I am glad to see such a healthy attendance so early in the morning.

My motivation in choosing this subject for debate stems from two concerns. First, two companies in my constituency are manufacturers of herbal remedies, vitamins and minerals. One, a very small company, is worried about the potential impact of regulation of the sector that might affect its business. The other company is much larger, but its anxieties are real too.

Secondly—like, I am sure, many other Members—I have been lobbied by consumers in my constituency about last year's proposed reduction in maximum permitted levels of dosage of vitamin B6. I think that we all remember the postbags that we received then. As vitamin B6 was classed as a food at the time, the Select Committee on Agriculture, of which I am a member, reviewed the Government's proposals. Our firm view was that the proposed regulation of the dosage was unjustified. Such evidence as there was that excessive consumption might pose a risk had been heavily criticised by scientists. No one taking vitamin B6 had complained of ill effects, despite the massive publicity given to the subject for several months—and, internationally, for longer.

If, as was claimed, the issue was purely one of safety, there was no real evidence to support intervention. There are two possible grounds for intervention: safety and need. Is the product effective in meeting a person's requirements? Does anyone need it? Are unjustified claims being made about the need for it? Let us begin with safety, however. As the Committee's report observed, as a society we allow many items to remain readily available, their availability being restricted only by often ineffective measures to protect children from products that carry known risks, such as alcohol and tobacco. It has been clearly demonstrated—possibly even in the personal experience of some Members—that excessive consumption of alcohol can damage health; yet we still allow it to be freely available in shops, with no suggested dosage levels.

A doctor with whom I conducted a debate on the radio this morning ventured to express the view that sales of alcohol and tobacco should be banned. I suggested that such a programme might enjoy limited support among the electorate. We must make judgments about what is practical and also about what should be left to individual citizens to decide for themselves, on the basis of reasonable information that is available to them.

We also allow the sale of salt without warnings, although excessive consumption of it can do significant damage, and we do not try to restrict the size of packets available in supermarkets.

We need to consider the concept of risk. We all take risks, in almost everything that we do. We take risks when we eat and when we consume drugs prescribed by doctors. We take risks when we cross the road. Which of those risks is it our responsibility to judge, and in which cases should the Government try to help? One of the problems has been the failure to establish the philosophy on the basis of which we should make decisions. Should the Government decide what people ought to consume when they are feeling ill, or should individual citizens make judgments based on their own perception of their health needs?

We should measure relative risks. We should be clear about the kind and level of risk that we expect citizens to weigh up for themselves, the cases in which clear warnings are justified, and the cases in which society should expect Government intervention in the form of either restriction or a total ban. Because we have engaged in no proper analysis or debate, we act in an ad hoc and reactive fashion featuring glaring inconsistencies of approach.

The Government's response to the Select Committee report is directly relevant to today's debate. Let me quote some key passages. The Government

"accepts the Select Committee's view that action on vitamin B6 should not be taken in isolation but in the context of the wider review of the safety of dietary supplements which is to be undertaken by the Expert Group on Vitamins and Minerals. The government recognises that the Expert Group will be considering the establishment of principles on which controls for ensuring the safety of vitamin and mineral supplements can be based."

I note what the hon. Gentleman has said about the expert group, although many in the health food industry are concerned about it. Will he, however, dissociate himself from the words of the Minister of State, Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food, who said that these were "drugs masquerading as foods"? Surely that compromises the work of the expert group before it has even begun.

My right hon. Friend the Minister for Public Health will have a chance to reveal the Government's position for herself. I will not be drawn into defending or otherwise a statement that I have not seen in context.

The response continued:

"The government agrees that there is a delicate balance to be drawn in this and other areas between regulation to protect the public and the desire to determine such issues on the basis of personal choice.

It is for this reason that the government accepted the Select Committee's recommendation that action on vitamin B6 should be deferred pending the report of the Expert Group on Vitamins and Minerals."

Essentially, the Government said that we have to understand the philosophy of how we should intervene in the sector before we take an isolated decision on one particular product. They accepted the argument that I have set out.

There is scepticism among many consumers and those in the vitamins and minerals industry. Our discussion on B6 showed an unhappy relationship between that sector and the "official" health sector. There is considerable suspicion that drug companies wish to undermine the position of those providing alternative products.

Do not large drug companies have a motivation to use increased regulation and licensing requirements as an enemy of economy of scale that they can exploit to exclude smaller firms that feature largely in the market?

The hon. Gentleman may have a point. On a slightly different subject, but related to it, consumers in my constituency have complained to me about changes in the price regime for the purchase of simple analgesics following changes in dosage levels. There is a suspicion that some companies in the sector find ways in which to raise prices, based on Government intervention that has just happened.

In recognition of that scepticism, the Government made an extremely welcome and positive step, which was to allow direct representation by consumers and representatives of the industry on the expert group. After it considered the Government's response, the Select Committee applauded both those steps: the recognition of the need for a clear philosophy and for proper representation in the decision making that would lead to a regulatory framework.

One might therefore assume that any new proposals for intervention will be founded on that report, when it finally emerges, and there is probably still another year or so to go before it concludes its evidence. One would be wrong. The Medicines Control Agency is proposing to take additional powers in the sector after a brusque consultation that even another Government Department, the Department of Trade and Industry, has commented on:

"We share your concerns that the consultation period was very short.… There are a number of pieces of legislation affecting these proposals in the 'borderline area' and we are concerned that the proposals from the MCA do not make any reference to these or require the MCA to consult with ourselves and other government departments with a responsibility for these areas."

That is scarcely a ringing endorsement of the consultation.

The MCA has proposed that it should have sole powers to decide whether any health product should be classified as a licensable medicine, requiring it to be tested for efficacy. Those tests carry massive costs for small companies. I think in particular of Surepharm, a small company in my constituency, which was built up from scratch by an individual entrepreneur, employs 30 or 40 people and specialises in the sector. It could not carry the regulatory cost that would be involved in securing clearance for particular products through the MCA.

That company had never imagined that it was manufacturing something that might be described as a medicine, yet someone could make that claim to the MCA and it could make that judgment. One recognises that most minerals, vitamins and herbal products could be described as either a food or medicine, and lie within that borderline classification. If the sole basis for classification is whether a product has a physiological impact, most foods and drinks would fall within the MCA's compass.

I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for raising the subject. On the key subject of classification, my constituent, Mr. Ralph Pike of the National Association of Health Stores, has referred to the problem of the definition "medicinal by function" which appears in the consultation. Does he share my concern about its being a strange and subjective definition in deciding such important issues?

Indeed; I share exactly that concern. I have also been contacted by health food proprietors near my constituency; as my constituency is not blessed with one of those shops, people have to go to Derby to buy the products. They are concerned about precisely those points, so I recognise the point that the hon. Gentleman makes.

An individual would only have to complain and say, "Yes, I believe it is a medicine," for the MCA to be involved in the process. There is no review of any MCA judgment in which the industry or other consumers might be involved.

As the MCA is likely to be reactive to individual contacts, its involvement will be incoherent. A comment will be made about an individual product, the MCA will make a judgment on whether it is a medicine, and then apply the necessary regulatory framework to it if that be so. Essentially similar products may be treated differently. That is why the Government wisely referred the issue of B6 to the expert group to provide a coherent framework within which decisions might be made.

That takes us to the second possible reason for intervention. On the B6 study, did taking B6 actually help anyone? The evidence on that was inconclusive. I am not a scientist or a consumer of the products, so I have no way of making a personal judgment on the matter. One could go only by the number of people who claimed positive effects. There are many reasons why someone might claim a positive effect for consuming a particular product. We are all reasonably well aware of the fact that consumption of particular items may make people feel good, but may not have any medical or physiological impact at all, although they feel better for having taken it.

The hon. Gentleman plays a distinguished part in the Select Committee on Agriculture. I thank him for his contribution. Does he recall that two members of the Select Committee claimed benefit from such products?

I thank the hon. Gentleman for his compliments. Indeed, one member of the Select Committee did a trial run on B6, taking it in measures that were in excess of those suggested by the Government. She then consulted her family and they all said that she seemed much the better for it. I personally think that she is very nice just as she is now, but that was just one individual's subjective judgment.

I am horrified by that exchange. The medical profession would say that a double-blind, crossover trial must take place on any substance before we draw any conclusions. I would hate anyone to go away with the impression that one person feeling a bit better according to her family after taking something should be the basis for a judgment.

I take the hon. Lady's comment. In a way, it exposes exactly the point that I am making, which is that many individual judgments are made on the matter. The scientific evidence is inconclusive. Select Committee members will bear me out: the information that we were able to obtain showed no clear judgment in favour of consumption of vitamin B6 for particular purposes.

Or against.

Or against. Therefore, people could simply make their own judgment. That is what hundreds of thousands of people did.

We heard no complaints. We were assured by the industry that it was careful not to attribute powers to the product that were not demonstrable. However, one cannot stop other people—in magazine articles, for example— suggesting the use of a product to deal with a particular problem. That often happens in the sector. People read a piece in a magazine that says that consuming a few more vitamins of a particular sort will do them a lot of good, and they go into a health shop and buy them. Perhaps the product does make them feel better—although we do not know whether they feel better because of the product. However, quite often, endorsement and marketing of products are effected by such informal means.

One cannot stop informal advertising. Moreover, we already have laws against misleading advertising. The MCA has also recently sought powers to control advertising claims for licensed medical products. There is an argument that such controls exist already. However, I am prepared to accept the view that there may be abuses that are best dealt with by the MCA. There is already such a proposal in an earlier MCA regulation that has not yet received parliamentary approval. However, that is not my specific concern today. The MCA would be applying the rules on advertising within the licensed sector, on products that have been licensed as a medicine—not the products that we are discussing today, unless the MCA chose to classify them as medicines through the process that I described earlier.

There is a third strand of regulatory activity, at European Union level. Since 1991, the European Commission has sought harmonisation of regulations for the sector. So far, the United Kingdom Government have rightly said that any regulation should be based on safety rather than need. Therefore, using the distinction that I drew earlier, the UK Government maintain that it should be a matter of whether a product is harmful, not whether it is demonstrably good for people. Although that is the correct view to take, it is not exactly the view that is taken in all other European countries—which is why the issue has been batted around for quite some time already.

The issue of efficacy should not be the determining factor in deciding EU regulation. However, the MCA's proposed involvement in the matter may make efficacy precisely the determining factor. Surely one should argue that there is inconsistency in the Government's approach to the matter. I believe that, provided manufacturers or marketers of the products make no medical claims for them, consumers should be left to make their own judgments.

The issue of dietary supplements evokes strong passion. Since becoming involved in it, I have discovered that people write extremely passionate letters on the benefits of the products that they have been consuming, and that, when they get on the telephone, they tell one about the products at considerable length.

One person told me: "Do not prevent us from taking responsibility for our own health." There is a broader philosophical issue—which we could debate at much greater length—on the balance between reliance on the medical profession to tell us about our health and reliance on individuals to make their own judgments on how they themselves should manage their own health. The person who told me that individuals should assume responsibility for their own health made an important and profound point. Individuals should own the issue of their own health—on which they, too, should make some judgments.

Furthermore, I do not think that it benefits the United Kingdom medical profession to regard itself as the sole arbiter of how health should be provided to individual citizens. Going down that route will lead only to overload and a complete lack of individual responsibility for what one consumes and how one lives one's life—all of which are much more critical factors in determining good health than whether one regularly visits the doctor.

Does the hon. Gentleman agree that, recently, the Government have shown some inconsistency on those issues? We are not allowed, for example, to make judgments for ourselves on beef on the bone. We have absolutely no chance of making a judgment on genetically modified foods, as substances that have been genetically modified are already in the food chain. Does he agree that the Government have to get their act together and decide just where they will stand on the issues?

The hon. Lady is dragging a very large red herring right across a debate that could engage us for quite some time. However, I should briefly deal with the two points, which deserve a quick response.

On the beef on the bone ban, I should say—for the benefit of Conservative Members who do not know me so well—that I am not by instinct a regulator, but have always taken the view that individual citizens should make judgments for themselves. Therefore, I took some persuading that the Government's action on beef on the bone was the correct course to take. However, the main persuader in the issue was the overriding objective of lifting the beef ban. A critical factor in attaining that objective was the Government's stance on bovine spongiform encephalopathy and on the possibility of Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease among human beings.

The need to deal with the critical factor of credibility led me to believe that the beef on the bone ban was necessary, to ensure that our European partners—with whom we were, and still are, negotiating to lift the ban— were persuaded of the seriousness of our intent. That was the justification for the ban.

On genetically modified foods, I take the view that the Government are very seriously engaged in ensuring that consumers have, by means of proper labelling, proper information on what they are purchasing. We are operating on that issue within an EU framework, in which we must try to persuade others of the validity of our point of view. Fortunately, we have greater sympathy within the EU on that matter than we would if we were negotiating with the Americans, who take a much more cavalier approach to the subject.

Certainly within the EU, we have been forcefully defending the position of providing greater information, both in labelling products themselves and in stating on labels the fact that GM-derived ingredients may be involved—or the fact that enzymes have been used that are not left in the food ultimately, but that nevertheless have a GM link. Currently, all those elements are subject to Government action.

I therefore believe that the Government are responding properly to the concerns mentioned by the hon. Member for Richmond Park.(Dr. Tonge).

I believe that consumers should be left to make their own judgments on dietary supplements. It simply should not be the Government's business to prevent someone from taking a product that is not known to be unsafe if they feel that it does them good. Let us establish a clear framework of how to regulate those products. If further regulation is needed, we should consult the public on their perceptions, and then act. Without such action, I believe that we shall risk taking incoherent action that is damaging to businesses and totally inexplicable to many consumers.

I congratulate the hon. Member for South Derbyshire (Mr. Todd) on securing this important debate and am grateful for the opportunity of stating the Opposition's view on the issue. I am grateful also to you, Madam Speaker, for allowing me to speak early in the debate. I apologise to the House and to the Minister for the fact that I shall have to leave before the debate ends, so that I may attend a Standing Committee. It is only one of the drawbacks of being somewhat short-handed on the Opposition Benches.

The British approach to dietary supplements, both by the current Government and the previous Government, has always been safety focused, concerned with the safety of consumers rather than with their dietary need. We strongly support that position. Although the direction in which the Medicines Control Agency is travelling has caused the industry some concern, the line taken in principle by the Government seems to be—as the Minister of State, Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food said, and as my hon. Friend the Member for South Holland and The Deepings (Mr. Hayes) quoted—that dietary supplements are "drugs masquerading as foods".

The British approach now has to be placed within the European context. Within the European Union, there is clearly a significant interventionist tendency focusing on dietary need—which often is expressed in terms of multiples of recommended daily allowances—rather than on safety. The European Union is therefore moving towards developing medicines standards in which not only safety and quality, but efficacy, have to be proved.

Safety must be the paramount consideration. Any substance, however it is classified, should be subject to removal from open sale if it is harmful. However, any such judgment must be based on sound science. We must have no repeat of the B6 fiasco. Therefore, the regulatory framework governing dietary supplements has to be the servant, not the master, and ensure that only safe products are on sale and that only justifiable claims for those products are made. It must not have the effect, however unwitting, of removing from sale products that are perfectly safe, that make no unjustifiable claims and that are widely used.

The great fear, which the hon. Member for South Derbyshire has expressed, is that extending medicines legislation to cover products that common sense tells us have little similarity with complex pharmaceutical compounds—the Medicines Control Agency has already publicly acknowledged that it is taking that action by embarking on action against products that are "medicinal in function", even if there is no concern about their safety—with all the associated costs of satisfying medicines standards, and introducing an efficacy hurdle, will effectively remove the products from sale by administrative action. Such a move would be a sledgehammer to crack a nut.

We must ask ourselves whether there is any evidence of serious safety risks from these products. Is any damage being done to consumers? Is the NHS suffering a burden of additional cost in treating ill effects caused by the products? Quite the opposite, I suggest, even if in some cases, as I think the hon. Member for South Derbyshire suggested, the benefits of taking them may be as much psychological as physiological.

I should like to suggest two possible ways of dealing with the problem. First, I question whether it is sensible to define everything as either a food or a medicine. Might it not be sensible to create a third category for supplements, with no requirement to prove the efficacy of the product—in other words, no requirement to prove need—but with a streamlined procedure for dealing with any science-based safety concerns? Secondly, if there is to be greater regulation of supplements, might we as a minimum consider introducing some grandfather rights so that products not hitherto subject to an efficacy test but on sale in substantial amounts throughout the country can continue to be sold unless they are demonstrated to be unsafe?

Is the hon. Gentleman aware that many prescribed drugs are on the pharmaceutical register only through grandfather rights? Digitalis and aspirin never went through the rigorous tests that are now mandatory, and they probably would not have passed them.

I take the hon. Gentleman's point. It is with that analogy in mind that I suggest that if the regulations are tightened it will be appropriate to protect the existing industry and consumers, where there is no suggestion of a safety hazard, by introducing a system of grandfather rights that would allow products to remain on sale.

The burden of proof in relation to an established product must lie with the accuser, in line with the long tradition of British justice. In any regulatory regime, the Medicines Control Agency cannot act as policeman, prosecutor, judge and jury in its own case. The consultation document MLX 249 takes a worrying step in that direction. That, as the Minister will be aware, seems to be part of a trend. Amendments to the Medicines (Advertising) Regulations 1994, which have also been laid and are due to be considered by a Committee of the House, appear to be headed in the same direction. They would extend the powers of the MCA and give it the right to act as judge and jury in its own case.

Other European Union countries operating under the same directive have managed to allow sales of supplements and herbal products either as foods or medicines, with a simplified regime. Any licensing regime in the United Kingdom must be appropriate to the products involved. The objective must be the safety of the consumer, not a constraint on his, or perhaps in this case I should say her—it often is a woman—buying only what she needs as opposed to what she wants. If we adopted that test, we would ban half the goods on sale in the high street today.

The regulatory burden must be proportional to the risk, and so far I have seen little evidence of any risk. Action can be justified only to protect the public, not to conform to what, for most of us, is an alien concept of state intervention to allow us to do only that which is good for us, as opposed to preventing us from doing that which is positively harmful.

We need as light a touch to the regulatory regime as is consistent with the safety of consumers. I think that the Government recognise that principle. As always, within the limits of the paramountcy of public safety, we should support an established industry which has many valuable small firms within it that make an important contribution to the economy. Above all, any regulatory change must ensure continued access to existing products from a diverse range of suppliers in a competitive marketplace, unless there is clear and compelling scientific evidence that demonstrates that they are unsafe.

The expert group on the safety of vitamins and minerals established after the B6 fiasco has only just begun its deliberations. As the hon. Member for South Derbyshire said, it has probably another year or 18 months of work ahead of it. I urge the Government to allow the group to consider the wider issues, and to withdraw the proposed regulatory changes outlined in MLX 249 until that group has finished its work and reported its conclusions so that the Government may come to an informed decision.

In among all the talk of medicines, supplements and dosages, it is clear to me that what is most urgently needed in the debate on dietary supplements is a dose of common sense. I hope that the Minister will deliver that when she replies to the debate. I am only sorry that I shall not be able to hear that reply in person, but I shall read it with great interest in Hansard.

