§ Q3. Mr. Sheldonasked the Prime Minister if he will appoint an economic adviser to the office of Prime Minister.
§ Mr. MaudlingI have been asked to reply.
No. My right hon. Friend already has access to a wide range of economic advice.
§ Mr. SheldonSince it is clear that either the advice is inadequate or the Government are paying no attention to it, what does the right hon. Gentleman intend to do about the figures released by the Department of Trade and Industry yesterday, which show that industrial investment this year will be less than for last year, which is the first time that this has happened since 1963? Is not this situation due to the fact that the Government changed from investment grants to tax allowances? Does it not show the failure of their policy?
§ Mr. MaudlingNo, Sir. I am certain that the figures do not fit with the timing of changes in investment incentives. We must recognise that continuing wage inflation absorbs the cash resources of industry and makes industrial investment very difficult.
§ Mr. HordernDoes not my right hon. Friend agree that, whatever economic advice the Prime Minister may care to take, he should take none at all from the Opposition who, while in power, achieved the worst record of economic growth of any of the O.E.C.D. countries?
§ Mr. MaudlingIt is unlikely that my right hon. Friend will look across the Chamber for economic advice.
§ Mr. GoldingSince a tribunal has been established to declare what the national economic interest is, will the right hon. Gentleman tell us that, in future, when men are appointed to adjudicate on the national economic interest, the Government will not appoint a chairman who cannot understand detailed statistics or an employers' representative who cannot understand economics?
§ Mr. MaudlingIf the premises on which that supplementary question were based had any validity, I should be prepared to answer it.
§ Sir Harmar NichollsWhile it is true that wage claims are having a great effect on the cash flow of industry, is it not also the case that high interest rates plus bank squeeze together are bound to interfere with normal business invest- 716 ment? Is there any chance of having a slight relaxation of the squeeze, if not of interest rates?
§ Mr. MaudlingI certainly would not predict reductions in interest rates, or in Bank Rate above all. It is true that the greater the rate of cost inflation, the more the need to restrain demand inflation.
§ Mr. Roy JenkinsIs there any country in the world which has interest rates as high as we have?
§ Mr. MaudlingI should need notice before I could answer about every other country in the world. Certainly I can think of few major industrial countries which have had such cost inflation problems as those which we inherited from the last Government.