UNEMPLOYMENT, RUTHERGLEN (Hansard, 19 December 1967)

§ Mr. Gregor Mackenzie (Rutherglen)
I begin by thanking you, Mr. Speaker, for making it possible for me to make these remarks tonight. I am grateful to you in view of the difficulties which we experienced when I was not able last week to make the speech which I wish to make now.
I am pleased to have this opportunity to discuss the whole question of unemployment in my constituency. The unemployment figures in my area have been growing for some time and I hope that, when the Minister replies, I will be given at least a little encouragement about the future for the people of Rutherglen, and particularly for those who are at present unemployed.
It is on this issue that, for possibly the first time, I have had the complete backing of my whole constituency. The town council, the trades council, and every shade of political opinion, Labour and Conservative alike, have asked me to raise this matter. All are extremely anxious and concerned about it and want to do everything that they possibly can to reduce the difficulties being faced by the people of my constituency, particularly during the Christmas and New Year period, as the Secretary of State for Scotland well knows.
My interest in raising this subject is not simply because I wish to talk about unemployment, though that is bad enough in itself. I wish also to draw attention to the number of firms which have closed in the past year in Rutherglen. Without wishing to labour the point, it might be for the convenience of the Minister if I were to outline briefly the sort of firms which are vanishing from the scene in Rutherglen.
A small but useful company dealing in gardening services, Kirkintilloch Gardening Services—admittedly, not the sort of articles that hit the headlines of the national newspapers—used to provide 17 much-needed jobs in the area. When that firm had to close, the loss of those jobs 1225 was greatly regretted by many people. The second firm to close, was Donald Clerk Ltd., of Rutherglen. This had been an old, well-established firm in the area and for many years had provided jobs in the constituency. In all, 140 jobs were lost when that firm closed. It closed primarily because of amalgamations and take-overs. At a time when we hear a lot about monopoly control and take-over bids, it may be noted that this was a classic example of a firm being taken over and a number of jobs being lost as a result.
The third important firm to close in Rutherglen in the last year was a subsidiary company of Stewarts and Lloyds, now under the control of the National Steel Corporation. It was called Weldings, Fittings and Flanges and, when it went, 230 jobs went with it. From time to time I have raised with the Board of Trade the question of a paperworks in my constituency. However, this paper mill—S.C.W.S. Paper Mill—closed and, again, it had been established for many years in the area. People had given a lifetime of service to the company and, when it closed, 54 jobs went by the board.
I regret having to catalogue these instances of closure, but it is important that the matter be got in perspective, for in addition to speaking about unemployment I wish to emphasise the loss of employment opportunities in my constituency. The fifth firm, Associated Chrome Chemicals Ltd., went as a result of a decision taken some time ago. It happened before the present Government came to power and we are having to suffer for the misdeeds of the past. The decision to close this company in Scotland was taken in 1964; prior to the election when the Labour Party came to power. It was decided at that time to rationalise the business, and it was transferred to Yorkshire. We in Rutherglen were the first to suffer when the first phase of the closure of this company took place. Several stages are involved in the closure but, in all, the loss of this firm represents the loss of 237 jobs.
In addition to these jobs being lost, as a result of closures generally, there have been 139 redundancies in my constituency caused, in the main, by short-time working in the furniture-making trade and so on. A considerable number 1226 of people in furniture making and the steel industry are on short time. If one adds to the total, which is already an unhappy one, the fact that a number of people who live in the Burgh of Rutherglen and who used to find their employment in Glasgow are unable to find as much work there as in days gone past, it makes a very depressing picture and one that calls for fairly drastic action.
Over the year as a whole we have lost a lot of jobs, and we now have about 1,157 unemployed. I concede to my right hon. Friend that this is by no means the highest unemployment figure we have ever had. It was much higher in 1962 and 1963, and in the early part of 1964. Nevertheless, it presents a very depressing picture, and one that it is right we should now discuss.
