HC Deb 22 May 1950 vol 475 cc1803-14

Motion made, and Question proposed, "That this House do now adjourn.":—[Mr. Popplewell.]

11.3 p.m.

Mr. Rodgers (Sevenoaks)

I am very glad to have this opportunity of raising a matter of equal interest to both sides of the House, and of drawing attention to the importance, urgency, and dangers of the present newsprint situation in this country. In doing so I hope I may have the indulgence of the House as this is the first time that I have had the honour of addressing it. At the same time, I would like to say that, although I am not uninterested in the advertising side of the newspaper industry, I am making a plea for an urgent consideration of this matter on far wider grounds than mere advertising.

Not very long ago a committee of U.N.E.S.C.O. was set up to investigate the Press conditions in 12 European countries. Our country was not included. They put on record this statement: That the Commission considers that to cover satisfactorily both national and international as well as local news, in addition to providing a proportion of lighter matter and advertising, a newspapers needs to have at least eight standard size pages. The right hon. Gentleman the President of the Board of Trade, and hon. Gentlemen on both sides are probably aware that far from having the eight-page standard paper in this country, our newspapers will be reduced to six pages. Having struggled to get up from four pages to seven for a penny national newspaper, from July they are to be reduced to six pages with a corresponding reduction for provincial papers. Even this six-page paper has only been made possible by a very belated concession from the Board of Trade to the Newsprint Supply Company that they could import 25,000 tons of newsprint during the second half of this year. There is no certainty yet whether we shall obtain the required newsprint because the concession has been made so late; or that we can, from present sources, maintain even a six-page paper in the fourth quarter of this year. Furthermore, the Board of Trade has made no pronouncement on the newsprint that will be available from 1951 onwards.

Before the war newspapers, as opposed to magazines, used over 22,000 tons of newsprint each week in keeping us supplied with information, recreation, news, opinions and ideas. The war reduced this to 5,000 tons. Today, five years afterwards, despite excellent plans and contracts made with various countries, and in particular Canada, we find that present usage will not much exceed 10,000 tons, or about half the pre-war figure. It is sad to reflect that our newspapers today national and provincial, are among the smallest in the world. By contrast, "Le Soir" in Brussels, with the largest circulation in Belgium, appears regularly with 12 to 16 pages. In France, important dailies such as "Figaro" and "Le Monde" have eight to 12 pages. Canada's usage has gone up to 174 per cent., and the United States to 157 per cent., and even in France it is 88 per cent. of pre-war usage.

Before the war, if quantity of newsprint used is a guide, and of course it is only a rough guide, we were among the best-informed people in the world. Per head of population we used 58 lb. of newsprint a year, compared with the United States use per head of 56 lb. Last year the United States usage had gone up to 70 lb. per head, while we were reduced to the melancholy figure of 26 lb. per head. Indeed, it is probably true to say that of all the countries in Europe, only one—Germany behind the Iron Curtain—is worse off in this regard than ourselves. For while in the Western Zone of Germany consumption is 88 per cent. compared with pre-war, in the Eastern Zone it is only 36 per cent. We know, of course, that it is the deliberate policy of the Soviet Government to keep out news of the outside world. Our policy, luckily, is the very opposite.

Today the home mills are producing more newsprint than at any time since the war ended British mills supply 70 per cent. of their pre-war output, and, owing to the effects of bombing and other factors, they are working to their full capacity. There is no hope of expansion from the British mills until new plant is in operation. Our supplies of pulp from Scandinavia have been pushed up to near pre-war levels, yet supplies of newsprint from Canada remained at only one-third of pre-war levels in 1948 and 1949, while in 1950 they have been reduced to only one-twelfth—that is the 25,000 tons recently authorised by the President of the Board of Trade—which is less than two-thirds of one per cent. of their production.

On the other hand, the United States will be using a further 250,000 tons this year, which is 6 per cent. more than last year. One of the reasons for the newsprint shortage in the world is the apparently insatiable demands of the United States. Important metropolitan papers in the United States have from 48 to 72 pages daily, while their Sunday papers are gigantic—ranging from 200 to 300 pages each issue. Moreover, while the main supplier of the United States is Canada, in addition to their own domestic mills, the United States are also large buyers of Scandinavian pulp, with the result that the price of our imports of pulp from Scandinavia has skyrocketed. This, of course, has serious repercussions on the costs of the newspaper industry, and on industrialists who use the columns of the Press for their advertising.