I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for South Derbyshire (Mr. Todd) on his timely Adjournment debate. I have nothing to declare other than an interest in the topic that has been created by workers in a factory in my constituency who make health products and by hundreds of constituents who wrote to me during the B6 saga. I do not use health products myself, although I must confess to having been brought up during world war two on a lot of spoonfuls of cod liver oil and rosehip syrup. I made a lot of pocket money by collecting rosehips from hedgerows in the fields where I used to play as a young lad.

It is worth reminding the House that the B6 saga was a long struggle and I congratulate the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food on referring the subject to the group that has already been mentioned by other hon. Members. I had intended to go over the history of B6, but in view of the time, I shall go to the crux of the debate.

I pointed out during the Adjournment debate on vitamin B6 that, whereas medicines and foodstuffs are closely regulated, the group of products that we are discussing this morning fall into a regulatory no man's land and attempts to use medicines law or foodstuffs law to regulate them will cause and have already caused problems.

MLX 249, which is partly causing the present controversy, is a proposed amendment to the Medicines for Human Use (Marketing Authorisations Etc.) Regulations 1994. It was issued recently by the Department of Health. A consultation letter was sent out on 6 November last year by the Medicines Control Agency and responses were requested by 31 December 1998. Note the very short time for consultation over one of the busiest holiday periods of the year. I shall come back to that in a moment. The proposal was to put the regulation in place by statutory instrument by 1 April. The MCA claims that it wants to make the decision-making process more transparent and put the classification process for medicinal products on a statutory basis.

MLX 249 relies for its existence on European directive 65/65, which was incorporated in UK law in 1995. That led to MAL 8, which is the MCA's interpretation—I underline that word—of the directive. Other countries have interpreted the same directive differently. Although the directive excludes foodstuffs, it has produced a broad definition of a medicine, which supersedes that given in the Medicines Act 1968, causing panic throughout the health food industry. The definition is:

"Any substance or combination of substances which may be administered to human beings or animals with a view to making a medical diagnosis or to restoring, correcting or modifying"—

I underline the next word—

"physiological functions in human beings or animals is likewise considered to be a medicinal product"

according to directive 65/65. Note the use of the word "physiological" instead of "pharmacological". The definition could classify water as a medicine, along with many other substances.

In a court action last year, the MCA used directive 65/65 and MAL 8 to remove melatonin from the shelves of health product stores and supermarkets. The industry is very worried that many other products will follow suit.

In a letter to me dated 2 February this year about MLX 249, my noble Friend Baroness Hayman, Under-Secretary of State at the Department of Health, said:

"The proposed legislation has no bearing on herbal remedies exempt from licensing".

She goes on to say that

"all the current exemptions from licensing for medicinal products will continue to apply."

However, at a meeting in Committee Room 18 on 19 February this year, John Neale, manager of the borderline unit at the MCA, took an apparently contradictory view when he said:

"The proposals will improve the MCA's prospects of success in court"

and

"make it extremely difficult for a manufacturer to prove a product is not a medicine".

He also said:

"We already have all the powers we need to do our job".

The health products industry regards such remarks as a threat to their business.

In response to a parliamentary question on 18 January this year, my right hon. Friend the Minister for Public Health admitted that at that time her Department had

"received 69 letters from hon. and right hon. Members and 278 representations from other interested bodies and individuals. Three representations broadly support the proposals. The remainder are critical of the proposals to some degree."—[Official Report, 18 January 1999; Vol. 323, c. 380.]

In the time available for the debate, I am not able to refer in equal detail to the MCA's other proposed new regulations, MLX 239, on advertising, and SI 267, which was laid subject to negative resolution.

I have a registered interest with a pharmaceutical company in my constituency. I am concerned about the lack of a satisfactory appeal mechanism to an independent body under SI 267. Companies could be in the invidious position of committing a criminal offence, on the judgment of the MCA, without being able to appeal to a higher court. I should like my right hon. Friend the Minister to address that.

I fully endorse that point, which I was going to make in my next few sentences.

If all the proposed regulations are accepted, the health food industry will be far more complicated to run. Many small firms will not be able to afford the costs involved. The MCA is a quango. As my hon. Friend the Member for Welwyn Hatfield (Miss Johnson) has just said, there is no right of appeal against its decisions. That is an important point that needs to be emphasised.

The 1997 Labour party manifesto made a commitment

"to monitor the scale and quality of regulatory activity".

As a result, the deregulation unit in the Cabinet Office, established by the previous Administration, became the better regulations task force. One of its first jobs was to produce a very important document, which many hon. Members may not have seen, called "The Better Regulations Guide and Regulatory Impact Assessment", which was published in July last year.

On consultation, the document says on page 9:

"Above all, allow enough time"

It goes on:

"Lack of time is one of the most frequent complaints about Government consultation. Eight weeks should generally be the minimum period."

On page 34, it says:

"Always consider the option of 'do nothing' or 'do minimum' as it may not be possible for Government to improve matters, or the costs of doing so may outweigh the benefits".

I have written to Lord Haskins, chairman of the better regulation task force, suggesting that some Departments are not taking much notice of the good advice given in the Government's booklet.

Vitamins, minerals, dietary supplements and herbal products are clearly not foodstuffs or medicines, but as I have tried to show, two Departments—MAFF and the Department of Health—have tried to regulate them. We are in a regulatory mess. Indeed, that is why the debate is being held.

What should the Government do? Clearly, there is a need to do something. The two Departments that I have mentioned have rejected the "do nothing" and "do minimum" options. The Government could try to make the existing regulatory frameworks work, as they appear to be doing, but they are clearly having great difficulty. I agree with the hon. Member for Runnymede and Weybridge (Mr. Hammond) that a third way is needed. I suggested that at the recent annual Health Food Manufacturers Association conference in London. The Government should consider establishing a separate regulatory framework to cover the substances in question. The principles of safety, quality and efficacy, based on bibliographic evidence and traditional usage, should be the key drivers for the regulations, as they always have been.

There is nothing new about this idea. Canada and Australia have tried it already. Following a letter from the Canadian Health Minister, dated 13 November 1997, the Canadian House of Commons Standing Committee on Natural Health Products published a document entitled "Natural Health Products; A New Vision" in November last year. It contains 53 recommendations. Health Canada was recommended to set out an appropriate definition of natural health products in conjunction with a new separate natural health product expert advisory committee. The relevant food and drugs legislation would then be amended accordingly. There were also recommendations to create a new regulatory authority for such products, to build appeal mechanisms into the processes, to seek advice from those involved in the production of natural health products and, importantly, to promote research on their efficacy and safety.

We have reached the critical stage in Britain at which we need to review the existing regulatory procedures and seek a third way. We could refer the matter to the better regulation task force or, like the Canadians and Australians, we could set up a commission to look at the quagmire that we appear to be getting into. I look forward to the response of my right hon. Friend the Minister for Public Health.

I congratulate the hon. Member for South Derbyshire (Mr. Todd) on allowing us all to appear so liberal this morning—even if only with a small "1". Citizens of this country can expect the Government to protect them in two ways: from being poisoned and from being ripped off. We are talking about substances which, in high concentrations, may well be poisonous, and substances for which claims are made that would make the average snake oil salesman blush. It may be that those claims are not made by the manufacturers, but they somehow find their way into advertising.

I am concerned that large sums of money are being spent by vulnerable people who are hoping to improve their lives. We must strike a balance, and I like the third way that seems to be breaking out all over the place—it is obviously catching.

The important issue is who decides what should be referred to the MCA. It is wrong that the agency has the power to trawl around to see what else might be within its remit. It is important that the shady line between what is a drug and what is food be addressed. I was disappointed that the draft Food Standards Agency legislation does not address the issue of who determines what should be treated as a pharmaceutically active and dangerous drug, and what is a food. Physiological functionality includes everything that we breathe, do and take in.

I made myself extremely unpopular in my party by supporting the Government's line on B6—and then they caved in. B6 was an extremely good example; in itself, B6 can be a beneficial substance, but taken in high doses, it can be harmful. I thought that the compromise of allowing it to be freely on sale at a reasonable, rather than high, dose was a good safety measure—rather like selling aspirins only in packages of 30.

At three times the cost.

That is not a debate for this morning.

The same issue can arise in terms of herbal remedies. As a GP, I am much more relaxed with people using herbal remedies. It is cheaper to use the natural product, and it is extremely difficult to take a pharmaceutically active substance in high enough doses to do oneself much harm. I am worried about the relentless drive to try to identify the active ingredient in whatever herbal tea we might be drinking, so that it can be concentrated and flogged off at a high price.

I am surprised that we have not had more support from hon. Members concerned about the debate on herbal cannabis and cannabinoids, as there is a similarity. It is dangerous to say that we need to identify every active ingredient in everything. That means we deny people a substance which may have some benefits—even if it is only as a placebo.

I urge the Government to set up a mechanism where we can identify what needs to be considered by the MCA. The FSA should have a responsibility in this area, and we need to work much more closely with the Advertising Standards Authority, which has a major responsibility in sorting out what is and is not a reasonable claim.

It is perfectly proper for any food or substance to be able to claim that it may be good for your health in general. "A Mars a day" helps whatever it is you want to do—that is a perfectly reasonable claim. It can be believed or not, and most people are not fooled. However, I would be extremely worried if it were claimed that a Mars could cure colitis, or stop cancer. There is a problem about claims being made for substances, as vulnerable people may be taken in. They may not help themselves by spending money that they do not have, and by taking substances in high doses—or to the exclusion of a more balanced diet—which may be harmful.

I urge the Minister to rethink. There is an opportunity to set up an agency with an overarching responsibility for food safety and nutrition. If we include the third category of substances, and align them more closely to food than to drugs—the link with drugs has already been established in terms of the FSA—we may find a way forward, provided we are prepared to be patient and to let the status quo carry on for the time being.

I congratulate the hon. Member for South Derbyshire (Mr. Todd) on obtaining this debate. He mentioned the B6 saga last year, and history seems to be repeating itself. The MCA's proposals on borderline substances have all the hallmarks of the proposals for B6. The Minister's hair should be standing on end, because those proposals caused enormous problems for the Government. If this proposal goes through, it will be devastating for consumers, manufacturers, and practitioners of herbal remedies and vitamins.

If Uncle Joe Stalin had been going through his red box in the Kremlin and this proposal had come up, he would have said, "I like it very much. It is good. It is disempowering the people. It is giving one of my Government agencies the opportunity to be judge, jury and de facto executioner." Does that really fit in with the Government's philosophy? It is bad luck for the Government that they have chosen 1 April to implement the measure—April fool's day. It is hardly a good omen.

The pressure on the Minister resulted in the extension of the consultation period, which was widely welcomed. However, as the hon. Member for Bolton, South-East (Dr. Iddon) said, that consultation period included Christmas; it was woefully short and quite inadequate.

When the MCA circulated proposals for the revision of the so-called 1994 regulations on medicines for human use last November, a flood of correspondence came into the offices of Members of Parliament—not least mine, as I am the treasurer of the parliamentary group for alternative and complementary medicine, a position that I have been proud to hold for three Parliaments. I have been doing the job for 10 years, and I regard it as valuable.

The hon. Gentleman is looking very fit on it.

I thank the hon. Gentleman; perhaps it is because I take a few supplements. Many complementary and alternative practitioners in this country are scared out of their wits by the proposal. An experienced traditional Chinese medical practitioner—a qualified UK physiotherapist and acupuncturist—said to me, emotionally, last week that the proposal, if it goes through, will make her a criminal. The hon. Member for Richmond Park (Dr. Tonge) may look askance, but the facts do bear that out.

The document would give the MCA new legal powers to allow it to decide, unilaterally and virtually without reference to anyone other than its own officials, whether a so-called borderline substance—one of the vitamins or supplements—was a medicine or not. The decision would be binding in any criminal or civil proceedings, unless shown to have been made unreasonably. Do the Government really believe that that is fair?

On 19 January, the parliamentary group of which I am treasurer met John Kneale, the manager of the policy and borderline unit at the MCA. I pay tribute to him for coming along—he did not have to. We were grateful to him for speaking to representatives from the industry and colleagues. He said:

"I do not believe that the MCA would be able to review products that have been on the market for a long time."

He tried to reassure us that the MCA was not taking powers that it did not already have, but he went on to say:

"The manufacturer would have to seek to show through the court that the MCA's decision was unreasonable. It improves the MCA's possibility of success in court."

The burden of proof is transferred from the accuser to the accused, which gives the MCA too much power and will result in the criminalisation of a practitioner through an MCA decision made without the necessary element of natural justice required to safeguard basic constitutional rights. Power is transferred to a prosecuting authority to adjudicate without accountability. Such a power exists nowhere in any other democratic society and if granted will unquestionably be open to abuse.

The current UK legal system operates to protect the innocent as well as to convict the guilty, placing the burden of proof on the state. That one simple aspect of British justice helps to prevent a large number of miscarriages of justice. If the proposal goes through, there will be widespread injustice, because arbitrary decisions will be taken, they will be disputed by those affected and there will be little recourse.

How does that sit with new Labour's so-called philosophy of open and accountable government? I suspect that the Government were hoping to slip the proposals through. They certainly were not checked by their spin doctors. Someone slipped up, however. If the proposals go through, it will be highly damaging for the Government's image and credibility in both the short and the long run. My hon. Friend the Member for Southend, West (Mr. Amess) may castigate me for trying to tip off the Government about these problems and may say that we should let them ride it out.

Why is all this happening? The whole exercise is being carried out not to protect or benefit consumers, health manufacturers and practitioners, but to make life easier for officials in the UK and to appease the bureaucrats in Brussels. At the meeting of the all-party group on alternative and complementary medicine, the borderline unit manager said:

"We are bound by European legislation."

However, we have exemptions, as in many other matters. We are fighting to maintain those exemptions, while the European Community as a whole is revising its position.

There is every indication that there will soon be new legislation on herbal products from the European Commission, as it tries to homogenise the law in Europe. The great concern is that the UK Government will try to pre-empt what is happening in Europe and introduce a draconian measure at a time when the whole process is being thought through at a more leisurely pace on the continent.

Herbal remedies are traditional medicines whose therapeutic use has been tried and tested over hundreds, or even thousands, of years. Such plant medicines invariably comprise many chemical components whose overall effect cannot simply be assumed by reference to perceived active constituents. Apparently unimportant fractions of a plant may act in vivo to buffer or amplify its principal pharmaceutical characteristics.

The essential features of herbal medicine have important implications for their assessment and licensing, but current European Union medicines licensing procedures are generally designed to evaluate and validate single chemical entities—not several chemical entities— as medicinal products.

I am rather concerned by the assertion that a medicine must be safe simply because it has been around for hundreds or thousands of years. All medicines require the rigour of full medical examination.

The hon. Gentleman may have the opportunity to make his own speech later on. Most medicines used by traditional Chinese medical practitioners have been used for a very long time.

Plant medicines cannot be patented, so the enormous sums required to bring a new product to the market cannot be recouped. The cost of licensing compound herbal medicines would be so high as to be unrealistic for all but the largest companies. The smaller companies referred to by the hon. Member for South Derbyshire and others would be put out of business.

It seems entirely wrong—this is borne out by all the letters that we have received—to classify pharmaceutical drugs in the same category as herbal medicines derived from natural sources, including many foods, such as cardamom, cinnamon, garlic, ginger, Chinese dates, peach kernels, orange skins, borage, celery, parsley, rhubarb and all spices.

At a presentation to the all-party group by the Association of European Self-Medication Industry, known as AESGP, we were told that the European Commission was considering issues concerning the internal market and herbal medicine. The association stressed that there is a wide divergence of opinion in the European Union but that strenuous efforts are being made to develop a sensible pan-European policy.

The Minister would be well advised to wait and see. Products not classified as medicinal products belong in most cases to the food and cosmetics category, even though they sometimes contain plants with pharmacological properties. In Ireland, Spain and the UK there exist preparations defined as medicinal products that are exempt, under specific conditions, from licensing requirements. We have to protect that position in the short term.

It will be the role of the European Commission to evaluate and assess the consequences of possible divergence in the legal position and/or the assessment of herbal medicinal products, and to agree a plan on how best to safeguard public health while allowing the free movement of herbal medicinal products throughout the European Union.

At a time when every country in the European Union has its own specific problems, it is not appropriate for the Government to take the arbitrary action that they propose. The issue is under debate and we do not need these draconian measures.

I offer the Minister the hand of friendship in finding a way out of this maze. There are three possible solutions. She could back off and leave everything as it is, which would satisfy most people, because nobody really wants the change. The second honourable way out would be to wait and see what happens in Europe; so much is going on that it seems foolish to pre-empt it. What is the third option? Several hon. Members have mentioned the third way. Having been a great fan of Mrs. Thatcher, I have not always been keen on the third way, but in this instance it is probably the right way forward.

The all-party group has consulted widely among our large membership to ascertain whether that idea should be pursued. In the United States, the Dietary Supplement Health and Education Act 1994 defines dietary supplements as a special category between foods and medicines. They are defined as products that are

"safe within a broad range of intake",

and for which

"safety problems within the supplements are relatively rare."

Such supplements include all the medicines that we have been discussing.

The way forward is not to allow the proposals through at this time. The Minister must back off or, perhaps better still, wait for Europe or consider the third way.

The Government should not rush into any legislation that would harm the future of herbal medicines, food supplements and vitamins. The B6 fiasco last year, followed by the present proposals, have raised great fears in the industry. That fiasco should have served as a warning to the Government that all European countries treat such products differently. This is not the time to classify celery and beetroot as drugs, or to break well-established principles of English law. The Government should agree to consider a third, new category between foods and pharmaceutical drugs, thereby getting themselves off the hook and making consumers and producers happy.

I congratulate the hon. Member for South Derbyshire (Mr. Todd) on the way in which he introduced the debate. He has certainly given the House an opportunity to explore all the various issues. He was right to represent the producers of the products in question in his constituency. If I had such producers in my constituency, I would have done the same. Sadly, I do not, but I have many constituents who use the products and a number of health food shops that supply them.

I pay tribute to Consumers for Health Choice, which has done a splendid job in educating Members of Parliament such as me on the various issues. Until the row about vitamin B6 last year, I knew precious little about the issues. I may regret what I am about to say, but I am not a natural pill taker. I would try anything to cure hay fever and have done so over the years. I was told that I would grow out of it, but I am taking a long time to do so.

I have been overwhelmed with letters and petitions on the matter from my constituents. Given that, in terms of the number of senior citizens who live there, Southend, West is 33rd out of the 659 constituencies, I can only conclude that those people are doing extremely well on those products so far.

Before the Minister responds, I simply want to draw attention to three pieces of information that I have received from constituents. One lady wrote that she used these products

"daily to try and stay healthy so as not to burden the state … I understand the Government is now trying to sweep vitamin products off health food shop shelves, by trying to licence them as medicines."

That lady wants the Government to tell her

"why these proposals are being rushed through with such urgency (1st April 1999)".

She points out:

"The only people that would benefit at the end of the day would be the pharmaceutical companies",

who, according to her, apparently already make "vast profits."

Another lady mentions the fact that 1 April is April fool's day and says:

"it is no joke for the many independently minded people who wish to take responsibility for their own health and avoid as long as possible being without any free choice of health therapy."

She asks me to

"protest against this underhand plan to tack on the power to restrict … liberty by avoiding free debate on this vital issue."

