HC Deb 26 February 1970 vol 796 cc1529-40

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

10.18 p.m.

Mr. Joel Barnett (Heywood and Royton)

I wish to make it clear at the outset that I do not wish to oppose the use of gas or gas appliances. I myself have had gas central heating at home for the past 10 years without any trouble whatever. I have no wish to knock the gas industry in any way, neither do I wish to over-dramatise the situation in the country at the moment. It is not necessary to do so since the situation is far too serious.

I wish to reiterate the request that I have previously made to my right hon. Friend for an independent and impartial inquiry into the whole matter of North Sea gas conversions and to ask that, while that inquiry is taking place, there should be a suspension of further conversions. I will give the House my reasons for thinking that that is necessary.

First, I believe that nothing less than a completely independent inquiry will satisfy public opinion. People have seen, heard, read of and had their own experiences of leaks, faults and explosions. Understandably, they are extremely nervous. Like many other hon. Members, I have received a great number of letters and calls and visits by people to my advice bureau telling of the experiences that they have had in areas all over the country. I have heard of an old lady who had a gas cooker explode in her face, fortunately without tragic consequences. I have heard numerous cases of pilot lights going out, with all that that means to people who fear the possible consequences. There have been cases of people smelling leaking gas, with all the serious consequences which can flow, even more serious when one remembers that sometimes it is not noticed by householders. There have been cases of boilers overheating, and so on.

I want to be fair to the Gas Council and the various gas boards. At the outset, let me say that I accept that in many cases these faults are not necessarily due to gas conversions. In some cases there are other reasons. There was an explosion recently in my constituency where the whole town centre was disorganised for some time. I complained to the chairman of the North Western Gas Board who told me that it was not the fault of gas conversions but of a leaking main which was allowing gas to escape through an old stone culvert. His engineers reported to him that they found …pipe fractures at two points due to ground movement, which could have been caused by frost heave or traffic vibration. Additionally, there were nine leakages from joints which were of a minor nature and dispersed around the area…I can, however, say that the above two cases to which I have referred are in no way connected with the work of converting our customers to the use of North Sea gas. Despite the fact that I believe the chairman of that gas board, that does not satisfy the people in my area. They do not believe it, and it is understandable that they do not. I will quote a typical letter that I have had about this sort of incident. It is from a vicar, and he says: I constantly meet people who are in a state of real fear about the change. They need a reassurance that it does not seem possible to give them at present. That is the point. One can quote the chairmen of local gas boards interminably, but it will not be enough. People will not be satisfied by gas boards up and down the country saying that it is all right and trying to reassure them. They will not be reassured, and it is understandable.

The second reason why I believe that we need an impartial inquiry is that we should be told how the job of conversion is being carried out. In my area, the job is sub-contracted. The same applies in other parts of the country. The trouble is that we have far too little experience. Obviously we cannot have a great deal since we have only recently turned over to North Sea gas. We know from an Answer given by my right hon. Friend to a Question on Monday that in one in five conversions there has to be a recall to the job. I know from my experience in my constituency that people are without heat and without cookers, not just for an odd day while a fitter comes back on a recall, but for weeks. I had an urgent telephone call only last night from a house with two young children which was without heat and had been for some days. It looked likely to be without it for longer still.

On Monday, my right hon. Friend said that there was no sign of an increasing proportion of complaints. I find that surprising, and I would like to see some evidence to support his assertion. Certainly there are increasing complaints to me. I do not know whether that is a coincidence, because I have been agitating recently for something to be done, but I have found no reduction in the number of complaints. I hope that my right hon. Friend will be able to give us the facts, if not tonight, certainly very soon.

I should like to know how much training is given to the fitters and engineers who are doing this job. From information that I have been given, there are people going around doing gas conversions who have perhaps had a two or three weeks' crash course. In some cases I am not sure they have even had that. This cannot be good enough. How many inspectors are there checking on the fitters who are trained in this way? One wonders whether there are any at all. Are the fitters on some kind of bonus incentive scheme which makes them do the job rather quicker? We need to know the answers to those questions. We know that there will be inevitable exaggerations by people in a period of change. But many of the cases of which I have personal experience are certainly not exaggerated.