It would be an impertinence for me to rehearse the various difficulties experienced by unemployed people. Those difficulties are well known to us all. We all feel very deeply about them, particularly those of us on this side of the House. Many of us regard the reduction of unemployment as our first priority. We have thought about the problem most of our working lives, and the idea of even one person behing unemployed is abhorrent to us all. Nor shall I discuss the miseries for the wives and families of unemployed men, and their particular difficulties at this time of year. That aspect, too, is well known to all of us. It is a soul destroying prospect for a man—or for a woman—who has skill and talent, and is anxious to work, keep a roof over his head and look after his family, to be deprived of the right to do so.
Things are more especially difficult, as I am sure many of us will appreciate, for those who are over 50 years of age. These people have often given a working life of service to one particular industry. That is true of those who worked for very many years with Associated Chrome Chemicals. They became very skilled in that type of work and were regarded by the company as skilled people, but once the works were closed, it was found that the skills and talents built up over many years were not required in other industries. At that time of a man's life it is not so easy for him to adapt himself to other skills in another job. It can truthfully be said of such people that 1227 the longer they have been working in one industry the more likely they are to find it difficult to move into something else.
Some of the difficulties I have mentioned are due to policies that are being pursued by the Government. That is perhaps particularly true of hire purchase in relation to the electrical appliances and furniture industries. But that is by no means the sole, or even the main, reason for the present unemployment in Rutherglen. The main reason is that, in a sense, Rutherglen is a microcosm of a development area. Our industries, which once made a very substantial contribution to the economic wellbeing of Scotland, are of the older type well known to my Scottish hon. Friends. We have depended very heavily on wire making, rope making, steel fittings of one kind and another, paper making, and so on. Some of these industries are now either dying out or are coming to the end of their useful working life. When demand is high and the economy is booming companies are prepared to keep some of these firms working even though they are not the most modern, but when things become a little slack these projects are closed down. This is happening in Rutherglen at present.
One of the main reasons for my raising this issue tonight is that when things improve—one can see various trends and from statements by the Board of Trade and the Treasury it appears that things will pick up perhaps next August—when demand picks up and the economy starts moving upwards, the industries in my constituency which I have mentioned will have closed their doors and there will be no prospect of their opening again because of the many difficulties involved.
I have outlined to the Front Bench a long and rather miserable tale of closures, but the more difficult part will come next year. I have referred to the movement of Associated Chrome Chemicals from Rutherglen to Yorkshire, but a second move is taking place next year when we shall lose more jobs. In the next few weeks we shall lose Stewart and Lloyds, which is a firm well known to all my Scottish colleagues. It is closing in February with the possible loss of 300 jobs. That company is under the control of the National Steel Cor- 1228 poration. I understand the justification by the Corporation to close those works is that the projects may be rationalised and its plants modernised so that they can continue to do business perhaps in other places. That will bring many difficulties, particularly to those who have worked in the firm for many years.
I have often heard it said by people who work in steel making in Scotland that there may be a number of such closures over the next 10 years. The Minister of Power has been concerning himself with the closure of pits and introducing measures to deal with redundant miners by provisions for pensions and training. The same kind of situation will perhaps develop in the steel industry, so we should be prepared to do something to help these people. These are some of the difficulties over closures in Rutherglen at present. We see very little prospect of anything new coming to the burgh in the next few years. It may be that when my right hon. Friend replies to the debate he will indicate the sort of measures the Government have been taking to assist areas such as mine which have been hard hit by closures or other difficulties mainly because of the Government's concern about re-structuring industry in Scotland.
I would be the first to support the Government in saying that regional employment premium, investment grants and loans have been very helpful to many parts of Scotland. It is a truism that had it not been for some of the action taken by the Government in the last few years to deal with this situation unemployment might have been a great deal higher than it is at present, but these measures, useful though they have been in Scotland and other development areas, have not been of particular value to Rutherglen. There we have had little in the way of assistance by grants and loans.
The Secretary of State may also say that there will be work in the course of the next few months arising in Glasgow and Lanarkshire because of the measures the Government have taken to build advance factories, to open up estates for new projects of one kind or another, and the training facilities which are now available in Lanarkshire as a whole. I welcome all these measures which have 1229 been used to assist in Glasgow and Lanarkshire, but they are not of great value to those who work in Rutherglen.