She continues:

"We want nutrition to be our first line of health defence and we want freedom of choice in medicine."

Finally, one supplier of such products in my constituency believes that the Medicines Control Agency wants

"to include far more than is necessary under their control umbrella and once they have gained the changes in the law will become judge, jury and executioner in the removal of anything they see fit from our shelves without consultation."

The letter continues that, as regards health food shops,

"there is in place effective control on products under the Medicines Act that has worked well for years. Freedom of choice is again in jeopardy".

I entirely agree with my hon. Friends the Members for Bosworth (Mr. Tredinnick) and for South Holland and The Deepings (Mr. Hayes). I do not want to cause trouble between the Department of Health and the Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food. However, it was unfortunate that the Minister responsible for food suggested, when he gave evidence, that these products were somehow masquerading as food or were foods masquerading as drugs.

If the hon. Member for South Derbyshire achieves anything today, I hope that it will be to persuade the Minister for Public Health to adjudicate on the difference between the two Departments and to put the fears of all our constituents at rest.

I shall begin not exactly by registering an interest, but by pointing out that my brother is a senior executive in Glaxo Wellcome. For that reason, I do not take part in departmental discussions or decisions about pharmaceutical licensing. I am responsible for complementary medicine, but I want the House to be aware of that fact in the context of my responding to this debate on a matter that would normally be handled by my noble Friend Baroness Hayman.

I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for South Derbyshire (Mr. Todd) on taking this opportunity to raise a matter that is of great cross-party concern. I hope that, in the time available, I can generate a little more light than heat and put the record straight on a number of important issues for those hon. Members here today and for the many people who are enormously concerned about the issue.

First, let us deal with the facts of the current controversy. I am concerned that much of the criticism of the proposals has been an unwarranted cause of worry and worse for manufacturers, retailers and consumers alike. I say that as someone who has ministerial responsibility for complementary medicines and who recognises the enormous public interest in this new and developing area of medicine, which is of potential benefit. We should be clearer and more systematic about the evidence for the benefits that many people anecdotally report. I approach this debate by making clear my sympathy for complementary medicine in general and my understanding of many people's enthusiasm for and reliance on methods of complementary medicine.

As has been clear throughout the debate, the problem is the lack of a legal definition of the term "dietary supplement". Many of the products described as such inhabit an increasingly grey area between foods and medicines. As the law stands, those products for which claims are made for the treatment or prevention of disease, or which are administered to restore, correct or modify physiological functions, fall within the definition of a medicine and are subject to the requirements of the Medicines Act 1968 and the appropriate European directive. Such products normally require a marketing authorisation—that is, a licence—before they can be sold or supplied.

Products that are licensed as medicines are excluded from the definition of food in the Food Safety Act 1990. Products that are not licensed are automatically regarded as foods and are subject to the general provisions of the 1990 Act, which effectively requires that they should not cause harm, and to the Food Labelling Regulations 1996, which control the labelling and advertising of food. Among other things, the regulations prohibit claims in labelling or advertising that a food has the property of preventing, treating or curing a human disease, and lay down conditions for the use of nutritional claims and certain descriptions that may mislead.

As regards policy, the Government have stated on a number of occasions that we believe that the quantity of vitamins and minerals in supplements sold under food law should be limited only in cases in which it is necessary to protect the public. Any limits should be based on safety considerations, judgments about which are made on the basis of expert scientific advice.

I would not pretend for one moment that such advice might never give rise to controversy, but the boundary between categories of product can be difficult to determine. Garlic, evening primrose oil and vitamins in general may be dietary supplements or medicinal products. The determining factor is whether they are sold with claims to treat or prevent disease. If they are, and if the manufacturer wishes to continue to make those claims, he must apply to the MCA for a licence for the product.

It may be helpful to remind the House of the responsibilities of the MCA. The agency has a duty, on behalf of the licensing authority, to implement and enforce the provisions of the Medicines Act 1968 and other medicines legislation. It does so to protect public health, and specifically to make sure that the medicines that sick people use are safe, of high quality and effective. The MCA has a very important role in protecting consumers.

Part of the MCA's duties involve deciding whether a product is or is not a medicine. The criteria against which it makes those decisions is a matter of European Union law.

Does the Minister think it appropriate for the MCA to be both the prosecution and the jury in these matters? Should not the MCA take up only matters referred to it rather than deciding for itself what its remit should cover?

I do not accept that point. The routes by which matters of concern are raised with the MCA are many and varied. Many of the grounds on which inquiries are raised about products that are in a grey area are identified by public concern or by general practitioners, such as the hon. Gentleman himself, on behalf of their patients.

Unless EU law changes, there will be no change in the status of products sold as food or as herbal remedies exempt from licensing. Those products will continue on open sale without the need for licensing. It is claimed that if the consultation proposals became law, the MCA would sweep supplements and herbal remedies from the shelves unless they were licensed. Those claims are completely unfounded.

What would the proposals do? They would make the process by which medicines are classified more transparent, consistent and credible among the wider public. That is important because the present purely administrative arrangements for classifying medicines are sometimes criticised by manufacturers on the ground that they have not had a full and fair hearing. It is the Government's view that decision-making processes should be as open as possible. We believe that introducing a new statutory process, on top of the agency's present administrative arrangements, will make for greater clarity and transparency.

The Government also believe that if manufacturers are given greater access to the classification process, they will be able to have faith in decisions under it, and it is important that they should have that faith. We believe that introducing a statutory right for manufacturers to participate in the process and put their arguments and cases to a review panel would effectively address the criticisms sometimes made about the alleged secrecy of the present classification arrangements.

At the same time, the proposals would improve the effectiveness of the MCA's compliance and enforcement processes by reducing the scope for delay and evasion. In that way, we would demonstrate the UK's commitment to full implementation and enforcement of medicines legislation. We believe that introducing a new offence of non-compliance with a final decision will bring greater precision to compliance and enforcement activity. The proposed presumption in favour of the MCA in any subsequent proceedings should also strengthen the effectiveness of enforcement activity.

Let me say something about what the proposals do not do. They do not give the MCA a new and unaccountable power to decide whether or not a product is a medicine. The MCA already has that power, as the Court of Appeal confirmed last year. The MCA exercises its powers in accordance with EU and UK law, legal precedent and its published guidance. The MCA also has the power, on behalf of Ministers, to seek to enforce its decisions in the courts.

I want to deal with some specific criticisms levelled at the proposals. It is suggested that the consultation exercise is too short and secret. In fact, the initial eight-week timetable was within the MCA's normal six to eight-week limit. We have extended the consultation period for an additional month, and implementation of the proposals is not tied to a target date of 1 April. We have already said that we are prepared to listen further, and so we should.

A second criticism is that the statutory review procedure would not be independent of the MCA. We propose that the members of the review body should be officers of the MCA. As the Court of Appeal has recognised, the MCA is a specialist body with accumulated experience in relation to medicinal products, which has had to develop a consistent policy for similar products. Under EU law, it is the licensing authority's duty as the competent authority to make final decisions on classification.

The third criticism is that the proposal to introduce a new offence of non-compliance with a final MCA decision is unnecessary. In any subsequent legal proceedings, the MCA's decision would be deemed correct, unless the manufacturer could show that it was unreasonable. The proposals are said effectively to prevent a manufacturer having any chance of a successful defence in court, but that is not the case. The European Court of Justice has recently agreed that the courts should not have to reassess the merits, as distinct from the legality and reasonableness, of the MCA's final decisions. Accordingly, we do not accept that it should be necessary for the courts to reassess the merits of MCA decisions.

If the MCA were to take proceedings because a manufacturer would not comply with a final decision, our proposed change would shift the burden of proof to the manufacturer, who would have to prove that the decision was unreasonable. We believe that that is justified. The decision would have been arrived at only after thorough and open assessment and review. Manufacturers will have repeated opportunities to make their case.

Perhaps the most alarming claim has been that dietary supplements will have to be licensed from 1 April as prescription-only medicines. That is emphatically untrue. The proposals will not affect the status of dietary supplements, and the idea that they would be available only on a doctor's prescription is equally unfounded.

We will consider carefully the criticism that the shift in the burden of proof in proceedings is oppressive and lacking in natural justice. We recognise that manufacturers would find it extremely difficult to prove a final decision by the MCA to be unreasonable. We are sensitive to the need to show that justice is done. Consequently, we will look particularly carefully at this part of the proposals, to ensure that they go no further than our obligations as the licensing authority require.

In conclusion, we want the people of the United Kingdom to have confidence—

Order. We now come to the debate in the name of the hon. Member for Totnes (Mr. Steen).

I am grateful for the opportunity to raise a matter that is of great importance, especially to my hon. Friends, although there do not appear to be many Labour Members present. I can see the odd Liberal.

Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

I have not yet started and there is no way that I will give way to the hon. Gentleman now. If he sits still for half an hour, I shall give way to him.

Last December, I was fortunate enough to obtain a half-hour Adjournment debate on the housing projections and the 4.4 million new units that will have to be built by 2011. The Minister explained that the whole thrust of the previous Government's policy of predict and provide was to be replaced by a new and radical planning model, based on the principle of plan and manage—the new buzz words. I have been fortunate enough to obtain an hour and a half debate some three months later and the same Minister is here to reply on behalf of the Government.

I do not know why the Government wheel in their Jeremiahs on such occasions. On 9 December, instead of making an optimistic and constructive contribution, the Minister said that it was all too late, and that new Labour's new solutions would not come into play until the 4.4 million homes in the 1991 housing projections had been built. That is probably why he has been wheeled in by the Government. His sole role is to say, "Too bad. All those houses will have to be built. We will build them in the towns and in the villages. We will build them all over the countryside, wherever we can squeeze them in." That is probably why the Minister is before us today, and he will probably say the same thing again. I hope not.

The Government have been assisted by the Liberal Democrats on Devon county council who have just approved the Devon county structure plan, which gives the go-ahead for the building of 70,000 new housing units for the county between 1995 and 2011. If that plan is carried out, 90,000 new housing units in total will have to be built in one of the most beautiful counties in Britain. That will increase the population from 1 million to nearly 1.25 million, or by some 20 per cent. On 15 December, the Herald Express, the local newspaper in Torbay, claimed that the number of people living in Torbay is set to rise to 133,600 by 2021, an increase of more than 10,000. I am pleased to see that my hon. Friend the Member for Teignbridge (Mr. Nicholls) is in his place, as one would expect, because the paper also pointed out that the population of Teignbridge is expected to expand from 116,700 in 1996 to 135,000 in 2021, an increase of 15.6 per cent. South Hams, a large chunk of which is in my constituency, faces a 17.2 per cent. increase, rising from 79,300 to 93,000. It is not surprising that the population of Devon will increase to 1.25 million. We are talking not about redistribution of the existing population but about a net increase.

Formal approval of the county structure plan and the Secretary of State's confirmation of the figures means that it will be difficult to change them. However, it is not too late to decide where the houses will go and at what speed they will be built. That is why the Government's plan and manage policy is critical. If it were applied, it would ensure that priority was given to building on brown-field sites. As things stand, there is little planning policy guidance and no attempt to ensure that developers are directed to build first in urban areas.

The logic of my hon. Friend's point is that, if the Government are content to say that the previous basis for planning was wrong and that plan and manage is the way forward, they cannot refuse to impose their policy change on the present figures. The Government can take one position or the other, but the current situation is untenable.

I hope that the Minister heard that point, because he was engaged in a conversation. If he does not answer that point when he winds up, I hope that my hon. Friend will remind him of it.

As matters stand, the 4.4 million homes will be built under the housing projection. The structure plans have been completed in Devon, and the district councils now have to formulate local plans for the placement of those houses, paying regard to environmental sustainability— again, the new buzz words. I am glad that a few Liberal Democrats are present, because those are their buzz words, albeit they mean as little in reality as new Labour's buzz words, plan and manage.

The Government have a 60 per cent. brown-field recycling target. We accept that figure, although we would increase it slightly. My right hon. Friend the Leader of the Opposition has said that if we were in office, the figure would be nearer 65 per cent.

Would my hon. Friend care to comment on the fact that the term "brown-field" can mean different things to different people? As the Minister is well aware, the Labour council in the borough of Trafford is seeking to build houses on playing fields, which count as brown-field sites for the Government's purposes.

That is news to me, and I hope that it is news to the Minister. I hope that he will ensure that the council does not build houses on playing fields, but I fear that he will squeeze them wherever he can fit them in, including on playing fields. I hope that he will deny that and issue a PPG note on the issue. I am prepared to give way to him now if he would like to deal with that point.

Following the convention of our Wednesday morning debates, I suggest that the hon. Gentleman focuses intelligently on the issues, instead of bandying abuse across the Chamber, which does not ensure a sensible debate on serious issues about how genuine housing need is met in a way that is sustainable and does not damage the countryside.

I would not have given way if I had known what the Minister was going to say. It was very unhelpful. I wanted him to deal with playing fields, but he clearly does not wish to do so yet.

The Government's 60 per cent. brown-field target is an admission of the fact that building in the countryside cannot continue at the rate that it has in the past. The aim is to recycle vacant, derelict, dormant, unused and brown-field land in our cities. That is nothing new, however: it was the aim from the 1970s onwards. In the 1980s, the Conservative Government set up a register of dormant, derelict, vacant, unused and under-utilised public land. I was much involved with that register and with what should be done with the 200,000 acres of unused vacant land that was then in public ownership.

In my excellent book "Plums", which I know many of my colleagues have read, I suggested that public vacant land should be auctioned off, with a covenant to ensure that it would be developed within five years. I proposed private regional development corporations, listed on the stock market and with the task of developing vacant land and public ownership profitably. The Minister for Housing and Planning at the time, my hon. Friend the Member for West Worcestershire (Sir M. Spicer), was on the point of acting to implement my proposals when, unfortunately, he was promoted. The privatisation of rail, water, gas and electricity all followed, and that switched much of the vacant land from public to private hands. Public vacant land became private vacant land and, as a result, the number of acres of public vacant land has dropped dramatically. However, the utilities still own much private vacant land that could be developed.

The brown-field recycling target is nothing new, only a variation on an established Conservative theme. The Western Morning News reported on 20 February 1999 that 58,000 of the new housing units planned for the west country could easily be built on brown-field sites in the west country. As a result, the figure for green-field building could be reduced and the figure for Devon could be reduced pro rata.

I apologise to my hon. Friend for missing the first few minutes of his speech.

The point from the Western Morning News about the availability of brown-field sites was taken from a report that has only recently been published by the south-west regional planning conference—the body that made the recommendation about the county structure plan numbers to Devon county council in the first place. Does my hon. Friend agree that, valuable as the report is, it would have been much more helpful if we had had such a report two and a half years ago when we began work on the country structure plan, rather than receiving it at the tail-end of the process, after the Prime Minister had issued a diktat to East Devon district council that it must now get on and plan those houses?

As always, my hon. Friend makes a telling and important point. One cannot deal with housing allocation if one does not have the information necessary to put houses in sensible, wise and productive places. I hope that the Minister will take that point seriously because it is a grave and important one that will add to this debate.

I have mentioned the problem of brown-field sites. Another problem stems from the failure to provide an arrangement by which local authorities can trade housing allocations. Districts cannot swap with districts, nor can counties with counties or regions with regions. North Devon might want to trade with the Torbay area—after all, both their councils are Liberal Democrat run—with the result that the houses planned for a highly congested and overbuilt area could be moved to one where there is more space.

The Minister is bound to say that that is not his fault, because those figures originated from the Office for National Statistics in the late 1980s and the then Secretary of State for the Environment, my right hon. Friend the Member for Suffolk, Coastal (Mr. Gummer), handed them down to the regions. At this stage, I shall not argue with the Minister about the figures—we have already gone around that course—although, as I have said, I think that they are suspect and are based on the predict-and-provide philosophy. They are treated as though they are divine guidance. My criticism is of the way in which the figures are handed down vertically: Government, regions, county, district, parish. There is no lateral integration and no way in which local authorities can deal with each other and trade in housing figures.

The ONS figures are merely a repetition of past trends. Past performance is not a guide for future demographic trends. The current structure plan is formulated on the basis of what has happened in the past. Can that make sense for the future? Surely, such calculations must be unreliable. For example, in the 1980s we believed that the economy would continue to grow and that that trend would never stop. Banks lent more and more money so that people could buy land and houses, and prices went up. However, it all went terribly wrong and many people burned their fingers; millions ended up with negative equity and debts.

The housing forecasts are based on exactly the same flawed assumption: that whatever happened in the past is bound to repeat itself in the future. Predict and provide— the basis for those housing forecasts—has become a self-fulfilling prophecy, and I pointed that out to the Minister last December. The buzz phrase is no longer predict and provide, but plan and manage. At the moment, it is merely a buzz phrase; the predict and provide approach continues to hold sway in planning credence. What is the point of changing the whole basis for housing number predictions, if there will be no effect until the date of the next structure plan? The Minister protests that the Government are doing something, but what is it please?

The figure of 4.4 million new homes for the United Kingdom—and 438,000 new homes for the south-west and 90,000 in Devon—should not be considered as a target that must be reached, but that is how planners and local politicians continue to regard it. The truth is that those figures are not targets, but merely projections—an informed guess or an estimate of what might be needed. The use of those housing figures as targets is the reason why councils and developers struggle to build houses, so that the targets are fulfilled at any cost.

It is just like the building of the M25; that, too, became a self-fulfilling prophecy. We thought that building a huge road around London would put a stop to gridlock and end traffic problems, but more and more cars used the road and the traffic jams are legendary. It is the same with house building; the more houses are built in an area, the more people come from outside to live in them and the more the demand increases.

Does the Minister agree that the figure of 4.4 million is not a target, but a projection; and that such projections forecast the maximum number of housing units that can be built if all the conditions are right? Why was there nothing in yesterday's Budget to give incentives for developers to build in towns and disincentives to them to build in rural areas? Furthermore, if that was a recognised aim of the Government, planning appeal inspectors could refuse permission to build on green-field sites by arguing at the appeal stage that there were plenty of brown-field sites left for development in neighbouring towns and cities. That would discourage developers from using the appeal process as a form of blackmail against councils that are afraid of spending council tax payers' money to defend such appeals.

Under the present system, councils and Government alike are obliged to allow developers to build wherever they want within the local plan area. In addition, councils feel pressurised by a time scale that forces them to allow building by a certain date; they are obliged by law to find sufficient land to designate for house building to fulfil the housing targets that have been handed down to them. The local plan highlights where those houses are to be built, but contains nothing to prioritise the use of brown-field sites in urban areas. That is because different local authorities deal with urban and rural areas and they are not able to liaise over the housing figures.

Councils should strengthen the incentives for brown-field site building by telling developers, "Until you find the building of sufficient infrastructure to serve this new development and to provide good quality of life for the residents, there is no way that we shall give you planning permission". If that were the case, South Hams—an area whose natural environmental beauty has been recognised by no less an authority than the House of Commons Library and which has been described as one of the most beautiful places in England and Wales—could say no to developers. Furthermore, the local council would be assured that its decision would be upheld by planning inspectors on appeal. That would force developers to look at towns for building purposes—the Plymouths, Torbays, Exeters and Bristols.