I come to the economic reasons. At Question Time on Monday my right hon. Friend said there were sound economic reasons for going ahead with the conversions. That is true, but equally I believe that it is in the best interests of the gas boards and the nation generally that the millions of pounds of national assets that are at stake should be given a proper chance to be utilised. The cost of conversion, estimated in 1966, was apparently £400 million. I imagine that this will now be rather higher. The capital expenditure of the gas boards over the next five years, according to an answer given by my right hon. Friend on Monday, is £1,500 million at £300 million a year, plus the expenditure in the North Sea.

To get a good return for the nation it is vital that we get this right or, like many of the people who write to me, the, public will be giving up gas appliances and turning more and more to other appliances. I have received many letters from people who, because of their fear of the consequences, are now turning, for example, to electric cookers and heaters. Surely this does not help the economic case for gas conversion. There is an enormous economic case. We want to reduce the amount of oil imports and the consequent saving on the balance of payments, so it is vital that these hundreds of millions of pounds which are at stake should give the nation an adequate return.

If my right hon. Friend cannot tell us tonight, may I ask him to inquire what is happening to the sales of gas appliances? I shall be surprised if sales of gas appliances are not very much reducing because of the fear that people have. My right hon. Friend said on Monday that it would be sound economic sense to maintain the momentum of conversions. There is not much use in maintaining that momentum if, in the process, we lose millions of consumers.

Following what I have said, the need for a temporary suspension of conversions is self-evident. We just do not know enough about what is happening. It may be that some of the explosions and leaks are not the fault of conversions to North Sea gas, but we know that the public believe this to be the cause.

It may also be that some are due to improper use of appliances by householders. This is not too surprising. People generally do not understand forms, diagrams and instructions telling them how to use particular things. It is not surprising that elderly people, many of whom live alone, are not able to follow the instructions left behind by fitters who themselves do not know how the appliances will work. My right hon. Friend said something very significant on Monday, that many of the appliances are themselves inadequate. What are the implications of this? One person who wrote to me this week said that she had been informed that she would have to have a new heater and that the gas board were prepared to pay for it, but the cost of running it would be substantially higher. In some cases, others who have written to me have been advised that they need new appliances. When people buy a new gas cooker or heater they expect it to last for some time, particularly the elderly person without large resources. They do not contemplate changing appliances very quickly.

When they are told that, because of gas conversions they are expected to buy new appliances, they not unnaturally feel a little apprehensive. So for this reason also there is good ground for saying that we should temporarily suspend until we know the full costs to the public in the possible change and purchase of new appliances.

I have no wish to be emotional about this. One can die crossing a road or through slipping on a banana skin, but this is a self-imposed hazard. How many more deaths must we have before we suspend? We have completed only 1¼ million conversions, out of 13¼ million consumers. We must consider not just those 1¼ million and the fact that 250,000 have had recalls and are already concerned about it. We must consider the other 12 million. How will they feel after hearing what has been going on?

In their interests, in the interest of the gas boards and in the public interest generally, there is a need for a fully independent inquiry. A Gas Council inquiry will not satisfy the public. While this is taking place, and until the public are satisfied that there is no need for this fear, it is vital that we suspend further conversions. Without this double process, we are in grave danger of wasting hundreds of millions of national assets—not to mention the lives which could be involved.

10.33 p.m.

Mr. Dudley Smith (Warwick and Leamington)

I support what the hon. Member for Heywood and Royton (Mr. Barnett) has said. Many of us have made these points before. Conversion in my area finished many months ago, but I am still receiving a stream of serious complaints. I support the call for an independent inquiry and I hope that the Minister will allow it. But, if not, with his undoubted ability and understanding in these matters, would lie at least take over supervision of this campaign, because it is getting very much out of hand and needs Ministerial authority? If he cannot, it will get completely out of hand over the next few months. I urge him to take serious note of what has been said.

10.34 p.m.

The Paymaster-General (Mr. Harold Lever)

I am grateful to the hon. Member for Warwick and Leamington (Mr. Dudley Smith) for being so brief. That is always a great sacrifice, but I have to cover a great deal of ground, so I am particularly in his debt.

