1968, when measles vaccine was eventually offered to all children, the then Chief Medical Officer wrote to all doctors stating that those who should receive vaccine first, despite anticipated shortages of vaccine, should include

"susceptible children living in residential establishments aged between 1 and 7."

Prior to the 1961 study, therefore, the researchers were in the following position: first, they knew that an outbreak of measles was coming; secondly, they knew that children with disabilities such has Down's syndrome were at particularly high risk from measles; thirdly, they knew that the US studies had shown the vaccine to be sufficiently safe and effective to recommend that it be given to special high-risk groups; fourthly, they had an opportunity to give the vaccine to such a high-risk group.

More importantly—I believe that this point has not yet been raised in the debate—the researchers then approached the parents of those children. As reported in Hansard on 4 December 1961 at columns 925–26, the children's parents had been asked and gave their consent to the trial in writing. The study went ahead, with immunisation occurring in January and February 1961.

In 1961, the largest recorded measles epidemic in the United Kingdom occurred, in which 764,000 cases were notified. Of those, 152 deaths were reported. Of those deaths, 132 occurred in the first six months of 1961. Of those 132 deaths, 66 deaths—exactly half—were among people with chronic disease or disability. If we examine those 66 deaths more closely, we discover that more than half those people either had Down's syndrome—accounting for 20 deaths—or were classified as having mental retardation or deficiency, accounting for a further 17 deaths. Most of the 66 people had been resident in hospitals or institutions for at least six months before the onset of measles and all but eight of them were aged under 15.

I am sure that my hon. Friend will agree that those figures tragically demonstrate the heavy toll paid by children with Down's syndrome or mental retardation during measles outbreaks before immunisation.

The point that I am trying to make is that conclusions reached as a result of tests on Down's syndrome children cannot be applied to the general population. That is my argument and my criticism of the way in which the tests were conducted. I accept that parents signed agreements to the tests—most people would expect them to have signed agreements—but such agreements do not justify the tests.

Clearly, there is an issue of consent. The issue would have arisen then, and it arises now. The important factor, however, is that the parents of those children gave consent to testing—on a group of children who, on the information available to me, were at high risk of measles.

In the 1961 UK vaccine study, the authors reported that none of the 56 vaccinated children developed measles and that none of the children suffered serious side-effects. The authors went on to recommend that the number of instances of rash and fever after immunisation in the study might be reduced by work further to weaken the vaccine virus strain used.

I understand my hon. Friend's concern about such studies and I, too, am determined to ensure that clinical trials are conducted to the highest standards of ethical behaviour and ethical practice. On the evidence available, however—because written parental consent was obtained, supporting research had already been conducted, an epidemic was imminent and the group being vaccinated was at high risk from the disease—I do not believe that that research can be equated with the situations that my hon. Friend mentioned in the Republic of Ireland or Australia.

It may be helpful to the House if I explain the process by which vaccine safety is ensured in the United Kingdom and how we continue to monitor vaccines after they are in widespread use. All manufacturers wishing to market vaccines in the United Kingdom have to apply for marketing authorisations. The applications include full data on the manufacturing process and quality control of the vaccines. The applications are reviewed by staff of the Medicines Control Agency, and advice is taken from experts on the Committee on Safety of Medicines and its biologicals sub-committee.

Each vaccine is considered individually, and a marketing authorisation is licensed only if all aspects of its quality, safety and efficacy are satisfactory. Furthermore, vaccines used in the childhood immunisation programme are batch released by the National Institute for Biological Standards and Control, which means that no vaccine is issued in the United Kingdom unless it passes the highest standards for purity.

Once that rigorous process of licensing has been completed, the licensed vaccine is available for use. Measles vaccine was introduced into routine use in the UK in 1968, by which time the UK had observed the experience in the US, where measles vaccine was first licensed and recommended for use in 1963.

Once vaccines are used, all reported adverse reactions to them are carefully monitored by the Committee on Safety of Medicines and the joint committee on vaccination and immunisation, which advises my Department. I tell my hon. Friend the Member for Blaenau Gwent that I am keen to ensure that all fresh evidence about any possible adverse reactions are submitted to that committee for proper scientific assessment and appraisal.