I congratulate the hon. Gentleman on securing this debate. He says that houses should be built not in South Hams, but in Torbay, of which he represents a quarter; and no doubt he does not want those 3,000 to 6,000 extra houses to be built in Brixham, Galmpton or Broadsands. The hon. Gentleman is being honest, so he is saying that those houses should be built in areas such as Occombe valley, Cockington or Preston Down road. The hon. Gentleman nods his head; I am grateful to him for that confirmation.

If I was nodding, it was because I was getting bored with the hon. Gentleman's remarks.

The "not in my backyard" principle is a good planning principle because it expresses self-interest and there is nothing like self-interest to ensure that the right decision is reached. Clearly, the right decision is that it is better for those new homes to be in the hon. Gentleman's constituency than in mine.

Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

I shall give way when I have dealt with the points made by the hon. Member for Torbay (Mr. Sanders).

There are many badly designed homes and buildings in Torbay, as the hon. Gentleman will agree. Torbay has grown like Topsy. If there was better planning and better design, the space could be used more productively.

I am sorry that the hon. Gentleman has abandoned his main thesis, which concerned the inadequacy of the predict-and-provide approach. We all now realise that the previous Government's failure to move away from that principle is why we are in the current position. Will the hon. Gentleman turn westward and consider the circumstances of his hon. Friend the Member for South-West Devon (Mr. Streeter), who is determined to have an even larger development on green-field sites than is currently proposed? What does the hon. Member for Totnes (Mr. Steen) say to his neighbour?

The hon. Gentleman raises a perfectly acceptable point. I must not be drawn too far from the thesis of predict and provide, as he was clearly following it with interest. I hope that the Minister will withdraw his unnecessarily unkind remarks about my not getting involved in a serious discussion. I see the Minister smiling. I am sure that he was overcome momentarily and is now back to his normal, happy self.

It is not for me to answer the hon. Gentleman's question. My hon. Friend the Member for South-West Devon (Mr. Streeter) is well known for his oratory, clarity and good sense. I am sure that, when the time comes, he will be able to respond to that point.

The time has come. Does my hon. Friend agree that the real glory of Devon is to be found not just in Dartmoor, in the rolling hills of South Hams—which he and I are privileged to represent—or in our coastline, but in our beautiful, picturesque villages? We do not want a new town or to see existing villages overwhelmed by new building. We must protect and preserve our existing villages in south Devon at all costs.

That is the right answer. The only snag is that, in the 1960s and 1970s, the planners and the county council in Devon said, "We want to protect villages and hamlets, but we realise that we can do that only by ruining one area completely by building a new town". I used to represent that new town of Ivybridge, which is now in my hon. Friend's constituency. It was a tiny hamlet of 1,500 inhabitants but now has 12,000 or 13,000 inhabitants. If that was the only place ruined, one could accept it. However, the planners not only ruined Ivybridge but have continued to build in all the villages and hamlets that they said they would not touch because they were building a new town in Ivybridge. Will the Minister address that important issue? If a new town is built outside Plymouth—large or small—will the hon. Gentleman put an embargo or guillotine on any further attempts by planners and local politicians to build in the villages or hamlets? That is the real problem.

I do not want to be drawn too far away from the point that I was pursuing. We must find a way of forcing developers to consider building in towns. I mentioned Plymouth, Torbay, Exeter and Bristol before the hon. Member for Torbay jumped up. Unlike their American counterparts, our cities are grey, often unfriendly and not fun places because they empty at the end of the working day when everyone rushes home to the suburbs. British cities are like doughnuts: they have empty centres where the jam used to be. Jam is made by combining a mix of ingredients: by including all ages, lifestyles, earning levels, types of marital status and so on. Our cities need to be vigorous, vital and exciting places in which to live and work.

That will not happen if developers continue to build on green-field rather than brown-field sites. By doing so, they make the urban sprawl worse—compounding the problem by attracting the more upwardly mobile members of society out to the suburbs, leaving behind the poor, the elderly and the ethnic minorities. Many of our cities are drab and dreary because of permissive planning policies that encourage building on green-field sites, which constantly robs the cities of the kind of people who could invigorate them—the upwardly mobile. We must ask what building by numbers is doing to our countryside as well as what it costs the taxpayer to build the extra infrastructure required by green-field developments.

The Devon county structure plan demands that two new settlements be built on green-field sites. One of them would be built near Plymouth and the settlement of 2,500 housing units would constitute 35 per cent. of the current demand from Plymouth. However, will that local demand be met given that, despite the fact that its supposed aim is to meet existing demand, the new town will be advertised all over the country? If taking up the Plymouth overspill is the real aim, why not build on existing vacant land and fill existing housing in that city? Why not put under-utilised sites to better use? There are many of them: shops with a vacant upper storey, vacant land in both public and private ownership, and disused dockland sites. Plymouth is a good example of an unplanned city that has grown up by accident rather than design.

Why are we not regenerating our cities? In the 1960s and 1970s, the then Prime Minister, Harold Wilson, launched several urban development initiatives, including the urban programme, the community development project, the education priorities and the young volunteer force, of which I was a director. Those initiatives switched the rates from rural to urban areas in order to finance the needs of rundown inner cities. The Labour Administration in the 1970s switched the rates from rural areas to urban areas in an attempt to regenerate them, and I welcomed that move.

In the early 1980s, my right hon. Friend the Member for Henley (Mr. Heseltine), then Secretary of State for the Environment in the Conservative Government, launched a crusade to regenerate our cities. Fortunately, I was the Member for Liverpool, Wavertree at the time, so I benefited from that policy. Yet our inner cities continue to empty outwards simply because people can move into a never-ending supply of housing built on green-field sites.

Green-field development prompts the need for schools, shops, sewerage, telecommunications, transport, medical and hospital services and leisure facilities. Who pays for that? It is not the developer. The developer simply connects the houses to the local sewerage system and possibly installs a few telephone and electricity lines. There is a myth doing the rounds that green-field development is much cheaper than redeveloping rundown areas in the towns. It is not cheaper: it is a question of who pays.

Green-field development is not cheap for the taxpayer, who must pay for all the services that new communities require. The only person for whom such development is cheap is the developer, who buys the land, builds the buildings and connects them to the main services. That is why green-field building land is so expensive to buy. I am told that Plymouth brown-field sites sell at about £50,000 per acre, while green-field land outside Plymouth sells for £800,000 an acre. The fact that it is so disproportionately expensive should alert us to the fact that something is wrong. Developers must be, and are, making good profits—so much so that the high cost of green-field land is worth paying.

It is left to the public authorities to pay for the long-term infrastructure and employment provisions of new communities. The council tax payer and the central taxpayer pay. Who pays for the buses that will have to serve the new areas? Is it the developer? No, it is the taxpayer. Who will pay for a new sewerage plant that might have to be built? Is it the developer? No, it is the water rate payer. Who will pay to resurface the roads and build new ones to cope with the extra traffic? Is it the developer? No way. It is the taxpayer, through the Department of the Environment, Transport and the Regions.

When the new green-field developments are advertised in the national newspapers and people—many of them retired—flock to the west country, who will pay for the extra hospital services needed to cope with the influx of elderly people or for the schooling of young families? Is it the developer? Of course not, it will be the taxpayer. Moving people from the cities to the suburbs costs taxpayers money. Who pays to decommission schools and other services in the town and set up new ones in the suburbs? It is not the developer, but the taxpayer.

Why should the taxpayer be drawn in behind the developer who makes the profit on green-field land development, leaving behind problems of declining cities and infrastructure costs for others to deal with? If developers want to build on green-field sites, they should provide the necessary infrastructure. However, there is another problem: developers can pay only if the development is big and profitable. They can pick up the cost of green-field development only if that development is large enough to generate sufficient money. That is why planners advocate building new towns: two dozen starter homes will not make enough money to enable a developer to build a road or a school.

The infrastructure is already in place in our cities. So why build on green fields, destroy the countryside and create endless unnecessary problems when pleasant homes can be built in the towns at less cost to the taxpayer? It is only bureaucracy that is preventing such development: the bureaucracy of handing down housing figures from Whitehall based on the predict-and-provide policy, the refusal to allow local authorities to trade with each other and the Government's failure to implement their brown-field sites policy.

There is no point arguing about the housing figures: rightly or wrongly, they are being treated as targets by the Government and by the Liberal Democrat-run Devon county council, which has rushed to approve them in the face of Conservative opposition. My argument is about where those houses will be built. I object to the inflexibility of the planning system. Once the figures are handed down from Whitehall, like the ten commandments from Mount Sinai, they are set in stone—mostly in our green fields.

I welcome house building—we need it and local people need it—but it needs to be in the right places. I welcome the building of houses for young people in urban areas so that they can bring back vibrancy to the centre. I welcome the regeneration of ugly urban areas into pleasant residential spaces convenient for young and old alike and close to existing shops, schools and hospitals. I should like to stop the brain drain in which young people continue to leave in droves counties such as Devon and other parts of rural England and retired people flock there in their place, occupying many of the green-field housing developments. I should like enlightened developers, guided perhaps by Government funding, to reclaim poisoned or brown-field land and build land-efficient houses on it.

Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

Does the hon. Gentleman think it wise to intervene?

I think it is very wise. Will the hon. Gentleman treat us to his rather idiosyncratic views on fiscal or taxation proposals on development property?

I hoped that the Chancellor would treat us to those yesterday, but he did not. If we are to shift the emphasis of building to regenerate our urban areas, clearly there must be tax incentives for the developers, and there are none at present. I was severely disappointed yesterday because I was looking forward to the Chancellor, in his giveaway Budget, giving away what we want.

Does the hon. Gentleman recall that his last debate on this matter was attended by the right hon. and learned Member for Rushcliffe (Mr. Clarke)—a most distinguished former Chancellor of the Exchequer—who distanced himself from the hon. Gentleman's proposals? Does he further recall the chaos that followed the introduction of development land tax and development gains tax?

I am glad to say that I do not. My right hon. and learned Friend the Member for Rushcliffe (Mr. Clarke) would have been present today—he wanted to contribute to the debate and support what I am saying— but unfortunately previous engagements prevented him from attending. The hon. Gentleman could have asked him that question if he had been here.

I shall recap because other hon. Members want to speak. The figures are not targets that have to be met by projections; they are not the holy grail. The Government are repeating exactly the same pious imperatives that the Conservatives did in the 1980s. They are pulling out and dusting down the vacant land registers in the Department of the Environment, Transport and the Regions, and if they are not doing so, they jolly well ought to. They were right to state that many houses could be built on brown-field land, but the whole initiative has been precluded from the current structure plans. We do not want jam tomorrow; we need it today.

Talking about jam brings me back to my earlier image of our cities as doughnuts that have no jam in the centre because the planning process has encouraged green-field site development. Cities will be neglected as long as we continue to encourage developers to make large profits on green-field sites because they do not have to pay for the infrastructure costs.

The Government claim to be passionate about the environment. The Liberal Democrats claim to be positively frenzied about sustainable development. Those are meaningless claims because there is no yardstick against which new developments are judged. Some areas of this country—south Devon is one—have reached the maximum size that is possible without there being an adverse effect on the quality of life of the people who already live there. Surely that must be the meaning of sustainable development.

If people's lives are affected by a flood of new housing and new people, the quality of their life changes—and that cannot be sustainability. That is why I have great problems in understanding why the Liberal Democrats on Devon county council talk about sustainable development when they continue ploughing up the land for houses. Perhaps one of the Liberal Democrats present, who have been eager to intervene, could tell me what sustainable development means to them, because it is not working.

Developers cannot be expected to provide infrastructure if the size of the development does not generate sufficient profit for them to do so. The planning gain has to be substantial if new sewers, hospitals and roads are to be built by the developers who cause the need for them rather than retrospectively by the taxpayer. Most of that much-needed infrastructure is already in place in our cities.

Building new towns in east and west Devon will make matters worse. They will further empty the population from the cities and cost the taxpayer an enormous sum in building new services for them. That is not to mention the cost of decommissioning old infrastructure in abandoned urban areas. I remember that, in Liverpool, schools in the inner city were constantly being closed, which cost a fortune. Taxpayers would have to meet the cost of decommissioning all sorts of infrastructure in Plymouth, Exeter and other cities as the people moved out.

It is likely that national advertisements will continue to encourage people from outside the county to drift to the south-west. That rise in migration into Devon is currently at the rate of between 32,000 and 35,000 people a year. That is equivalent to seven or eight times the population of Totnes—or Kingsbridge, which is in my constituency—entering Devon each year. Those figures have been rising as we build more and more houses.

The Government cannot be excused for failing to recognise what is happening and how it will damage the beauty and quality of the environment in the south-west. The Liberal Democrats have even less excuse for letting that damage take place under their very noses. They have approved a massive programme of unsustainable development, and they are answerable to the electorate in Devon for what they are allowing to happen. That electorate must remember that they will have an opportunity to get rid of the Liberal Democrats on 6 May.

Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

No, I have given way enough.

Buzz words such as "plan and manage" are fine, but they are meaningless if they allow the building of 90,000 houses all over Devon. Such a level of house building is simply not sustainable. The Liberal Democrats know that; the Government know that and I know that. Politicians in authority and the Liberal Democrats in Devon have no excuse for not taking action to stop that house building. They have the means but not the will or the inclination to stop it.

Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

No, if the hon. Gentleman wants to catch your eye, Mr. Deputy Speaker, he can make his own points, provided that I do not go on for too long. There are politicians without backbone and the Liberal Democrats are good examples. They are always passing the buck.

It is not too late for the Government to ensure that new homes, many of which are needed for local people, are built in the right place. Our cities are crying out for new investment, new enterprise and new opportunities. The countryside is Britain's finest asset. To concrete over thousands of acres in the next 12 years will be environmental vandalism of the worst possible kind. The electorate will not forget that betrayal at the next general election.

I am grateful for the opportunity to participate in this debate on well-worn territory. I initiated a debate on this subject last year, and I have intervened on the hon. Member for Totnes (Mr. Steen) in a half-hour debate. Some of us are interested in these issues and continue to battle on.

My stance is fairly well known. I support the Government's approach, but I have not been uncritical on certain points, including housing numbers. I shall concentrate on the household projection and its implications, but first I shall set the issue in context because the Government have done much good work and have had a difficult task given the problems that they were left by the previous Administration.

I was interested to hear the speech of my hon. Friend the Minister for the Regions, Regeneration and Planning to a conference of the Economic and Social Research Council on 2 March, and I heartily agree with many of his remarks. It is only too clear that, unless we take action, we will face difficulties in future. I support, as I am sure all hon. Members do, the movement away from predict and provide and the emphasis on brown-field development, with the 60 per cent. target. I should like to know how the Conservative party could raise that figure, because it has a history of having much lower targets.

There is undue criticism of the Rogers task force. I invited the task force to Stroud. It is doing much good work, but it is not yet ready to complete its report. We shall find out what the report says about fiscal measures and planning changes and I hope that my right hon. Friend the Chancellor will then deal with those. Perhaps now is not the right time for that.

The Labour party is committed to considering the whole area of planning guidance. A number of consultation papers have been issued and I am sure that hon. Members have responded. We look forward to the results. We view the emphasis on the regional dimension as an important departure which should be heartily supported. In a nutshell—I use an analogy from another policy area—we are seeking a firmer, faster and fairer method of planning and implementation.

We have a sword of Damocles hanging over us in the form of the 4.4 million household projection. There is a rumour—perhaps it is now more of a prediction—that the figure is likely to increase when the Government issue their new projection. Paraphrasing the argument of the hon. Member for Totnes, I juxtapose the encroachment into the green-field areas, while our inner cities continue to decline. We must grapple with that problem and turn a lose-lose situation into a win-win situation.

We have long experience of the problems in my county. The debate so far has focused on Devon and Cornwall, but the pain is felt in Gloucestershire and in my district, Stroud. Any meeting on housing is always packed with members of the public, who have an understandable interest in the subject. I congratulate the councillors who have tried to grapple with the issue; it is not always pleasant.

We heard reference to NIMBYism. One person's self-interest is another person's demoralisation and the denigration of his area. The planning process must work properly, or the less privileged will lose out and those who have no voice will always be dumped on. As a politician, I am not prepared to see that happen. We are in politics to do something about it.

There is a need for balance. We must conserve our landscape, where appropriate, but we must also allow evolution in rural as well as urban areas. That means building not on every green-field site, but on appropriate sites in an appropriate way. I shall return to that theme later.

The central tenet of my argument is that there is a fundamental difference between the need for housing and housing need. Recently, we have concentrated on the need for housing, and on delivering what developers tell us there is demand for. We have failed to grasp that those in real need are being let down, in both rural and urban Britain. Contrary to what has been alleged from the Opposition Benches, I have villages where people are crying out for social housing and where the young people are being driven out. That is social exclusion of the worst kind. Why should future generations not be able to carry on living there?

rose—

I am aware that the hon. Gentleman wants to intervene, but I am sure that he will understand that I want to keep my remarks fairly brief. Perhaps he will catch your eye in due course, Mr. Deputy Speaker.

There is social exclusion, unfairness and unsustainability. If a village is not living, evolving and moving, it is not a place where many people want to live. They do not want their villages pickled in aspic, to remain as they were in the 19th century. That is not sensible.

Experience has shown that, if development is carried out properly, it can work well. Too often, the problem in rural Britain is that a development is proposed which may include affordable housing or even social housing, the principle is agreed to and the planning application is allowed, but suddenly the developers change their mind and propose a development of four or five-bedroomed executive homes. Lo and behold, the very people for whom the housing was intended are excluded. There are many examples of that, which the Government must tackle.

The problem of the dereliction of urban Britain is not confined to the cities. In the market towns of my region, there is much evidence of the need for regeneration through sensible housing policies, including the possibility of people living over a shop. There are too many barriers, social and economic, to such development. I hope that the urban task force under Lord Rogers will offer new ideas to move it forward.

The difficulties originate in the ever-growing number of housing requirements. I am a critic of the trend-based forecasting on which the Office for National Statistics relies. My argument is that what happened in the past is not necessarily what is happening now, let alone what will happen in the future. I know that consultation has been offered, to examine alternative methodologies and mechanisms. I welcome a debate on alternative approaches to projections.

I readily agree that projections are necessary for planning. If we do not know what we are planning for, it is difficult to know whether we are delivering what is required. However, there is a need for alternatives such as the bottom-up approach, and ways of dealing with issues such as net migration flows, which are particularly relevant in the south-west.

Household projections are not the same as housing projections. I readily admit that questions of social engineering arise, about which some hon. Members may feel uneasy. If the Government are not prepared to consider such matters, who will? We need to understand the effect of the growth in single households. That is not a good thing in itself, although it may be what people want. An analogous case is that of the motor car. We know that more and more cars will eventually lead to increasing congestion and misery.

I have outlined some of the issues that the Government must take up and introduce into the planning procedures. They have a difficult task, but they have made some movement. We need new planning procedures sooner rather than later. I hope my hon. Friend the Under-Secretary will tell us that those will be discussed shortly. We all have a part to play. People feel that they have been excluded in the past, and they have strong views to express. I hope that the debate today will take matters forward.

As the dust settles on Mr. Brown's Budget, we should reflect on two missed opportunities—the absence of a green-field development tax, and the absence of any moves towards equalising the VAT on new build and conversions. Those measures would have helped to reduce the rate of urbanisation, which is running at a rate of 110 sq km a year, and increased the percentage of new homes built on previously developed land, which all parties in the House support.

