HC Deb 04 March 1970 vol 797 cc578-90

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

11.8 p.m.

Mr. Donald Dewar (Aberdeen, South)

I am tonight raising the question of emigration and the rate of emigration from Scotland. This is an extremely sensitive issue, and I had always imagined that those who watch Scottish politics kept a very close eye on the figures. This simple assumption has, however, been slightly shaken by the story that appeared in the Scotsman on Thursday, 29th January. In that issue an extraordinary number of column inches was devoted to what was presented as a dramatic revelation allegedly culled from a report of population loss prepared for the Scottish Economic Planning Board.

The impression was given that a major scoop was being revealed, if that is not too vulgar a term for a such a genteel paper. We were told that the document which was allegedly being quoted was for circulation only among Cabinet Ministers and senior civil servants, but I hope that the House will not think it ungracious of me if I suggest that it was a very small scoop indeed, or think it uncharitable if I were to go further and describe it as a non-event, a very damp squib. However, the paper is noted for its rather individual definition of what makes news. We normally allow it to go its own way, but on this occasion some of the assumptions in that story should not go completely unchallenged. There appeared to be running throughout the story and leading article that was based upon it in the same issue the suggestion that in some way facts were being suppressed; that things which ought to be known to the Scottish people were unavailable; that facts were being deliberately kept from them by the non-publication of this document.

This conspiracy theory was given rather wider currency by the support of certain factions in the Scottish political scene. I do not think that I should be accused of being cynical if I described them as less than disinterested—the Scottish National Party and also Her Majesty's Opposition. The Scotsman the next day described Tory M.P.s, rather dramatically, as being "in full cry" on this issue.

I think that it is worth taking this opportunity to ask my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State to put the record straight and perhaps banish some of the misconceptions which seem to linger in the economics department of the Scotsman. I do not wish to ask specifically about the document which has allegedly been quoted. It seems, on the evidence presented, to be no more than a working paper for the Scottish Economic Planning Board, and the non-publication of this hardly justifies the furore that broke out in the columns of the paper. It would be a dangerous precedent if we could demand that every Departmental brief should be made public.

What worried me was the whole presentation and the rather doubtful habit of making statements of the obvious and suggesting in some way that they were new and suddenly revealed truths. The headline that Scotland loses 92 per cent. of her natural population increase is a fact which would have been available to anyone with a knowledge of simple mathematics who was prepared to correlate the Registrar General's figures. Similar calculations were made by the Conservative Government in their White Paper, Development in Central Scotland, and indeed in my right hon. Friend's White Paper, Cmnd. 2864, The Scottish Economy 1965 to 1970, for slightly different periods. I shall be pleased if my right hon. Friend can confirm that the information which was proclaimed in that headline has always been available to anyone who was interested enough to look for it.

It was suggested that the story of the 17-year period with which the report deals, could seriously embarrass the Government's preparations for the General Election. This struck me as a remarkable statement because my right hon. Friend has had responsibility for only four years and the trends which were advertised on that occasion were well known.

The hon. Member for Moray and Nairn (Mr. Gordon Campbell) was quoted in the Scotsman as saying that the report outlined a serious situation and confirmed his own anxieties. I confess that that does not surprise me, because if the hon. Gentleman looks at the Conservative White Paper produced in 1963. Cmnd. 2188, dealing with Central Scotland, he will see that it says: In itself loss of population on this scale is serious enough. But if it continues at present levels the prospects of securing in Scotland a much faster growth of new employment could be seriously prejudiced. The year in which hon. Gentlemen opposite made these remarks was 1962–63, when the loss was 34,000, and the next year it went up to 40,000, and I think that the then Administration could hardly not have recognised the trend. To say that it confirms anxieties can hardly be described as a surprise.