I should like to make three quick points, all of which I am sure that you will answer. Will you tell me, first, what safety trials have been conducted on re-vaccination? Secondly, will you comment on the studies by Dr. Andrew Wakefield of the Royal Free Hospital? Thirdly, do you accept the link between vaccination, measles, MMR and MR and autism and Crohn's disease? If not, can you explain—

Order. I remind the hon. Gentleman that he is addressing the Chair.

In the time left in this debate, I will endeavour to cover the points raised by hon. Friend. If time runs out, however, I will write to him to deal with them. I am aware of the concern about an alleged link between measles, autism and Crohn's disease. I understand that evidence submitted to the joint committee on vaccination and immunisation could not establish such a link, and that the absence of such a link has been confirmed by a further study of the evidence by the World Health Organisation. I make it clear to my hon. Friend, however, that, if fresh evidence becomes available, I will insist that further investigation of that evidence is undertaken.

Secondly, I know that Dr. Andrew Wakefield of the Royal Free hospital has conducted research in this area, and I will ensure that proper attention is given to it and its conclusions by my officials. However, I have to make it clear that it is the joint committee on vaccination and immunisation—an independent body—which currently advises the Department on vaccine safety.

Order. We now come to the next debate.

I am grateful for the opportunity to raise the issue of new age travellers in my constituency. I am also grateful to the Under-Secretary of State for the Environment, the hon. Member for Greenwich and Woolwich (Mr. Raynsford), for his attendance to respond to the debate.

Until relatively recently, my constituency was mercifully free of trouble from new age travellers. Two years ago, a small group of them set up camp on farmland in Blaston, but, following the intervention of the landowner through the courts—albeit at considerable expense to himself—they were moved on, and have not been back since. This year, however, things have taken a turn for the worse.

In February and March, an illegal encampment of travellers was set up in Welham lane in the parish of Great Bowden. Welham lane is a public highway that leads from the A6 Market Harborough bypass eastwards towards the village of Welham. It is about three miles from the A6 to Welham along that lane—a single-track road with wide grass verges. There is a hedge down each side of the lane, and beyond the hedges lies typical Welland valley pasture land, which for centuries has been used by local farmers to graze cattle and, more recently, sheep.

At the A6 end of the lane, there is a farmyard to the north and a pheasant hatchery and farmhouse to the south. Halfway along the lane to Welham there is a hump-backed bridge over a stream. When the bypass was completed, the bridge was blocked to road traffic, but it remains open to horses, bicycles and pedestrians. The lane has been used extensively by local residents and farmers for recreational and agricultural purposes for many years.

The land either side of the lane is farmed by tenants and landowning farmers. This spring, as in earlier years, the fields were used for ewes and lambs as well as for the beef cattle for which Harborough is justly famous, but all this changed when the new age travellers arrived.

To begin with, there were only a few who parked their caravans, lorries and old buses on the verges to the west of the mid-way bridge. They were mostly in their twenties and thirties, although there were a few young children. They also had dogs—large dogs which ran up and down the lane, chasing the farmers" pick-up trucks carrying feed to the sheep, or barking at the heels of the horses being ridden down the lane.

At first, the new age travellers were seen as a curiosity by local residents, but, as their numbers grew, their behaviour became worse. By April, there were about 80 people living along the lane. It was by now impossible to take a dog for a walk along the lane without being menaced by the travellers' dogs. Riders would not risk taking their horses down the lane.

At weekends, the travellers held noisy parties, setting up large amplifiers in the fields and blasting music across the countryside to the annoyance of my constituents. One couple who live in a village two or three miles from Welham lane had to stay with relations in Suffolk to be sure of getting some sleep at night.

The encampment became a centre for drug dealing, as dealers from the city of Leicester found a ready market there. The site became a health hazard as the travelers defecated in the hedgerows, left litter and burned open fires along the verges. The travellers would steal petrol from local garages and demand drinking water from nearby farmers. The farmers themselves were also being abused. The travellers' dogs were allowed to roam free across the neighbouring fields, worrying and killing ewes and lambs. When the farmers came down the lane each morning and evening to feed their beasts, their vehicles were damaged and their access was blocked.