I have no complaint at all at this debate. Indeed, I feel some gratitude towards my hon. Friend the Member for Heywood and Royton (Mr. Barnett) for seeking an occasion for it and I am grateful for the moderate and informed way in which he presented his case. Natural gas is new and makes news and anything that goes wrong with it makes news too. But then hon. Members are here to probe and prod, not to bring comfort to occupants of the Front Bench. Although the occasion for the debate is dissatisfaction with the answers which my hon. Friend got, I am still grateful to him for giving me the opportunity to deal with his points on this very important subject.

It should be borne in mind that natural gas is new in England but not new in the world. Nor is it a strange eccentricity on our part to use it. What has been unusual has been to use gas made from coal. America, Canada, France, Holland and many other countries use natural gas and have used it with satisfaction for varying periods of time. So this is not a new fuel and the Gas Council, before embarking on the conversion to natural gas, made a very careful study of all the situations in other countries which might be useful to it in proceeding with conversion in this country.

I realise that a great deal of inconvenience is attached to conversion from town gas to natural gas. The old appliances were intended for one type of gas and they are being asked to serve a new type, and to make them effective to serve that new type they have to have certain adjustments and modifications made to them which inevitably involves inconvenience while the work is done, with people being unable to use their cookers for a while and so on. We have very skilled people carefully trained in this work, with all the equipment one would expect to achieve the quickest and most effective conversion.

Usually the conversion is simple and results in no complaints. That covers 80 per cent. of the cases. The conversion is done and people appear to use the natural gas with complete satisfaction thereafter. Of the remaining 20 per cent. who call us back again, one call is usually enough to put them into the same category as the original 80 per cent. One assumes that they have been satisfied and that their complaints have been dealt with. It really means that 90 per cent. of the 20 per cent. who have to be seen again have to be seen only once and then their problems are over.

So we have the remaining 2 per cent. of the consumers whose appliances for one reason or another require more than one visit to get them right. We know of no way to do it better. We are trying all the time to do it better, however, and we shall not rest until we do do it better and until we have satisfied the most difficult customer, however many times we have to go back and check and recheck and adjust appliances to make sure that they work satisfactorily.

My hon. Friend questioned whether we are improving our methods. When we first started the rate of call back was one in four; now it is one in five, which is a significant improvement. He must not suppose that, when we used to install ordinary gas appliances, we did not have a rate of call back. One in 10 was about the rate of call back after the installation of appliances under the old system, these being appliances specially designed for the use of town gas. I cannot regard a one in five call back, with 90 per cent. of those calls back satisfied after one more visit, as evidence of there being an abnormal situation. All the evidence is one way—that things are being done faster and better.

Though there is inconvenience and technical difficulty, one would imagine from the talk that some new hazard had been introduced into British life by the introduction of natural gas. I will give some facts. In the years 1966–69, fatalities from gas of all kinds, both natural and town, were reduced from 755 to 272, no mean achievement in additional safety over four years. In 1969, in terms of fatalities, we were very nearly three times as safe as in 1966, a mere four years ago. That progress has been steady.

Mr. Dudley Smith

Does it include suicides?

Mr. Lever

Those are all the fatalities. The figures improve even more if suicides are segregated from the others. All deaths caused by gas of all kinds are just over one-third of what they were four years ago.

Deaths from explosions have averaged only 10 a year from all gases—this is a pretty static figure—during the last four years. How much did North Sea gas add to this hazard? In 1968 there was one death from explosion by natural gas. In 1969 there were no deaths from explosions from natural gas. These facts are different from the impression given in newspapers, on the radio, on television, and in complaints made in the House. I am not blaming any of those concerned. The job of newspapers, the television and the radio is to bring to the notice of people who are interested news about what they are interested in. It is not their fault if the proportion is not immediately observed by the public. It is, however, my duty to put the matter into proportion. Those figures serve to put the matter into perspective.

As to the numbers of burnt gas fatalities—that is, where the gas asphyxiates people, which one would think would be more likely to happen after conversion to natural gas—in 1969 50 people died from asphyxiation by gas of all kinds, and in only 6 per cent., or in three cases, was the accident due to natural gas, although by this time natural gas exceeded 10 per cent. of the total gas supply. Those facts do not bear out the suggestion that natural gas is in any way less safe than town gas. There is no doubt that in an atmosphere of difficulty, although the call-back rate is being reduced, although accidents are being reduced, people have a sense of alarm.