I know of the Government's point about studies in transportation. One of the most important things happening in the West of Scotland is a greater Glasgow transportation study. Although I could not pre-judge the findings of this body, I will say that one of the recommendations will undoubtedly be that travelling should be kept down to the bare minimum. We in Rutherglen would welcome this, because we have no desire for our people to move to other parts of Lanarkshire or into Glasgow to find work. We do not want to become a dormitory suburb of Glasgow. We were once a very thriving community in our own right. We want to stay this way.
Therefore, we cannot accept a repetition of the process whereby vital communities such as ours, which were built up by time and by much capital equipment, are allowed to lie as economic by-waters in the way of industrial movement determined primarily by short-term considerations.
Rutherglen is a very fine town. It is well built. It is well served in the way of social services of various kinds. We want these services to be used. We want the town to be used. We make an urgent appeal that it should not become a dormitory suburb of Glasgow. It is encouraging to hear of all the areas which are getting various facilities from the Government. We are delighted about this but we should like some of the cake for ourselves. We hear about what is going on in the new towns. Of course we are delighted that there is a build up in East Kilbride and Cumbernauld, but we think that there is a substantial case for something being done for some of the older communities such as Rutherglen.
Briefly, we want Government projects which will provide work for our people. We want something done for our older workers, perhaps an interchange from the older industries in which they have worked to some of the newer science-based industries about which we hear so much nowadays. A number of buildings in Rutherglen have been left vacant over the past year. These could profitably be used by other organisations which might want to establish themselves in the West of Scotland. Could not a survey be made 1230 of these under-utilised buildings and of the land which has been made available because some of the people who formerly occupied the buildings have left?
We have pressed various Government Departments—the Treasury, the Board of Trade, the Scottish Development Department—on the possibility of siting an inland contained port within Rutherglen. I hope that my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State will study this problem. Rutherglen has a lot of advantages and much to offer. I am grateful to my right hon. Friend for coming to answer this debate. We in Rutherglen are very worried about our position and we trust that we can be given some encouragement to hope that there will be some future for us.

§ Mr. Tarn Dalyell (West Lothian)
rose—

§ Mr. Speaker
Order. Before I call the hon. Gentleman, I remind him that we are debating the question of employment in Rutherglen. Does he wish to speak to that?

§ Mr. Dalyell
I think that it is appropriate, Mr. Speaker, that I should intervene for a minute or so, as it is from Rutherglen and Glasgow that many of my constituents have come under the Glasgow overspill agreement. At a time when we hear of a great deal going wrong, or supposedly going wrong, we should from time to time comment on what is going right.
I wish to draw attention to the success of the Glasgow overspill scheme as it affects the Burgh of Whitburn and other places in West Lothian. If my right hon. Friend the Minister of State, Board of Trade, is criticised from time to time about this, that or the other, he could well bear in mind that there is a remarkable success story in the whole overspill agreement and the bringing of industry to the West Lothian area. It is right that this should be said. In Whitburn, we have a community which is growing fast, and growing fast because of the many skilled people who are brought in from the constituency of my hon. Friend the Member for Rutherglen (Mr. Gregor Mackenzie) and elsewhere.
I think it appropriate to draw attention to one worry which my hon. Friend the 1231 Member for Rutherglen and I have in common, and that is, our worry about the future of the paper industry. The industry is concentrated in Central Scotland, and, although I do not wish to take up more time on the details of the matter, this being a debate about Rutherglen and not about the paper trade, I think it right that some of us should voice concern about the state of affairs in the industry which is well known to my right hon. Friend the Minister of State, whom we greatly respect.

§ The Minister of State, Board of Trade (Mr. George Darling)
I think that my hon. Friend the Member for Rutherglen (Mr. Gregor Mackenzie) will understand my view of the matter which he has raised when I say that this is the seventh approach that I have had during the past few months from various deputations from parts of Lanarkshire about the industrial development which is required there to ensure that we get rid of unemployment and return to full employment. We are always glad to receive these representations, and we do our best to make sure that they are properly considered so that we can set developments going which will provide the full employment we all wish to see.