In the end, it became impossible to use the land at all, and flocks had to be moved to other land. That meant that tenant farmers had to pay hundreds, and even thousands, of pounds to rent the grazing that was effectively now out of bounds. For tenants and owners alike, it meant facing the possibility of over-grazing other land, at a time when rain and new grass were scarce. As if all that were not bad enough, the way in which the local authorities and the police dealt with the illegal encampment left much to be desired.

Before I say what I am about to say, let me make it clear that, on an individual basis, the Home Office, the county council and district council officials and the police officers from Market Harborough, whose task it was to deal with the new age travellers, did their best, and genuinely wanted to help. But what I and my constituents found so frustrating was the slowness of the official reaction and the apparent failure to anticipate and then co-ordinate a response to the problem caused by the travellers.

It seems that each agency of government was nibbling at the problems but without reference to any other relevant department, and that no one was taking a strategic overview or producing a co-ordinated response. To illustrate what I mean, I cite the following example: the nuisance caused by the loud music systems was a matter for the district council's environmental health department. The environmental health officer had powers to serve a noise abatement order, but, for understandable reasons, he would not go down Welham lane to serve the order without a police escort.

The police headquarters in Leicester felt that it was not a proper use of precious resources to send a regiment of policemen to protect one environmental health officer in far-off Great Bowden while he served a noise abatement order, when officers could be more fruitfully employed patrolling the streets of the city of Leicester. Nor would the police escort farmers to and from their fields through the encampment twice a day. They could not arrest the drug dealers or drug users unless they had evidence, and none of sufficient quality was available. If the vehicles were unlicensed and uninsured, it was a small matter compared to what needed doing elsewhere.

Action eventually came from the legal department of the county council, the highway authority with responsibility for Welham lane. In my naivety, I thought that the council would take proceedings under section 77 of the Criminal Justice and Public Order Act 1994—one of the provisions of that statute designed specifically to deal with the increasing problem of new age travellers.

I had several discussions with the county council in April this year, and I formed the distinct impression—although it was not put in so many words—that, as a matter of policy, Leicestershire county council and other local authorities do not use the 1994 Act, because it does not achieve its intended purpose. It was suggested to me that the Act allows for defences to be raised which hinder and delay the implementation of court orders made under it.

Instead of using that Act, the county council had applied to the district judge by originating summons under order 113 of the rules of the Supreme Court—a procedure for recovering possession of land wrongfully occupied by trespassers, which has been in use for 20 years or so and which is designed to deal primarily with urban squatters where not every trespasser can be identified.

The district judge was sympathetic to the county council's application but felt constrained to adjourn the hearing for two weeks, which was extended to three weeks, to allow the respondent new age travellers to gather evidence of hardship, to apply for legal aid and to apply to the divisional court to review the county council's decision to evict them. This was done on the advice of a firm of solicitors which has made something of a name for itself in this aspect of the law.

To my constituents, this meant that the very people who were continuing to do them harm were now being financially assisted by the state—over and above the welfare benefits that they were already receiving—through legal aid to allow them to do further harm. It was a case of the law-abiding, taxpaying citizen subsidising the unlawful, social-welfare-receiving trespasser in the continuance of his anti-social conduct.

The only thing that my farming constituents and I found in the least amusing throughout this episode was the new age travelers' denial that it was their dogs that had killed the sheep. It could not have been their dogs, they told the district judge, because their dogs were vegetarians.

The other illegal encampment in my constituency is in Mill lane in Smeeton Westerby. This village is about eight miles north-west of Market Harborough, and eight miles south-east of the city of Leicester. Mill lane runs north from the village main street towards the parish of Fleckney. The first half mile of the road from the village is a metal road; the remainder is not made up but is still part of the public highway. Like Welham lane, it is hedged and verged, and runs through grazing land. At one point, there is a privately owned wood or orchard adjacent to the lane.