Such measures would have helped the Government towards their somewhat unambitious target of 60 per cent. of development on brown-field land and reduced the impact on our countryside of the 4.4 million or possibly 5 million—I believe that an announcement is expected shortly—new homes that will be needed by 2016.

The absence of any measures to equalise VAT on new build and conversions will make it virtually impossible to bring into circulation the hundreds of thousands of empty homes in England and Wales. That view is supported by the Empty Homes Agency. I spoke to its chief executive, Ashley Horsey, this morning. He said:

"The Government claims to be promoting brownfield development and looking for an urban renaissance. Such action is meaningless if they are not prepared to take real effective action."

It is worth reminding hon. Members of the facts about empty homes. There is a 4 per cent. vacancy rate in the United Kingdom. That is the equivalent of almost 800,000 empty homes. In Holland, the vacancy rate is 2.3 per cent. By matching Holland's vacancy rate, we would create 300,000 to 350,000 new homes.

There are also empty flats above shops. According to a report produced by the Department of the Environment, Transport and the Regions, about 1,500 flats were created above shops between 1992 and 1995. Assuming that conversion has continued at that rate, about 20,000 flats could be created above shops.

Office conversions offer further potential accommodation. Estimates suggest that 20,000 flats could be created in London. Assuming that that figure could be doubled across England and Wales, there is the possibility that a total of 400,000 new homes could be created from office conversions and by utilising empty homes and flats above shops. That figure represents 10 per cent. of the need. We can all imagine how much safer and more attractive our cities and towns would be if those empty homes were brought back into use. By ruling out a green-field development tax, Gordon Brown has sent the wrong signal—

Order. That is the second occasion on which the hon. Gentleman has made such a mistake, and I hope that he will not do so again.

I apologise, Mr. Deputy Speaker.

By ruling out a green-field development tax, Chancellor has sent the wrong signal to developers.

Until we have the urban task force's report, no recommendation is in place as to how that would take effect.

I thank the hon. Gentleman and I note what he says.

Mr. Brown's Budget was—

Order. If the hon. Gentleman continues in this way, he will have to resume his seat. He knows the conventions of the House.

I am sorry, Mr. Deputy Speaker.

The Chancellor's Budget was, without doubt, a bad Budget for brown-field sites; but other developments could make the Government's task of minimising the environmental and aesthetic damage of new housing estates harder—the creation of the regional development agencies.

In evidence to the Environment Sub-Committee yesterday, the Minister for the Regions, Regeneration and Planning said that the RDAs' role would be to make good the economic deficit in the regions. That is a perfectly valid objective for the RDAs, but another must be to ensure that development is sustainable. That objective is given much less prominence.

Does my hon. Friend agree that we have had a monumental dollop of hypocrisy from the hon. Member for Totnes (Mr. Steen)? Does he recall that the previous Government dictated—

Order. We must always have temperate language in the House. I would not associate the hon. Member for Totnes or any other hon. Member with hypocrisy.

The RDAs will have to track an environmental indicator—the percentage of new homes built on previously developed land. But that is only one such sustainable development indicator. The RDAs will have to pay regard to many more economic indicators.

With the proliferation of the different bodies that will operate at a regional level—the RDAs, the regional chambers, the regional planning conferences, the regional government offices and Whitehall—the potential for confusion about household projections and the preferred locations for development is enormous.

Confusion is the best case scenario. The worst case scenario is a bloody battle between the RDAs and the regional planning conferences, with the former seeking to promote industry and housing in an environmentally sensitive area, and the latter fighting any such development. The potential for chaos is not helped by the Government's unwillingness to state whether regional planning guidance or the RDAs' regional strategies will be pre-eminent.

I hope that PPG11, which is to be reissued at the end of the consultative process, will clear up some of those uncertainties, but the draft has not made a good start. It says:

"the Regional Planning Bodies should work with the Government Office and other stakeholders to establish the level of housing required to meet the region's housing needs. In making this assessment the Government's latest published household projections should be taken into account."

It goes on to say:

"the Regional Planning Bodies should take a realistic and responsible approach to future housing provision",

and

"once the housing requirement in RPG has been established and confirmed by the Secretary of State".

That still smacks of intervention by the Secretary of State. We might yet find that the corpse of predict and provide makes a full recovery on the mortuary slab.

One final aspect which has not been given sufficient consideration in this or other debates about household projections and new residential developments is water provision. As more water is taken from the environment to meet increasing demand, more and more wetlands are drying out. That has been confirmed in reports produced by English Nature, the biodiversity challenge group and the Environment Agency in recent years.

All the new households that will be built will need water, and it is estimated that about 214 million litres a day will be needed. London will need an extra 25 million by 2016. Yet the water supply is already stressed and any further increase in demand will exacerbate the problems, and probably cause drying out on other sites as well.

To cope with the increased demand, new reservoirs and new river transfer schemes will be needed. It is essential that the Government issue new planning guidance to planners to ensure that water is seen as a constraint on new development. That is in line with the recommendation of the Select Committee on the Environment, Transport and Regional Affairs, which stated:

"water supply should become a major part of the consultation and planning process. Planning authorities should be given the power to insist that water efficiency measures are included in new houses and to refuse developments where they are concluded that it would not be possible to provide adequate water supplies without damage to the environment."

That national planning guidance must be produced quickly to address issues such as from where the water resources would come and how any additional water demands would be met.

I hope that the Under-Secretary will respond positively to some of my concerns in relation to a green-field development tax, VAT equalisation, RDAs, regional planning guidance and water resources, but he will find it hard to convince the House that the Chancellor's Budget has not scuppered the Government's chance of hitting their 60 per cent. target of development on brown-field sites

I share the privilege of representing a constituency in what I hope hon. Members will agree is probably the most beautiful county of Devon. In the few minutes available, I want to tackle some of the issues concerning where the new houses can be built, because some misleading statements have been made about the extent to which the cities can accommodate them.

The space as well as the distance are two of the attractions that generate the desire among constituents of many other hon. Members to go and live in the south-west, and particularly in Devon and Cornwall. As the Under-Secretary of State for the Environment, Transport and the Regions, my hon. Friend the Member for Greenwich and Woolwich (Mr. Raynsford), said in a debate instigated by the hon. Member for Totnes (Mr. Steen) on 9 December 1998, we do not live in a Maoist society in which we can ban such migration.

The population projections take account of population change and household formation, and that includes migration. Migration into Devon always comes under the closest scrutiny. For the reasons that I have mentioned— space, distance and beauty—in-migration is a significant factor in some parts of our county, but not within the Plymouth sub-region. Our principle need is for housing to meet the needs of our existing population.

Plymouth is an attractive city. The Shell guide praises its waterfront as one of pre-eminence in the world, and The Independent lists Plymouth as the 26th most interesting place in the world to be at the millennium, alongside other cities such as Moscow and Paris. [Laughter.] Hon. Members may laugh, but there are good reasons for that, to which I may return in another debate. I mean The Independent, not the local rag The Sunday Independent.

The aspiration of many hundreds of thousands of people is for country living in small villages and towns, or something more remote on moor or coast. I prefer city life, but I understand why many of those bringing up families and seeking a peaceful retirement should make such a choice.

If the hon. Member for Totnes and his colleagues believe in choice—I think that they do—he must respect those who chose to move to join us in the many privileges that we enjoy. I hope that he also seeks to represent the interests of those most in need, particularly housing need, in his constituency.

The hon. Gentleman will have noted paragraph 6.12 of the report from the panel that conducted the public examination of the Devon structure plan, which states:

"Having regard to the various representations on this matter, the Panel find that there is no convincing evidence to conclude other than that restricting new house building would serve not to stop immigration but to significantly worsen the living conditions of those at the lower end of the housing market."

The report continues:

"the Panel fundamentally rejects the view that somehow under provision is not a significant problem. Under provision is likely to hit those most in housing need in the community and damage the housing prospects of the next generation."

The projections for Plymouth predict growth, not from migration, despite the attractions of our city, but from changes in the household needs of the citizens of Plymouth. Meeting those needs will be challenging for us. The structure plan for Plymouth proposes that 6,800 dwellings should be built between 1995 and 2011. Plymouth city council has said that it will seek to provide those dwellings within its boundaries, but that is clearly a tough target. In all previous analysis, the council identified potential for 5,500 sites, and that figure has been based on existing allocations, estimates for conversions of properties into flats and windfall opportunities on small sites.

An extra 1,300 dwellings on top of that known potential is also a tough target. The council is working hard to apply the Government's philosophy, which is identified in the White Paper "Planning for Communities of the Future". However, even with greater use of recycled lands, it will still be pushed to accommodate 6,800 dwellings, especially because, where redevelopment of poor housing is to take place—often because that housing is unfit and poorly laid out and of an inappropriately high density—the aim will rightly be to reduce density and maintain our precious and, many of my constituents would say, too few, open spaces.

One can say that some debates are timely, but I do not believe that of this debate. On 26 February 1999, the Devon structure plan was adopted by the five strategic authorities. They agreed that the housing proposals in the structure plan would stand, but there is also agreement that they should be closely monitored under the Government's provision of "plan, monitor and manage", as outlined in the White Paper. All five authorities are seeking to progress the structure plan positively. They are committed to a proper process of monitoring and review in the light of future events and the requirements of my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State.

At regional level, the planning guidance for the period to 2016 is being considered. That, too, will provide a proper framework within which the interests and concerns of our local authorities and the constituents of Plymouth, Sutton and of Torbay—as well as the interests and concerns of the constituents of the hon. Member for Totnes—can be properly addressed. I urge the hon. Member for Totnes to take an early flight, as I did this morning, on a clear day and to reconsider, in the light of the space that he would observe beneath him, the contrast between the vast spaces of his constituency and the high density of the population of my constituency and that of my hon. Friend the Member for Plymouth, Devonport (Mr. Jamieson).

I reject the endorsement of the hon. Member for Totnes of the narrow-minded NIMBYism of some of his constituents, many of whom are the very same people who have sought to exercise their choice, as he did, to migrate to our beautiful county of Devon.

I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Totnes (Mr. Steen) on raising this issue and on his masterly exposition of the current situation, particularly in Devon. The beauty of his constituency is second only to that of my constituency. I look forward to visiting his constituency, before it all disappears under concrete.

As my hon. Friend explained, how typical it is of the Liberal Democrats to say one thing about the environment and do something quite different when they are in control. In my constituency, the local Liberal Democrats forced through planning permission to overdevelop Beachy Head, which is a major attraction for visitors to my constituency.

Does the hon. Gentleman think that there is something rather incongruous about the position taken by the hon. Member for Totnes (Mr. Steen)? Does he recall that a housing figure for Devon of more than 100,000 units was dictated by the previous Government? Devon county stuck to its guns and the Secretary of State has agreed to slightly more than 70,000 dwelling units.

I always think that my hon. Friend is noted for his congruousness. The very best of the hon. Gentleman's case is that his colleagues on the council have collaborated in those overdevelopments.

I commend my hon. Friend the Member for Totnes for putting his finger on many of the central issues. He has long service in the House and told us some of the background to recycling land, which is nothing new. However, I suspect that his excellent book "Plums", which I read a long time ago, is out of print.

My hon. Friend described how predict and provide had been replaced by plan and manage. How right he was that these figures should be treated not as targets, but merely as projections, and he drew attention to a central point— the Government's failure to implement their brown-field site policy.

There is considerable expert and political argument over the projection of 4.4 million homes needed by 2016. We have heard that that figure may increase. However, the Government's view seems to be that that is the best available figure in all the circumstances. Conservative Members remain highly sceptical, particularly bearing in mind the fact that there are supposed to be 1 million empty dwellings in this country.

Where are all those new homes to go? The Government still seem to be fumbling for a policy. In the meantime, there are constant encroachments on the green belt, often with the connivance of the Secretary of State. The worst example is the go-ahead given for 10,000 new homes on green-belt land near Stevenage. Nearer my constituency, the Secretary of State is forcing West Sussex to build 58,700 new houses by 2011. We have heard from my hon. Friend the Member for Totnes about the parlous situation in and near his constituency.

Nationally, if new housing continues to be built on green-field sites at the present rate, an area the size of Suffolk will disappear under concrete by the time today's school leavers reach retirement age. The green belt must be protected if we are to avoid urban sprawl, and I am proud that, under the previous Conservative Government, the size of the green belt was doubled.

A great deal of the Government's hopes are pinned on the development of brown-field or recycled sites, but there is growing evidence that their faith is misplaced. Their declared target is for 60 per cent. of new developments to be built on brown-field sites, which is a belated increase from 50 per cent after sustained pressure from Conservative Members, among others. [Interruption.] The Under-Secretary laughs, but he may remember his description of a target of 60 per cent. as a "recipe for disaster".

We have suggested two thirds of new development as a target and, according to the Select Committee, some witnesses suggested that 75 per cent. is feasible. Let us be fair and judge the Government on their stated target.

Is not the problem that brown-field sites tend to be where people are migrating from and green-field sites are in the parts of the country to which people are migrating? That is true nationally and in Devon, where the brown-field sites are in Plymouth. People do not want to move to Plymouth, however, and the green-field sites are in the county, which is where people want to live.

The hon. Gentleman is being a little over-simplistic, but there is a problem of mismatch as he describes.

Let us judge the Government on their stated target. The problem is that rhetoric and reality have parted company. The Government's performance in respect of brown-field sites is still limping along on a figure of 53 per cent. That is not so much urban renaissance as a new dark age, with concrete being poured indiscriminately.

What has become of the draft consultation version of PPG3? The Under-Secretary of State for the Environment, Transport and the Regions, the hon. Member for Greenwich and Woolwich (Mr. Raynsford), said on 3 February that it would be with us shortly. He is stretching the word "shortly" a little, but no doubt he will tell us when we will see it. What has happened to Lord Rogers and his task force? I am delighted to learn that they visited Stroud, and no doubt there have been other sightings of them; but when will they produce something with which we can grapple?

We hear a great deal about a "sequential" approach to planning, but that in itself may cause delays and problems. The Under-Secretary may be aware of a study published recently by the Civic Trust and the House-Builders Federation, which focused on 54 potential brown-field sites identified as long ago as 1986. The study discovered that only 39 sites—72 per cent.—had been developed at all in the intervening time, and that only 29, or 54 per cent., had been developed for housing on either all or part of a site. It concluded:

"The Government's target of 60 per cent. of new homes to be built on recycled or brownfield land will not be realised unless action is taken to learn from past failings and the process is improved and strengthened".

The study helpfully lists a series of problems that arose in many of the case studies. It mentions the problem of contaminated land, and what it describes as

"a lack of flexibility, creativity, technical and market knowledge in some local authorities",

which, it says, can

"hinder … public/private partnerships".

The whole question of land assembly is often crucial to such developments. It is not a happy story.

Will my hon. Friend give way?

No.

The Under-Secretary may also have seen "An Urban and Rural Renaissance", an excellent document produced by Shelter. According to the document,

"Current planning and housing policies are failing to ensure the provision of sufficient affordable housing".

Shelter makes clear just how many improvements in the planning system are needed to deal with the problems. All too often, that system fails us in terms of the identification and use of brown-field sites. Such studies are important, and worrying.

In his remarkable speech, my hon. Friend the Member for Totnes made an excellent point: he said that there should be an incentive for developers to build in towns, and a disincentive for them to build in rural areas. I could not agree more; how sad that the Government, in the shape of the Chancellor of the Exchequer, ducked the issue only yesterday.

Perhaps the Under-Secretary has noted, and will comment on, an excellent proposal made by my hon. Friend the Member for South Suffolk (Mr. Yeo). My hon. Friend has suggested a system of tradeable tokens, whereby a developer who built a home on a previously developed site—a brown-field site—would be awarded a token and, as well as obtaining planning consent, those wishing to build on green-field sites would be required to produce two such tokens before they could do so. That would easily, and with minimal administration and costs, deliver the two-thirds target to which Conservative Members currently aspire.

Conservative Members are working hard—that is an example—to protect our environment and to come up with practical, constructive solutions to the problems that any Government will undoubtedly face in this regard. I can promise that we shall continue to drag the Under-Secretary and his hon. Friends to the House until they finally develop a proper and workable policy of their own, to replace the incoherent shambles that lies before us now.

I congratulate the hon. Member for Totnes (Mr. Steen) on securing the debate, and on his persistence; he has raised this issue before. As the hon. Member for Eastbourne (Mr. Waterson) observed, his was a remarkable speech, in which he made a number of valid points with which I wholeheartedly agree. He produced a passionate defence of the case for building in cities and regenerating them for the urban renaissance, and for the use of brown-field sites. I entirely agree with him, and hope to say more shortly about what the Government are doing in that regard.

However, the hon. Gentleman showed a certain Jekyll and Hyde tendency, which was most obvious when he delivered what was probably the most emphatic endorsement of NIMBYism that I have ever heard in the House. I do not think that I have previously heard anyone describe "not in my back yard" as a good principle. I believe that I have quoted the hon. Gentleman correctly. He also slightly glossed over his own career pattern, which rather contradicts the course that he has urged on us. He wants us to ensure that there is no move towards green-field building, and to concentrate on brown-field sites. He forgets, however, that, as a former MP for a brown-field constituency in Liverpool, he has gone in exactly the opposite direction—to the green fields of Devon.

Regrettably, the boundary commissioners completely destroyed my constituency of Liverpool, Wavertree. Every one of my five wards went into a new constituency, which is now run by the Labour party. I would have stayed in Liverpool had I had that chance.

I am tempted to say that I hope the hon. Gentleman will have an encounter with the boundary commission in the near future that will enable him to renew his acquaintance with brown-field constituents.

I am afraid that, in a number of respects, the hon. Gentleman did not fully recognise the extent of the changed agenda that the Government are already introducing, which is making a significant difference. I shall give the figures, but, for the moment, suffice it to say that Devon is a very good example of the flexibility of our new system—which, by the way, is "plan, monitor and manage": the word "monitor" got left out. It is working far better than the old predict-and-provide approach that characterised the last Government.

The hon. Gentleman said that there was no scope for local authorities to trade housing targets or housing levels. There is, and the new system provides a very good framework. The hon. Gentleman has a particular problem with the household projections. He also has a problem with how the housing situation in Devon could be better managed. I shall take each point in turn. As he knows, we have changed our approach to establishing housing numbers. Our new draft PPG11—which was entirely misunderstood by the hon. Member for Carshalton and Wallington (Mr. Brake)—sets out our proposals for improving the preparation and content of regional planning guidance. It represents an important step in the modernisation of the planning system, and reflects our commitment to decentralised decision making and integrated policy making to achieve sustainable solutions.

The new arrangements give more responsibility to local authorities, through regional planning conferences, in the preparation of regional planning strategies. They should lead to increased regional ownership of the policies, and increased commitment to their delivery. Instead of the Government, the regional planning body will be responsible for preparation of the draft regional strategy, which will include proposing the amount of additional housing that will be needed in the plan period.