Obviously, the main reason for this situation is the fact that we can purchase from Scandinavia in sterling, whereas Canadian supplies must be obtained by dollars. Canada and Newfoundland were the only sources of supply during the war, and since the war, with the full support of the Government, the newspaper industry has negotiated a 10-year contract for the purchase of some 300,000 tons of newsprint a year. Hardly had this agreement been signed when it was cut to 100,000 tons. Three times since the war we have had to dishonour contracts with Canada, made in face of keen competition from other foreign buyers, and I think it says much for Canada's friendship and loyalty that, in spite of this conduct, she has remained sympathetic and has accepted our economic plight as partially, but only partially, the explanation.

Today, 85 per cent. of Canada's gross output goes to the United States, as against 72 per cent. pre-war, and capacity is almost at full stretch. The Canadian Secretary of State for External Affairs said in London only last week, that Canada needs United States dollars, that the United States was her best customer, but that he hoped circumstances would not force the Dominion to make a choice of markets between the United Kingdom and the United States. I am sure that it is in the long-term interests of both countries that we should expand our orders of newsprint from Canada and should aim at seeing that at least one-third of our newsprint supply comes from Canada. Moreover, we should order enough now to keep the existing contracts alive and to ensure that this trade between the United Kingdom and Canada is not lost for ever.

The President of the Board of Trade has authorised the purchase of some 25,000 tons for the second half of this year. What would a further 75,000 tons cost, to make it 100,000 tons a year? I estimate that at most it would be only £3 million sterling, or only 1½ per cent. of our 1949 imports from Canada. Surely ways and means could be devised to make this possible. No one would wish to import newsprint at the expense of food or other vital raw materials, but I think this Government—and I say it with reluctance—is guilty of discriminating against the British daily Press, both national and provincial. The newspapers are not asking for any specially favourable treatment, but I think they are rightly protesting against receiving specially unfavourable treatment. While magazines are back to roughly 90 per cent. of pre-war consumption of paper, the daily Press, as I have pointed out, is receiving only about half of its pre-war consumption, despite the fact that the population of this country has risen by some 5 per cent.

The demand for information and opinions is still unsatisfied. The small size of our newspapers has led to more and more people buying more and more copies of different newspapers, despite the fact that in the main those newspapers carry exactly the same news. Only a few items are different, but those different items are absolutely vital if our people are to obtain a balanced and fuller judgment of affairs. In spite of the increase from four to seven pages, this tendency to buy more and more newspapers continues, and I suggest that that is significant of the fact that the people of this country are starved of news.

Before the war we could claim that this country had one of the best informed and most politically mature electorates in the world. Today the nation runs the danger of being half-informed, which to my mind is far worse than being uninformed, on issues. Because or the small size or our newspapers, conferences of great importance, such as that which has just concluded at Sidney, received only a mere half-column or so. The public is being reduced to reading headlines and potted summaries, yet these events throughout the world are of vital importance to all of us. The people need far more public discussion in the Press on issues of supreme importance, such as the position of this country after Marshall Aid ceases in 1952.

Again, the people need to be made aware of the incredible swiftness and importance of events happening in South-East Asia. Not long ago, Mr. Sulzberger, of the "New York Times "—and I think we ought to weigh his words very carefully—said that Britain was risking the fundamental democracy of her people by rationing their information, and he described this as a threat to democratic life. All, I am sure, would agree that an efficient and thorough Press is, as Lord Burnham once said, the first requirement of democracy. The journalists of this country have performed wonders; they have succeeded in getting quarts into pint pots. They have performed their difficult task so well that it may not be realised how badly, in fact, we have forced them to do it. I believe that the Press, national and local, is and can be most important in helping to stage a great industrial comeback and to solve a good many of our social and political problems. But it cannot do it with its present restricted dimensions.

With our newspapers among the smallest in the world today we are in danger of keeping our own people starved of essential information. So great a friend of this country as Sir Keith Murdoch of Australia has said that Britain has today a poor fund of information about international affairs. More important even than that, we are also losing prestige abroad. Today, not only are fewer copies of the British Press going abroad but the matter in them is so compressed and they are so small that they cannot adequately portray and reflect the British way of life.

One of the quickest stimulants to our export drive and to securing our position as one of the leaders in the world would be, I am sure, to increase the size and quantity of papers going abroad. Therefore, I urge the President of the Board of Trade to do all he can to see that our Press is not among the smallest in the world and if possible to restore the original contract for importing at least 100,000 tons of newsprint a year, for three reasons—first, because we owe it to our own people; second, because it would raise our prestige abroad; and third, because we owe it to our sister nation Canada, who has continuously stood by us so faithfully all these years.

11.14 p.m.

Mr. Deedes (Ashford)

It falls to me to congratulate most warmly the hon. Member for Sevenoaks (Mr. Rodgers) to whose maiden speech we have just listened. He has spoken most forcefully and with great authority and clarity on his subject, and I am sure we look forward to hearing him again.