About three or four years ago, a small group of travellers broke into the wood and set up camp there. They did all the things that trespassers usually do, but, as the site was on private land and the owner lives in Australia and has either lost interest in it or cannot be found, the travellers have stayed in the wood. So long as there were not many of them and they kept their dogs under control, nobody did anything much about them. Indeed, they have been there for so long that I believe the Post Office has given them a postal code, and two children from the camp attend the local primary school.

Unfortunately, the site has acted as a magnet for other new age travellers, who have camped along the verge of the lane. The problems experienced by residents and farmers in Great Bowden with the Welham lane site are now being replicated in Smeeton Westerby.

There are now approximately 80 new age travellers living along Mill lane. Their dogs have killed sheep and lambs—two of the dogs have been shot dead by a local farmer to protect his sheep. The new age travellers have begun to attract drug dealers from Leicester, and they have made it impossible for villagers to ride their horses or bicycles along the lane, or even to walk their dogs.

Attempts to remove the new age travellers from Mill lane have been frustrated by two things: first, by the travellers simply moving to the adjacent private land and then, after an interval, returning to reoccupy the verges; and, secondly, by the landowner's absence abroad.

However, following the lessons learned from the Welham lane episode, the police, Leicestershire county council and Harborough district council are working together in a more organised fashion to decide how best to deal with the 50 or so vehicles and their inhabitants on Mill lane. Inspector Steve Hanson, who has recently taken over as officer in charge of the Market Harborough local police unit, has introduced a greater sense of purpose and focus. The chief executives of the two councils and their legal departments are now working closely together.

When the Welham lane site was eventually vacated by the new age travellers after the district judge's order had been finalised in May, the police said that they were prepared to provide back-up in sufficient numbers to let the travellers know that they meant business, and the travellers withdrew their application to the divisional court. A vast amount of public money had been spent dealing with the encampment—not just on police and local authority officers' time, but on lawyers' fees, legal aid, Home Office inquiries by me, and the collective dealing with the public inquiries by the several agencies involved. The Smeeton Westerby travellers are still on site. Proceedings against them are being contemplated by the county and district councils.

We need to reconsider the issue of new age travellers with a greater sense of urgency. It is the Government's duty to persuade local authorities to co-ordinate their approach to the problem more effectively. If one county has information about a convoy or encampment of new age travellers, it should make sure that its neighbours know. Removing travellers from Leicestershire helps the people of my county, but that may mean that the encampment moves on to one of the several adjacent counties, and the legal process has to be gone through again at further public expense.

Why cannot the Home Office or the Department of the Environment set up a unit to monitor the activities of new age travellers and advise local authorities on the best means of solving the problems they cause? The same approach should be taken by the police across the country. Intelligence and previous experiences should be shared for the greater advantage of the law-abiding and tax-paying public.

Within counties, district and county councils should talk to each other, plan together and act in concert with the police. It is also incumbent on local authorities to let Members of Parliament and the Government know if they are unclear about or dissatisfied with a statute and its perceived effects or defects, rather than keeping their misgivings to themselves and failing to use it.

Local authorities and the police are misleading themselves about the Criminal Justice and Public Order Act 1994 and recent case law. Section 61 gives the police a power to direct trespassers to vacate land. That power arises if the police believe

"that two or more persons are trespassing on land and are present there with the common purpose of residing there for any period, that reasonable steps have been taken by or on behalf of the occupier to ask them to leave and—

(a) that any of those persons has caused damage to the land or to property on the land or used threatening … behaviour towards the occupier … or

(b) that those persons have between them six or more vehicles on the land".

The police need only have reasonable grounds for believing the persons concerned to be trespassers. The trespass does not have to be established by an order of the court before the power under section 61 arises. The period of residence is not specified. I suggest that it can be any period.

The section requires only that the owner should have taken reasonable steps to ask the trespassers to leave. When passing the Bill into law, Parliament did not say that the occupier should be expected to have taken legal action or obtained a court order before the power in section 61 may be invoked. We do not ask those who are assaulted to take civil action before the police become involved to press criminal charges. The power under the section arises if there are at least six vehicles on the land, even if none of the events that I have just recited has occurred.