The new arrangements provide a more open and inclusive process for the determination of planning issues at regional level. The new strategies, including the new housing figures, will be tested at a public examination before an independent panel, whose report will be made public. The procedure has been piloted in East Anglia, where a public examination of the draft planning strategy for the area was completed last month. The regional planning guidance for the south-west is still at the pre-draft stage. One of the key tasks of the new-style regional planning guidance will be to advise on the overall level of housing and its distribution within the region, with the aim of making full use of previously developed land.

In assessing the housing provision required for the 15 to 20-year period covered by the strategy, we expect the regional planning body to work with other regional stakeholders to establish the level of housing required to meet the region's housing needs. In the making of that assessment, the Government's latest published household projections should be taken into account—that is perfectly logical and reasonable—but we are not insisting that they are targets, as the hon. Gentleman seemed to think. They are projections, and should be treated as such.

The Minister has spoken of a policy shift towards planning, monitoring and managing. Is not the logic of that change in policy such that it should be applied to the present situation in Devon? If things go ahead as planned, Devon will be transformed; it will be wrecked and ruined out of all recognition. The Minister has made a policy change on which I compliment him— now let him follow through the logic.

Clearly, with any change of policy there needs to be an orderly progression from the existing procedure to the new one. That is what we are doing. If the hon. Gentleman will bear with me when I come to Devon, he will see that the operation of the principles that underpin the Government's new approach is having a positive impact in Devon. I hope that he will recognise that.

As well as looking at the Government's figures as guidance, not as a target, we expect regional planning conferences to undertake urban capacity studies to explore the implications of changing policies and standards, which would reduce the land take of new development while securing attractive residential environments.

Against that background of need and capacity, the regional planning body should be able to take a realistic and responsible approach to future housing provision. It must be prepared to justify its views fully in public at the examination—that is fairly obvious. The structure plan and unitary plan authorities will, of course, be party to that process, so there is plenty of scope for them to negotiate and to discuss the apportionment between them.

The problem is that the west country is run by the Liberal Democrats. They control the county council, the district council and the unitary authority, so it is the Liberal Democrats talking to each other.

The hon. Gentleman displays a curious degree of ignorance of local politics. Is he not aware that the distinguished city of Plymouth is a Labour-controlled authority? He appears to have a complaint about the process of democracy. We are all here courtesy of that process and we should respect the verdict of the electorate.

The presumption is that, once the housing requirement has been established and confirmed by my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State following the public examination, structure plans and unitary district plans should focus on the broad distribution and location of growth. The essence of the plan, monitor and manage approach is that both the assessment of housing requirements and distribution within the region should be kept under review. If there are signs of either under or over-provision, we expect both RPG and development plans to be reviewed accordingly. We need to work together in ensuring that the new approach is developed in as constructive a context as possible.

I want to deal with the points that were made by the hon. Member for Totnes about the Devon structure plan and the county's proposed new settlements adjoining Exeter and Plymouth. As I have mentioned, household growth is a fact and it is for local authorities in each area to find the best possible solutions for managing the growth sustainably. We cannot turn our back on the need to house people, and I do not think that any hon. Member would suggest that.

The Devon structure plan was not imposed by the Government; it was proposed and adopted by the local authorities on 26 February. That outcome shows that the plan, manage and monitor approach is flexible, while maintaining our commitment to ensuring that everyone has the opportunity of a decent home. That approach is based on a thorough analysis of the available evidence.

The structure plan has raised two main issues: the overall figures for new housing and proposals for two new communities, one near Exeter and the other near Plymouth. Obviously, I shall concentrate on the one near Plymouth. First, I shall look at the overall housing provision. Regional planning guidance figures were agreed by the authorities in 1994 under the previous Government. They indicated 83,000 extra houses in Devon between 1995 and 2011, based on 1989 household projections. The independent panel that examined the plan in public in 1997 tested it against more recent 1992-based projections. Unusually, those projections were lower than the 1989-based set, and the panel therefore recommended 79,000 extra houses, a reduction of some 4,000 on the previous figure.

The five structure plan authorities published modifications in October 1998—at that stage, under the present Government. They proposed a lower figure still of 75,800 houses, 3,200 less than the figure that was recommended following the examination in public. There were two reasons for that. First, actual house building during the 1990s was well below the rates that were projected both in regional planning guidance and by the panel: during 1995–97, a period for which figures were not available to the panel, 2,100 fewer homes than the projected number were built. Secondly, it was felt that the achievement of Government objectives to reduce vacancies in the housing stock would absorb more of the extra households—an estimated 1,100 more.

After careful consideration of those proposals in the light of our new policy, spelt out in "Planning for the Communities of the Future", the Secretary of State accepted that the county's proposal for 75,800 houses did not need to be raised. We accepted its case that lower than expected house building during the mid-1990s did indicate a lower requirement for the period to 2011. That should not be taken as a precedent for other counties because circumstances vary from county to county.

Will the Minister give way?

I will in a moment.

House building rates can be affected by a variety of factors—for example, land availability or other supply-side problems. The circumstances in Devon do not suggest supply-side limits to house building. In addition, the county level, 1996-based population projections that were published by the Office for National Statistics in December 1998 show a further small reduction in projected population growth for 1996–2006, which weakens the case for raising provision.

I want to clarify that point and get it on the record. Is the Minister saying that the amount of housing that has been accepted by the Government is less than was originally predicted under the previous Government and, therefore, that the comments of the hon. Member for Totnes (Mr. Steen) were less than accurate?

Yes, I can confirm that, but I am surprised that the hon. Gentleman could not have drawn that conclusion from what I said. I thought that I had made it clear that that was the case.

We do not regard new communities as free-standing new settlements, as described in "Planning for the Communities of the Future." As proposed, they are distinct, compact new neighbourhoods close to, and with good links with the two cities concerned.

Will the Minister give way?

I am afraid that I cannot give way to the hon. Lady. I know that she is greatly concerned about the matter, but I have only three minutes left and I have important matters to cover. I am sorry.

On the plan for Plymouth, no precise location has yet been proposed and no name has yet been given to the new settlement, but it is proposed that the development might be between half a mile and three miles from the urban edge of Plymouth.

The independent panel endorsed the new community proposals as potentially the best way in which to secure balanced and sustainable communities with the proper level of services and facilities. The Exeter community is related to large-scale employment development and a rail freight terminal proposal. The Plymouth one is being developed to meet the need for accommodation for people from Plymouth, which was graphically described by my hon. Friend the Member for Plymouth, Sutton (Mrs. Gilroy).

The whole aim is, of course, to ensure that we concentrate development in areas where it is appropriate and sustainable, rather than allow indiscriminate development across a wide area of rural Devon, which clearly is the concern of the hon. Member for South-West Devon (Mr. Streeter), whose comments on the proposals, from what I have seen, have been entirely responsible and appropriate. The alternative to new settlements would be indiscriminate and unsustainable housing development. I do not think that anyone would welcome that.

The way forward lies in building on the positive options for meeting housing requirements and for protecting the countryside. There is far more common ground than is sometimes acknowledged. Everyone wants to see as much land recycling as possible and more sustainable patterns of development, to protect the countryside, to regenerate urban areas and to ensure that people are properly housed. The Government are developing that agenda as proactively as possible. There is much more work to be done to help authorities to develop that agenda.

We have a full programme of revising the relevant PPG notes. We will shortly publish the draft PPG3, which will detail policies to underpin our recycling target. We expect authorities throughout the country, including authorities in the south-west, to do their bit to maximise land recycling. We are also working on other planning guidance notes, such as those on transport, and have published draft guidance on regional planning and development plans.

The Government are acting positively, seriously and responsibly in dealing with an important agenda. That contrasts with the previous Government—

Order. We must now turn to the next debate.

I thank Madam Speaker for choosing this debate, which is a very important one for the people in the area represented by me and my hon. Friends the Members for Upminster (Mr. Darvill) and for Romford (Mrs. Gordon). I also thank the Minister, my hon. Friend the Member for Knowsley, North and Sefton, East (Mr. Howarth), who will reply to the debate.

I have been involved in the campaign to keep Hornchurch's second fire pump from even before the cut was announced—as there had been some indication that there would be such a cut. In the past three or four months, there has been a magnificent campaign— particularly by the Hornchurch fire fighters, who led the campaign, and by the people of Hornchurch—against the cut. A few weeks ago, we had a public meeting outside the fire station that attracted about 1,000 people, who were primarily from Hornchurch but also from Romford and Upminster. Previously, we had a public meeting that attracted about 200 people.

I have received about 1,000 letters on the issue, including one recently from officials and representatives of the Royal College of Nursing, who object to losing the engine both on health grounds and because of the area's many nursing homes—particularly in the more far flung and vulnerable parts of the ground—and other health facilities, such as our two hospitals and many doctors' surgeries. Two particularly far-flung nursing homes are in the constituency of my hon. Friend the Member for Upminster.

Recently, Hornchurch fire fighters and I handed in to No. 10 Downing street a petition containing the names of 40,000 people who want to keep the second pump at Hornchurch. We also handed in to the London fire and civil defence authority, on Albert embankment, approximately 12,000 consultation leaflets that had been completed by local people, all of whom were against the cut and said that they were willing to pay more, in council tax and perhaps in other charges, to keep the fire pump in Hornchurch.

All of those representations have been ignored by the London fire and civil defence authority, which has treated the people of Hornchurch contemptuously. Tony Ritchie, the authority leader, and other authority members have simply brushed aside the opinions of the people of Hornchurch and those living in other parts of the ground, saying, "We're going to get rid of the pump anyway." They have been absolutely contemptuous.

Hon. Members should remember that since 1986, 63 pumps have been cut from Greater London fire stations, 14 of which have gone since the Docklands bomb—on a night when the London fire authority was pulling in pumps from as far away as Essex and Surrey. The cuts make us wonder whether we could cope in London if there was another, similar massive disaster. In addition to previous cuts, the LFCDA is planning to cut another five pumps across London. Today, however, I am dealing specifically with the Hornchurch pump.

The London fire authority has a £5 million reserve in the bank and, in the current financial year, an underspend of £6.5 million. Very likely, there will be an underspend also in the next financial year. I therefore cannot understand why the authority insists on cutting the Hornchurch pump or the other four pumps. I shall certainly watch the future career of Tony Ritchie with great interest.

My ground of Hornchurch is one of the biggest—the second biggest—in Greater London. We have had two appliances since 1936, when Hornchurch was still a village. Many older people in the area still refer to Hornchurch as a village. In 1936, both Rainham, in the south, and Upminster were also tiny villages. Since 1936, there has been an enormous expansion not only in the population, which has increased many fold, but in roads. We now have the M25 and the A127, on which the Hornchurch pumps spend a great deal of time. Hornchurch's pumps spend a lot of time covering the A13 and the A12 also, although they are not in our ground. All of those roads are hugely busy, particularly at rush hour, taking people in and out of London.

There has also been enormous industrial development in the ground. The Fairview estate, for example—which is in the south of my constituency—often has to be covered by the Hornchurch pumps. Ferry lane, which also is in my constituency, frequently has fires and problems that must be attended by our fire brigade. All those developments—including increased industrialisation— have occurred in the past 50 years.

Traffic jams on the big roads—particularly the A13, A127 and M25—often entail enormous tailbacks. People leave the main roads, go on to back roads that they do not know very well, drive too fast and have accidents. Therefore, there are major problems on the back roads that also have to be attended by the Hornchurch pumps.

In the past few years, risk categorisation in the borough of Havering has been greatly reduced. At one time, parts of Romford were A risk, and Hornchurch was generally B risk. Now, the ground has nothing but C and D risk areas. That is unfair. Even on the basis of current risk assessment, there is no reason why Hornchurch and Romford should not be categorised as B risk. Arguably, parts of Romford should be classified as A risk.

Currently, the Home Office is conducting a fire cover review. I argue today—as I did in a previous debate on the subject—that, until the review is completed, there should be a moratorium on cuts in front-line fire cover in Greater London. I hope that the review will recommend using risk-based assessment. However, until the review is finished, we shall not know the future basis of fire cover. I believe that the use of risk-based assessment will ensure that there will be at least two pumps at Hornchurch for ever and a day.

In the past two years, the number of two-pump call-outs at Hornchurch has increased from 396—in 1997—to about 430 last year. There is not yet a definitive figure for 1998, but it will be at least 430. Nevertheless, there has been an increase in the number of two-pump calls, which is the crucial factor when considering cutting the second pump at Hornchurch fire station. Last year, the total number of calls was 1,410—not 960, as the fire authority claimed—which includes calls to fires in other grounds.

I put those figures to the authority leader, Tony Ritchie, but he failed to respond to them. At a meeting well before Christmas, I told him the figures; he failed to respond. Shortly before the meeting at which the authority decided to proceed with the cut of five pumps, I again gave him the figures; again, he failed to respond. If he is prepared to treat a Member of Parliament like that, I wonder how he treats members of the public who approach him saying that they do not want any more cuts in the fire service. It makes the mind boggle.

In the past two years, the number of fire deaths in London have increased by one third. I cannot believe that that crucial fact—the huge increase in the number of fire deaths—is completely unconnected to the fact that there have been so many cuts in the London fire service. If we continue cutting, we shall have more loss of life and more serious injury.

Only last night, I discovered that—according to Hornchurch fire fighters—on Saturday, 30 January, Hornchurch was without fire cover for three hours: the station was empty, the pumps were out and no cover was provided by other stations. If Hornchurch is already going without fire cover for three hours on a Saturday—which is surely one of the station's busiest times—I should think that even the idea of cutting Hornchurch's second pump is simply dicing with death.

I have a strong personal view on the matter. My family lives in one of the more vulnerable parts of the ground, in Upminster. I do not want to see our home going up in smoke—and cutting the second pump would put families like mine at risk. I cannot see how we can continue to cut fire pumps from across Greater London and expect that there will not be an increase in deaths and injuries. The slogan of the Fire Brigades Union for many years has been "Cuts cost lives". That encapsulates what I am saying today. We cannot afford any more cuts and we certainly cannot afford to lose the fire pump at Hornchurch. I look forward to my hon. Friend the Minister's response.

I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Hornchurch (Mr. Cryer) on securing this debate and I endorse and support what he has said. Hornchurch fire station serves part of my constituency, as my hon. Friend said, and in particular Emerson Park, Cranham, Upminster and part of Harold Wood. That is a large area. In terms of area covered, my constituency is one of the largest in Greater London. It is no coincidence that Hornchurch fire station serves such a large area.

My constituents are very concerned at the chief fire officer's recommendation, which has now been endorsed by the London fire and civil defence authority. I share their concern. Like my hon. Friend, I live in the ground covered by Hornchurch fire station. I have been inundated by representations and messages of support for the campaign against the decision. My postbag is full of complaints from constituents; I am lobbied every time I walk down the high street and my friends and neighbours constantly raise the issue with me. It is a big issue in the area.

I had the opportunity to speak in an Adjournment debate a few weeks ago on the London fire services obtained by the hon. Member for Twickenham (Dr. Cable). I raised a number of points to which my hon. Friend the Minister helpfully said that he would respond in writing. I look forward to his response. I shall not repeat those points today, as I know that time is short, but I take this opportunity to request an early meeting with my hon. Friend the Minister to make further representations to him on behalf of my constituents, who are very worried. In the mean time, I urge him to consider the enormous number of representations that I know are being sent to him and to my right hon. Friend the Home Secretary.

There is a strong case for a postponement of the decision. I know that the risk-based assessment for fire cover is being reviewed. Changes in the London emergency services will come about as a result of the Greater London Authority Bill. I know that the finances of the LFCDA could tide us over until those changes happen.

Hornchurch does not merely provide direct fire cover. As my hon. Friend the Member for Hornchurch said, the area is surrounded by the M25, the A13 and the A127. They are busy roads and there are numerous accidents on them. The firefighters tell me that they are constantly called out to road traffic accidents on those roads. They are frequently able to save lives because advances have been made in ambulance services and improved treatment can be given to accident victims. My concern is that a reduction in the number of fire appliances will not only reduce the fire cover but reduce the number of incidents that the fire service can get to quickly to save lives.

The chief fire officer's recommendations are based on minimum cover. I believe that we should strive not merely to achieve minimum cover, but to obtain better cover for the area. A reduction in the number of fire appliances in Hornchurch will affect not only the ground but other parts of the area, including Romford, Dagenham and Wennington, which are covered by Hornchurch when local services are called out to emergencies. Our constituents' genuine concern is important. As the Members of Parliament representing the area, we need to emphasise that to Ministers. With all that in mind, I look forward to my hon. Friend the Minister's reply.

I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Hornchurch (Mr. Cryer) on securing this debate on Hornchurch fire station and my hon. Friend the Member for Upminster (Mr. Darvill) on his speech. I think that my hon. Friend the Member for Upminster is aware that this Minister is always willing to meet right hon. and hon. Members if they have a problem, as they perceive it, in their constituency. He may not be aware that my hon. Friend the Member for Hornchurch has already written to me asking for a meeting, and in a letter of 8 March I responded saying that I would be willing to meet him. If the arrangements have not been completed, they are certainly under way.

As hon. Members will know, there was a serious, tragic and horrific fire in Chingford last week. Our sympathies go out to all the friends and relatives of those who died in that fire. The cause is very suspicious and arson is strongly suspected. Regrettably, arson has increased considerably. In the past decade, 1.7 million fires have been started deliberately, causing 22,000 injuries and 1,100 deaths. We shall be publishing shortly the outcome of a Home Office review, which has examined the current arrangements for combating arson and will recommend a range of new measures arising out of that.

Hornchurch appliances were not called to the Chingford fire so I can now turn to the subject of today's debate. I fully understand the concern that my hon. Friends have expressed today and during last month's debate on the London fire service, about the proposal by the London fire and civil defence authority to remove a fire appliance from Hornchurch fire station.

As I said last month, we have good reason to be proud of the fire service in this country. It achieves consistently high standards of performance, often in difficult and hazardous circumstances. The fire service's high level of performance in responding to fire calls has been confirmed year after year by the Audit Commission. So it is with good reason that the fire service is highly regarded by the public, both in Hornchurch and elsewhere in the country. The key point to stress is that the statutory responsibility for the provision of an efficient fire service rests with the fire authority, and, in the case of Hornchurch, with the London fire and civil defence authority.

It is for the authority to keep its fire cover provision under review and to set a budget that will allow it to meet its statutory and other obligations and, in particular, to provide a service that meets the national standards of fire cover. However, under section 19 (4) of the Fire Services Act 1947, the fire authority cannot reduce the number of fire stations, fire appliances or fire-fighting posts without the express permission and consent of my right hon. Friend the Home Secretary.

My right hon. Friend has a specific role in considering section 19 applications. He will grant approval only if he is satisfied on three counts. The first is that the proposals have been sufficiently widely publicised, in sufficient detail and with adequate time to enable any interested party to make representations. The second is that the representations have been considered by the fire authority. The third is that Her Majesty's inspectorate of fire services advises that the national standards of fire cover will be maintained if any of the proposals were implemented.

There is no statutory requirement on the fire authority to consult, but my right hon. Friend and I consider it important that proper consultations are undertaken. Once a section 19 application has been made, we will also take into account representations made to us direct. We will consider and reflect carefully on the points made by my hon. Friends today. Our primary concern is the maintenance of the national fire cover standards. Successive Secretaries of State have interpreted the duty to provide an efficient fire service against those standards.

