HC Deb 21 June 1972 vol 839 cc463-5
23. Mr. Adam Hunter

asked the Secretary of State for Scotland how many bodies or organisations in receipt of public money are involved in the attraction of industry, planning for industry and advisory services for industry in Scotland.

Mr. Younger

Local authorities, new towns, regional development authorities and Government Departments are all engaged in some or all of these activities; also my right hon Friend is paying £100,000 a year to the Scottish Council towards the cost of a campaign to attract industrial investment to Scotland from Europe.

Mr. Hunter

Is the hon. Gentleman satisfied that the money spent and the services rendered are making any real impact on the job situation in Scotland? Will he now give attention to the thousands of jobs lost from existing indutries? Is he aware that many small firms throughout Scotland, including my constituency, have had to reduce manpower because of the lack of orders and other commercial reasons? Will he now concentrate on this aspect of job loss?

Mr. Younger

There are two sides to the loss of jobs. One is to give existing industries adequate incentives to expand and improve and re-equip themselves. We now have a vastly improved system of incentives for that purpose. However successful that was to be, it would still be necessary to attract new industry from outside. It is because we have not been successful in the past in attracting industry from other parts of Europe that the Government are taking these special steps and I am confident they will make a considerable inroad into the Scottish unemployment problem.

Mr. Bruce-Gardyne

Is not the short answer to the original Question "Far too many"?

Mr. Younger

That might be a very fair point.

Mr. Strang

Does the Minister agree that the most effective thing the Government could do to reduce the length of the dole queues in Scotland would be to impose a freeze on al redundancies in the nationalised industries until unemployment comes down to a more acceptable level? Is it not reasonable to take the line of waiting until the new jobs come from the promotional exercises before going through with rationalisations which will create more misery?

Mr. Younger

The question of a freeze on redundancies in nationalised industries would have to be put to the Minister responsible for those industries. One notable feature of the previous Government's activities was not to put any sort of freeze on redundancies in the coal industry, which had severe effects on many parts of it.