I want to add my support to the plea he has made. I feel there is a danger of complacency about this problem of newsprint. It is felt that the newspapers have managed so long on so little that no great harm is being done if they continue to do so indefinitely. In my view, great and lasting harm is being done to the profession and to the newspaper reading public. The public, as my hon. Friend pointed out, is being denied a great deal of information about the world in which they live. That information is essential to a well-informed democracy. Whatever we may think about some newspapers, the fact is that they provide the raw material for public thought. In the present state of the world it is important that the raw material should be provided in larger quantities than we are getting now.

I can think of no industry which has been more held back since the war than the newspaper industry, not even motoring. The national daily papers today are down in consumption of newsprint to 38.4 per cent. of their pre-war figures. Larger papers like "The Times" are down to 33 per cent., which is exactly one-third; the "Daily Telegraph" is down to 26.1 per cent., which is just over a quarter; and the "Daily Herald." which I would mention, is down to 26.2

per cent., which is also just over a quarter. Sunday papers are down to one-third or a half, and all the provincial daily papers, with one exception, are down to just under one-half.

I do not want to be controversial or to suggest there has been a deliberate policy of discrimination in this matter, but it is not surprising that some newspapers think there has been. I hope the right hon. Gentleman will give us some reassurance on that. Anyone looking at the (bookstalls today and at their contents may well be excused for wondering if newsprint is scarce. There appear to be more magazines and periodicals than ever before. If there is no discrimination, there is a feeling that this is not regarded by the Government as a matter of great urgency. The Royal Commission stressed, in paragraphs 601 and 602, the recommendation of securing at the earliest possible date a supply of newsprint adequate to the newspaper industry's needs. The newspapers were required to fulfil their part of the Royal Commission's recommendations about a Press Council and are doing it now. I think they are entitled to look to the Government for an earnest of the Government's intention to fulfil that recommendation.

The Royal Commission thought that some of the improvements recommended would not be possible until newsprint was provided. I would go further and say, with some years of experience in a humble capacity in this industry, that we cannot expect the industry to flourish when running to one-third or one-half of its capacity. We cannot expect it to give the publicity abroad which every industry needs, when it is cut back in this way. I feel sure these restrictions are discouraging to the profession. Journalists like to see what they write in print—not all of it, but a proportion of it—just as hon. Members like to see their speeches in print. The health of the profession as well as the interest of the newspaper reading public, is involved. I feel sure that a Government which has the health of the industry so much at heart as to set up a Royal Commission specially to investigate it, cannot turn a deaf ear to our plea tonight.

11.20 p.m.

The President of the Board of Trade (Mr. Harold Wilson)

I should like to agree with the hon. Member for Ashford (Mr. Deedes) in expressing a tribute to the maiden speech we have heard tonight. I am sure that all of us who heard it, though I am not sure that I can include the hon. and learned Member for Ilford, North (Mr. Hutchinson) in that, would agree. I think it was a speech which augurs well for future intervention by the hon. Member in our debates. He was speaking on a subject about which he knows, and about which he obviously felt strongly, and, without becoming excessively controversial, he said what he felt.

I should like to agree with the general view which the hon. gentleman expressed, that it would be desirable, if we could do it, to have larger newspapers. I think there is some doubt in the minds of some newspapers whether they would like to go back to the pre-war size of newspapers, in view of the cost of newsprint; but I want to assure the hon. Member for Sevenoaks (Mr. Rodgers), and the hon. Member for Ashford. that there is no question of discrimination against the Press. It is a question of dollars in relation to the supply of newsprint available.

While it is easy, and I make no complaint about it, to suggest that more dollars should be found for this purpose, as one hon. Member did, there is some obligation upon the speaker who puts forward that suggestion to indicate what items of dollar expenditure ought to be cut. Only a few minutes ago it was suggested that we ought to be buying more timber with dollars, more food, more petrol, and more of many other things. Therefore it is no good coming forward with the suggestion that we ought to spend more dollars on newsprint without saying and without realising what effect it is likely to have, if we do so, upon the raw material position in many other industries, and upon the employment position in those industries.

I agree with the hon. Member for Sevenoaks in his concern about the need in a democracy for the fullest possible reporting of all items of public importance. He referred to a conference, and to many other items; though I think it is probably true that more newsprint was spent on reporting a conference since the one to which he referred, and a good deal of imagination was employed in that reporting.

Sir Wavell Wakefield (St. Marylebone)

There was a lot of public importance in it.