There is a technical point of some interest and importance on which I invite the Secretary of State's comments. The suggestion is constantly made by various people in Scotland that when the net emigration figures are finally calculated they are the result of setting off the gross figures of those leaving Scotland against the gross figures for those coming in, and by this subtraction getting a net figure. The Scotsman says: By resorting to the use of the term net emigration loss in most of its charts and giving only the result figure after deducting immigrants from emigrants—both un-numbered—the report manages to conceal the exact number of people involved. Again, this is a return to the idea that in some sort of way the true facts are being concealed and a smokescreen is being erected. I may be wrong, but, as I understand it, there are not gross figures for output and input of population in that kind of absolute sense. The figures are arrived at by taking previous Census figures, 1961 as to the original Census and more recently the 1966 Census, and the electoral rolls and doing a calculation on that kind of basis—in other words, an adjustment on the Census figures. Cross checks can be done by the use of housing returns and National Health Service cards. It would be useful if the Secretary of State could say a few words about this matter since there seems to be a continuing misconception about how the figures are calculated.

it is also constantly said that we are losing the economically active people. Again, perhaps my right hon. Friend could say something about the situation. The Conservative White Paper lent its support to this theory: In other words a very large proportion of the net loss to Scotland by emigration consisted of the young and more active elements of the working population. This is a matter with which the Scotsman makes great play. I wonder whether the typical incomer to Scotland is the retired army officer putting himself out to grass in a remote highland glen. Is there not something more up to date on which to go? There must be a large number of Scots people who retire to England. In the case of the elderly it must be a two-way flow. Surely the drain does not always involve the young and economically active.

I was interested to read in this connection on article by Harold Lind, published in October, 1969, in the magazine Scotland. When he was attached to the National Institute under Professor Brown he did a great deal of research into the migration of the educated population within Britain. Simplifying it into a few sentences this is what he said: Scotland is a net loser of educated people, but less heavily than many regions, particularly the North of England and Wales … Scotland seems to suffer heavy losses in the younger age groups (about 20–29) but there appears to he a considerable influx of educated people in their 30s to Scotland which is not easy to explain, as it resembles no other region of England or Wales. The result of this influx is that Scotland has a great many more educated people than would be suggested by the unfavourable nature of its occupation structure. I should be glad to have my right hon. Friend's comments on that and any up-to-date information he can provide. That work was based on the 1961 Census figures and may be to some extent out of date.

Obviously the emigration figures are vital indicators of Scotland's prosperity and the Government are often judged on this basis. We have seen an enormous improvement in the last two or three years. In 1967–68 emigration amounted to 33,000, last year it dropped to 25,000. We would all be interested to know what are the Government's projections.

I recognise that this is a difficult matter. I realise that the Secretary of State has burdened himself with a specific promise in his White Paper in 1965–70 to halve the emigration by the latter year. I know that there is a good deal to discourage his optimism.

The hon. Member for Ayr (Mr. Younger), in a debate on 2nd March, 1967, said that … all the signs are that last year's depressingly high rate is likey to be higher still this year."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 2nd March, 1967, Vol. 742, c. 789.] The hon. Member for Perth and East Perthshire (Mr. MacArthur), who can never be kept out of this kind of argument, rolled ponderously into the attack amazed that my right hon. Friend could cling to the Scottish Plan when the whole basis of the emigration targets in it have been clearly shot to pieces by events."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 2nd March, 1967; Vol. 742, c. 837.] I hope my right hon. Friend will be able to comment on that.

Mr. Ian MacArthur (Perth and East Perthshire) rose—

Mr. Dewar

I must press on.

Mr. MacArthur

What satisfaction can the hon. Gentleman find in the fact that since his right hon. Friend has taken office 109,000 Scots have gone abroad, 17,000 fewer people live in Scotland and we have 67,000 less jobs in the country, which is quite contrary to the White Paper?