My hon. Friend has raised several questions about individual concerns, such as the Associated Chemical Companies, Stewarts and Lloyds, and the Eastfield paper works. We quite understand the difficulties which will arise if these various rundowns, if I may put it like that, in industrial employment come along, and we fully appreciate the difficulties which we shall have to face in providing alternative work. However, I do not wish to go into individual cases in this debate. We can deal better with individual cases in consultation with the firms concerned and with the Members of Parliament interested.
The problem we have to face in the Board of Trade is that, in the area of which my hon. Friend has spoken, we have to provide about 1,000 new jobs. It would create a false impression if we tried to convey the idea that this part of Lanarkshire is a run-down area. There are many schemes coming along which, if properly developed and exploited, can provide the employment which is needed 1232 to ensure that in this part of Scotland at least we provide something like full employment in the way that we measure full employment in our general statistics.
Rutherglen has a very important historical industrial record. It is placed on the outskirts of Glasgow, near to the North Lanarkshire industrial area and there is a number of jobs in prospect—

§ Mr. Darling
Industrial development certificates are being provided in this area and industrial projects are coming along. I agree that the Government must provide the climate for industrial development to come, and that we must give confidence to the industrialists concerned that there will be a profitable outcome to their enterprises. If all those circumstances are provided, as I am sure that they will be, then the industrial projects which we have in mind, and to which we have given our support, will more than cover the unemployment in the area at present.
But we must face the situation that places like Blantyre, Bellshill and the other industrial estates round about must provide facilities for travelling to work. We cannot make absolutely certain that all the activities will take place in the Burgh of Rutherglen, and I am sure that my hon. Friend would not wish that to happen.
We are trying to develop industrial estates within the neighbourhood of Rutherglen as best we can. There is now no difficulty about acquiring the land. We can go ahead with the advance factories and build Board of Trade factories. We can give all the help needed to ensure that industrial enterprises get off the ground and develop within the general area of the outskirts of Glasgow and further into the Lanarkshire.
Our real problem at present is how to get industrial development going in South Lanarkshire, in the areas that depended in the past entirely on coal mining, and where there are no other industrial developments unless the Board of Trade steps in to provide advance factories and 1233 try to get firms to go to those areas. But we are now considering the problem of North Lanarkshire, and we shall give all the assistance we can to ensure that there is no continuing unemployment there.
My hon. Friend raised a number of questions. I do not want to go into detail about Ronald Lyon (Estates) and Taylor Woodrow Industrial Estates, which have sites in Rutherglen, where we are giving all the help we can to see that there is a combination of public and private enterprise to provide the industrial estate developments that we all want.
My hon. Friend mentioned the case of the Associated Chemical Companies. There are certain points here which I am willing to discuss with him. I do not think that it would be helpful if we discuss them in public. I think that we can get the enterprise connected with Associated Chemical Companies going.
My hon. Friend also asked whether we could provide an inland container terminal to serve Glasgow, and suggested that the best place to site it is in Rutherglen. That is not entirely a matter of parochial pride, because Rutherglen is one of the sites that we have under consideration on purely economic grounds and not merely to satisfy his desire to 1234 have it in his constituency. We will keep this under examination and I shall keep in touch with my hon. Friend and tell him, bearing in mind that a number of sites are in competition with each other, whether Rutherglen will be selected.
We appreciate the problems my hon. Friend has raised and sympathise with his desire to get more industrial developments going in Rutherglen so that the problem of unemployment can be completely eliminated. We in the Government will use our powers to the full to assist in suitable projects which come along in that part of Scotland. We shall continue to do all we can to bring the facilities that are being offered to the notice of all inquiring industrialists on all appropriate occasions, so that we can provide the industrial development certificates and the financial inducements to fulfil what my hon. Friend asks—the appropriate industrial development in the Rutherglen area and, I repeat, to ensure that unemployment is driven out of that part of Scotland.