At the beginning of this month, we received the authority's application to remove the second pumping appliance from Hornchurch and from four other fire stations around the capital. We are seeking advice from Her Majesty's inspectorate of fire services on the authority's proposals. We shall ask the inspectorate to look carefully at the representations of my hon. Friend the Member for Hornchurch and any that other hon. Members, organisations or individuals may make. I assure my hon. Friend that we shall not approve any proposal unless we are entirely satisfied that national fire cover standards will be maintained.

The authority's latest proposals result from a review of its fire cover. All fire authorities are obliged to review the fire risks in their area regularly against the national standards to ensure that the brigade's deployment of resources is updated in the light of changing circumstances. That is not contentious. Most people agree that it is sensible to do so.

It may be helpful if I explain the national standards in a little more detail, because they were an important part of my hon. Friend's speech. The standards are not just nationally recommended; they are nationally agreed in the Central Fire Brigades Advisory Councils for England and Wales and for Scotland, which are constituted under the Fire Services Act 1947 to represent fire service interests in advising the Secretary of State. The standards lay down terms for the number of appliances and also the speed of response in the initial attendance to a fire. They rest on four main standards of service, which depend on the risk category of the area, and assume for each category that a predetermined number of fire-fighting appliances should attend within a specified time. The area served by Hornchurch fire station has been assessed as 55 per cent. C risk and 45 per cent. D risk. My hon. Friend has suggested that Hornchurch should be reclassified as B risk.

Under the national standards, a brigade should aim in normal circumstances to meet the following response times: in a B risk area, one pumping appliance to arrive in five minutes and one within eight minutes; in a C risk area, one pumping appliance to respond to the incident within 10 minutes; and in a D risk area, one pumping appliance to respond within 20 minutes.

In considering the section 19 application, my right hon. Friend the Home Secretary will want to be assured by Her Majesty's inspectorate that the area has been correctly categorised for fire risk and that, if a pumping appliance was removed from Hornchurch, the brigade would continue to meet the above standards.

In 1995, the Audit Commission recommended that there should be another review of the standards of fire cover. The commission recognised that no fundamental change should be considered without careful research. That recommendation was taken forward by a further joint committee of the advisory councils. Its report "Out of the Line of Fire: Modernising the Standards of Fire Cover" was published in July 1998.

The advisory councils have endorsed the report's conclusions in favour of risk assessment as a more flexible approach to planning fire cover that explicitly addresses the risk to life. Pilot trials are in hand with a number of brigades, including London, to confirm the practicality of that approach and, if successful, what the arrangements for implementation should be. However, that is a longer-term project. In the mean time, the existing standards of cover continue to apply.

When the authority set its budget for 1999–2000 on 18 February, it had to take into account the local government finance settlement and the implications for its reserves and assess what savings it should seek to make. The local government settlement provides a £143.6 million overall increase in the fire service element of total standard spending in England—an average annual increase of 3.5 per cent. over the next three years. That includes £ 47.1 million—3.6 per cent.—for 1999–2000. London's share is an above-average increase of £9.9 million—3.8 per cent. That follows an increase of 5 per cent, in 1998–99. The settlement, which I am proud of, acknowledged future funding pressures, notably on pensions and training, which were identified by fire service interests. It should help fire authorities to plan ahead on a more stable funding basis. The settlement has also set the fire service a challenging efficiency target of 2 per cent. a year. The best value initiative should play a key role in assisting fire authorities achieve that target.

I shall reflect carefully on the points that have been raised in the debate. There are matters of significance and concern that we have to take into account.

It might be worth spending a few minutes on our approach to community fire safety. We want progress to be measured against our commitment to community fire safety. To that end, we have publicly set a target of reducing the average number of house fire deaths by 20 per cent. over the next five years. That move towards prevention is a step change for Government policy and for the work of brigades. Prevention work should be regarded as the first line of defence against fire. The vast majority of fatal fires are accidental and therefore preventable. However, the speed with which fire spreads and smoke kills often means that no matter how quickly the brigade arrives, it can be too late.

In this financial year, we have provided an extra £ 12 million to the fire service in England to undertake community fire safety work, thus implementing a key recommendation of the Audit Commission report on funding fire prevention. We have also recently established a national community fire safety centre, which will take forward the objective of reducing fires and casualties and act as a resource for fire brigades in England and Wales. I announced last December that we would be providing the new centre with £14 million of funding over the next three financial years to run high-profile safety campaigns in conjunction with every brigade. We have also conducted a major national smoke alarm television campaign for fire brigades, including London, to make sure that every householder has a smoke alarm and maintains it properly.

It is disappointing that house fires and fatalities in London have increased, particularly when other metropolitan brigades have been able to achieve significant reductions in recent years. However, the brigade is not alone in seeing such increases and the national trend has been upwards since 1994.

We recognise that without intervention the projected trend for house fires is set to increase. We are not prepared to let that situation arise and have therefore put in place a wide range of measures to reduce the number of house fire deaths. We are working closely with London and other brigades to ensure effective community fire safety arrangements. Whatever the outcome of the Hornchurch proposals, I know that my hon. Friends the Members for Hornchurch and for Upminster will support us in our endeavour.

As I have said, we shall reflect carefully on the points that have been made in this debate and seek advice from Her Majesty's inspectorate of fire services on the section 19 application and all the representations that have been made. We shall not approve any application unless we are entirely satisfied that the national fire cover standards will be maintained and the safety of the public in Hornchurch and elsewhere is assured.

I am grateful for the opportunity to raise my concerns about the use by the police of DNA samples collected during their investigations for the purposes of subsequent investigations, and others taking place at the same time.

My concern about the issue arises from a tragic situation in my constituency—the story of Louise Smith. On Christmas eve 1995, Louise left home with her friends to go to a local nightclub, and did not return home. On Christmas day, Louise's family reported to the police that she had not returned home, and thus began a difficult and protracted investigation.

About three weeks later, a search was conducted for Louise's body, and more than 10,000 local people took part. The fact that so many people turned out showed the strength of feeling in the community, the solidarity with Robert and Gill Smith—Louise's parents—the sense that any parent would dread to be in the same situation and the desire simply to do something to help. I understand that my predecessor as the Member of Parliament for Northavon took part in the search—not with high profile or fanfare, but as a member of the public. That is a tribute to his decency.

Sadly, no body was found, and the agony and uncertainty went on until the middle of February 1996, when two boys playing in a local quarry discovered Louise's body, which had been carefully hidden. The police inferred from that, and from other circumstances, that the murderer was a local man, or certainly a man with strong local connections. Thus began a murder hunt which was to last for many months.

As the body had been found—and despite the circumstances—it was possible to obtain a DNA sample, although it was some eight weeks after Louise had died. I gather that such a gap was almost unprecedented. As a result, Avon and Somerset police felt that they were able to use DNA methods to try to track down the killer.

One of the first things to happen was that a number of people recognised a photofit of the suspect that was issued, and a DNA test was undertaken on that person. The DNA test proved innocence. In other words, someone who, under other circumstances, might have been pursued by the police, was eliminated from their inquiries early on. By April 1996, 400 DNA tests had been carried out on local men. By November 1996, that figure had reached 2,000, and, by Easter 1997, more than 4,500 DNA samples had been taken from local men who had volunteered, if only to be eliminated from inquiries.

In March 1997, a man named David Frost was swabbed for a DNA sample—not locally, but in South Africa. He was a local man, but was in South Africa. The DNA samples matched. He came back to the United Kingdom, was arrested at Heathrow airport in April 1997 and was charged with murder. In the way of these things, it was not until February 1998 that the case came to court. At the last minute, he changed his plea to guilty, and he was sentenced to 14 years on a tariff.

The process, sentencing and so on raised wide issues that are beyond the scope of this debate, but the point made to me by the family—which I fully accept—was that the majority of those tested were not suspects in the inquiry. Even David Frost, the killer, was not a suspect when originally asked to give a DNA sample. On the other hand, serious suspects were arrested and swabbed during the inquiry, but were quickly eliminated because of DNA testing.

The key issue is the use of those DNA samples, and what happens to them after the inquiry. My understanding of the law and the practice is that the only DNA sample that may be retained is that of the killer. By law, all the other samples that were offered must be destroyed. I understand that another inquiry was going on at the same time elsewhere in the south-west, and that the police were prohibited from using the samples collected in one inquiry for use in the other.

Superintendent John Newman, in addressing the Police Superintendents Association conference in September of last year, said that the inquiry was one of the largest that Avon and Somerset had undertaken. With regard to the DNA samples, he said:

"The murder inquiry quickly became one of the largest ever inquiries conducted in Avon and Somerset"

and said that the inquiry as a whole cost well over £1 million. He added:

"It also involved the largest ever intelligence led mass screen".

I understood that to mean that not all the men in the local area were swabbed, but that the police used their intelligence and what they could work out about the killer to screen and select a smaller number of men. None the less, more than 4,500 swabs were taken.

Each individual swab costs £37.50 to analyse. Added to that are the costs of cool boxes, polaroid film, fingerprint examinations and cameras, and the cost comes to about £41 per item. When that is multiplied by more than 4,500 swabs, the cost comes to between £200,000 and £250,000.

The Minister will understand why the family were dismayed to learn that all that police time, money and effort—although it helped to identify the killer—resulted in the swabs and the information being destroyed. They could not be used by the police in other inquiries at the same time, or in subsequent inquiries.

Clearly, the police's view was that they had spent a large amount of money on the inquiry, and they did not regret a penny of it because of the outcome. On the other hand, money must be best used and should not be wasted. One might ask whether this situation will arise again, and God forbid that it should. However, another young girl was murdered recently in a neighbouring area, and another police inquiry was launched. It is not stretching credibility too far to imagine that we might have to go through the whole process again. This would put a burden not only on the police and their resources, but on the good will of the local population. As I have said, there is tremendous good will towards the family.

Many people would sensibly say that, if they willingly came forward and offered a sample, and if they were offered the positive choice—with no pressure—of giving their consent to the sample being retained for future use by the police, their wish in that respect should be honoured. When they realised that the samples had to be destroyed, the family wanted to do something about it.

With the backing of a local newspaper, they launched a petition, which I presented to the House last night. The petition points out the waste of police and public time and money if samples are destroyed. The petition calls upon the House of Commons to seek amendment of the Police and Criminal Evidence Act 1984—our initial guess at how we might achieve success. I hope that the Minister will advise me whether that is the case, or whether a change in police practice or paperwork—or some other means—could achieve the outcome.

Indicative of local support for the family and the campaign is the fact that more than 9,000 local residents—principally from the Yate-Chipping Sodbury area, but also from around the country—signed the petition. It is easy to get signatures for a petition about the closure of a local hospital because the issue is simple and easily expressed. This, as will be apparent, is a complex and sensitive issue, and the family have spent days in shopping centres, gathering petitions. They have gone over the matter again and again because they feel passionately that something is wrong.

I pay tribute to Robert and Gill Smith—Louise's parents—and to the family for the way in which, through dreadful circumstances, they have tried to seek the good and the positive. They have behaved with dignity throughout. Since Louise's death, the family have tried to support and help the police in dealing with the victims of crime. Their experience was that the police were supportive and helpful but that they were inexperienced and did not necessarily know how to handle people who had suffered the death of someone close to them. I pay tribute to what the family have done in trying to turn things to the good and to their efforts in getting up the petition.

I am grateful to the Minister both for responding to this debate and for his generosity in being willing to see the family briefly later today. I ask him to respond to a heartfelt plea from the family and from me. One small change, whether in practice or in legislation, could mean that police time is not wasted and that maximum use is made of the efforts of volunteers and the general public. It is a matter of common sense that action should be taken.

I want to take this opportunity to extend my sympathy to the parents of Louise Smith, the victim in this tragic case. The facts of the case make a powerful argument for the use of DNA testing, which led to the conviction of the perpetrator of that dreadful crime. The officers responsible for the arrest and the investigation are to be congratulated.

The way in which the whole community—about 10,000 people, as the hon. Member for Northavon (Mr. Webb) said—came together to assist in the initial search is a prime example of the commendable solidarity and community spirit that one would like to be spread more widely, as a sign that each and every one of us takes responsibility for the welfare of others.

DNA technology is a vital intelligence tool that we want the police to have at their disposal. It is changing the face of criminal investigation in much the same way as fingerprinting did at the turn of the century. The opportunities that it creates for advancing the battle against crime are to be embraced.

The Forensic Science Service has been operating a national DNA database on behalf of the police since 1995. It currently holds about 490,000 profiles of suspects and offenders and 49,000 profiles from crime scene stains. Advances in technology have increased the number of investigations in which DNA plays a part. It can help to reduce the time taken to identify suspects and plays an increasingly important role in subsequent trials.

The Forensic Science Service has performed a real public service in advancing DNA techniques, making the tests increasingly sensitive to smaller amounts of material. The hon. Gentleman drew attention to the fact that, despite the seven or eight weeks that had passed since the body was hidden, it was still possible to take samples that were to prove so helpful in bringing to book the perpetrator of this awful crime. We can now identify an individual's DNA profile from a fleck of dandruff or part of a hair root. We are keen for this investigative tool to be developed and used further.

The circumstances under which DNA can be taken and the arrangements for the destruction of samples are broadly the same as for fingerprints and are dealt with in the Police and Criminal Evidence Act 1984, which was amended by the Criminal Justice and Public Order Act 1994. The database is also registered with the Data Protection Commissioner.

DNA profiles are retained in a searchable form on the national database only if the suspect is convicted or cautioned for a recordable offence or if action against an individual is on-going. If an individual has been eliminated from an inquiry, the law as it stands requires that a DNA sample must be destroyed; and if the same individual is subsequently involved in another inquiry, samples have to be retaken and another entry made on the national DNA database.

Mass screening is used only in the most serious unsolved cases. It involves the taking of voluntary samples—skin cells from inside the mouth, or head hair— from a targeted section of the population. The profiles are then compared against a sample from the crime scene to see whether there is any match. If a match occurs, the police are advised, and the donor is asked to provide a blood sample, which is then tested against the crime scene sample, and if that confirms the result of the mass screening sample, the police can pursue their inquiries with a probable suspect.

There have been 110 mass screenings to date. The mass screening following the murder of Louise Smith was the largest ever undertaken, involving the analysis of more than 4,500 samples, and it resulted in a successful conviction. Mass screenings can result in the identification of a suspect when all other investigative techniques have failed. The advantage is that only a targeted section of the population need be screened—for example, local men in a specific age range—and the innocent can be quickly eliminated, as was the case in the murder of Louise Smith. The samples are put not on the national DNA database but on a dedicated mini-database, established solely for the given inquiry. If the profiles show no match, the samples are destroyed.

In some circumstances, either because of geographic location or because certain individuals fit the profile of possible suspects in more than one investigation, individuals may be approached a number of times to act as donor volunteers in mass screenings. That is one effect of the safeguards afforded by the current legislation.

One can well understand why the family of Louise Smith should feel as they do, as the hon. Gentleman said, about the time and expense that could be saved by retaining DNA profiles. It is an important issue that is certainly worth exploring, and I welcome the opportunity to do so, but the advantages of retention have to be balanced against proper legal safeguards and wide-ranging concerns, and fundamental civil liberties issues are involved.

It is important to ensure that any changes do not discourage volunteers from participating in mass screenings. The hon. Gentleman will appreciate the importance of that because, if Louise Smith's killer had refused to participate in the screening, the matching of the sample could not have led to his conviction. A dangerous and wicked man was taken out of circulation for a very long time. The Home Office must have the balance very much in mind when considering those issues.

The voluntary retention of DNA profiles on a separate database is already under consideration in a wider review of the legislation in the Police and Criminal Evidence Act 1984 relating to fingerprints and samples to ensure that it reflects recent technological advances. That is something on which I can give the hon. Gentleman some assurance— I think that he was about to raise that matter. We are considering the voluntary retention of DNA profiles, on a separate database, in the context of a wider review of the legislation as it relates to fingerprints and samples.

The current database is expanding rapidly and was designed to hold up to 5 million profiles. Although PACE enables samples to be taken from anyone suspected, charged or convicted of a recordable offence, the police currently restrict themselves to taking samples only in cases of burglary, sexual or violent offences. That represents the best use of resources by focusing on cases where DNA evidence is most likely to be of value.

The Minister raised an option that I had not thought of—the retention of the samples on a separate database. Can he give some idea of the time scale in which the review of PACE might be concluded?

The review is under way. We are balancing the issues that I described and, in due course, we shall arrive at conclusions. Our concern is to make available the best and most robust basis for the successful detection and prevention of crime, so we are proceeding with all due expedition—of that, the hon. Gentleman can be sure.

The establishment of a truly national DNA database for the population as whole raises fundamental questions. There is a strong analogy with fingerprints, which uniquely identify individuals, but we do not require every individual to have their fingerprints on record. One could argue that that would be useful, but we do not do it for reasons that the hon. Gentleman will understand.

Therefore, before we take any step towards establishing a national database, we need to consider carefully the balance of the rights of the individual and its desirability and practicality. Although developments in the technologies required and the ability to search large databases mean that such a database is becoming technically feasible, the concept still raises fundamental questions, such as the balance of individual rights and the cost, which need to be addressed.

However, the Forensic Science Service is working closely with the police service, to develop a joint strategy with the Association of Chief Police Officers, to realise fully the potential of forensic science to support criminal investigation and the detection and reduction of crime. Increasingly sensitive techniques are being developed to allow DNA profiles to be extracted from small crime stains, enhancing the ability of the police to bring criminals to justice. We are committed to taking all steps necessary and making the best use of new technologies to that end.

This has been a useful debate. It has given the House the opportunity to express its determination to ensure that we develop new technologies in a way that will benefit the police and the detection and reduction of crime. The care and concern that the family of Louise Smith have taken subsequent to her tragic death to be supportive of the police and mindful of the importance of gathering public support behind the steps that need to be taken to develop to the maximum the new technologies are to be commended. They have performed a great service by raising the profile of the issue with the public, not least in collecting the 9,000 signatures to which the hon. Gentleman referred.

Ultimately, if there is to be a change in legislation, it will need to be supported by the public. It will also need to be seen to be supportable in terms of the balance of civil liberties and the rights and interests of all concerned and of a sufficiently large number of people volunteering to allow samples to be retained to make it meaningful— as the hon. Gentleman will appreciate, were the number to fall below a certain critical mass, the value of the exercise would be destroyed.

Therefore, it has been enormously valuable that the family of Louise Smith have raised the issue as they have. The hon. Gentleman has also done the House a service in bringing the matter before us. I look forward to meeting the family to express in person my appreciation of what they have done. The case in question highlights the benefits of DNA evidence. It also highlights the importance of using the best and most readily available technologies to that end and the importance of intelligence expertise in the analysis of crime in the hands of our dedicated police service as a way to identify where and how such techniques might be used. The fact that Louise Smith's murderer was brought to justice stands as a tribute to the police and the public.

We began with Louise's case and it is right that we should end with it. We should all express a determination to ensure that her tragic death and the loss that her family suffered is something from which we can draw lessons to prevent the loss of other lives, with all that that would entail for other families. The House will wish to join me again in expressing my deepest condolences to Louise's family.

I start by thanking Madam Speaker—through you, Mr. Deputy Speaker—for allowing this Adjournment debate on night flights into Heathrow, which is a subject that is near to the hearts of all those in the Thames valley and perhaps also now to Madam Speaker.

