HC Deb 04 April 1968 vol 762 cc581-4
2. Mr. Costain

asked the Secretary of State for Economic Affairs when he now intends publishing the Government's proposed national plan; and whether he will make a statement.

13. Mr. David Howell

asked the Secretary of State for Economic Affairs, what effect the recent Budget proposals will have on the National Plan.

27. Mr. Hordern

asked the Secretary of State for Economic Affairs when he will publish a new national plan.

Mr. Shore

We aim to publish a substantial planning document in the autumn describing the economic and industrial prospects over the next four to five years. This could serve as a basis for further planning work next year. It will take account of all the relevant factors including those referred to by the hon. Member for Guildford (Mr. David Howell).

Mr. Costain

Does not the right hon. Gentleman appreciate that the stationery bill has gone up by £6.5 million this year? Is not publication of these plans, which never seem to work, a further waste of money? Would it not be better to abolish the whole idea?

Mr. Shore

I do not think that the hon. Gentleman's view is shared by those engaged in planning and certainly not by the N.E.D.C., or by the large number of firms anxious that the Government should carry on their planning work.

Mr. Howell

Will the right hon. Gentleman ensure that this time the new national plan is put together more intelligently than the last one? Will not he concede that the last National Plan had certain weaknesses, particularly its failure to take account of that most obvious contingency, the balance of payments crisis?

Mr. Shore

This document will make the best possible use of the available information, but I need hardly remind the House that one of the problems with the 1965 Plan was the great shortage of statistical material available to the planners and forecasters.

Sir R. Cary

What happened to the first National Plan? Has it been pulped?

Mr. Shore

The forecasts and assumptions on which it was based were invalidated by events in 1966.

Mr. George Jeger

While appreciating that there is no shortage of planning, particularly with regard to Humberside and South Yorkshire, may I ask my right hon. Friend whether he does not agree that what we require there is a little less planning and a little more action?

Mr. Shore

My hon. Friend will know that we have already given our response to the very excellent report on preliminary strategy produced by the Yorkshire and Humberside Economic Planning Council.

7. Mr. Marten

asked the Secretary of State for Economic Affairs if he will publish the preliminary paper on the economy since devaluation prepared in connection with the new planning exercise for the second national plan.

The Joint Under-Secretary of State for Economic Affairs (Mr. Edmund Dell)

No, Sir.

Mr. Marten

If the Ministry will not publish this report, could the hon. Gentleman tell us the estimated growth of the gross national product over the six years 1964–70? Is it the 15½ per cent. we have been led to believe, or the full 25 per cent. proposed in the National Plan?

Mr. Dell

As the hon. Gentleman has just heard, my right hon. Friend expects to publish a substantial planning document in the autumn. I hope that it will go some way to meeting the hon. Gentleman's requirements. Meanwhile, a very informative Financial Statement has been published by the Chancellor of the Exchequer.

Mr. Higgins

Will the paper give any indication of how the forecasts of the Chancellor of the Exchequer last year totally differ from the forecasts of the Chancellor of the Exchequer this year? Will it analyse how Government economic policy has completely broken down?

Mr. Dell

I cannot accept that. This Government have gone a great deal further in publishing economic forecasts than was ever done in the past.

Mr. Fletcher-Cooke

When the Minister devises the second national plan, would he make it clear, which was not made clear in the first National Plan, whether it is a forecast or a target, because it cannot be both?

Mr. Dell

Obviously the plan will have elements of a forecast and a target in it. After all, the Government, in publishing this planning document, are responding to a great deal of pressure placed on them by industry as well as to their own need for a basis for their own public expenditure proposals.

20. Mr. Ridley

asked the Secretary of State for Economic Affairs how many people are engaged upon studies for a new national plan.

Mr. Dell

No Government servant is engaged solely on work of this kind, which enters into the work of all those concerned with economic policy and forecasting.

Mr. Ridley

Will the hon. Gentleman consider referring this activity to the National Board for Prices and Incomes to see whether it thinks we are getting value for money with all this national planning?

Mr. Dell

The hon. Gentleman is clearly completely out of touch with the needs expressed by industry of this country for Government planning, and also equally out of touch with the Government's own requirement to make a basis for public expenditure which his party continually insists we should keep under control.