The statutory purpose of section 61 is clear. When we passed the Act, we wished the police to have the power to direct that land be vacated if at least six vehicles are present, even if no criminal activity or damage to land is involved, without expecting the landowner to use a civil remedy before acting. The importance of that parliamentary intention is emphasised by the reduction in the number of vehicles that must be present, from 12 under the Public Order Act 1986 to six.

Section 77 enables a local authority to serve a direction requiring persons to vacate land, the failure to comply with which may also constitute a criminal offence. However, there are some important differences between section 77 and section 61. The power in section 77 arises if persons are residing in only one vehicle on land in an authority's area. The requirement of at least six vehicles does not apply. It applies if vehicles are located on highway land, unoccupied land or occupied land without the consent of the occupier.

Even for an occupation of fewer than six vehicles, there is no requirement that any of the criminal conduct referred to in section 61 should have occurred for section 77 to apply. An offence is committed under section 77 when a person knowing of the direction fails to leave the land as soon as practicable.

Any defence is restricted to a failure to comply caused by

"illness, mechanical breakdown or other immediate emergency."

The defence under section 61, by contrast, includes

"a reasonable excuse for failing to leave the land as soon as reasonably practicable".

If a direction under section 77 is contravened, the local authority may apply to the magistrates court for an order requiring the removal of any vehicle, property or resident person. The order may also authorise the authority to remove vehicles or property. Under section 61, the police have a power to arrest, and under section 62 they have the power to seize and remove vehicles without the need for a warrant or order of the court.

I hope that I have shown that sections 61 and 77 are different. If they were not, one of them would be unnecessary. Section 61 is directed at situations in which trespassers remain present on land despite the occupier's request that they should leave and certain misconduct has occurred. That power is available to the police if any of the events set out in section 61(1)(a) have occurred. The police can take direct action against the persons thought to be wrongfully present and their property. The section is clearly intended by Parliament to be a speedy and effective remedy, without the need for additional legal proceedings before the trespass is brought to an end.

In contrast, section 77 deals with a broader range of circumstances, in which criminal activities or substantial numbers of vehicles need not be involved and the interests of private landowners need not be affected. Although the local authority is unable to take direct action without court proceedings, the defence under section 77(5) is relatively limited.

Local authorities and police forces have placed reliance on the case of R. v. Lincolnshire county council and Wealden district council ex parte Atkinson, which was decided by Mr. Justice Sedley in 1996. They have also been influenced by the Department of the Environment circular 18/94.

That case and that circular gave some police forces the false impression that the same principles enunciated by the judge in the Wealden case apply to orders issued by the police or local authorities under the 1994 Act. Some police forces think that inquiries about education, housing, social service needs and similar matters have to be made before a local authority direction can be made, and that, before the police can invoke their powers under the Act, account should be taken of the personal circumstances of the travellers.

The judge in the Wealden case did not analyse section 61 of the 1994 Act in detail. His decision was based as much on the statutory duties placed on local authorities under the Children Act 1989 and the Housing Act 1985, as well as the obligation on local education authorities to provide education for all children of school age in their area.

The Wealden judgment does not support the view that a local authority or chief constable owes a duty of care to trespassers who are the subject of action under section 61. The function of the police is to enforce the law. It is not their primary duty to take a view on social welfare. There is no legal basis for asserting that the police are under a legal duty to take social factors into account before acting under section 61. The annexe to the Home Office circular 45/94 does not suggest that the Wealden case is relevant, or that any such duty applies.

The powers provided to the police under section 61 and to local authorities under section 77 of the 1994 Act to deal with new age travellers are clear. Parliament deliberately provided those powers, and my constituents and I have a right to expect that they will be exercised by public agencies and authorities when necessary.

As a lawyer, I am the first to admit that the law is not always certain, but it can be made more certain if the Government take the steps that I am advocating: the organisation of greater co-operation across the country in dealing with new age travellers on the one hand, and on the other hand instilling a firmer sense of purpose among police forces and local authorities in applying the powers and remedies deliberately given to them by Parliament under the 1994 Act.