Two thirds of a million people suffer directly under the flight path from night flights into Heathrow, but I shall choose just one constituent, whose letter reads:

"I have been living in Putney for the last two years and it is only recently that my husband and I seem to have been woken up at early hours in the morning with the noise of planes. They have become extremely infuriating and indeed very stressful. Over the recent Bank Holiday weekend I was woken up early at 4.20 am by a plane and they seemed to be coming in by the minute. In my sleepy state I made notes of the times they came in. The first was 4.20 am and then a succession at 4.21 am, 4.22 am, 4.30 am, 4.34 am and 4.35 am. I have been woken up many times with these early morning flights in the last two months. Isn't this the time when a person is in their deepest sleep? Perhaps because it has been so hot we have had the windows open wider whereas before it may have been possible we did not hear them as clearly because we had the windows closed. What are we expected to do—not breathe? What I would like to know is where in the world are planes allowed to fly over residential areas from 4.00 am onwards? I would greatly appreciate an answer to this question.

I am rather ignorant at this stage as to who the Chairman of the BAA actually is or the parties involved. I wonder if you could provide their names and addresses. I would like to go and park my car outside their homes at 4.00 am every morning, and blow my horn. I wonder how they might feel?"

I am not suggesting that my constituents should do that, but it shows the strength of feeling of law-abiding citizens.

The second stage of the Government consultation has just closed and the timing of this debate is to ensure that the Minister has a chance to hear what is being said unanimously by the people and their Members of Parliament who live in the afflicted area: "No more night flights."

The first stages of the consultation clearly emphasised that view. Only the airline industry wants the status quo— or worse. As a representative of the people of the Thames valley, I must ask the Department of the Environment, Transport and the Regions to represent the people, not the industry. The curfew requested by HACAN of 11.30 pm to 6 am seems eminently sensible, and I proposed it in my Adjournment debate of 28 October 1997.

The second stage consultation document of November 1998 asked for ways to deal specifically with noise from Heathrow night flights. Regrettably, its proposals would merely share the noise around the area. However, for my constituents' sake, I must back the idea of moving towards an easterly preference for landing. That would mean landing from over Windsor and to the south of Windsor wherever possible. I propose that runway alternation should be used to share the noise damage further.

The hon. Member for Windsor (Mr. Trend) established in his Adjournment debate on 24 July 1998 that the Cranford agreement does not exist, and that the northern runway can be used as well as the southern one. I understand that BAA has no problem with the easterly preference or with runway alternation. A decision on that rests, of course, with my hon. Friend the Minister for Transport in London.

I suggest that alternation should cease between 6 am and 7 am to allow both runways to be used to take flights arriving after the curfew from 11.30 am to 6 am that I have also suggested. The hon. Member for Windsor argued in his Adjournment debate for retention of the status quo, which would protect his constituents and the people of east Berkshire. The hon. Member for Maidenhead (Mrs. May), who cannot be here today, has asked me to make it clear that she, too, supports the status quo.

I must point out, however, that 580,000 people suffer from the westerly preference because they live directly under the approach path, and much larger numbers are also affected. Some 64,000 suffer from the easterly preference. Those figures come from the House of Commons Library. Clearly, my suggested changes would share the damage more equitably.

However, part one of the consultation document and its appendices contain the crucial argument for why night flights must continue. It is the economic argument that if flights were banned, they would go elsewhere in Europe. The pre-eminence of Heathrow—the busiest airport in Europe—would be undermined, and there could be job losses.

My hon. Friend the Minister made that case in her responses both to me in 1997 and to the hon. Member for Windsor in 1998. The airlines do not want to change their schedules. However, another Putney resident wrote to me:

"British Airways has four flights from the Far East landing between 04.55 and 05.35. I know from my own experience that these overnight flights are very convenient and that later landings would require take-offs well after midnight in the Far East. This should not be a problem with the new Hong Kong airport or Australasian flights refuelling there. These early morning landings should only be allowed into Stansted, thus stimulating connecting flights from there."

Does the hon. Gentleman agree that one argument advanced by the airlines for early morning arrivals is the lack of terminal space a little later in the morning, which makes it difficult to unload large aircraft that arrive after 6 am? Does he agree that if terminal 5 went ahead, one of the major arguments offered by the airlines to support continuing early morning arrivals would disappear?

I am interested in that point, which I have not heard before. When I returned recently from the United States on an early morning flight, I was put on an isolated stand and bussed back to the terminal, so I do not believe that that is a problem. More isolated stands could be used after 6 am.

My constituent's letter continues:

"British Airways also has five flights from the eastern USA landing between 05.35 and 07.00. Flights from New York are scheduled at 7 hours. From my experience"—

and from my own—

"of flying this route, the jetstream can reduce this to as little as 5 hours, making the landing times even earlier. Later evening flights out of the East Coast"—

from, say, 9 pm onwards—

"would be advantageous to passengers in avoiding rush hour traffic, take-off congestion and a more natural time to go to sleep."

Clearly there are answers to the problem of re-scheduling night flights, if the airlines wish to apply them.

Appendix E of the consultation document notes the night restrictions at foreign airports, and that seems to be the nub of the economic argument. If Heathrow closes at night, and if there is no ban on night flights into Paris Charles de Gaulle, Amsterdam Schipol or Frankfurt-am-Main—as at present—Heathrow will lose out. The argument is, therefore, that Heathrow must have its night flights.

May I ask the Government to take up the matter with our European Union partners at the next intergovernmental meeting, and to seek a ban on night flights across Europe? I cannot believe that that is impossible to achieve. We are truly in a zero-sum game: if no European airport will accept flights during the night, no single airport will suffer. I note from appendix E that Tokyo Narita airport and Sydney airport close to all traffic through the night from 11 pm to 6 am. It can be done.

I pray in aid two further points. First, as long ago as 1995, the European Parliament in resolution A4–0012/95, section 5b, called for

"harmonisation and strengthening of legislation governing aircraft noise in areas adjacent to airports, including legislation on night flights."

Secondly, the draft manifesto for the European elections of the Party of European Socialists was agreed in Milan last week, and commitment 11—"Ensuring a Health Environment"—states that

"pollution does not respect national boundaries. We can only deliver a sound environment if we work together to raise common standards."

I appreciate that change will take time, so I have various suggestions for action while we await a pan-European ban as the outcome of the second consultation. First, I suggest an immediate ban on night flights from 11.30 pm to 4 am to reflect current unspoken practice, and to establish a principle in favour of a ban using the powers of my hon. Friend the Minister under section 78(3)(b) of the Civil Aviation Act 1982.

Secondly, I suggest a change in the time period for all other restrictions, to run from October 1999 to October 2000—not October 2004—to enable time for a European night flight ban to be agreed by the new European Parliament and the Council of Ministers. Thirdly, I suggest that the night-time ban could come into effect across Europe—including Heathrow—in October 2000. It would be a fitting symbol of the millennium, putting people ahead of a spurious zero-sum game of economic interests.

I commend my proposals to the Minister. I do not expect an immediate reply, but I hope that they may provide a basis for the decision that the Government will take on the future of night flights into Heathrow.

I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Putney (Mr. Colman) on securing this debate on an important issue that has occupied this House on two recent occasions—on 24 July last year in a debate initiated by the hon. Member for Windsor (Mr. Trend), who is in his place, and before that on 28 October 1997, in a debate initiated by my hon. Friend the Member for Putney when we considered day-time and night-time noise.

The main issue at night is of course interference with sleep and the distress and annoyance that can cause, which is a problem not only for the constituents of my hon. Friend the Member for Putney, but for thousands of people who live around Heathrow and under its principal flight paths. Heathrow, of course, is not unique in that respect. My hon. Friend referred to the Government's two-stage consultation on future night restrictions at Heathrow, Gatwick and Stansted airports. Our aim has been to make consultation as open and accessible as possible, and for that reason we decided to proceed in two stages.

The preliminary consultation paper issued in February last year sought views on all aspects of the present regime introduced in 1993, including the underlying principles. After careful consideration of all the responses, on 10 September last year I decided that the movement limits and noise quotas for the three airports for summer 1999 should be the same as they were for summer 1998. In November we issued a second consultation paper inviting comments on the Government's proposals for future restrictions at Heathrow, Gatwick and Stansted, to ran from 31 October 1999 for five years until the end of the summer season in 2004.

As my hon. Friend the Member for Putney said, the second consultation paper also considers a range of options for changes to the preferential use of Heathrow's runways at night, which follows up on the trials of night-time runway alternation. The Government have not reached any view on the many options outlined in the second consultation paper, but we believe it right that those issues should be examined thoroughly before any decision is made.

The closing date for the second consultation paper was 12 February 1999, and the process of logging the many responses and studying them is under way. I am sure that my hon. Friend the Member for Putney and the House will understand that I cannot comment today on the responses we have received or on the decisions we may reach in the light of them.

Night flights have never been banned at Heathrow. Restrictions were introduced in 1962 in recognition of the disturbance caused to local people by the first generation of jet aircraft. Those very noisy aircraft have long since been banned from United Kingdom and other European airports and the process of phasing out the second generation of jets certificated to ICAO Chapter 2 standards is well under way and will be complete by the end of March 2002. In setting restrictions on night flights, successive Governments have sought to strike a balance between the impact such flights can have on people living around airports and the need for airlines to operate services at night, taking account of the user and the economic benefits they bring.

I recognise the Minister's arguments about the economic benefits of night flights, but may I suggest a way in which we might reduce the problem a little without any serious economic impact? The hon. Member for Putney (Mr. Colman) mentioned the earlier than scheduled arrival of flights, especially from the USA, as one of the problems that contributes to early morning disturbance. I understand that flights arriving early are required by Civil Aviation Authority regulations to land immediately. The airline does not have the option of holding that flight away from the airport so that it lands at the scheduled time which is, after all, the time that the passengers expect to arrive. It does them no good to be dumped on the ground up to two hours early.

Will the Minister consult the CAA to see whether it is possible to change the guidance so that early arriving aircraft could be held, perhaps over the Bay of Biscay or somewhere convenient, so that they arrive after the curfew deadline and do not contribute to the noise nuisance?

The hon. Gentleman makes an interesting proposal. As a nervous flier, the idea of going round and round the Bay of Biscay for two hours before my aeroplane was allowed to land at Heathrow, after a long international flight, fills me with horror. I will consider the hon. Gentleman's request, but his proposal could lead to gross unfairness. Many aircraft arrive early due to conditions over which no one has any control—not least the winds—and that could cause difficulties.

The concept of planes circling over the Bay of Biscay also fills me with horror, but my hon. Friend the Minister might wish to consider a slightly different proposal. When flight plans are logged at, for example, Kennedy airport in New York, and they show that the flight will take five hours, not seven hours, the plane could be held on the ground for two hours to ensure that it makes the time at which it is due to arrive. That could perhaps be achieved through co-operation.

As I am sure my hon. Friend is aware, I have no jurisdiction over the flight plans at Kennedy airport. The USA is an independent, sovereign state. I can examine the issue, but I have no jurisdiction in the area.

The present restrictions specify a night period, 11 pm to 7 am, during which time the noisiest aircraft may not be scheduled to land or take off. In addition, from 11.30 pm to 6 am, the night quota period, aircraft movements are restricted by a movements limit and a noise quota. The noise quota is a supplementary measure designed to encourage the use of quieter aircraft. Aircraft count against the noise quota according to their quota count— or QC—classification, with the noisier the aircraft, the higher its QC. The movements limits and noise quotas are set for the season as a whole: they are not sub-divided across the hours of the night or between types of services, and airlines may operate services as they wish within the limits and quota available.

The Government's main objectives in carrying out the current review of the night restrictions are, first, to strike a balance between the need to protect local communities from excessive aircraft noise levels at night and to provide for air services to operate at night where they benefit the local, regional and national economy.

We recognise that local environmental expectations may be changing, as may the commercial interests of the airlines. Our second objective is to take account of the competitive factors affecting UK airports and airlines. Our third objective is to take account of the research into the relationship between aircraft noise and interference with sleep, including any health effects, and the fourth is to safeguard improvements in the noise climate in the night quota period since 1993, which we are proposing to do by reducing the noise quotas to nearer the level of current usage. The fifth objective is to encourage the use of quieter aircraft at night, and the sixth is to put in place at Heathrow and Gatwick arrangements which will bring about further improvements in the night noise climate around the airports over time.

In pursuing the last two objectives, it has not been possible in the Government's proposals for Heathrow to make as much progress as we would have wished. Most aircraft using Heathrow are already modern types with many years of service ahead of them and, of course, there are tight constraints on runway and terminal capacity at the south-east airports.

It is not possible in the time available to cover all aspects of the Government's many and detailed proposals contained in the second stage consultation paper. However, among the main ones relating to Heathrow are proposals to maintain the QC system and seasonal movement limits supplemented by noise quotas; to reduce the seasonal noise quotas for Heathrow to nearer the level of current usage in order to safeguard the improvements in the noise climate in the night quota period since 1993; subject to the proposed review of the QC system, to ban aircraft classified QC4 from being scheduled to land or take off during the night quota period from the start of the 2002 summer season; to extend the restrictions on very noisy aircraft classified as QC8 to match those already in place for the noisiest types classified as QC16; and to reduce end-of-season flexibility by half. However, it is not proposed to introduce a complete ban on night flights as that would fail in our objective of striking a balance.

Aircraft noise at night and during the day remains a contentious subject. We freely acknowledge that. Unfortunately, despite the great improvements made over the past 30 years, it is likely to remain so. I announced on 27 February last year that we are commissioning a research trial into the impact of aircraft noise at night. We are particularly interested in the scope for research into sleep prevention: that is, delay in getting to sleep at night and the difficulties of not being able to get back to sleep after being awakened in the early morning—a problem mentioned by my hon. Friend as being the experience of his constituents. However, we should not underestimate the complexities of such research, or the length of time it may take.

The difficulties of scheduling intercontinental services is a significant factor in the present pattern of early morning arrivals at Heathrow. The night curfew at Hong Kong's former airport Kai Tak was often said to contribute to that, but it was far from being the only or the most important reason. We do not expect the pattern of movements to change radically now that Hong Kong's new airport at Chek Lap Kok has opened. Such services and similar ones cross many time zones, which limits their scheduling window for making suitable connections with other services. In addition, many services are now able to complete their journey non-stop owing to technological improvements and shorter routings, which means that they arrive earlier. There are now few departures from Heathrow during the night quota period, but some that take off just before our restrictions begin land at sensitive times at other international airports as a result.

In his own inimitable way, my hon. Friend referred to the fact that other comparable European airports have tougher night restrictions, but that is usually not the case at European countries' principal international airports— indeed, most have less severe restrictions and few have any restrictions at all on the number of chapter 3 aircraft that may operate at night, as we have at Heathrow, Gatwick and Stansted. In addition, most European cities are one hour ahead of London—an advantage that might go some way to explain why there is little interest in Europe in establishing common standards for night restrictions. In respect of my hon. Friend's interesting suggestion regarding the European Parliament, it is unlikely that an agreement of that sort could be achieved in less than 12 months.

My hon. Friend focused on aircraft landing at Heathrow in the early morning, from 4 am onwards and sometimes earlier. That is understandable, given that such flights now constitute the substantial majority of night flights at Heathrow. They fly over Putney and neighbouring areas when the wind is from the west, and over Windsor and adjoining areas when the wind is from the east. Internationally agreed standards and safe operating practice require that landing aircraft follow a stable straight-in descent aligned with the runway, which precludes dispersal of noise once aircraft are established on the airport's instrument landing system, normally at a distance of between 8 and 16 nautical miles and between 10 and 20 nautical miles at night.

My hon. Friend is aware of and referred to the trial of runway alternation at night for landing aircraft carried out by BAA for the Heathrow airport consultative committee. The results were summarised in our second consultation paper. The survey of local opinion organised by HACC indicated that there was a balance of opinion in favour of the procedure's introduction on a continuous basis. The Government have invited further views from the wider area likely to be affected, and opinions on some of the practical difficulties of applying it during the hour from 6 am to 7 am.

We have also asked for views on the operation of the 5-knot westerly preference at night, which has caused concern for people living to the west of Heathrow. Westerly preference is a noise amelioration procedure introduced in the 1960s to reduce the number of aircraft taking off over the more densely populated areas to the east of the airport. It is generally recognised to be an effective noise amelioration measure during the day, but because the pattern of night flights has changed since the 1960s and there are seldom take-offs between 11.30 pm and 6 am, but more landings between 4 am and 6 am, maintaining the procedure at night might now be having the opposite effect of increasing overflight of the most densely populated areas east of the airport.

The Government consider it necessary to review the use of that procedure at night, as well as the related issue of night-time runway alternation. However, the Government have not formed any view on the matter; at this stage, we do not favour any one option over another, including the status quo. All responses will be taken into account, including views on which options would provide the greatest benefits overall, which would provide the greatest improvements over the current arrangements, and what would be fair and equitable, taking account of operations during the day as well as at night.

The Minister speaks of possible improvements. I listened with great respect to the hon. Member for Putney (Mr. Colman), who spoke well on behalf of his constituents. Governments have the power to inflict misery on or bring benefits to the people of this country, but this is not a simple numbers game, or a question of west London versus east Berkshire.

Benefits might accrue from any change in the night flight regime, but they would be far outweighed in the balance by the certain misery that would be visited on the people of east Berkshire. The Minister will not be surprised to learn that I remain implacably opposed to any change whatsoever. Because the people of east Berkshire have always had the worst of the take-offs, now that the balance has changed it would be wrong to change the balance of misery and benefit between the two communities. The effect on us would be so much worse and far outweigh any possible benefit that might be achieved in west London.

The hon. Gentleman makes the argument on behalf of his constituents—a duty which he has fulfilled with persistence and dedication. I congratulate him on that, but I am sure that he accepts that it would be totally improper for any Government to enter into a wide-ranging consultation process on the issues before us, but to fail to take into consideration the responses to that consultation document. We shall fairly and intensively scrutinise all the responses we received.

My hon. Friend the Member for Putney referred to the commercial aspects of the area we are debating. It is undoubtedly true that Heathrow airport is a major national asset. It occupies a position of central importance in international trade and communications in Europe and in the UK economy. It is the busiest airport in Europe and the busiest international airport in the world: in 1998, it handled 60 million passengers, 35 per cent. of whom used the airport as an interchange point. It is currently used by more than 90 airlines serving 200 destinations world wide; and it is the UK's largest port in terms of value of trade handled. It provides 57,000 jobs directly and a further 25,000 indirectly in support services; those jobs benefit all those who live around the airport and contribute to the prosperity of the country as a whole.

People living near Heathrow, Gatwick and Stansted want to enjoy reasonably quiet nights. Successive Governments have consistently recognised the need to ensure that people living near those airports are not exposed to excessive numbers of aircraft at night. The current Government also recognise that need, believing it both right and necessary to set restrictions on night flights at those airports and, in so doing, preserve a balance between environmental, aviation and economic interests while taking account of changes in public expectations and in the commercial needs of airlines.

I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Putney and all those who have participated in the debate for giving the House the opportunity this afternoon to consider the issues and, in conjunction with all the responses we have received to the consultation, helping the Government to reach decisions on those difficult and complex issues.