Mr. Wilson

There was a lot of public importance, but it would have been more interesting, I think, if the reports had been based upon what took place at the conference. [HON. MEMBERS: "Tell us."] I think that in making that reference to democracy, we must be careful not to be hypocritical. It would be possible for the Press to give more space to questions of public importance today, with the present level of newsprint. The hon. Member for Ashford spoke of the raw material for public thought, but if one turns to the average newspaper, one will find a lot of items which are hardly the raw material for public thought.

I found that a newspaper the other day thought it essential to give a highly inaccurate report of what I had for lunch that day. I have no objection to that being done, if it is really of interest to the public and if it is raw material for public thought. I do not want any hon. Member to think that because of my feelings on that matter I should want to see newspapers have less newsprint. Of course I should not. I should like them to have more newsprint, so that they could give details, if this is of interest to the public, of what hon. Gentlemen had for lunch. We all desire, therefore, to see more newsprint available. When it is available, it is entirely a matter for the newspapers how they use it. I have always steadfastly resisted any suggestion, from whatever quarter it has come, that newsprint supplies should be used in any way for censorship purposes. But, in saying that, it is a little easy to fall into making suggestions that no more can be done with the present level of supply.

I would remind the House of one or two facts about the newsprint position. As the House knows, before the war, the home consumption for newspapers and periodicals was about 1,200,000 tons a year, and home production was about 800,000 tons a year, of which about 60,000 tons were exported; the remainder of our requirements was imported, mostly against payment in dollars. Exports now are higher than at that time, running at about 100,000 tons, preeminently to Australia, which has the effect of helping that country to save dollars. In that connection I would say that I was interested to hear of the quotation from an Australian about our position. We are depending now to a much greater extent than we were before the war on home production.

The total home output was greatly reduced by enemy action. Production until last year, even so, was a long way below capacity mainly owing to the shortage of supplies of pulp. Now, home production is going pretty well full blast, but, after allowing for exports, there are only about 400,000 tons available for home consumption. It is within the knowledge of hon. Members that imports are now freely allowed from soft currency countries, but the amount which can be made available for dollar imports has had to be greatly reduced.

The hon. Member for Sevenoaks referred to the regrettable necessity of cancelling the Canadian contracts three years ago. That was debated in this House, and as he rightly says, there are no dollar imports now coming in; but dollars have been made available for the importation of about 25,000 tons for the second half of this year. That, we know, is relatively small, and it is not possible for me to say what the position will be in 1951. It is calculated that there should be enough newsprint to maintain the six-page paper for the second half of this year, after allowing a restricted amount for periodicals. But, as hon. Members know, they have been freed and periodicals, in the main, use paper other than newsprint.

Although we have only the six-page paper compared with the very considerable sizes to which we were accustomed before the war, this represents about 50 per cent. of pre-war consumption, largely owing to the fact that we have a very high rate of consumption of copies of papers per head of the population. In other words, the total circulations are very high for the size of the population, and it is reckoned by some authorities that ours is the highest in the world. It has been suggested that only at the last minute did we save the situation for the six-page paper; but that has been made more secure by this 25,000 tons proposal. The hon. Member for Harrow, Central (Mr. Bishop) and I have often met on this subject, and as he knows, we have arranged at the request of the newspapers themselves, that they should organise their own consumption within the eight-page limit against the background of supplies which are expected and with a view to maintaining stocks at a certain minimum level. If I may say so, I think they were a little optimistic of what might happen in the second half of this year and they could have made it a little more certain if they had gone back to the six-page paper a little earlier in the spring.

Uppermost in our minds is the question of our relations with Canada and our desire to keep that line of supply open. For a number of reasons, it was agreed that dollars should once again be forthcoming for Canadian imports and that has made possible the maintenance of the six-page papers in the second-half of this year. Since this House last debated newsprint—and it is now some two years since this subject was last debated—we have seen the size of newspapers going up from four to this present figure of six to seven pages, and circulations have been freed. We have seen a short period of seven pages.

What the future holds is very difficult for me to forecast. It depends to a very considerable extent on the building and installation of new newsprint machinery. None of us would suggest that we ought to cut exports of newsprint which is supplied primarily to Australia. Apart from the need to export to Australia in order to pay for our food and raw materials, there is the dollar-saving implication of newsprint exported to that country. New production in this country cannot yield results at the earliest until late 1951 or early 1952.

Therefore, the position next year must depend on the dollar situation. We recognise the great importance of keeping that link with Canada open, if it is humanly possible to do, but the House will appreciate that it will be impossible for me tonight, without going into the general dollar position, to say what the prospects are and to say what we hope may be possible with regard to newsprint supplies for the next year or more.

Adjourned accordingly at Twenty-nine Minutes to Twelve o'Clock.