Local government officers and police officers are human—so, too, are lawyers—and they naturally have a well-intentioned concern for the welfare of travellers with whom they are required to deal, but I suggest that such well-intentioned concerns should not be placed above the rights of the law-abiding and tax-paying citizens, whose lives and businesses in my constituency—and no doubt many others as well—have been so badly affected by the unlawful activities of new age travellers.

I congratulate the hon. and learned Member for Harborough (Mr. Garnier) on securing this debate on an issue of concern in his constituency: the unauthorised camping by so-called new age travellers on land which they do not own, and the appalling nuisance that has been caused, particularly in relation to their dogs roaming on adjacent land, noise from rave parties and intimidation of people living in the area. The hon. and learned Gentleman and his constituents have my sincere sympathy for the obvious distress that the travellers have caused.

As the hon. and learned Gentleman has made clear, this is a complex and emotive area, which can have a real impact on local businesses and communities. It inevitably covers a range of issues: unauthorised camping, noise nuisance, threatening behaviour, dogs, and many others—the list is very long. He has drawn particular attention to how the issue involves working with a number of different authorities and different powers. The spread of responsibility inevitably crosses administrative boundaries not only locally but in central Government. Indeed, I think that he was a little surprised that I was the Minister responding to the debate.

As the hon. and learned Gentleman will be aware, although my Department has policy responsibility for local authority powers under the Criminal Justice and Public Order Act 1994, my right hon. Friend the Home Secretary has responsibility for those powers available to the police, which deal not only with trespass on land but with drug dealing and general criminal activity—whether among travellers or anyone else. There are also important links between our Departments in policy on dogs and dealing with noise nuisance and raves.

The hon. and learned Gentleman has identified the frustrations which can arise when the agencies involved do not, for whatever reason, work well together. It is precisely because the issues are so complex that my officials and their colleagues in the Home Office keep in constant touch on such matters, and have indeed discussed this very case over the past few days.

My officials have also been in touch with officers at Leicestershire county council, who I understand have evicted the travellers camped at Welham lane using civil powers, to regain possession of the council's land, despite attempts to challenge it through the courts. That proves that such situations can be dealt with effectively, and that unauthorised campers, particularly those who make life a misery for everyone else, can be evicted. One point about the case, however, is the time that the process can sometimes take, which has obviously caused considerable irritation locally.

I am very conscious of the real difficulties that encampments such as the ones described by the hon. and learned Member can present to local authorities, particularly when the travellers involved seek to use every ruse to prolong their stay on a totally unsuitable site. Nobody pretends that it is easy, especially when such large groups are involved, to strike a balance between the need to control what can be—and clearly was in this case—an appalling public nuisance and the rights of the campers concerned, but local authorities which have a consistent, workable policy in place and have good working relationships with the local police and other agencies are more likely to be able to evict successfully when the need arises.

It is precisely such a co-operative attitude—all agencies working together and being clear about one another's responsibilities—that we want to encourage. My Department is examining the scope for disseminating the good practice already in place in some authorities for dealing with unauthorised camping—whether by new age travellers, gipsies or others. We have appointed research contractors from the university of Birmingham to carry out the work. They have just completed phase I of their project, which comprised detailed case studies in six local authority areas where unauthorised camping is known to be a problem, concentrating on the methods employed by those authorities to deal with it.

The researchers have interviewed officers, covering a range of issues such as those pertaining to environmental health, social services, education and enforcement. I look forward to seeing the outcome of their research so far, which will form a vital part of our collective ministerial education on matters concerning gipsies and other travellers. I can already tell from my postbag that the issue excites much public interest across the country. I am, however, bound to say that I get the strong impression that there is no one easy solution to the problem. If there were, someone would presumably have found it by now.

I turn to some of the specific points that the hon. and learned Gentleman raised—first, drug misuse. He says that the Welham lane site became a centre for drug dealing in the Leicester area. I should say straight away that tackling drug misuse, whether by new age travellers or anybody else, is a priority for the Government. He may know that my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister has appointed my right hon. Friend the President of the Council to serve as Chair of a Cabinet Committee to oversee the development of the Government's drug strategy.