Mr. Dewar

We are dealing with emigration which is an intractable problem. As the hon. Member for Ayr remarked, nobody least of all himself would suggest that any Government could have solved the problem in one, two or five years. This is typical of a great deal of the lugubrious pessimism displayed by the Opposition when examining the Scottish economy. It seems to me my right hon. Friend is well on the way to meeting his target and I very much welcome any further news he may have on the situation.

11.20 p.m.

The Secretary of State for Scotland (Mr. William Ross)

rose—

Mr. MacArthur rose—

Mr. George Younger (Ayr)

rose—

Mr. Deputy Speaker (Mr. Harry Gourlay)

Mr. Ross.

Mr. MacArthur

On a point of order, Mr. Deputy Speaker. I understand that this debate will run for another 20 minutes or so. Is it not possible for an hon. Member on this side of the House to intervene?

Mr. Deputy Speaker

I conformed to normal practice by calling the Minister when he rose. Mr. Ross.

Mr. Ross

Anyone who has any interest in or knowledge of the Scottish economic situation ought to be well aware of the main facts and figures on emigration. After all, they are published in the Digest of Scottish Statistics, in the annual reports of the Registrar-General for Scotland, in the Quarterly Review of Economic Development, and in detail in the Census tables. The information has also been made available from time to time in answer to Parliamentary Questions and in debates. I remember the debate that we had in March. 1967, when right hon. and hon. Gentlemen opposite said that our target in respect of emigration was impossible and that we could not reach it.

When we were talking in terms of the last available figures being 47,000, right hon. and hon. Gentlemen opposite predicted that that figure would rise. It did not. It has gone down not once, not twice, but three times since then. The fact is that everything said by the Opposition in respect of emigration has proved wrong. They said at that time that there was a new upward trend. In fact, the upward trend started in 1961–62. It rose from a net emigration figure of 20,000 per year until the time that they left office, giving them the benefit of the half-year, to the point where it was 40,600. In other words, in the lifetime of the last Conservative Parliament, net emigration from Scotland doubled. In the lifetime of this Labour Parliament, emigration will be halved.

Mr. MacArthur

rose—

Mr. Ross

No, I will not give way. The hon. Gentleman abused his last intervention in the speech of my hon. Friend the Member for Aberdeen, South (Mr. Dewar).

Mr. MacArthur

Give way.

Mr. Ross

No one can seriously suggest that the facts are not available. The recent revelations are not news, but history, and pretty distorted history at that.

I want to clear up some of the misconceptions in recent comments which have failed to appreciate how fast the situation is improving. We have had a smokescreen of distorted history that has obscured the facts which should be good news to hon. Gentlemen opposite if they are good Scotsmen. They have chosen to take emigration figures from the past and treat them as if they were current.

Can a loss by emigration of 92 per cent. of the natural increase be described as "news"? I saw it described by the S.N.P. in my local newspaper as "an appalling revelation". But the figures of emigration and of the natural increase are given in the Digest of Scottish Statistics, and anyone with an elementary knowledge of arithmetic can work them out. Certainly the figures should not be news to anyone in this House. The White Paper which I published in 1966 pointed out that, in the two years 1963–64 and 1964–65, the loss was 100 per cent. But evidently 100 per cent. is not news, yet 92 per cent. is.

It has been said that young people are leaving and being replaced by old people. It is true that most of the people who leave are younger people of skill. That is why concern was expressed in the Conservative document in 1963. The facts are that, between the Census years of 1961 and 1966—this is where information in detail can be obtained, and it is there for everyone—we lost more aged 65 and over to England and Wales than we gained. The net loss over these five years was 690. In other words, if there had been no migration at all, the resident population would have contained more old people than it does. Moreover, the number of old people who move is very small. We can see that from these figures. Old people are generally less mobile than young people.

