ANNUAL REPORTS (Hansard, 31 July 1972)

§ Mr. Chataway
I beg to move Amendment No. 39, in page 16, line 37, leave out from beginning to 'year' in line 38 and insert: 'For the financial year ending on 31st March, 1973, and for each subsequent financial'.

Mr. Deputy Speaker
With this Amendment it will be convenient for the House to discuss Government Amendment No. 41.

§ Mr. Chataway
This gives effect to an undertaking I gave in Committee. The Committee was anxious to ensure that the report comes out as soon as possible. I undertook to look at that carefully. The nearest analogy is other reports that were published under the Local Employment Acts. Those reports come out in November or thereabouts. There was, however, a practice of laying the report in dummy at the end of the parliamentary recess, and that apparently enables the publishing of the report to go forward. That was why the hon. Member flawed me in Committee about producing one which was dated July or August.
We are here dealing with a reporting exercise which will be more complex than that under the Local Employment Acts. There will be a good deal more to cover. I am anxious that it should be full. In Committee we went into a number of the things that the report must cover. I agree with the hon. Member for East Stirlingshire (Mr. Douglas)—in case he might feel it unnecessary to move his next Amendment—that it must 293 include full information about construction credit guarantees and the work of construction grants. It has, therefore, to cover a very wide range.
In setting a six months' time limit within which the report has to be produced, one is therefore being realistic. One is setting a considerably better target than was achieved under the Local Employment Acts. I hope that by saying that it must be in by the end of September, that will enable debate to take place, if necessary, in the autumn and will mean that it will be a very full report that will be available to the House.

§ Mr. Normanton
I welcome my right hon. Friend's Amendments but wish to put to him three questions. First, as to the work of the Industrial Development Advisory Board, who will answer in the House for the operation of the Bill? Secondly, who will answer concerning the investments, if one might euphemistically call them investments, which my right hon. Friend's Department will make on the advice of the board, and who will answer parliamentary Questions on this subject?
My second question—

Mr. Deputy Speaker
Order. The hon. Member is hardly in order to ask those questions on this Amendment.

§ Mr. Normanton
With respect, Mr. Deputy Speaker, I was presuming that the Amendment related to advising the House of the progress of the Bill when it becomes an Act and reporting on it. In that context, I hoped that my right hon. Friend might be able to comment along the lines I had suggested to him.

§ Mr. Dell
There is, of course, another analogy, and that is the IRC. I regret that the Government are taking six months to make their report whereas the IRC was able to do it in four months. It is a bad sign and a very poor note to strike at the end of discussion of the Bill.

§ Mr. Douglas
I beg to move Amendment No. 40, in page 16, line 43, at end insert: 'and in particular showing the total amount of construction credit guarantees given and the proportion thereof relating to the United Kingdom flag fleet and the total amount of construction grants given, together with any 294 proposals for the modification or extension of the scheme'. I shall be brief because in speaking on a previous Amendment the Minister gave me an indication that in broad general terms the details I have specified will be incorporated in any reports. I ask, however, that the proportion thereof relating to the United Kingdom flag fleet be given. I know that the construction credit has to apply to United Kingdom registered companies and to ships built in United Kingdom yards.
4.45 a.m.
This is a small probing Amendment. Is it intended that these credits be given specifically for ships which will be registered in the United Kingdom and come under the United Kingdom flag? I hope that the Minister can cheer us a little at this hour by saying when he expects to announce the results of his discussions with the Chamber of Shipping and the Shipbuilding and Ship Repairers National Association as to the form of assistance he might be giving to the shipping industry in relation to replacement of investment grants by other forms of assistance.

§ Mr. Chataway
That statement will be made before the House rises. I can give the hon. Member for East Stirlingshire (Mr. Douglas) the assurance for which he sought in relation to home credit guarantees, which can be given only in respect of United Kingdom owners' orders in home yards and for ships coming under the United Kingdom flag. That meets exactly the point the hon. Gentleman raised.

§ Mr. Douglas
With that full acceptance of the intention of the Amendment, I beg to ask leave to withdraw the Amendment.