What about an expert inquiry independent of the Gas Council? I have been as fair and as charitable as I can to everybody who has been concerned in creating all this public interest, which I do not complain about. I do not complain about the reporting of cases which are of public interest, though it is rather odd that we hear little about the figure of 4,000 people in a year who die from falls in their homes. But one does not get the impression from reading newspapers, listening to the radio, and watching television, that in two years only one person has been killed by a natural gas explosion. I make no complaint, however. It is the duty of Ministers to be as responsive to the public mind and public anxiety as hon. Members are and as members of the Press and representatives of the radio and television media are.

I would therefore rather have an unnecessary independent inquiry than unnecessary anxiety or an unjustified feeling, rather than be said to be somebody who wishes to whitewash the gas industry. Therefore, I have had discussions with Sir Henry Jones, who has readily agreed that there be an independent expert inquiry to look into the safety question of all matters affecting natural gas and its appliances. [Interruption.] I know that the hon. Gentleman is of the act first, think later school. I am of the opposite school. I needed a short time in which to consider the request which my hon. Friend put to me before and pressed on me today and which I have now readily accepted. My hon. Friend will have done a service by helping to calm the public mind by inducing me by his representations that there is a demand for such an independent inquiry to give the public the facts. I am glad to say that Sir Henry Jones readily agrees with this.

I have tried to put a few facts before the House about safety.

I can say frankly, having looked at the figures that are available to date—I do not pretend that I have been able to get all the evidence that will be available to an independent inquiry—that natural gas offers far less risk of death or serious accident than the gas which it is replacing, and I hope that the public will take note of this.

As for the economic argument, natural gas is more economical than the former gas. I confess that during this period of capital expenditure and when there is a change from the old to the new, there are bound to be many inconveniences to those who find that their appliances are not as really tip-top for the purpose of natural gas as they were before. I am afraid that this is inevitable, just as it must have been when people changed from gas mantles to electric lamps. In a sense, a similar process is taking place with regard to natural gas.

But I urge the House to consider the benefits that accrue to the country; to our balance of payments, in terms of cheap energy for industry and cheaper gas for the housewife. Even now, we are charging 1d. per then less than we were previously, even though we are going through a period of great expenditure in the conversion operation. We have, nevertheless, actually been able to reduce prices, which, even under the present Administration, is not too common an aspect of our domestic life.

It should be noted that, while I have quoted the figures of risk and inconvenience, they are figures relating to the time of conversion. I confidently expect that we will get even better results, in terms of both safety and convenience, when everything has had time to settle down. Hon. Members will be gratified to know that in areas where conversions first took place we have, after dealing with the initial complaints, got to the point of the normal complaint percentage relating to manufactured town gas. This is remarkable in such a short period.

I appreciate that the new people coming into the system will have inconvenience in some cases, but everything will gradually settle down. I have explained that natural gas is now at least as safe—I feel confident in saying that it is safer—as the gas it has replaced. It is right that hon. Members should express the anxieties of people and I appreciate that, if there is a gas leak, people may tend, because of what they have read and heard in the newspapers and elsewhere, to think that there is danger and that an explosion may occur.

Natural gas has a great future. It is a great natural asset. It is a safe fuel, at least as safe as its predecessor and probably a good deal more so. When everything has settled down and when the country has got over this interruption to its conservative habits—that is, when the changeover has been completed—natural gas will be welcomed as a great improvement.

Mr. Barnett

I completely accept, and welcome, the spirit in which my right hon. Friend has dealt with this matter. I thank him very much indeed for agreeing to establish an independent inquiry. Would he deal with the question of suspension during the period of the inquiry?

Mr. Lever

There is no ground, on the facts I have given, to suspend conversions. The inconvenience of conversions is being reduced. The cost of suspension would be enormous and there would have to be a well documented case to justify it.

Mr. Dudley Smith

Before the Minister sits down, would he——

The Question having been proposed after Ten o'clock, and the debate having continued for half an hour, Mr. DEPUTY SPEAKER adjourned the House without Question put, pursuant to the Standing Order.

Adjourned at twelve minutes to Eleven o'clock.