There has been, rightly, a tendency to concentrate on what we lose in the way of skills, and we have lost sight of what we gain. Of the economically active, two-thirds of those going out, as against three-quarters of those coming in, are in the Registrar General's socioeconomic classes 1–9—from managers and employers down to skilled men. As many as one in four of all the economically active people coming into or returning to Scotland are in the highest professional and managerial classes, as compared with a ratio among home-based workers of less than one in ten. This is one of the explanations of the fact borne out by the 1966 Census as well as mentioned by Mr. Harold Lind in the article in Scotland. The extent of this highly qualified inflow shows the new pattern of more sophisticated modern industry in Scotland. People are coming with the industry and skilled Scots are coming back, and this augurs well for the sort of new technology which is being developed in Scotland.

It has also been suggested that Scots leave and non-Scots come into the country. We in Scotland welcome people of skills coming in, and we like a mixture. It is always heartening for me to visit Dounreay and find it almost a multiracial society, with a Welshman in charge of that establishment. It is not necessarily a bad thing for Scots to welcome people from other countries. The censuses show that, between 1911 and 1966, Scotland lost in population by net migration about 1,300,000 people. Of course, this was covered up by the very high natural increase and the birth rate in those earlier years. Yet the proportion of the population who were native-born Scots remained virtually the same in 1966 as in 1911, at 92 per cent. Many Scots must go away early in their careers and come back later. This supports the inference in Mr. Lind's article.

My hon. Friend mentioned the status of the document quoted. The officials of the Planning Board from time to time produce working papers incorporating detailed analyses of historical data already available in Census tables. I am sure that that was done by the previous Government in drawing up their plan for Central Scotland. I should be very surprised if they were expressing concern at emigration and did not produce some studies and reports.

But this kind of thing is done as part of the normal process of building up detailed information which can be used to check earlier policies and to help guide the evolution of new policies. My officials have not been engaged in any new research, other than that involved in bringing together, comparing and analysing existing data, nor have they made any policy recommendations. This data is already there.

The outcome of all the work undertaken by my officials confirms what the Government have maintained, that the main reason for emigration loss is comparative lack of economic opportunities and that the policies for the economic development of Scotland introduced by the Government are the best way—

Mr. Alick Buchanan-Smith (North Angus and Mearns)

rose—

Mr. Ross

No, I am sorry: I have only a few minutes, and this is my hon. Friend's debate.

These are the best way of combating the legacy of persistent and growing emigration loss.

My hon. Friend asked me how the figures were compiled. One source is the Census data on number, age, sex and socio-economic characteristics of people recorded in the Census returns as having changed their address. Then there is the National Health Service Central Register, which is the main source of information for the Registrar General's annual estimates of net migration between Scotland and the rest of the United Kingdom.

The net migration figure is being used all the time by Governments for good reasons. There is also the international passenger survey which covers a sample of outgoing and incoming passengers by air and sea routes. Finally, there are statistics from the main receiving countries about their immigrants. In relation to overseas emigration our main information comes from the receiving countries.

There is no mystery about net figures being quoted more commonly than gross figures. It should be obvious that accurate gross figures are difficult, if not impossible, to get, because in this country people do not have to report their movements to the central Government with details of the purpose of their journey and their intended length of absence. Figures of net migration, on the other hand, can be cross-checked against other data—electorate and housing data, changes in population between censuses, less the effect of natural increase, and so on, so that they provide a reliable estimate of overall migration trends. The net figures are not obtained by measuring the gross flows and then subtracting them. The net figures are therefore the ones normally used, and they are in any case the most relevant as showing the overall trend.

It would have been wiser for the Scotsman and hon. Gentlemen opposite to have looked this particular gift horse document in the mouth before they started getting excited about alleged "secrecy" and "revelations" and "suppressing information". I think that they would have found the horse was a very elderly, broken down hack.

If anyone pretends that it was news that in the 1950s and the early 1960s we were losing most of our natural increase by emigration, they must have been asleep for decades. I am afraid that the party faction about which the hon. Gentleman spoke are the Rip van MacWinkles of the 1970s.