Part of the remit of my right hon. Friend the President of the Council will be the appointment of a drugs tsar—someone who will play a major role in ensuring that the Government's strategy for dealing with the problem is effective as it can be. He or she will have the power to gather together key people from health, the police, education, prisons, the probation and other services to ensure that they work closely together. Much good work is already being done, including that led by the drug action teams across the country at local level. I understand that there is such a team in the Leicestershire area.

More generally, police officers have the power to search persons for possession of drugs under the Misuse of Drugs Act 1971. Section 23 of that Act provides that a constable may stop and search any person—or search any premises—for the purposes of finding controlled drugs. The search must be carried out in accordance with a code of practice issued under the Police and Criminal Evidence Act 1984, and an officer must have reasonable grounds to suspect that the items are being carried before undertaking a search.

The hon. and learned Gentleman painted a worrying and disturbing picture of the travellers' dogs killing a number of sheep on land adjacent to the camp. The excuse offered by travellers that their dogs could not have killed sheep "because they were vegetarian" is one of the richest that I have ever heard.

The hon. and learned Gentleman may be aware that provisions of the Environmental Protection Act 1990 make it an offence for an owner or person in charge of a dog to permit it to be in a public place not wearing a collar with the name and address of the owner on the collar or on a plate or badge attached to it. The Act also allows for the seizure of dogs on private land, provided that the landowner or occupier has given his consent. The Control of Dogs Order 1992 lists certain types of dogs as exemptions, but dogs belonging to gipsies and travellers are not included.

I turn to the powers available to the police under section 61 of the 1994 Act, which I know is of particular concern to the hon. and learned Gentleman. Such matters are properly for my right hon. Friend the Home Secretary to consider, but I can say that his general position is that he will not comment on specific police operations since they are the responsibility of the chief constable.

It is for the chief constable to decide how to use the resources at his disposal and how to order his policing. It is also important to remember that the power is discretionary, and that only in circumstances where there is a serious threat to public order or of criminal activity will the police consider using the power. I know that the hon. and learned Gentleman has already been in touch with the Leicestershire constabulary on the matter.

The hon. and learned Gentleman has given a reasonable description of the section 61 powers, and he was right to say that the Wealden case did not concern the use of the power. He will, I am sure, know that it is not for me or any ministerial colleague to give a definitive interpretation of the law. That, rightly, is for the agencies involved and ultimately for the courts.

It seems only common sense that the police and local authorities should liaise with one another in such cases, so that, if the police decide to use their public order powers, the relevant local authorities can take steps to fulfil any statutory responsibilities that they may have towards the trespassers. The police will also wish to take into account welfare factors in using their powers, and responsibility for judging how to do that rests with the chief constable.

As for setting up a unit to monitor new age traveller activity, I understand that a body called the northern intelligence unit, which is hosted by Cumbria police, and a sister unit, which is hosted by Wiltshire police, collect data from all forces about the movements of new age travellers and ravers in England and Wales. Intelligence is provided to police forces as appropriate, and I would expect forces to liaise with local authorities on the basis of such intelligence where that is appropriate. We have, however, to remember that there may be some sensitivity surrounding the use of intelligence obtained by the police for agencies outside the police service.

The police also have powers under the 1994 Act to deal with unlicensed mass night-time raves on land, which, as at Welham lane, cause an unacceptable public nuisance and affect many people, who are kept awake, sometimes for nights on end, by incessant music played at intolerable levels. I know that the hon. and 1 Gentleman will agree with me that local communities should not have to fear the prospect of mass invasions of land by those who selfishly seek entertainment regardless of the rights and amenities of others. The police are, for example, able to stop persons who they believe will attempt to go to a rave site within a radius of five miles of the site and direct them not to proceed. It is an offence not to obey that direction.

Once again, I thank the hon. and 1 Gentleman for bringing this important arid difficult subject to the attention of the House. He has highlighted a number of points which ministerial colleagues and I will want to bear well in mind as we consider the range of issues involved. He has also highlighted all too well the difficulties which can arise when agencies responsible for eviction try rightly to balance the need to restore public order with the rights of the campers concerned. Nobody pretends that that is, or ever has been, an easy balance to strike—