It is odd to criticise me of suppressing information about emigration when I made it a touchstone of economic performance, even when I was in opposition, and when I described the gravity of the situation in detail in the White Paper four years ago. It is even odder to say that this alleged "revelation" embarrasses me when the figures talked about relate mostly to a period when the Tories were in power. It is time that they broke through the smokescreen of distorted history to the facts of recent years.

I am proud of the Government's record in reducing emigration in recent years, and I hope that all hon. Members will join me in welcoming a most encouraging trend over the last three years or so. From the peak of 47,000 in 1965–66 we dropped to 25,000 in 1968–69. The reduction in the net loss to England and Wales was even more impressive: from 24,000 in 1963–64—the last full year when the party opposite was in power—to 11,000 in 1968–69. The figures so far available for 1969–70 show a continuation of this drop.

Mr. MacArthur

That is not surprising.

Mr. Ross

For example, the net loss to England and Wales in the last six months of 1969 was 2,600 compared with 5,300 in the last six months of 1968. That is a further 50 per cent. cut in the latest available six months figures—[Interruption.] Hon. Gentlemen opposite have proved themselves wrong, so they need not start shouting and trying to find some other alibi.

Put another way, in the lifetime of the last Tory Government total net emigration doubled from 20,300 to 40,600. In the lifetime of this Parliament I am confident that the total net emigration will be more than halved from 47,000 to about 20.000 or even less. I am hoping for the best figures for 20 years. Indeed, we did more than highlight the matter. We set ourselves a target, which hon. Gentlemen opposite never did. They drew attention to its importance, but they never went beyond that. We have prescribed remedies: a massive programme of investment and infrastructure, especially in roads, housing, clearing of dereliction, the erection of new factories, hospitals and schools. Expenditure on fixed capital formation in the public sector increased from £266 million in 1963–64 to £454 million in 1968–69.

I will tell hon. Gentlemen opposite that Lord Clydesmuir's explanation for the high emigration figure in 1965–66 was that it was related to the high unemployment figures under the Tories two years earlier when, from November, 1962, right through the whole of 1963 to March, 1964, the monthly average over the period as a whole was over100,000. That is why we got this trend, this continuing trend—

Mr. MacArthur

There were more jobs.

Mr. Ross

There were more jobs, but not the people in them. There was more unemployment.

To almost the whole of Scotland we gave access to the development area industrial incentives which, under this Government, have become the most powerful set of regional measures ever adopted in this country—

Mr. Buchanan-Smith

That is why there are fewer jobs.

Mr. Ross

We now have the strongest pattern of Scottish industry that we have ever had, and if the hon. Gentleman did not know that, he should try to realise it now.

The evidence is in the record levels of factory building completed—6 million square feet in each of the years 1966 and 1967—and the very high levels of investment by manufacturing industry in Scotland in plant, machinery and vehicles: £73 million in 1964 and £125 million in 1968. Development area assistance to industry rose from £64 million in the four years 1960–64 to £262 million in the five years 1964–69. We have more than trebled the training places available. We have authorised 55 advance factories since October, 1964, and only today we heard about the advance factory that is being built at Cowlairs which has been taken over by Metal Box, who intend to build another of equal capacity. Hon. Gentlemen ask about jobs. There will be 300 jobs there.

If the Tories had left us with a float in advance factories like this, we would be in a far better position, but they did not do anything about advance factories for year after year. Scotland is far better off and has a far better outlook than she had in those days.

There has been an improvement in wage rates—another important indicator of Scotland's strengthening economy. In October, 1964, the average weekly earnings of adult male manual workers in Scotland were 6.7 per cent. below the United Kingdom level. By April, 1969, the gap had been reduced to 2.4 per cent.

It is, therefore, no coincidence that emigration is dropping at the same time as there is an improvement in the ratios of earnings and unemployment as between Scotland and the rest of the United Kingdom. It is clear proof that policies of regional economic development are working, and that they are working right—

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 twenty-two minutes to Twelve o'clock.